A Simile of an Eon (Second Discourse)

‘Venerable Sir, how long is an eon?’

An eon is long, Monk. It is not easy to count it and say it is so many years, or so many hundreds of years, or so many thousands of years, or so many hundreds of thousands of years.

‘Then is it possible to give a simile, Venerable Sir?’

It is possible, Monk, The Perfectly Enlightened One said.

Suppose, Monk, there was a city with iron walls a yojana (12-15 km) long, a yojana wide, and a yojana high, filled with mustard seeds as dense as a topknot. At the end of every hundred years a man would remove one mustard seed from there. The great heap of mustard seeds might by this effort be depleted and eliminated but the eon would still not have come to an end.

So long is an eon, Monk. And of eons of such length, we have wandered through so many eons, so many hundreds of eons, so many thousands of eons, so many hundreds of thousands of eons.

Because, Monk, this Cycle of Rebirth is without discoverable beginning. A first point is not identifiable of beings roaming and wandering on, hindered by ignorance (unknowing of true reality) and fettered by craving. For such a long time, Monks, you have experienced discontentedness, misery, and disaster, and swelled the cemetery.

It is enough to experience fading away of strong feelings towards all conditions, enough to become free from strong feelings towards them, enough to be liberated from them.

(Reference: SN 15.6)

In this Teaching from Gotama Buddha, he shares a Teaching to help Students understand the length of time of an “eon” is immeasurable and incalculable.

He also explains how the beginning of when The Cycle of Rebirth started is not identifiable. Essentially what The Buddha is explaining is that the beginning of time is not identifiable.

Oftentimes human beings attempt to figure out when the world started. The Buddha is explaining that it is not discernible and is not something that can be discovered. In reality, it does not matter when the beginning of time was or how the world started. The fact is, we are here now, beings are struggling with discontentedness and continuing to roam and wander through The Cycle of Rebirth, and it would be wise to apply effort to eliminating discontentedness to escape The Cycle of Rebirth.

When or how the world started (i.e. when or how The Cycle of Rebirth started) is not important. That is in the past and the goal for each being who is interested to end their discontentedness should be to learn, reflect, and practice The Teachings in order to attain Enlightenment and escape the constant and continuous rounds of discontentedness through continued existence in The Cycle of Rebirth.

The Buddha explains that “for such a long time, Monks, you have experienced discontentedness, misery, and disaster, and swelled the cemetery”. He is sharing that each being alive today has experienced countless rebirths in the past.

Based on The Teachings of Dependent Origination and occasional statements such as “A first point is not identifiable of beings roaming and wandering on hindered by ignorance (unknowing of true reality) and fettered by craving”, you can observe that The Buddha is explaining that the primary problem that is keeping beings trapped in The Cycle of Rebirth is ignorance (unknowing of true reality), and second to that is craving/desire/attachment.

It is The Buddha’s Teachings that help a Practitioner to acquire the wisdom to remedy ignorance (unknowing of true reality) to eliminate craving/desire/attachment, eliminate discontentedness, and escape The Cycle of Rebirth.

Detailed explanation of Dependent Origination is available in this same book series found in Chapter 14 of the book “The First Stage of Enlightenment (Stream-Enterer)” (Volume 5).