Every Day
I’m still doing my One-A-Day practice (reading one sutta every day…starting with the Middle Length Discourses) and I’m actually enjoying it! OK, it’s not like reading short stories by Alice Munro (my all-time favorite), but it’s not nearly as dry and arcane as I had imagined. The translation is quite readable (thank you Bhikkhu Bodhi) and some of the suttas are even slyly humorous.
I just finished #25, titled: “The Bait.” It goes like this:
Bhikkhus, a deer-trapper does not lay down bait for a deer herd intending thus: ‘May the deer herd enjoy this bait that I have laid down and so be long-lived and handsome and endure for a long time.’
A deer-herder lays down bait for a deer herd intending thus: ‘The deer herd will eat food unwarily by going right in amongst the bait that I have laid down; by so doing they will become intoxicated; when they are intoxicated, they will fall into negligence; when they are negligent, I can do with them as I like on account of this bait.’
You’ll notice a certain repetitiveness, but other than that, it moves right along. Check it out!
(image from “A Whole World,” by Couprie and Louchard)