LEGEND OF KING AŚOKA IN A FORMER BIRTH, AND HIS NARAKA.
When king Aśoka, in a former birth,[1] was a little boy and played on
the road, he met Kâśyapa Buddha walking. (The stranger) begged food,
and the boy pleasantly took a handful of earth and gave it to him. The
Buddha took the earth, and returned it to the ground on which he was
walking; but because of this (the boy) received the recompense of
becoming a king of the iron wheel,[2] to rule over Jambudvîpa. (Once)
when he was making a judicial tour of inspection through Jambudvîpa,
he saw, between the iron circuit of the two hills, a naraka[3] for the
punishment of wicked men. Having thereupon asked his ministers what
sort of a thing it was, they replied, ‘It belongs to Yama,[4] king
of demons, for punishing wicked people.’ The king thought within
himself:—‘(Even) the king of demons is able to make a naraka in which
to deal with wicked men; why should not I, who am the lord of men,
make a naraka in which to deal with wicked men?’ He forthwith asked
his ministers who could make for him a naraka and preside over the
punishment of wicked people in it. They replied that it was only a man
of extreme wickedness who could make it; and the king thereupon sent
officers to seek everywhere for (such) a bad man; and they saw by the
side of a pond a man tall and strong, with a black countenance, yellow
hair, and green eyes, hooking up the fish with his feet, while he
called to him birds and beasts, and, when they came, then shot and
killed them, so that not one escaped. Having got this man, they took
him to the king, who secretly charged him, ‘You must make a square
enclosure with high walls. Plant in it all kinds of flowers and
fruits; make good ponds in it for bathing; make it grand and imposing
in every way, so that men shall look to it with thirsting desire; make
its gates strong and sure; and when any one enters, instantly seize
him and punish him as a sinner, not allowing him to get out. Even if I
should enter, punish me as a sinner in the same way, and do not let me
go. I now appoint you master of that naraka.’
Soon after this a bhikshu, pursuing his regular course of begging his
food, entered the gate (of the place). When the lictors of the naraka
saw him, they were about to subject him to their tortures; but he,
frightened, begged them to allow him a moment in which to eat his
midday meal. Immediately after, there came in another man, whom they
thrust into a mortar and pounded till a red froth overflowed. As the
bhikshu looked on, there came to him the thought of the impermanence,
the painful suffering and insanity of this body, and how it is but
as a bubble and as foam; and instantly he attained to Arhatship.
Immediately after, the lictors seized him, and threw him into a
caldron of boiling water. There was a look of joyful satisfaction,
however, in the bhikshu’s countenance. The fire was extinguished, and
the water became cold. In the middle (of the caldron) there rose up a
lotus flower, with the bhikshu seated on it. The lictors at once went
and reported to the king that there was a marvellous occurrence in
the naraka, and wished him to go and see it; but the king said,
‘I formerly made such an agreement that now I dare not go (to the
place).’ The lictors said, ‘This is not a small matter. Your majesty
ought to go quickly. Let your former agreement be altered.’ The king
thereupon followed them, and entered (the naraka), when the bhikshu
preached the Law to him, and he believed, and was made free.[5]
Forthwith he demolished the naraka, and repented of all the evil which
he had formerly done. From this time he believed in and honoured the
Three Precious Ones, and constantly went to a patra tree, repenting
under it, with self-reproach, of his errors, and accepting the eight
rules of abstinence.[6]
The queen asked where the king was constantly going to, and the
ministers replied that he was constantly to be seen under (such and
such) a patra tree. She watched for a time when the king was not
there, and then sent men to cut the tree down. When the king came, and
saw what had been done, he swooned away with sorrow, and fell to
the ground. His ministers sprinkled water on his face, and after a
considerable time he revived. He then built all round (the stump) with
bricks, and poured a hundred pitchers of cows’ milk on the roots; and
as he lay with his four limbs spread out on the ground, he took this
oath, ‘If the tree do not live, I will never rise from this.’ When
he had uttered this oath, the tree immediately began to grow from the
roots, and it has continued to grow till now, when it is nearly 100
cubits in height.
NOTES
[1] Here is an instance of 昔 used, as was pointed out in chap. ix,
note 3, for a former age; and not merely a former time. Perhaps ‘a
former birth’ is the best translation. The Corean reading of Kaśyapa
Buddha is certainly preferable to the Chinese ‘Śâkya Buddha.’
[2] See chap. xvii note 8.
[3] I prefer to retain the Sanskrit term here, instead of translating
the Chinese text by ‘Earth’s prison (地獄),’ or ‘a prison in the
earth;’ the name for which has been adopted generally by Christian
missionaries in China for gehenna and hell.
[4] Eitel (p. 173) says:—‘Yama was originally the Âryan god of the
dead, living in a heaven above the world, the regent of the south;
but Brahmânism transferred his abode to hell. Both views have been
retained by Buddhism.’ The Yama of the text is the ‘regent of the
narakas, residing south of Jambudvîpa, outside the Chakravâlas (the
double circuit of mountains above), in a palace built of brass and
iron. He has a sister who controls all the female culprits, as he
exclusively deals with the male sex. Three times, however, in every
twenty-four hours, a demon pours boiling copper into Yama’s mouth,
and squeezes it down his throat, causing him unspeakable pain.’ Such,
however, is the wonderful ‘transrotation of births,’ that when Yama’s
sins have been expiated, he is to be reborn as Buddha, under the name
of ‘The Universal King.’
[5] Or, ‘was loosed;’ from the bonds, I suppose, of his various
illusions.
[6] I have not met with this particular numerical category.