Fire Sermon

The Ādittapariyāya Sutta (Pali, "Fire Sermon Discourse"), is a discourse from the Pali Canon, popularly known as the Fire Sermon. In this discourse, the Buddha preaches about achieving liberation from suffering through detachment from the five senses and mind.

In the Pali Canon, the Adittapariyaya Sutta is found in the Samyutta Nikaya ("Connected Collection," abbreviated as either "SN" or "S") and is designated by either "SN 35.28" or "S iv 1.3.6" or "S iv 19". This discourse is also found in the Buddhist monastic code (Vinaya) at Vin I 35.

English speakers might be familiar with the name of this discourse due to T. S. Eliot's titling the third section of his celebrated poem, The Waste Land, "The Fire Sermon." In a footnote, Eliot states that this Buddhist discourse "corresponds in importance to the Sermon on the Mount."

In the Vinaya, the Fire Sermon is the third discourse delivered by the Buddha (after the Dhammacakkapavattana Sutta and the Anattalakkhana Sutta), several months after his enlightenment, on top of the Gayasisa Hill, near Gaya, India. He delivered it to a thousand newly converted ascetics who formerly practiced a sacred fire ritual (Pali: aggihutta; Skt.: agnihotra).

The 5th-century CE post-canonical Pali commentary, Sāratthappakāsini (Spk.), attributed to Buddhaghosa, draws a direct connection between the ascetics' prior practices and this discourse's main rhetorical device:

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