Mahakhandhako, The Great Chapter sections 1-4

8
The Buddha eventually reaches the Deer Park at Isipatana, a few kilometres from the
capital of Kāsī, Bārāṇasī. Although the group-of-five have been chosen for the first
formal teaching of the new school, they are anything but impressed when they see
their former associate coming. Indeed they make an agreement amongst themselves
not to honour him in any way, although as he is a member of the Khattiya class they
agree to put out a seat for him.
As the Buddha approaches though they are unable to keep to their agreement and
they rise up, prepare a seat, take his bowl and robe, put out water for him, and so on.
But still they are not quite ready for the new teaching and the Buddha will not teach
them until they acknowledged his declared status. Eventually they are convinced by
his earnestness and stop addressing him in a familiar way and speak to him with all
due reverence. 12
It is only then that the Buddha deigns to teach them the discourse that is famous now
for Setting the Dhamma-Wheel Rolling. The Discourse itself is as revolutionary as it
is simple. It basically only consists of an outline of the Four Noble Truths with short
definitions of each. However the approach to the spiritual life that it signifies must
have been felt to be quite extraordinary.
The prevalent religious teachings of the time stressed either correct ritual observance
or extreme asceticism. The Buddha knew that neither led to the desired goal, and
started his teaching career with a completely fresh look at the problem of existence.
First he had diagnosed the problem: suffering; then he had found the cause: craving;
then he had seen that its end (nirodha) was possible, and to the group-of-five monks
he taught the Path to that goal, the eightfold noble Path which went, contrary to their
expectation as ascetics, by the middle way.
For religious steeped in extreme asceticism, that must have been revolutionary
indeed, and one of them, Koṇḍaññā, did indeed attain to the first stage of sainthood
on that very teaching, and all of them were ordained as monks by the Buddha. But
for their further progress many more teachings would be required.
Unfortunately for us the teachings during those first few days have not been
preserved in any of the traditions that have come down to us, but over the next few
days the Buddha did give them the necessary basis upon which they gradually made
successively deeper attainments until they stood on the brink of full liberation. 13
It was then that the Buddha taught the second recorded discourse containing the
profound teaching about non-Self, which demonstrated that there was no Self or
Divinity to be found in any of the constituents that make up the human personality,
and that none of them were worth clinging to. It was on the basis of this teaching
that the group-of-five monks fulfilled the teaching and attained to such a state of
purity that they would never be reborn again, and it is this teaching that closes the
first section for recital (bhāṇavāra).
12 This is signalled in the text by the change of address from Āvuso to Bhante.
13 They were technically non-returners (anāgāmi) when the Buddha taught the following
discourse.