Tipitaka >> Sutta Pitaka >> Khuddaka Nikaya >> Theragatha >> Thera(250):Telakani
Adapted from the Archaic Translation by Mrs. C.A.F. Rhys Davids.
Note: 'C' in Pali text is pronounced as 'ch' as in 'China'.
Chapter XVI.
Twenty Verses[]
250. Telakāni[]
He was reborn in this Buddha-age, before the Lord(Buddha)'s birth, at Sāvatthī, in a brahmin(priest) family, and named Telakāni. Matured as to antecedents, he wearied of worldly desires, and left the world as a wandering recluse. Seeking for emancipation(nirvana) of spirit, he toured about, thinking: 'Who is he in the world who has got beyond?' and asking questions of recluses and brahmins(priests) without receiving satisfaction. Meanwhile our Exalted One(Buddha) had arisen, and was rolling the Path(Dhamma)-Wheel, working the good of the world. Him one day Telakāni heard, and found faith, was initiated in monks order, and not long after won arahantship(enlightenment).
Sitting one day with bhikkhus(monks), and remembering his own toiling and winning, he declared it all to them thus:
[747] Cirarattaɱ matātāpī dhammaɱ anuvicintayaɱ,||
Samaɱ cittassa nālatthaɱ pucchaɱ samaṇabrāhmaṇe.|| ||
[748] Ko [74] so pāraŋgato loke ko patto amatogadhaɱ,||
Kassa dhammaɱ paṭicchāmi paramatthavijānanaɱ.|| ||
[749] Antovaŋkagato āsi macchova ghasamāmisaɱ,||
Baddho3 mahindapāsena vepacittyasuro yathā.|| ||
[750] Añchāmi naɱ na muñcāmi asmā sokapariddavā,||
Ko me bandhaɱ muñcaɱ loke sambodhiɱ vedayissati.|| ||
[751] Samaṇaɱ brāhmaṇaɱ vā kaɱ ādisantaɱ pabhaŋgunaɱ,||
Kassa dhammaɱ paṭicchāmi jarāmaccupavāhanaɱ.|| ||
[752] Vicikicchākaŋkhāgathitaɱ sārambhabalasaññutaɱ,||
Kodhappattamanatthaddhaɱ abhijappappadāraṇaɱ.|| ||
[753] Taṇhādhanusamuṭṭhānaɱ dve ca pannarasāyutaɱ,||
Passa orasikaɱ bāḷhaɱ bhetvā yadi tiṭṭhati.|| ||
[754] Anudiṭṭhīnaɱ appahānaɱ saŋkappaparatejitaɱ,||
Tena viddho pavedhāmi pattaɱ'va māluteritaɱ.|| ||
[755] Ajjhattaɱ me samuṭṭhāya khippaɱ paccati māmakaɱ,||
Chaphassāyatanī kāyo yattha sarati sabbadā.|| ||
[756] Taɱ na passāmi tekicchaɱ yo metaɱ sallamuddhare,||
Nānārajjena satthena nāññena vicikicchitaɱ.|| ||
[757] Ko me asattho avaṇo sallamabbhantarapassayaɱ,||
Ahiɱsaɱ sabbagattānā sallaɱ me uddharissataɱ.|| ||
[758] Dhammappati hi so seṭṭho visadosappavāhako,||
Gambhīfara patitassa me thalaɱ pāṇiɱ ca dassaye.|| ||
[759] Rahade'hamasmi ogāḷho ahāriyarajamattike,||
Māyāusūyasārambha thīnamiddhamapatthaṭe.|| ||
[760] Uddhaccameghathanitaɱ saññojanavalāhakaɱ,||
Vāhā vahanti duddiṭṭhiɱ saŋkappā rāganissitā.|| ||
[761] Savanti sabbadhi sotā latā ubbhijja tiṭṭhati,||
Te sote ko nivāreyya taɱ lataɱ ko hi checcati.|| ||
[762] Velaɱ karotha bhaddante sotānaɱ sannivāraṇaɱ,||
Mā te manomayo soto rukkhaɱ'va sahasā luve.|| ||
[763] Evaɱ me bhayajātassa apārā pāramesato,||
Tāṇo paññāvudho satthā isisaŋghanisevito.|| ||
[764] Sopāṇaɱ sukataɱ suddhaɱ dhammasāramayaɱ daḷaɱ,||
Pādāsi vuyhamānassa 'mā bhāyī' ti ca abravī.|| ||
[765] Satipaṭṭhānapāsādaɱ āruyha paccavekkhisaɱ,||
Yaɱ taɱ pubbe amaññisisaɱ sakkāyābhirataɱ pajaɱ.|| ||
