Food, Elements, and the Rewards of Concentration (Chapter 11)

What this chapter covers: This chapter explains the last two of the forty meditation subjects: seeing the repulsiveness of food and defining the four elements that make up the body. It then summarizes the benefits of developing concentration. The food meditation reaches access concentration by reviewing how disgusting eating really is. The elements meditation reaches access concentration by breaking the body down into earth, water, fire, and air — dissolving the illusion of a solid “self.”

Seeing Food as Repulsive

What Is Nutriment?

The word “nutriment” (ahara) means “what brings on” or sustains life. There are four kinds:

Physical nutriment — ordinary food that is eaten, drunk, chewed, and tasted. It sustains the material body.
Contact — the meeting of sense organ, object, and consciousness. It sustains the three kinds of feeling (pleasant, painful, and neutral).
Mental volition — the intention behind our actions. It sustains rebirth into the three realms of existence.
Consciousness — the knowing mind. It sustains mind-and-body at the moment of rebirth.

Background Note: Each kind of nutriment carries a hidden danger, illustrated by a vivid simile from the Buddha’s discourses. Physical food is like a couple forced to eat their own dead child’s flesh to survive a desert crossing. Contact is like a skinless cow attacked by insects from every direction. Mental volition is like being dragged toward a pit of burning coals. Consciousness is like a criminal stabbed by a hundred spears every day. Each simile shows how clinging to that type of nutriment brings suffering.

For this meditation, only physical food — what is eaten, drunk, chewed, and tasted — is the subject. The practice is to see its repulsive side clearly enough that a perception of disgust arises naturally.

The Method: Ten Aspects of Repulsiveness

To practise, learn the method thoroughly, then go into solitary retreat. Review the repulsiveness of physical food in these ten ways:

1. Going to get food. Picture the monk’s morning routine. After a night of study and meditation, after sweeping the grounds and attending to duties, he must leave behind the peace of the forest. He sets out for the village like a jackal heading for a charnel ground. On the way he treads on a carpet grimy with dust and gecko droppings. He passes the doorstep fouled by rats and bats. He crosses grounds littered with old leaves, spittle, and — in the rainy season — mud. The road to the village is worse still, full of stumps, thorns, and washed-out ruts. At the village gate, animal carcasses may lie rotting, assaulting his nose. All this — just for the sake of food.

2. Seeking food. Inside the village he wanders house to house like a beggar with a dish. In the rains his feet sink into mud up to the calves. In the heat, dust and grass blow over him. He treads through gutters crawling with worms, swarming with flies. Some people give; some ignore him. Some offer yesterday’s stale rice and rancid sauce. Others say, “Move along.” Others avert their eyes. Others insult him: “Go away, bald-head.” All this — just for the sake of food.

3. Using food. Sitting down to eat, as soon as he dips his hand in, sweat from his fingers soaks any dry food. He crushes each mouthful between his teeth like a dog’s dinner being pounded in a dog’s trough. His tongue turns it over and over. Thin spit from the tongue’s tip smears it. Thick spit from behind the tongue smears it. Grime stuck between teeth that no toothpick can reach smears it. This peculiar compound loses all its original colour and smell. It becomes as nauseating as a dog’s vomit. It can only be swallowed because the eyes can no longer see it.

4. Secretion. Once swallowed, food meets the body’s secretions. In someone with excess bile, it becomes as revolting as if smeared with thick oil. With excess phlegm, like plant juice. With excess pus, like rancid buttermilk. With excess blood, like dye.

5. Receptacle. The stomach it enters is no golden bowl. If the person is ten years old, it is like a cesspit unwashed for ten years. If they are fifty, like a cesspit unwashed for fifty years. If a hundred, like one unwashed for a century.

6. What is undigested. Before digestion, food sits in that dark, airless place, surrounded by foul smells. It is like a pit at the edge of an outcast village — filled with dead snakes, dogs, and rubbish after an unseasonal rain — all warmed by the sun until it froths and bubbles.

7. What is digested. After being cooked by the body’s internal heat, food does not turn into gold or silver. It turns into excrement, filling the lower bowel like soft brown clay packed into a tube. And it turns into urine, filling the bladder.

8. Fruit. When digested properly, food produces head hairs, body hairs, nails, teeth, and the rest. When digested poorly, it produces diseases — itching, ringworm, leprosy, consumption, coughs, and so on.

