Ananusociya-Jātaka

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Source: Adapted from Archaic Translation by H.T. Francis and R.A. Neil
JATAKA No. 328

ANANUSOCIYA-JATAKA

"Why should I shed tears," etc.--This story was told by the Master while living at Jetavana monastery, of a certain landowner who had lost his wife. On her death, they say, he neither washed himself nor took food, and neglected his farm duties. Overcome with grief he would wander about the cemetery mourning, while his predestination to enter the First Path(Trance) blazed on like a halo about his head. The Master, early one morning, putting his eye upon the world and seeing him said, "Except me there is no one that can remove this man's sorrow and give to him the power of entering the First Path(Trance). I will be his refuge." So when he had returned from his rounds and had eaten his meal, he took an attendant monk and went to the door of the landowner's house. And he on hearing that the Master was coming went out to meet him, and with other marks of respect seated him in the prescribed seat and came and sitting on one side saluted him.

The Master asked, "For which reason, lay disciple, are you silent?"

"Reverend Sir," he replied, "I am grieving for her."

The Master said, "Lay disciple, that which is breakable is broken, but when this happens, one should not grieve. Sages of old, when they lost a wife, knew this truth, and therefore sorrowed not." And then at his request the Master told an old-world tale.

The old legend will be found set on in the Cullabodhi Birth (*1) in the Tenth Book. Here follows a short summary of it.

Once upon a time when Brahmadatta was reigning in Benares, the Bodhisattva was born into a brahmin family. And when he grew up, he studied all the arts at Taxila and then returned to his parents. In this Birth the Great Being became a holy young student. Then his parents told him they would look out a wife for him.

"I have no desire for a married life," said the Bodhisattva. "When you are dead, I will adopt the religious(hermit) life of an ascetic."

And being greatly begged by them, he had a golden image made, and said, "If you can find me a girl like unto this, I will take her to wife." His parents sent on some emissaries with a large escort, and asked them to place the golden image in a covered carriage and go and search through the plains of India, till they found just such a young brahmin girl, when they were to give this golden image in exchange, and bring the girl back with them. Now at this time a certain holy man passing from the Brahma world was born again in the form of a young girl in a town in the kingdom of Kasi, in the house of a brahmin worth eighty crores(x10 million), and the name given her was Sammillabhasini. At the age of sixteen she was a fair and gracious girl, like to an Apsara, gifted with all the signs of female beauty. And since no thought of evil was ever suggested to her by the power of sinful passion, she was perfectly pure. So the men took the golden image and wandered about till they reached this village. The inhabitants on seeing the image asked, "Why is Sammillabhasini, the daughter of such and such a brahmin, placed there?" The messengers on hearing this found the brahmin family, and chose Sammillabhasini for the prince's bride. She sent a message to her parents, saying, "When you are dead, I shall adopt the religious(ascetic) life; I have no desire for the married state." They said, "What are you thinking of, girl?" And accepting the golden image they sent off their daughter with a great group of attendants. The marriage ceremony took place against the wishes of both the Bodhisattva and Sammillabhasini. Though sharing the same room and the same bed they did not regard one another with the eye of sinful passion, but lived together like two holy men or two female saints.

In due course of time the father and mother of the Bodhisattva died. He performed their funeral rites and calling to him Sammillabhasini, said to her, "My dear, my family property amounts to eighty crores(x10 million), and yours too is worth another eighty crores(x10 million). Take all this and enter upon household life. I shall become an ascetic."

"Sir," she answered, "if you become an ascetic, I will become one too. I cannot forsake you."

"Come then," he said. So spending all their wealth in almsgiving and throwing up their worldly fortune as it were a lump of phlegm, they journeyed into the Himalaya country and both of them adopted the ascetic life. There after living for a long time on wild fruits and roots, they at length came down from the Himalayas to procure salt and vinegar, and gradually found their way to Benares, and lived in the royal grounds. And while they were living there, this young and delicate female ascetic, from eating insipid rice of a mixed quality, was attacked by dysentery and not being able to get any healing remedies, she grew very weak. The Bodhisattva at the time for going his rounds to beg for alms, took hold of her and carried her to the gate of the city and there laid her on a bench in a certain hall, and himself went into the city for alms. He had scarce gone out when she expired. The people, seeing the great beauty of this female ascetic, crowded about her, weeping and mourning. The Bodhisattva after going his round of begging returned, and hearing of her death he said, "That which has the quality of dissolution is dissolved. All impermanent existences are of this kind." With these words he sat down on the bench on which she lay and eating the mixture of food he rinsed out his mouth. The people that stood by gathered round him and said, "Reverend Sir, what was this female ascetic to you?"

"When I was a layman," he replied, "she was my wife."

"Holy Sir," they said, "while we weep and cry and cannot control our feelings, why do you not weep?"

The Bodhisattva said, "While she was alive, she belonged to me in some sort. Nothing belongs to her that is gone to another world.: she has passed into the power of others. For which reason should I weep?" And teaching the people the Truth, he recited these stanzas:

Why should I shed tears for you, Fair Sammillabhasini? Passed to death's majority You are from now on lost to me.

For which reason should weak man mourn What to him is only lent? He too draws his mortal breath Loses every hour to death.

Be he standing, sitting still, Moving, resting, what he will, In the twinkling of an eye, In a moment death is near.

Life I count a thing unstable, Loss of friends inevitable. Cherish all that are alive, Sorrow not should you survive.

Thus did the Great Being teach the Truth, explaining by these four stanzas the impermanence of things. The people performed funeral rites over the female ascetic. And the Bodhisattva returned to the Himalayas, and entering on the higher knowledge arising from mystic meditation was destined to birth in the Brahma-world(Realm of ArchAngels).

The Master, having ended his lesson, revealed the Truths and identified the Birth:-At the conclusion of the Truths, the landowner attained to fruition of the First Path(Trance):-"At that time the mother of Rahul was Sammillabhasini, and I myself was the ascetic."

Footnotes:

(1)No. 443.