praise Forbearance, for it is an excellent boon, I offer you.'
But the king disdained these gentle flowers of speech which the Muni
offered him. Scornfully he said to that foremost of _Ri_shis: 'Let us
now see your attachment to forbearance,' and so speaking, he directed
his sharp sword to the right hand of the Muni, which was a little
extended towards him, with a prohibitive gesture, having its very fine
and long fingers upward, and severed it from his arm like a lotus from
its stalk.
53. Yet the Bodhisattva did not feel so much pain, even after his hand
had been cut off--so steadfast was he in keeping his vow of
forbearance--as sorrow concerning the cutter, whose future misfortune he
saw, which was to fall terrible and irremediable upon that person
hitherto accustomed to pleasures.
And thinking within himself: 'Alas! he has transgressed the boundary of
his good, he has ceased to be a person worth admonishing[198],' and
commiserating him, as he would do a sick man given up by the doctors,
he kept silent. But the king continued to speak threatening words to
him.
[198] Cp. Story VII, stanzas 20-26.
54. 'And in this manner your body shall be cut to pieces until death.
Desist from your hypocritical penance, and leave that villainous
forgery.'
The Bodhisattva made no answer. He understood him to be deaf to
admonition and had learnt his obstinacy. Then the king successively and
in the same way cut off the other hand of the High-minded One, both his
arms, his ears and nose, and his feet.
55. Yet that foremost of Munis did not feel sorrow or anger, when the
sharp sword fell down on his body. His knowledge that the machinery of
his body must eventually come to an end, and his habitual practice of
forbearance against everybody made him so strong.
56. In consequence of its habitual friendliness, the mind of that
virtuous one was inaccessible to the sense of sorrow on account of
himself. Even while he saw his limbs being cut off, his forbearance
remained unshaken, but that he saw the king fallen from Righteousness,
made him sore with grief.
57. Verily, the compassionate who are great in retaining their
tranquillity throughout are not so much afflicted by pain arising in
themselves, as they grieve on account of the suffering of others.
58. But the king, after performing that cruel deed, was anon caught by a
fire-like fever, and when he went out of the gardens, earth on a sudden
opened and swallowed him.
After swallowing the king, the earth continued to make a fearful noise,
and fiery flames appeared in the opening. This caused great
consternation all around, and perplexed and alarmed the royal
attendants. The king's ministers, knowing the grandeur of the
penance-power of that Muni and imputing to it the catastrophe of the
king, were affected with anxiety, lest that holy _Ri_shi should burn
down the whole country on account of the king. Thus apprehending, they
went up to the holy _Ri_shi, and bowing to him entreated him with folded
hands to be propitious.
59. 'May that king, who impelled by his infatuated mind has put thee
into this state by an exceedingly rash action, be alone the fuel for the
fire of thy curse. Pray, do not burn his town!
60. 'Pray, do not destroy for his fault innocent people, women and
children, the old and the sick, the Brâhmans and the poor! Rather
shouldst thou, being a lover of virtues, preserve both the realm of that
king and thy own righteousness.'
In reply to this, the Bodhisattva comforted them: 'Do not fear,' he
said, 'sirs.
61, 62. 'As to that king who just cut off with his sword my hands and
feet, my ears and nose, maiming an innocent ascetic living in the
forest, how should a person like me aim at his hurt or conceive even
such a thought? May that king live long and no evil befall him!
63. 'A being subject to sorrow, death and sickness, subdued by cupidity
and hatred, consumed by his evil actions is a person to be pitied. Who
ought to get angry with such a one?
64. 'And should that line of conduct[199] be ever so preferable, O that
his sin might ripen (its unavoidable result) in detriment of no other
but me! For to people accustomed to pleasure meeting with suffering,
even for a short time, is keen and unbearable.
[199] Viz. indulging in anger and cursing that king. The curse of a
_Ri_shi, who has obtained supernatural power by his penance, is a
dreadful weapon.
65. 'But now, as I am unable to protect that king who annihilated in
this manner his own happiness, for what reason should I give up that
state of powerlessness of myself and indulge in hatred against him?
66. 'Even without a king's intervention, everybody born has to deal with
sufferings, arising from death, &c. Therefore in this (series of evils),
it is birth alone which one has to oppose[200]. For this not being, what
suffering may there arise and from whence?
[200] In other words, one has to strive for final extinction.