[766] Yadā ca maggamaddakkhiɱ nāvāya abhirūhanaɱ,||
Anadhiṭṭhaya attānaɱ titthamaddakkhimuttamaɱ.|| ||
[767] Sallaɱ attasamuṭṭhānaɱ bhavanettipabhāvitaɱ,||
Etesaɱ appavattāya desesi maggamuttamaɱ.|| ||
[768] Dīgharattānusayitaɱ cirarattamadhiṭṭhitaɱ,||
Buddho me pānudī ganthaɱ visadosappavāhano' ti.|| ||
[747] Oh the long days I busied about in thought,
Ardent to find truth [that could set me free]![1]
No peace of mind I won, [but up and down
I moved about,] asking of brahmin(priest) and recluse:
[748] [299] 'What man in all the world has got beyond?
Who in the Ambrosial has a foothold won?[2]
Whose doctrine can I to my bosom take,
By which the Highest[3] I may come to know?'
[749] Caught on a hook within, my spirit hung
Even as a fish that swallows baited food.
Captured I lay, as Vepachitti(demon king) once,
The Asura(demon), in mighty Indra's toils.[4]
[750] I dragged my chains along, nor found release
From this [unending source of] grief and dole.
Is there no man on earth who can unloose
My bonds, and make me know Enlightenment?
[751] What brahmin(priest), what recluse can tell me how
To break them off? Whose Path(Dhamma) can I accept,
Able to bear away old age and death?
[752] See this load! coil of perplexity
And doubt, the mortal force of it
Wearing the temper, stiffening the mind,
And lacerating with a vast desire,
[753] Fell offshoot from the bow of craving, due
To [forms of false opinion,] twice fifteen[5] -
See, I say, how mightily about
My breast this pressure crushes where it lies![6]
[754] The ruck of vain opinions[7] not put off
[300] But quickened by foud hopes and memories:[8]
By this transfixed I stagger to and fro,
And quiver as a leaf blown by the wind.
[755] it is from within me that has sprung the dart,[9]
From where swiftly is consumed this self of me,[10]
Even this body with its sixfold field
Of contact, where it did proceed always.
[756] I see him not, that surgeon skilled, who can
Extract the dart and clean me of my doubts
By subtle probe, and not by other knife.[11]
[757] Can any one, without or knife or wound,
Leaving the members of me all unharmed,
Draw out this shaft that's stuck within my heart?
[758] Master of Dhamma(path), he, the Best,
Who can the venom's fever-harm disperse,
Who, were I fallen in the deep, could show
A hand and[12] point where shallows sloped to land.
[759] Yes, in a pool it is that I am plunged,
A pit of dust and mire undrainable,
Extended wide with treacherous counterfeit,
Envy and overstrain,[13] torpor and sloth.
[760] [301] Thunder of thought distracted overhead,
And fetters cloud about my path: -
The rush of lust-borne impulse and intent
Did there sweep me - to a sceptic's doom.[14]
[761] And everywhere the streams are flowing by,
And ever growing the creeper stands -
Those streams whose strength avails to stop?
That creeper who can sever from its root?[15]
[762] Make you[16] a dyke, good sir, to dam the streams;
See that the mind's strong current ruthlessly
Dash you not hence like any log away!
