[431] At Sāvatthī. "Bhikkhus, when what exists, by clinging to what, by adhering to what, does such a view as this arise: 'These seven bodies are unmade, not of a kind that is made, uncreated, not of a kind that is created, barren, steadfast as a mountain peak, standing firm like a pillar. They do not move, they do not change, they do not afflict one another; they are incapable of causing one another pleasure or pain. What are the seven? The earth-body, the water-body, the fire-body, the air-body, pleasure, pain, and the soul (jīva). These seven bodies are unmade, not of a kind that is made, uncreated, not of a kind that is created, barren, steadfast as a mountain peak, standing firm like a pillar. They do not move, they do not change, they do not afflict one another; they are incapable of causing one another pleasure or pain. Even one who cuts off a head with a sharp sword does not deprive anyone of life; the sword merely passes through the opening between the seven bodies. Now there are these fourteen hundred thousand principal modes of origin, and six thousand, and six hundred; five hundred kinds of kamma, and five kinds of kamma, and three kinds of kamma, and kamma and half-kamma; sixty-two ways of practice, sixty-two intermediate aeons, six classes of birth, eight stages of man, forty-nine hundred modes of livelihood, forty-nine hundred kinds of wanderers, forty-nine hundred abodes of nāgas, twenty hundred faculties, thirty hundred hells, thirty-six realms of dust, seven percipient wombs, seven non-percipient wombs, seven wombs of beings born of knots, seven kinds of gods, seven kinds of humans, seven kinds of pisāca demons, seven lakes, seven pavuṭas and seven hundred pavuṭas, seven precipices and seven hundred precipices, seven dreams and seven hundred dreams; and there are eighty-four hundred thousand great aeons through which the fools and the wise, having roamed and wandered on, will make an end of suffering (dukkha). Herein there is no such thing as: "By this virtue, or observance, or austerity, or holy life I shall bring unripened kamma to ripening, or, experiencing again and again kamma that has already ripened, I shall make an end of it" — such a thing cannot be. Pleasure and pain are measured out as with a bushel; saṃsāra has its limits fixed; there is no decrease or increase, no rising higher or falling lower. Just as a ball of thread, when thrown, rolls along unwinding itself, even so the fools and the wise, unwinding, run on through pleasure and pain'?"
"Venerable sir, our teachings are rooted in the Blessed One …"
"Bhikkhus, when form exists, by clinging to form, by adhering to form, such a view as this arises: 'These seven bodies are unmade, not of a kind that is made … the fools and the wise, unwinding, run on through pleasure and pain.' When feeling (vedanā) exists … when perception exists … when volitional formations exist … when consciousness exists, by clinging to consciousness, by adhering to consciousness, such a view as this arises: 'These seven bodies are unmade, not of a kind that is made … the fools and the wise, unwinding, run on through pleasure and pain.'"
English translation from the Pali (Siam Raṭṭha edition) — under review, not for citation.