67. 'For many kalpas I have lost my worthless body in manifold ways in
numbers of existences. How is it that I should give up forbearance on
account of the destruction of that frame? Would it not be as if I were
to give up a jewel of the first water for a straw?
68. 'Dwelling in the forest, bound to my vow of world-renunciation, a
preacher of forbearance and soon a prey to death, how should I feel the
desire of revenge? Do not fear me any longer, then, peace be to you,
go!'
69. After thus instructing and at the same time admitting them as
disciples in the Lore of the pious, that foremost of Munis, who kept his
constancy unshaken owing to his relying on forbearance, left his earthly
residence and mounted to Heaven.
* * * * *
So then, indeed, to those who have wholly imbibed the virtue of
forbearance and are great in keeping their tranquillity there is nothing
unbearable. [Thus is to be said when discoursing on the virtue of
forbearance, taking the Muni for example. On account of the vices of
rashness and wrath, taking the king for example, this story is also to
be told, and when expounding the miserable consequences of sensual
pleasures, saying: 'In this manner sensual pleasures lead a man to
become addicted to wicked behaviour which brings him into ruin.' It may
also be told with the object of showing the inconstancy of material
prosperity.]
This story is also extant in the Avadânakalpalatâ, in pallava 38,
as appears from the Anukrama_n_î, verse 15 (ya_h_ kshânti_s_îla_h_
_s_ântyâbhû_k_ _kh_innângo 'py avikâravân), but this part of the
work has as yet not been published nor is it found in the Cambridge
MSS.
XXIX. THE STORY OF THE INHABITANT OF THE BRAHMALOKA.
Since the tenets of unbelief are blameable, those who are possessed by
the vice of clinging to a false belief are especially worth
commiserating by the virtuous. This will be taught as follows.
One time the Bodhisattva, our Lord, having gathered by a constant
practice of dhyâna a store of good karma, obtained, it is said, a birth
in the Brahmaloka, in consequence of the ripening of that merit.
Nevertheless, owing to his having always been conversant with
commiseration in his former existences, that high happiness of the
Brahmaloka, which he had obtained as the effect of the excellence of his
dhyâna, did not destroy in him his longing for the task of benefiting
others.
1. By indulging in sensual pleasures, however material, worldly people
become utterly careless. But a frequent absorption in the delight of
meditation, however ideal, does not hide the desire for benefiting
others from (the mind of) the pious.
Now one time it happened that the High-minded One was passing his looks
over the Region of Sensuality[201] below (his Brahma-world), where
Compassion finds its proper sphere of action, since this is the region
visited by hundreds of different forms of sufferings and calamities, and
containing the elements for moral illnesses, disasters, injuries against
living beings, and sensual pleasures. And he perceived the king of
Videha, named Aṅgadinna, erring in the wilderness of a wrong belief,
partly by the fault of his intercourse with bad friends, partly also in
consequence of his being ardently attached to false thoughts. That king
had got this persuasion: 'there is no other world after this; how could
there be anything like result ripening out of good or evil actions?' and
in conformity with this belief his longing for religious practices was
extinguished, he was averse to performing the pious works of charity,
good conduct (_s_îla), &c., felt a deep-rooted contempt for such as led
a religious life, and owing to his want of faith, bore ill-will to the
religious law-books. Being inclined to laugh at tales concerning the
other world, and showing but little respect and honour to _S_rama_n_as
and Brâhmans, whom he held in little esteem, he was exclusively given up
to sensual pleasures.
[201] The Brahmaloka or Brahma-world is in Buddhist cosmology the
world superior to the region of sensuality, the kâmadhâtu (see
Burnouf, Introduction, &c., p. 604) or kâmâva_k_ara (see Hardy,
Manual, pp. 3, 261). Cp. Kern, Geschiedenis van het Buddhisme, I,
pp. 290, 291. Cp. Story XXX, stanza 21, where we have this series
of happiness: 1. royalty on earth, 2. heavenly bliss, 3. Brahma's
world, 4. final extinction (Nirvá_n_a).
2. He who is firm in the belief 'surely, there is a world hereafter
where good and evil karma produce their fruit of happiness and mishap,'
such a one will avoid evil actions and exert himself to cultivate pious
ones. But by absence of faith a man follows his desires.
