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Dhammapada verses 146–156 explore impermanence, the nature of the body, and the inevitability of aging and death. Through metaphors of a world ablaze, a decaying body, the house-builder and a city of bones, they point to life's transience and the futility of clinging to sensual pleasures. The verses highlight the cultivation of wisdom, detachment, and the pursuit of an unconditioned state beyond constructs, contrasting fleeting youth and inevitable old age with the timeless teachings that lead to liberation.
Jarā vagga - Chapter 11 - Old Age
146
What is the laughter, what is the joy, when the world is perpetually ablaze; Enveloped by darkness, why do you not seek the light?
147
Behold this form, a mind-made adornment, propped up, a body full of sores; Afflicted, full of plans, of which, there is nothing enduring or stable.
148
This body is worn out, a nest of disease, fragile; This putrid accumulation breaks apart, for life surely ends in death.
149
Like discarded bottle gourds, in the autumn season; Are these greyish bones, seeing them, what is the delight?
150
This body is a city built of bones, plastered with flesh and blood; Within it dwell old age and death, along with pride and contempt.
151
The beautifully adorned royal chariots wear out, and the body too experiences old age; But the teaching of the sages does not age, the wise make it known to the virtuous persons.
152
A person of little learning, grows old just like an ox; They grow in mass, but their wisdom does not grow.
153
Through countless rebirth in the cyclical existence, I have wandered without finding [a way out]; Seeking the house-builder [of this body], unpleasant is birth again and again.
154
I have seen you, house-builder, you will not build a house again; All your rafters are dismantled, your ridgepole is deconstructed; The mind has gone beyond all conditions, having exhausted craving.
155
Not having lived the holy life, and not having obtained wealth in youth; They brood like old herons, in a pond depleted of fish.
156
Not having lived the holy life, and not having obtained wealth in youth; They sit, spent and exhausted, lamenting over the past.