Adapting Teaching Practices Through the Middle Way : หน้า 198/263

how to adapt the teaching for our personal practice. How-ever, if we look at how Luang Phaw Wat Paknam explained these same words, compiled from sermons he gave on many occasions: SECTION 2: THE MIDDLE WAY O! Monks! The Middle Way [majjhima paṭipāda] which doesn’t err towards the aforementioned extremes of practice, which I, the Buddha have attained [abhisambuddha] with utmost insight, will bring the following benefits to those who practice: 2.1 Cakkhukaraṇī: Is of the nature to bestow the means of seeing according to reality. It was not that the Group of Five were blind — but they lacked the “inner eye” to see things according to reality; 2.2 Nānakaraṇī: Is of the nature to bestow the means of knowing according to reality. It was not that the Group of Five were unaware of the reality of the world around them — but they lacked the “inner knowing” to understand the world according to reality; What then was the “means”, the “device”, or the “where-withal” which the Buddha referred to which the Group of Five were lacking before their enlightenment? The Buddha was not yet to elaborate this point — but the reason why the Pañcavaggiyā didn’t immediately give up listening to the sermon in anger, was because they already had some degree of inner experience as a result of their practice. They would already know the meaning of such things as “inner brightness” and so what the Buddha was referring to in his sermon would simply be building upon experience they already had. They might already have had experience of “inner bodies” up to the level of the Brahma-body. Even though