Four Kinds of Generation

Sāriputta, there are these four kinds of generation.

What are the four?

Egg‑born generation, Womb‑born generation, Moisture‑born generation, and Spontaneous generation.

What is egg‑born generation?

There are these beings born by breaking out of the shell of an egg; this is called egg‑born generation.

What is womb‑born generation?

There are these beings born by breaking out from the caul (the amniotic membrane enclosing a fetus); this is called womb‑born generation.

What is moisture‑born generation?

There are these beings born in a rotten fish, in a rotten corpse, in rotten porridge, in a cesspit, or in a sewer; this is called moisture‑born generation.

What is spontaneous generation?

There are gods and inhabitants of hell and certain human beings and some beings in the lower worlds; this is called spontaneous generation.

These are the four kinds of generation.

(Reference: MN 12)

In this Teaching from Gotama Buddha, he shares the four kinds of generation for beings to come into the world.

Egg-born, womb-born, moisture-born, and spontaneously generated.

The Buddha provides a detailed description of each of these methods for beings to come into the world.