Now that king, whose disastrous attachment to a false lore must have
mischievous consequences and become a source of calamities to his
people, roused the compassion of that High-minded Devarshi. One time,
when that king, always directed by his indulgence in sensual pleasures,
was staying in a beautiful and lonely arbour, he descended in his
flaming brilliancy from the Brahma-world before his eyes. On beholding
that luminous being who blazed like a mass of fire, shone like an
agglomeration of lightnings, and spread about a great brilliancy of
intense light like a collection of sun-rays, the king, overwhelmed by
that lustre, was alarmed and rose from his seat to meet him reverently
with folded hands. Respectfully he looked up to him (who stood in the
air) and said:
3. 'The sky makes thee a resting-place for thy feet, as if it were the
earth, O thou being with lotus-like feet; thou shinest far and wide,
bearing the lustre of the sun, so to speak. Who art thou, whose form is
a delight to the eyes?'
The Bodhisattva replied:
4. 'Know me, O king, one of those Devarshis who attained Brahma's world,
having by the power of their mind's strong and assiduous attachment to
religion vanquished love and hatred[202], those two proud foes, like two
haughty chiefs of a hostile army in battle.'
[202] Love, viz. sensual love and covetousness, and hatred (with
anger) are the two great divisions of vyasanâni (vices, evil
habits), not only with Buddhists. See, for instance, Manu VII, 45
foll.
After these words the king offered him the hospitable reception due to a
worthy guest, water to wash his feet and the arghya-water[203],
accompanying this act (of homage) with kind words of welcome and the
like. Then, casting admiring looks at his face, he said: 'Very
wonderful, O Great _Ri_shi, is thy figure. Indeed, thy power is
supernatural.
[203] The arghya is the name of a worshipful offering of water to a
worthy guest, given with the other ceremonial marks of hospitality:
vish_t_ara, padya, madhuparka.
5. 'Without clinging to the walls of a building, thou walkest in the sky
as easily as on earth. Tell me, O thou whose brightness has the lustre
of a flash of lightning, how didst thou obtain this supernatural power?'
The Bodhisattva spoke:
6. 'Such superhuman power is the result, O king, of meditation (dhyâna),
spotless good conduct (_s_îla), and an excellent restraint of the
senses, which I have so practised in other existences that they became
essential elements of my nature.'
The king said: 'Does there exist in earnest anything like a world
hereafter?' The Brahman[204] said: 'Verily, Your Majesty, there is a
world hereafter.' The king said: 'But, my dear sir, how should I too be
able to believe so?' The Bodhisattva said: 'This is a tangible truth,
Your Majesty, which may be proved by reasoning with the ordinary modes
of proof (pramâ_n_a): perception by the senses and the rest[205]. It is
exemplified by the declarations of reliable persons, and may be tested
by the method of accurate examination. Do but consider this:
[204] The inhabitants of Brahma's world are called Brahmans.
[205] The others are inference and analogy; for it is unlikely that
the Brahman would think of persuading a disbeliever by means of the
fourth mode of proof, revelation.
7. 'The heaven, with its ornament of sun, moon and stars, and the
many-shaped variety of animals, are the world hereafter in a concrete
and visible form. Let not thy mind be benumbed by scepticism so as not
to perceive this truth.
8. 'Further there are now and then persons who, owing to their practice
of dhyâna and the vividness of their memory, remember their former
existences. From this it must likewise be inferred, there exists a world
after this. And myself, do I not give thee the evidence of a witness?
9. 'Moreover, thou must infer its existence also from this. The
perfection of the intellect presupposes a previous existence of that
intellect. The rudimentary intellect of the fetus is the uninterrupted
continuation of the intellect in the preceding existence.
10. 'Further, it is the faculty for catching matter of knowledge that is
called intellect (buddhi). Therefore there must be a sphere of
employment for the intellect at the beginning of existence[206]. But it
is not possible to find it in this world, because of the absence of the
eyes and the other (organs of sense). By inference, the place where it
is to be found, is the other world.
[206] In other words, in the state of the fetus.
11. 'It is known by experience that children diverge from the nature of
their fathers and show discrepancies of conduct and the like. Now, since
this fact cannot arise without a cause, it follows that we have to do
here with habits acquired in other existences.
12, 13. 'That the new-born child, though his mental powers are wholly
rude and his organs of sense in a torpid state, makes an effort to take
the breast without being instructed so and almost in a state of deep
sleep, this proves his having in former existences exercised himself as
to the fit ways of taking his food. For practice, perfecting the mind,
sharpens its faculty for acquiring knowledge for different special
performances.