9. Outflow. Food enters by one door but flows out by many. Eye-dirt from the eyes, ear-dirt from the ears, and so on down. It is eaten happily in company. It is voided in secret, alone. On the first day one eats it with delight. On the second day one holds one’s nose to void it, with a wry face.

The food and drink so greatly prized — The crisp to chew, the soft to suck — Men like to eat in company, But to excrete in secrecy.

The food and drink so greatly prized — The crisp to chew, the soft to suck — These a man eats with high delight, And then excretes with dumb disgust.

The food and drink so greatly prized — The crisp to chew, the soft to suck — A single night will be enough To bring them to putridity.

10. Smearing. While eating, food smears hands, lips, tongue, and palate. Even after washing, the smell lingers. Inside the body, food turns into tartar on the teeth, phlegm on the palate, and eye-dirt, ear-dirt, snot, urine, and excrement — smearing every exit. No amount of washing makes these places clean.

What Level of Concentration Is Reached

When a meditator reviews these ten aspects again and again, physical food becomes vivid in its repulsive aspect. He cultivates this sign repeatedly. The five hindrances are suppressed. His mind reaches access concentration — but not full absorption. This is because the true nature of physical food is too profound and subtle for the mind to lock onto it completely.

Background Note: The meditation is called “perception of repulsiveness in nutriment” because perception — the mind’s act of recognising the repulsive quality — is the most prominent mental factor at work. The underlying reality (the nutritive essence in food) has an individual essence too deep for the mind to absorb into fully, which is why this subject reaches only access concentration, never full absorption.

Benefits

When a monk devotes himself to this practice, his mind retreats from craving for flavours. He eats without vanity, only to sustain life — like a traveller who eats his dead child’s flesh just to survive the desert. His greed for sense pleasures becomes easy to understand and let go of. Body-focused mindfulness comes to perfection through seeing the repulsiveness of what is undigested and the rest. He enters a path aligned with the perception of foulness. Even if he does not reach the deathless in this life, he is at least bound for a happy rebirth.

Defining the Four Elements

What This Practice Is

The “defining of the four elements” (catudhatu-vavatthana) means determining the four basic qualities that make up all matter by identifying each one’s individual characteristic. “Attention given to elements,” “the meditation subject of elements,” and “defining of the four elements” all mean the same thing.

This subject is given two ways in the scriptures: in brief (in the Mahasatipatthana Sutta) and in detail (in the Mahahatthipadopama Sutta, the Rahulovada Sutta, and the Dhatuvibhanga Sutta).

The Brief Teaching: The Butcher Simile

The brief version is for a person of quick understanding:

“Monks, just as a skilled butcher or his apprentice, having killed a cow and cut it into pieces, sits at a crossroads with the parts laid out before him — so too, a monk reviews this body, however placed, however disposed, as consisting of elements: ‘In this body there are the earth element, the water element, the fire element, and the air element.’”

What does this mean? While the butcher is feeding, leading, tying up, and slaughtering the cow, the idea “cow” stays in his mind. But once he has carved it into pieces and sits at the crossroads, the idea “cow” vanishes. Now the idea “meat” takes over. He thinks, “I am selling meat,” not “I am selling cow.”

In the same way, an ordinary person lives with the idea “living being,” “man,” or “person.” But when he breaks the body down into its elements, the idea “living being” vanishes. His mind settles on bare elements — mere qualities, not a person, not a soul.

The Detailed Teaching: The Four Elements Defined

The detailed version names each element’s parts within the body:

Earth element — whatever in oneself is hard or rough: head hairs, body hairs, nails, teeth, skin, flesh, sinews, bones, bone marrow, kidney, heart, liver, midriff, spleen, lungs, bowels, entrails, gorge (stomach contents), dung, and brain. That makes twenty parts.

Water element — whatever in oneself is liquid or flows: bile, phlegm, pus, blood, sweat, fat, tears, grease, spittle, snot, oil of the joints, and urine. That makes twelve parts.

Fire element — whatever in oneself is heat or warmth: the heat that warms the body, the heat that ages the body, the heat that can cause fever, and the heat that digests food. That makes four parts.

Air element — whatever in oneself is motion or pressure: up-going forces (causing vomiting, belching), down-going forces (expelling waste), winds in the belly, winds in the bowels, winds coursing through all the limbs (enabling flexing and extending), and the in-breath and out-breath. That makes six parts.

