Jataka Vol. II: Book III. Tika-Nipāta: No. 285. Maṇisūkara-Jātaka
p. 283
No. 285.
MAṆISŪKARA-JĀTAKA 1.
"To hell shall go he" etc.--This story the Master told at Jetavana, about the
murder of Sundarī. At that time we learn that the Bodhisatta was honoured and
respected. The circumstances were the same as in the Kandhaka 2; this is an
abstract of them. The brotherhood of the Blessed One had received gain and
honour like five rivers pouring in a mighty flood; the heretics, finding that
gain and honour came to them no longer, becoming dim like fireflies at sunrise,
they collected together, and took counsel: "Ever since the priest Gotama
appeared, our gain and glory has gone from us. Not a soul ever knows that we
exist. Who will help us to bring reproach on Gotama, and prevent him from
getting all this?" Then an idea occurred to them. "Sundarī will make us able to
do it." So when one day Sundarī visited the heretics' grove, they gave her
greeting, but said nothing more. She addressed them again and again, but
received no answer. "Has anything annoyed the holy fathers?" she asked. "Why,
sister," said they, "do not you see how the priest Gotama annoys us, depriving
us of alms and honour?" "What can I do about it?" she said. "You, sister, are
fair and lovely. You can bring disgrace upon Gotama, and your words will
influence a great many, [416] and you can thus restore our gains and good
repute." She agreed, and took her leave. After this she used to take flowers and
scents and perfumes, camphor, condiments and fruits, and at evening time, when a
great crowd had entered the city after hearing the Master's discourse, she would
set her face towards Jetavana. If any asked where she was going, she would say,
"To the Priest Gotama; I live with him in one perfumed chamber." Then she spent
the night in a heretical settlement, and in the morning entered the road which
led from Jetavana into the city. If any asked her where she was going, she
replied, "I have been with the priest Gotama in one perfumed chamber, and he
made love to me." After the lapse of some days they hired some ruffians to kill
Sundarī before Gotama's chamber and throw her body into the dust-heap. And so
they did. Then the heretics made a hue and cry after Sundarī, and informed the
king. He asked where their suspicions pointed. They answered that she had gone
the last few days to Jetavana, but what happened afterwards they did not know.
He sent them to search for her. Acting on this permission, they took his own
servants, and went to Jetavana, where they hunted about till they found her in
the dust-heap. Calling for a litter, they brought the body into the town, and
told the king that the disciples of Gotama had killed Sundarī, and thrown her in
the dust-heap, in order to cloak the sin of their Master. The king bade them
scour the city. All through the streets they went, crying, "Come and see what
has been done by the priests of the Sakya prince!" and came back to the palace
door. The king had placed the body of Sundarī upon a platform, and had it
watched in the cemetery. All the populace, except the holy disciples, went about
inside the town, outside the town, in the parks and in the woods, abusing the
Brethren, and crying out, "Come and see what the priests of the Sakya prince
have done!" The Brethren told all this to the Buddha. Said the Master, "Well, go
and reprove these people in these words:
p. 284
"To hell shall go he that delights in lies,
And he who having done a thing, denies:
[417] Both these, when death has carried them away,
As men of evil deeds elsewhere shall rise 1."
The king directed some men to find out whether Sundarī had been killed by
anybody else. Now the ruffians had drunk the blood-money, and were quarrelling
together. Said one to another, "You killed Sundarī with one blow, and then threw
her in the dust-heap, and here you are, buying liquor with the blood-money!"
"All right, all right," said the king's messengers; and they caught the ruffians
and dragged them before the king. "Did you kill herd" asked the king. They said,
yes, they did. "Who bade you?" "The heretics, my lord." The king had the
heretics summoned. "Lift up Sundarī," said he, "and carry her round the city,
crying as you go: 'This woman Sundarī wanted to bring disgrace upon the priest
Gotama; we had her murdered; the guilt is not Gotama's, nor his disciples’; the
guilt is ours!'" They did so. A multitude of the unconverted believed, and the
heretics were kept out of mischief by receiving the punishment for murder.
Thenceforward the Buddha's reputation grew greater and greater. And then one day
they began to gossip in the Hall of Truth: "Friend, the heretics thought to
blacken the Buddha, and they only blackened themselves: ever since, our gains
and glory have increased!" The Master came in, and asked what they were talking
about? They told him. "Brethren," said he, "it is impossible to make the Buddha
impure. Trying to stain the Buddha, is like trying to stain a gem of the first
water. In bygone ages people have wished to stain a fine jewel, and no matter
how they tried, they failed to do it." And he told them an old-world tale.
_____________________________
Once upon a time, when Brahmadatta was king of Benares, the Bodhisatta was born
into a Brahmin family. When he grew up, perceiving the suffering that arises
from desire, he went away, and traversed three ranges of Himalaya, where he
became a hermit, and lived in a hut of leaves.
Near his hut was a crystal cave, in which lived thirty Boars. Near the cave a
Lion used to range. [418] His shadow used to be reflected in the crystal. The
Boars used to see this reflection, and terror made them lean and thin-blooded.
Thought they, "We see the reflection because this crystal is clear. We will make
it dirty and discolour it." So they got some mud from a pool close by, and
rubbed and rubbed the crystal with it. But the crystal, being constantly
polished by the boars' bristles, got brighter than ever.
They did not know how to manage it; so they determined to ask the hermit how
they might sully the crystal. To him therefore they came, and after respectful
greeting, they sat down beside him, and gave utterance to these two verses:
"Seven summers we have been
Thirty in a crystal grot.
Now we are keen to dull the sheen--
But dull it we can not. p. 285
"Though we try with all our might
To obscure its brilliancy,
Still more bright shines forth the light,
What can the reason be?"
The Bodhisatta listened. Then he repeated the third stanza:
"’Tis precious crystal, spotless, bright, and pure;
No glass--its brilliancy for ever sure.
Nothing on earth its brightness can impair.
Boars, you had best betake yourselves elsewhere."
And so they did, on hearing this answer. The Bodhisatta lost himself in
rapturous ecstasy, and became destined to Brahma's world.
_____________________________
After this discourse was ended, the Master identified the Birth: "At that time,
I was the hermit."
Footnotes
283:1 Cf. Morris, Folk-lore Journal, iv. 58.
283:2 This story is given in Udānaṁ, iv. 8 (p. 43). Khandhakaṁ seems to mean the
Vinaya (Childers s. v., J. P. T. S. 1888 s. v.), but I cannot find the story
there.
284:1 Dhammapada, v. 306; Sutta Nipāta, v. 661.
Next: No. 286. Sālūka-Jātaka
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