The monk, who is devoted to conscientiousness and who is fearful of negligence,
advances like a fire, burning the fetters, small or big.

a+ppamāda+rato       bhikkhu   pamāde bhaya+dassi       vā
|          |          |               |             |           |           |          |
neg.  N.m.  Adj.m.      N.m.       N.m.    N.n.    Adj.m.  conj.
|_____|      Nom.Sg.  Nom.Sg.  Nom.Sg.   |      Nom.Sg.   |
    |_________|               |             |           |______|          |
            |_____________|              |_________|                |
                        |____________________|_____________|__________________

List of Abbreviations

saṃyojanaṃ aṇuṃ     thūlaṃ    ḍahaṃ     aggī      va    gacchati
|                      |             |             |             |          |           |
N.n.            Adj.n.     Adj.n.    Adj.m.     N.m.    part.   V.act.in.
Acc.Sg.      Acc.Sg.  Acc.Sg.  Nom.Sg.  Nom.Sg.   |      3.Sg.pres.
|                      |_______|              |            |______|           |
|________________|                    |                   |_________|
               |___________________|                           |
__________________|                                            |
               |__________________________________|
 

appamādarato: appamādarata-, Adj.:
    appamāda-, N.m.: conscientiousness, non-negligence. A negated (by the negative
    prefix a-) word pamāda-, N.m.: negligence. Doubled p is due to the euphonic
    combination (a + pamāda = appamāda).
    rata-, Adj.: devoted. It is a p.p. of the verb ram- (to delight in, to be devoted to).
Nom.Sg. = appamādarato.

bhikkhu: bhikkhu-, N.m.: a (Buddhist) monk. Nom.Sg. = bhikkhu.

pamāde: pamāda-, N.m.: negligence. Loc.Sg. = pamāde.

List of Abbreviations

bhayadassi: bhayadassin-, N.m.: seeing an object of fear. A compound of:
    bhaya-, N.n.: fear, fright.
    dassin-, Adj.: seeing, finding, realizing. Derived from the verb dis- (to see).
Nom.Sg. = bhayadassī. The form bhayadassi is due to the metrical requirements.

vā, conj.: or.

saṃyojanaṃ: saṃyojana-, N.n.: bond, fetter. For enumeration see the Commentary.
Ac.Sg. = saṃyojanaṃ.

aṇuṃ: aṇu-, Adj.: small, atomic, subtle. Acc.Sg.n. = aṇuṃ.

thūlaṃ: thūla-, Adj.: massive, big, strong. Acc.Sg.n. = thūlaṃ.

List of Abbreviations

ḍahaṃ: ḍahant-,: Adj.: burning. Derived (a.pr.p.) from the verb root ḍah- (or dah-; to burn). Nom.Sg.m. = ḍahaṃ.

aggī: aggi-, N.n.: fire. Nom.Sg. = aggi. The form aggī is here for metrical purposes.

va, part.: as, like.

gacchati, V.: goes. the verb root gam-. 3.Sg.in.act.pres. = gacchati.

List of Abbreviations

    The subject of this sentence is the word bhikkhu (monk, nominative singular) with two attributes, appamādarato (devoted to conscientiousness, nominative singular) and bhayadassi (fearful, nominative singular) with its own attribute pamāde (in negligence, locative singular). They are connected by the conjunction vā (or). The verb here is gacchati (goes, 3rd person, singular, active, indicative, present tense).
    There is a clause, saṃyojanaṃ aṇuṃ thūlaṃ ḍahaṃ (burning the fetter, small and big). Here the subject is still the word bhikkhu from the main sentence, the verb is ḍahaṃ (active present participle) and the object is saṃyojanaṃ (the fetter, accusative singular) with two attributes aṇuṃ (small, accusative singular) and thūlaṃ (big, accusative singular).
    The last clause is aggī va (like a fire), where the subject is aggī (fire, nominative singular) and the verb is the same as in the main sentence (gacchati). The particle va (as, like) connects this clause to the main sentence.

    Once there was a monk who received his subject of meditation from the Buddha. He practiced hard, but he made very little progress. So he became very depressed and frustrated. He went to see the Buddha about his problems. But on the way there he saw a big forest fire. He ran to the top of a mountain and observed. While there, he realized that just as the fire burnt up everything around, be it big or small, so the insights from the practice of meditation will burn up all the fetters, big and small.
    The Buddha saw this from far away and appeared in front of the monk telling him that he was on the right track and to keep up the idea. The monk did accordingly and attained arahantship very soon.
     According to Buddhist philosophy, there are ten fetters (saṃyojana). They can be divided into two kinds, five so called "lower" or "big" fetters and five "higher" or "small" fetters.

The five big fetters are:
1) personality belief (sakkāya-diṭṭhi),
2) skeptical doubt (vicikicchā),
3) clinging to rules and rituals (sīlabbata-paramāsa),
4) sensuous craving (kāma-rāga),
5) ill-will (vyāpāda).

The five small fetters are:
1) craving for fine-material existence (rūpa-rāga),
2) craving for immaterial existence (arūpa-rāga),
3) conceit (māna),
4) restlessness (uddhacca),
5) ignorance (avijjā).

Sentence pronunciation

Word pronunciation:

appamādarato
bhikkhu
pamāde
bhayadassi
vā
saṃyojanaṃ
aṇuṃ
thūlaṃ
ḍahaṃ
aggī
va
gacchati