In total, the four elements are detailed across forty-two aspects.

Methods of Development

There are four ways to develop this meditation, arranged from simplest to most detailed:

Method 1: Constituents in Brief

A meditator of quick understanding goes into solitary retreat and simply reflects:

“In this body, what is stiff or hard is earth element.”
“What is cohesive or fluid is water element.”
“What is maturing or hot is fire element.”
“What is distending or moving is air element.”

He adverts to these again and again — “earth element, water element” — seeing them as mere elements, not a living being, not a self. Access concentration arises before long.

Background Note: The text compares the quick and slow learner to two monks reciting a text with many repetitions. The quick learner fills in the repeating parts once or twice, then recites only the key phrases. The slow learner says, “What is he reciting? He never even gives me time to move my lips!” So the detailed method exists for those who need each step spelled out.

Method 2: Constituents by Analysis

If the brief method does not work, the meditator examines each of the forty-two body parts one by one.

For each part, he reflects on its colour, shape, location, and boundaries. Then he sees that this part is devoid of awareness and devoid of self-concern. For example:

Head hairs grow on the skin covering the skull. The skin does not know “head hairs grow on me.” The head hairs do not know “we grow on skin.” They have no mutual awareness. Head hairs are simply a component of the body — without thought, morally neutral, void, not a living being — rigid earth element.

The same reflection applies to every part:

Body hairs are like grass growing on an empty village square — the square does not know the grass, the grass does not know the square.
Nails are like sticks poked through fruit kernels in a children’s game.
Teeth are like posts placed in stone sockets and cemented in — the sockets do not know the posts, the posts do not know the sockets.
Skin is like damp ox-hide stretched over a lute.
Flesh is like thick clay plastered over a wall.
Sinews are like creepers binding sticks together.
Bones are like bricks stacked one on another — those below do not know they support those above, and those above do not know they rest on those below.

And so on through bone marrow (like bamboo shoots inside bamboo joints), kidney (like a pair of mangoes on a stalk), heart (like meat placed inside an old cart frame), liver (like a lump stuck on the side of a cooking pot), midriff (like a rag wrapping meat), spleen (like a lump of cow dung near a barn), lungs (like a bird’s nest hanging in an old barn), bowel (like a beheaded snake coiled in a trough), entrails (like ropes binding a rope-ring), gorge (like dog’s vomit in a dog’s bowl), dung (like soft clay packed in a bamboo tube), and brain (like dough inside a gourd).

For the water element parts — bile, phlegm, pus, blood, sweat, fat, tears, grease, spittle, snot, oil of the joints, and urine — each is identified as “liquid water element in the mode of cohesion,” with similar reflections on mutual unawareness.

For the fire element — the four heats — and for the air element — the six forces — the same approach is used.

As he defines them this way, access concentration arises.

Method 3: Characteristics in Brief

If the analytical approach still does not work, the meditator looks for all four elements within each group. For example, in the twenty earth-element parts, the dominant quality is stiffness (earth), but cohesion (water), heat (fire), and distension (air) are also present. He defines all four in each group.

Method 4: Characteristics by Analysis

If even that does not succeed, he identifies all four elements within each individual part. In head hairs alone: the stiffness is earth, the cohesion is water, the warmth is fire, and the distension is air. He does this for every single component.

Additional Ways of Examining the Elements

The text describes thirteen further angles of investigation:

Word meaning — Earth means “spread out.” Water means “flows.” Fire means “heats.” Air means “blows.” They are called “elements” because they bear their own characteristics.
By groups — Each body part is really a cluster of eight qualities (colour, odour, taste, nutritive essence, and the four elements). “Head hairs” is just a conventional name for this cluster. Taken separately, no single quality is “head hairs.”
By particles — The earth element in the body, if ground to the finest dust, would fill about one measure. It is held together by water, maintained by fire, and kept from collapsing by air. This mechanism of elements — like a magic trick — deceives people into seeing “man” and “woman.”

