Why ancient insight cannot substitute evidence
I decided to read the Brahmajālasutta in The Long Discourses, translated by Bhikkhu Sujato, with genuine seriousness because it is presented as a discourse of the Buddha himself, unfolding through encounters with Brahmin interlocutors. It is not framed as mythology or allegory, but as discussion and response. If there was a place within religious literature where claims about ethics and the nature of reality might be clarified through dialogue, I expected it to be here.
The Brahmajālasutta appears at the opening of the Long Discourses and is presented as a comprehensive survey of ethical and philosophical views held by ascetics and Brahmins of the time. The structure is dialogical. Views are introduced, acknowledged, and situated within a wider framework.
The discourse begins with ethics. Moral discipline is described primarily in terms of restraint and abstention. The Buddha outlines conduct that avoids killing living beings, taking what is not given, sexual misconduct, and false speech. This restraint is extended further to include abstaining from idle chatter, from luxurious beds, from garlands and perfumes, from music, dancing, and public entertainments. For ascetics, the discipline includes refraining from handling gold and silver, avoiding trade, and withdrawing from ordinary means of livelihood.
The text distinguishes between the expectations placed upon wandering ascetics and those placed upon householders. Ascetics are described as undertaking complete renunciation, while householders are praised for practising restraint within domestic life. Ethical conduct is thus presented as graduated according to social role, though guided by the same ideal of renunciation.
From ethics, the discourse moves to cosmology. A Brahmin describes the views commonly held among ascetics regarding the nature of the cosmos. Some hold that the cosmos is finite, others that it is infinite. Some maintain that it is finite in one respect and infinite in another, vertically bounded yet horizontally infinite. These positions are presented as serious metaphysical claims debated at the time.
The Buddha rejects these speculative views and states that the cosmos is finite. When asked how such knowledge is obtained, he answers that it is known through direct experience attained in meditation. The discourse does not provide further elaboration on this method, nor does it pursue the question further. The discussion moves on to other classifications of views.
The sutta also catalogues theories concerning the past and the future, including views that assert eternal existence, annihilation at death, and continuity across lives. These positions are grouped and described without endorsement, as part of a broader survey of speculative doctrines.
Similarly, views concerning the self are outlined. Some posit an enduring self, others deny it, and others describe the self as impermanent or conditionally arisen. These positions are again presented as part of the spectrum of views circulating among ascetics and thinkers of the period.
At no point does the Brahmajālasutta attempt to resolve these issues through empirical demonstration. Its purpose is classificatory. Views are identified, arranged, and situated within a wider framework of understanding.
My response to this text arises not from hostility, but from reflection. Reading the discourse as it stands, I became aware of a fundamental difference between ancient and modern standards of knowledge. The text treats ethical refinement as a function of withdrawal and cosmological understanding as a matter of direct experiential insight. These approaches made sense in a historical context where observation, measurement, and experimental method were unavailable.
From a contemporary standpoint, however, the limits of this approach become visible. Meditation can disclose inner experience, but it does not provide a shared method for establishing claims about the structure of the cosmos. Ethical restraint may cultivate discipline, but it does not by itself address questions of harm, responsibility, or social consequence. These are not failures of intention, but of method.
I do not read the Brahmajālasutta as foolish or deceptive. I read it as a record of serious human effort to understand the world with the tools available at the time. What it offers is not evidence in the modern sense, but an historical snapshot of how knowledge was once pursued.
The difficulty arises when such texts are treated as final authorities rather than provisional attempts. Respect for intellectual history does not require suspension of critical standards. Ancient insight can be acknowledged without being insulated from examination.
I approached this discourse expecting clarity grounded in experience and dialogue. What I found instead was a careful classification of views shaped by the limits of its age. That recognition does not diminish its historical value, but it does define its boundary.
What this discourse reveals is not a failure unique to one tradition, but a shared limitation of all religious texts shaped by pre-scientific ways of knowing.
Reference for readers
The Long Discourses (Dīgha Nikāya), translated by Bhikkhu Sujato, is freely available at SuttaCentral:
Maq Masi Blog 
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