論客サッチャカが心身の訓練について仏陀に問いただし、仏陀が悟りに至る前の自らの探求——極端な苦行、飢えた体では真の安楽を得られないとの最終的な気づき、失望して去った五人の苦行仲間、そして最終的な完全な解脱への突破——を語ったという経典である。

A discourse in which the debater Saccaka questions the Buddha about training body and mind, prompting the Buddha to recount his own pre-Enlightenment quest — his extreme austerities, his eventual realization that a starved body cannot yield true bliss, the desertion of his five ascetic companions in disgust, and his final breakthrough to full liberation.