[363] **He would not take up those (views) and speak of them — a nāga:** he is a nāga because he does no wrong (āguṃ na karoti); he is a nāga because he does not go (na gacchati); he is a nāga because he does not come (na āgacchati).
How is he a nāga because he does no wrong? "Wrong" (āgu) is a designation for evil, unwholesome dhammas — defiling, leading to renewed existence, accompanied by distress, ripening in suffering (dukkha), leading to future birth, aging, and death.
"He who does no wrong of any kind in the world ('Sabhiya,' said the Blessed One),
who has cast off all ties and bonds,
who clings nowhere, liberated —
such a one, being thus, is called a nāga."
Thus he is a nāga because he does no wrong.
How is he a nāga because he does not go? He does not go the wrong course of desire, does not go the wrong course of hatred, does not go the wrong course of delusion, does not go the wrong course of fear; he does not go by way of lust, does not go by way of hatred, does not go by way of delusion, does not go by way of conceit, does not go by way of views, does not go by way of restlessness, does not go by way of doubt, does not go by way of the latent tendencies; he is not carried, led, borne along, or swept away by partisan dhammas. Thus he is a nāga because he does not go.
How is he a nāga because he does not come? Those defilements that have been abandoned by the path of stream-entry — he does not return to, revert to, or come back to those defilements; those defilements that have been abandoned by the path of once-returning, by the path of non-returning, by the path of arahantship — he does not return to, revert to, or come back to those defilements. Thus he is a nāga because he does not come.
**He would not take up those (views) and speak of them — a nāga:** the nāga would not, having grasped, taken up, seized upon, adhered to, or become fixed upon those views, speak, declare, utter, explain, or express: "The world is eternal," "The world is not eternal" … "The Tathāgata neither exists nor does not exist after death; only this is true, all else is vain." Hence, "He would not take up those (views) and speak of them — a nāga."
English translation from the Pali (Siam Raṭṭha edition) — under review, not for citation.