'Perhaps, since thou art not accustomed to the idea of the existence of
another world, thou mayst still be doubtful about the last statement.
(Should this be the case and shouldst thou reason in this way:)
14. '"Then the lotuses shutting and opening themselves are also a proof,
indeed, of their having already practised those movements in other
existences. Otherwise, this not being admitted, why dost thou affirm
that the suckling's effort of taking the breast is the effect of
exertion made in previous births?"
'then thou art obliged to put aside that doubt by the consideration that
in one case there is compulsion, in the other freedom, and exertion is
not made there, but that it is made here.
15. 'In the case of the lotuses, their opening and shutting depend on
time, but the effort to take the breast not so. Moreover, there is no
exertion in the lotus, but in the case of the suckling it is evident
there is. It is the power of the sun that is the cause of the lotuses
expanding.
'In this manner, then, Your Majesty, by a close and careful examination
it is possible to have faith in the world hereafter.'
But the king, as he was deeply attached to the false lore he professed,
also because the extent of his sin was large, felt uneasy on hearing
that account of the other world, and spoke: 'Why, great _Ri_shi,
16. 'If the next world is not that (well-known) bugbear for children, or
if thou judgest it fit for me to believe in it, well, lend me five
hundred nishkas[207] here, and I shall give thee back one thousand in
the next existence.'
[207] A nishka is a gold coin, whose value varied at different
times.
Now when the king, according to his habitual boldness, had uttered
without scruple this unbecoming language, which was as it were the
vomiting of the poison of his wrong belief, the Bodhisattva answered him
in a very proper way.
17. 'Still in this world those who wish to employ their money, in order
to augment it, do not make any loan at all to a wicked person or a
glutton or a blockhead or a sluggard. For wealth going to such persons,
tends to their ruin.
18. 'But if they see one bashful, with thoroughly subdued senses, and
skilled in business, to such a one they offer a loan, even unwitnessed.
Such a bestowal of money produces bliss.
19. 'The very same line of conduct must be followed, O king, with
respect to a debt payable in the world hereafter. But it is not suitable
to contract such a loan with thee who art a person of a wicked behaviour
because of the evil doctrine thou professest.
20. 'For, at the time when, being precipitated into hell by thy own
cruel actions originating in the sin of a wicked lore, thou wilt lie
there, sore with pains and paralysed in thy mental powers, who would
then call upon thee for a debt of one thousand nishkas?
21. 'There the regions of the sky do not shine in their full feminine
beauty[208] by the beams of sun and moon, the destroyers of their veil
of darkness. Nor is the firmament there seen with its ornament of crowds
of stars, like a lake embellished by unclosed waterlilies.
[208] The di_s_a_h_ belong grammatically, and for this reason also
mythologically, to the females. Hence they are spoken of as women
(digaṅganâ_h_).
22. 'The place where the unbelievers dwell in the next world, is
encompassed with thick darkness, and an icy wind prevails there,
penetrating to the very bones and extremely painful. Who, being wise,
would enter that hell in order to obtain money?
23. 'Some wander for a long time on the bottom of the hell, which is
wrapt in dense obscurity and dull with pungent smoke; they are afflicted
there, drawing along their rags fastened with leather thongs, and crying
with pain as often as they tumble over each other.
24. 'Likewise others are running with wounded feet again and again in
all directions in the Hell _G_valatkukûla [ = Flaming Chaff], longing
for deliverance from thence, but they do not attain the end of their
sin nor of their life.
25. 'Terrible servants of Yama carve like carpenters the limbs of
others, having them fastened in different manners, and delight in
shaping them by cutting with sharp knives, as if they wrought in fresh
timber.
26. 'Others again are entirely stripped off their skin, groaning with
pain, or are even bereaved of their flesh, living skeletons, but they
cannot die, kept alive by their own evil actions. Likewise others who
are cut to pieces.
27. 'Others draw flaming chariots for a long time. They wear broad
flaming bits in their mouth and submit to harnesses and goads of a tawny
hue, being fiery. The grounds on which they draw are of iron, heated by
an unceasing fire.
28. 'Some have their bodies crushed, when they meet mount
Sa_m_ghâta[209], and ground to dust by its incursion; nevertheless, even
in that great suffering of the most intense degree, they cannot die
before their evil karma is annihilated.
