Venerable Sir, you mentioned that one must definitely enter the Noble Eightfold Path through the entrance called Right View. But through which entrance, Venerable Sir, should we enter Right View?

There is indeed a correct entrance through which you must get into Right View. That entrance constitutes: (1) associating with a ‘wise and virtuous friend’ (kalyāna-mitta), (2) listening to the ‘true dhamma’ (saddhamma), and (3) wisely reflecting (yoniso-manasikāra) upon the true dhamma that has been listened to. It is through this very entrance that one must enter Right View. Here, the ‘wise and virtuous friend’ is the revered-person who educates you of the frightfulness, the depths, of saŋsāra―the round of rebirths. Buddha says the one who gives discourses on the Dhamma, the speaker of the Dhamma, is that revered-person who teaches you of the dreadfulness of saŋsāra. If someone advises you to wait for the emergence of Metteyya Buddha1 to realize nibbāna, that person may be a friend, but they won’t be a wise and virtuous friend. If someone tells you that you can’t attain the noble ‘fruits of the path’ (magga phala) in this lifetime, they may be a friend, but they won’t be a wise and virtuous friend. Buddha says association with a wise and virtuous friend is one of the rarest things in the world.

You may get the association with a wise and virtuous friend and thereby listen to the true dhamma, but if you were not skilful to wisely reflect upon the Dhamma that has been listened to, there, you'd be a weakling, a hopeless incompetent. You’d be the world’s most unfortunate person, for even after getting this rare association with a wise and virtuous friend and having listened to the true dhamma, you drift farther away from the entrance to Right View purely owing to your unskilfulness to contemplate with wisdom. This ineptitude to wisely contemplate arises in you solely due to the five hindrances, the pañca nīvarana―the five qualities that obstruct the mind and blind mental vision―which are: desire for sense pleasures, hate, sloth and torpor, restlessness and scruples, and sceptical doubt.

Now it’s perfectly clear to you that the path of the Dhamma means the Noble Eightfold Path; the main entrance to embark on the Noble Eightfold Path is Right View; and the correct entrance to get into Right View is associating with a wise and virtuous friend, listening to the true dhamma and wise reflection, which then leads to dhammānudhamma paṭipatti―practising the path of the Dhamma in accordance with the Dhamma.2

Venerable Sir, what are the basic characteristics that can be seen in a revered-person who has cultivated Right View?

The main factors pertaining to Right View are:

1.  Confidence, or faith,―saddhā―in the triple-gem;

2.  To believe that there is rebirth after death in accordance with the law of causality;

3.  The belief in the causation of actions and their results, aka karma (kamma) and karma-results (vipāka);

4.  The belief in rewards of giving alms (dāna) and living according to moral precepts (sīla)―that is, rewards of generosity and morality;

5.  The belief in the great qualities of the mother and father;

6.  To believe that there are beings born spontaneously (opapātika)―born without the instrumentality of parents;

7.  To believe that there have been noble venerated beings who attained the ‘fruits of the path’ (magga phala).

1 Just as ‘Gotama’ is the name of the present Buddha, so is ‘Metteyya’ the name of the next Buddha, who will emerge long after the present dispensation has ended.

2 Dhammānudhamma paṭipatti―practising the path of the Dhamma in accordance of the Dhamma―also refers to the ‘Noble Eightfold Path’, or the ‘middle path.’