12.9 Of Evil Tendency (KV12.9)

Controverted Point: That for a person holding sound views evil tendencies are eliminated.

Theravādin: But you concede that such a person though safe as to his destiny may still get infatuated with any purgatorial objects of sense, may commit fornication with females that are not human, whether demons, animals, or fairies; may keep worldly possessions, such as goats and sheep, poultry and swine, elephants, cattle, horses and mules, partridges, quails, peacocks and pheasants. If you assent to all this, your proposition cannot stand. Moreover, you cannot possibly admit all this in the case of an Arahant. Contrariwise, you repudiate it for him, while you admit (as you must) that it may prove true for one who has merely sound views.

Uttarāpathaka: Then if I am wrong, you imply that the person holding sound views may yet be reborn in purgatory, in the animal kingdom, in the realm of the Petas? If you deny, you must also retract your contradiction.

The Points of Controversy, an English translation of the Pali Abhidhamma Kathāvatthu. Translated by Shwe Zan Aung and C.A.F. Rhys Davids. First published by Pali Text Society, 1915.

This SuttaCentral edition was prepared by Manfred Wierich and Ven. Vimala and proofread by Josephine Tobin. Some changes were introduced:

Abbreviations, i.e., those of cited works and the participants in the controversies, were expanded.

Cross-references were linked.

Some typographic changes were introduced, among others, i.e.: the phonetic symbol “ŋ” was changed to the Pāli diacritical letter “ṃ”, “ô” to “o”, single quotes to double quotes, and “:—” to “:”.

Letter-spacing with fixed spaces was replaced with bold font.

The corrigenda were merged into the text. Some could not be resolved, though.

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