By characteristic, function, and manifestation:

Element	Characteristic	Function	Manifestation
Earth	Hardness	Acts as foundation	Receiving
Water	Trickling (flowing)	Intensifies	Holding together
Fire	Heat	Matures and maintains	Continued supply of softness
Air	Distension (pressure)	Causes motion	Conveying

By origination — Among the forty-two parts: gorge, dung, pus, and urine arise from temperature only. Tears, sweat, spittle, and snot arise from temperature and consciousness. The digestive fire is produced by past actions (kamma) only. In-breath and out-breath are consciousness-produced only. All the rest arise from all four sources.
By variety and unity — Each element has different characteristics, functions, and manifestations (variety). Yet all four are equally material, equally impermanent, equally suffering, and equally not-self (unity).
By separability and inseparability — The four elements always arise together in every material group. They cannot be physically separated. But they can be distinguished by their characteristics.
By similarity and dissimilarity — Earth and water are similar in heaviness. Fire and air are similar in lightness. The heavy pair is dissimilar to the light pair.
By internal and external — Internal elements support the physical bases of consciousness and the sense faculties. They are associated with bodily postures and arise from all four sources. External elements are the opposite.
By inclusion — Elements sharing the same origination are grouped together. All kamma-originated elements belong together, and so on.
By condition — Each element supports the other three. Earth provides the foundation. Water provides cohesion. Fire provides maintenance. Air provides distension. Each is held together, maintained, and distended by the others.
By lack of conscious reaction — The earth element does not know “I am the earth element.” Water does not know “I hold the others together.” None of them is aware of itself or the others. There is no knower inside.
By analysis of conditions — Four conditions produce the elements: past actions (kamma), consciousness, nutriment, and temperature. Each type of origination has its own specific set of conditional relationships.

Background Note: The verse on how the elements condition each other can be summarised: three elements arise dependent on one (four ways); one element arises dependent on three (four ways); two elements arise dependent on two (six ways). During walking, for instance, the earth element provides pressing, water provides settling, fire provides lifting, and air provides shifting forward.

What Level of Concentration Is Reached

As the meditator gives attention to the elements from any of these angles, the elements become clear to him. Access concentration arises — but not full absorption. This is because the object of this meditation is the individual essence of real phenomena, which is too specific and profound for the mind to absorb into fully.

Benefits

A monk devoted to defining the four elements immerses himself in voidness. He dissolves the perception of “living being.” Because that perception is gone, he no longer entertains false notions about wild beasts, spirits, or ogres. He conquers fear and dread. He conquers delight and boredom. He is neither elated by pleasant things nor depressed by unpleasant ones. As one of great understanding, he either reaches the deathless or is bound for a happy destiny.

Defining the four elements Is ever the wise man’s resort; The noble meditator lion Will make this mighty theme his sport.

Wrapping Up the Section on Concentration

Two Kinds of Concentration

The concentration described throughout these chapters comes in two forms:

Access concentration — the level reached in ten of the meditation subjects (the perception of repulsiveness in food, the four elements, and others) and in the mental moments just before full absorption in the remaining subjects.
Absorption concentration — the deep, stable unification of mind reached in the remaining meditation subjects.

Both are developed through the forty meditation subjects described across these chapters.

The Five Benefits of Developing Concentration

The development of concentration yields five great rewards:

A blissful abiding here and now. Fully awakened beings (arahants) who enter absorption dwell in unified bliss for an entire day. The Buddha said: “These are called blissful abidings in the Noble Ones’ discipline.”
Insight. Ordinary people and those still training emerge from concentration and exercise insight with a concentrated mind. Access concentration also serves this purpose. The Buddha said: “Develop concentration; one who is concentrated understands correctly.”
Higher powers. Those who have attained all eight levels of absorption can use them as a basis for extraordinary abilities — multiplying one’s form, seeing with the divine eye, and so on. The Buddha said: “He attains the ability to be a witness of any state realizable by direct knowledge, whenever there is an occasion.”
An improved rebirth. Those who have not lost their absorption and aspire to a higher realm — or even without aspiring — are reborn among the radiant beings of the Brahma world. Even access concentration ensures rebirth in the pleasant realms of the sensory world.
The attainment of cessation. Noble ones who have mastered all eight attainments can enter the cessation of perception and feeling — remaining without consciousness for seven days, abiding in the bliss of what is essentially the experience of nibbana here and now.

So wise men fail not in devotion To the pursuit of concentration: It cleans defiling stains’ pollution, And brings rewards past calculation.

This is the eleventh chapter, “The Description of Concentration — Conclusion,” in the section on the Development of Concentration in the Path of Purification, composed for the purpose of gladdening good people.