[763] it was even so for me who sought in fear,
On this side for the distant shore, when He,
The Lord(Buddha), followed by his saintly followers,
[764] He the true Refuge, and with insight armed,
Held out to me a stairway, strongly made,
And firm, made of the Path(Dhamma)'s pure heart of oak,[17]
And to me toiling spoke: 'Be not afraid!'
[765] I climbed up to the terrace where the mind
Alert and vigilant applies itself,[18]
From there I could contemplate the sons of men
Delighting in that sense of 'I' and 'mine,'[19]
In which I once was wont to nurse conceits.
[766] And when I saw the Way, even the ship
On which to embark, and lived no more on Self,
it was then that I saw Nibbāna's shore.[20]
[767] [302] The dart that sprang from self, offshoot of her
Who to becoming leads[21] - to stop all that
The perfect Path [the Ariyan] he taught.
[768] The knotted bonds long buried in my life,
Fixed up about me for so many years,
The Buddha loosed and threw them off from me,
And every poison canker cleaned away.
[1] So the Commentary, vimuttidhammaɱ, vimokkhadhammo.
[2] 'In this world among those who are acknowledged as religious teachers, who now has gone up to Nibbāna beyond Saŋsāra (i.e., consecutive livings and dyings)? Who is established in Nibbāna, in the path of emancipation?' (Commentary).
[3] Paramattha, the supreme good, or meaning.
[4] See Saɱy. Nik., i. 220, Ī 4.
[5] According to the Commentary, the 'twice fifteen' refers to the twenty forms (6 x 4) of sakkāyadiṭṭhi, or body-self-view (Dh. S., Ī 1003 = Bud. Psy., p, 259), and the ten forms of micchādiṭṭhi (Vibhanga, p 392).
[6] I read with the Commentary bāḷhaɱ and tiṭṭhati.
[7] The word anudiṭṭhīnaɱ is paraphrased by anudiṭṭhīnaɱ ... sassatadiṭṭhi ādīnaɱ.
[8] The Commentary reads sankappa-paratejitaɱ ... micchāvitakkena parajane ... ussāhitaɱ. The other reading, sankappasara-tejitaɱ, seems more intelligible and less forced in construction. There is an approximate precedent in sarasankappā (Majjh. Nik., i. 458; Saɱy. Nik., iv. 76). Lit., the 'not putting off' is 'quickened.'
[9] Stress is laid in the Commentary on the wound being self-inflicted, much in the style of Christ's words: '... those things which ... come forth from the heart; ... they defile the man' (Matt. xv. 18).
[10] Māmakarɱ = mama santakaɱ attabhāvaɱ.
[11] 'Doubts,' as 'the dart,' are here said to typify the entire group of kilesas (lit., torments, cankers; cf. Bud. Psy., 327, n.). The probe, nānārajja, is paraphrased by esanī-salākā. Ahiŋsaɱ = abādhento.
[12] The Commentary reads pāṇiñ ca.
[13] Sārambha (cf. verse 752) is explained by karakuttariya-lakkhaṇo.
[14] The Commentary interprets vāhā vahanti as 'a rush of great waters carrying me to the doom-ocean.' Cf. Jāt., v. 888 f.; Dhp., ver. 339 f.
[15] These are standard similes for 'craving' (taṇhā). Cf. verse 1094.
[16] Karotha is 'make you,' but one meets with this inflexion in the singular sense, such as the context demands.
[17] Lit., 'made of the essence of the Path(Dhamma).'
[18] Satipaṭṭhāna-pāsādaɱ.
[19] Sakkāya, paraphrased as ahaɱ mamāti.
[20] Titthaɱ uttamaɱ - lit., best or supreme shore - paraphrased by 'the landing-place of the ambrosial great-beyond, called Nibbāna.'
[21] Taṇhā. See p. 292, n. 1. Pabhāvitaɱ = samuṭṭhitaɱ (Commentary).