Dhammapada · Chapter 22
Hell (Woeful State)
14 verses · The liar goes to woeful states; speaking lies, doing what one says is forbidden, both lead downward. The Buddha warns that easy is the path to wrong destinations, hard the path to good — yet base deeds reliably bear bitter fruit.
Chapter 22
निरयवग्गो
Nirayavagga
22.1
The speaker of untruth goes to hell, and so does the one who, having done a deed, says,…
22.2
Many wearing the ochre robe around their necks are of evil nature, unrestrained
22.3
Better to swallow a red-hot iron ball, blazing like a tongue of fire, than for an immoral…
22.4
Four fates befall the heedless man who consorts with another's wife: the gaining of…
22.5
The accumulation of demerit, a bad destination, the brief pleasure of the frightened with…
22.6
As a blade of kusa grass wrongly held cuts the hand, so the spiritual life wrongly…
22.7
Whatever action is slack, whatever vow is defiled, whatever holy life is followed with…
22.8
If one is going to do it, let one do it firmly
22.9
Better is the evil deed left undone — afterwards it torments
22.10
Like a frontier city guarded within and without, so guard yourself
22.11
Those who are ashamed of what is not shameful, and unashamed of what is shameful — having…
22.12
Those who see fear where there is no fear, and see no fear where fear is — having adopted…
22.13
Those who see fault in the faultless, and no fault in the faulty — having adopted wrong…
22.14
But those who know fault as fault, and the faultless as faultless — having adopted right…