[209] Sa_m_ghâta is the name of a kind of infernal Symplegades. Cp.
Journal Asiatique, 8^e S., tome XX, p. 184 foll.
29. 'Some others are being ground to dust with big and flaming brazen
pestles in troughs incandescent by fire during a succession of full five
hundred years, and yet they do not lose life.
30. 'Others again are hanging with their heads or even feet to trees
made red-hot like corals and of a rough surface, being beset with
flaming thorns of sharp iron. They are beaten by demons, attendants of
Yama, who chide them with harsh cries.
31. 'Others enjoy the fruit of their conduct, lying on large heaps of
burning coals, flaming and resembling molten gold. (Helpless) they are
exposed to their fate, they can do nothing but lie and moan.
32. 'Some howl with their tongues hanging out of their mouths, while
their bodies are overcome by heavy pains caused by hundreds of sharp
spears on a ground illuminated by garlands of flames rising out of it.
In that time they are made to believe that there exists something like a
world beyond this.
33. 'There are others whose heads are encircled with flaming diadems of
brass; others are boiled out in pots of brass. Of others the bodies are
wounded by sharp stings of showers of weapons, and devoured by crowds of
ferocious animals, who gnaw them off to the bones.
34. 'Others again, exhausted by toil, enter the salt water of the
Vaitara_n_î, but that water is painful to touch like fire, and their
flesh wastes away from their limbs, when in it, but not their life, kept
up by their evil actions.
35. 'And those who afflicted because of the intense torment caused by
burning, have resorted to (the hell named) A_s_u_k_iku_n_apa [the hell
of unclean corpses] as to a pond of fresh water, meet there with
unparalleled pain. Their bones are brought to decomposition by hundreds
of worms.
36. 'Elsewhere others undergo the pain of being burnt for a long time.
Surrounded by fire, their bodies flame like iron staves surrounded by
flames. Yet they do not burn to ashes, being kept alive by their
actions.
37. 'There is sawing of others with fiery saws, cutting of others with
sharp razors. Of others the heads are crushed with hammers quickly
swung, so as to make them yell with anguish. There is roasting on a
smokeless fire of others, fixed on broad iron-spits which pierce through
their bodies. Others again are compelled to drink liquid brass looking
like blazing fire, which makes them utter raw cries.
38. 'Some are assailed by spotted dogs of great strength who with their
sharp-biting teeth tear off the flesh from their limbs; they fall on the
ground with lacerated bodies, crying loudly with pain.
39. 'Of such a nature are the tremendous torments in the different
hells. If thou, impelled by thy karma, shalt once have reached that
state[210], who then would think of calling upon thee for that debt at
that time, while thou art sore with sorrow and thy mind is afflicted
with exhaustion and sadness?
[210] The second pâda of this stanza is wanting an iambus in its
middle part. I think it is thus to be supplied: prâpto bhavishyasi
(yadâ) svak_ri_tapranunna_h_.
40. 'It may happen that thou art staying in the hell of brazen jars
filled with the corpses of wicked people and hard to approach because of
the fire-flames, which heat them and make thee move helplessly exposed
to the suffering of being boiled. Who then would think of calling upon
thee for that debt at that time?
41. 'Or thou mayst lie with tied limbs on flaming iron pins or on the
earth made red-hot by a blazing fire. While thou wilt be weeping
piteously, thy body burning away, who then would think of calling upon
thee for that debt at that time?
42. 'Who would require that debt from thee, when thou wilt have reached
that wretched state of humiliation, undergoing terrible sufferings and
not even able to make any answer?
43. 'Or suppose thy bones to be pierced by the icy wind which destroys
even the power of groaning, or thy voice uttering roaring cries of pain,
when thou wilt be torn asunder, who would dare ask thee for that money
in the other world?
44. 'Or, if rather thou wert to be exposed to the injuries of Yama's
attendants, or to lie in the midst of fiery flames, or if dogs and crows
were to feast on thy flesh and blood, who would urge thee with a call
for money in the other world?
45. 'Besides, when thou wert to undergo an uninterrupted torture by
striking or cutting or beating or cleaving, by burning or carving or
grinding or splitting, in short, by the most different modes of tearing
up (thy body), how shouldst thou be able to give back that debt to me at
that time?'