Things that prevent you from eating include anger, pain, sickness, sabbath, or being unable to get food. So mendicants, for a human being with a hundred years lifespan I have counted the lifespan, the limit of the lifespan, the seasons, the years, the months, the fortnights, the nights, the days, the meals, and the things that prevent them from eating. Out of sympathy, I’ve done what a teacher should do who wants what’s best for their disciples. Here are these roots of trees, and here are these empty huts. Practice absorption, mendicants! Don’t be negligent! Don’t regret it later! This is my instruction to you.”
Numbered Discourses 7.75 8. The Monastic Law An Expert in the Monastic Law (1st)
“Mendicants, a mendicant with seven qualities is an expert in the monastic law. What seven? They know what is an offense. They know what is not an offense. They know what is a light offense. They know what is a serious offense. They’re ethical, restrained in the monastic code, conducting themselves well and resorting for alms in suitable places. Seeing danger in the slightest fault, they keep the rules they’ve undertaken. They get the four absorptions—blissful meditations in this life that belong to the higher mind—when they want, without trouble or difficulty. They realize the undefiled freedom of heart and freedom by wisdom, and live having realized it with their own insight in this very life due to the ending of defilements. A mendicant with these seven qualities is an expert in the monastic law.”
Numbered Discourses 7.76 8. The Monastic Law An Expert in the Monastic Law (2nd)