Khuddaka Nikaya - Psalms of the Sisters - Psalms of Four Verses

Khuddaka Nikaya - Psalms of the Sisters ( Therigatha ) - Psalms of Four Verses



CANTO IV
PSALMS OF FOUR VERSES
XXXVII
Bhaddā of the Kapilas. 184
NOW she was born in the time of Padumuttara Buddha, in a clansman's house at
Haŋsavatī. Come to years of discretion, she heard the Master preach, and saw him
assign a Bhikkhunī the first rank among those who could recall previous lives.
Thereat she made her resolve, wishing that she, too, might acquire such a rank.
Working merit all her life, she was reborn, when no Buddha had arisen, in a
clansman's house at Benares, and in due course married.
Then one day a quarrel arose between her and her sister-in-law. And the latter
having given food to a Silent Buddha, Bhaddā thought, 'She will win glory for
this,' and taking the bowl from his hand, she filled it with mud instead of
food. The people said, 'Foolish woman! what has the Silent Buddha done to offend
you?' And she, ashamed of herself, took back the bowl, emptied and scrubbed it
with scented powder, filled it with the four sweet foods, and sprinkled it on
the top with ghee of the colour of a lotus-calyx. Handing it back, shining, to
the Silent Buddha, she registered a prayer: 'May I have a shining body like this
bowl!'
After many fortunate rebirths, she was reborn, in the time of Kassapa Buddha, at
Benares, as the daughter of the wealthy treasurer. But by the fruition of her
previous karma her body was of evil odour, and she was repulsive to others. Much
troubled thereby, she had her ornaments made into an ingot of gold, and placed
it in the Buddha's shrine, doing reverence with her hands full of lotuses.
Thereby her body, even in that birth, became fragrant and sweet. As a beloved
wife she did good all her life, was reborn in heaven to celestial joys, and at
length took birth as the daughter of the King of Benares. There she lived
gloriously, ministering to Silent Buddhas. When they passed away she was greatly
troubled, and left the world for ascetic practices. Dwelling in groves, she
practised Jhana, and was reborn in the Brahma heavens, and thence into the
family of a brahmin of the Kosiya clan at Sāgala.185 Reared in great state, she
was wedded to the young noble Pippali at the village of Mahā-tittha. When he
renounced the world she handed over her great wealth to her kinsfolk that she
too might go forth; and she dwelt five years in the Sophists' Grove,186 after
which she was ordained by Great Pajāpatī the Gotamid. Establishing insight, she
soon won Arahantship.
And she became an expert in knowledge of her past lives, through the surplus
force of her resolve (made in past ages), and was herein ranked first by the
Master when, seated in the Jeta Grove among the company of Ariyans,187 he
classified the Bhikkhunīs. One day she broke forth in a Psalm, recounting all
that she had wrought, accompanied by a eulogy of the virtues of the great Elder
Kassapa, 188 thus:
Son of the Buddha and his heir is he,
Great Kassapa, master of self, serene!
The vision of far, bygone days is his,
Ay, heaven and hell no secrets hold for him. (63)
Death too of rebirth hath he won, and eke
A seer is he of mystic lore profound.
By these three arms189 of learning doth he stand
Thrice-wise, 'mong gods and men elect, sublime. (64)

She too, Bhaddā the Kapilan–thrice-wise
And victor over death and birth is she–
Bears to this end her last incarnate frame,
For she hath conquered Mara and his host. (65)

We both have seen, both he and I, the woe
And pity of the world, and have gone forth.
We both are Arahants with selves well tamed.
Cool are we both, ours is Nibbana now! (66)



184 Dr. Neumann translates Kapilāni by 'the Blonde' (kapilo is auburn,
reddish), as if in keeping with the soubriquet of the other Bhaddā (Ps.
xlvi.). I have not done so because elsewhere a soubriquet is always explicitly
accounted for in the Commentary, and here nothing is said. Moreover, and this
is fairly conclusive, the Apadãna chronicle, quoted in the Commentary, makes
Bhaddā 'daughter of Kapilā the twice-born (brahmin).' Kapilānī, therefore,
refers to her family. and should be Kāpilānī. The Phayre and Paris MSS. of the
Therīgāthā both read Kāpilāni, so does Vin., iv., 290, 292.
185 On the three Sāgalas, see Rhys Davids, Buddhist India, p. 38. According to
the Apadāna this was the capital of the Maddas (cf. Ps. lii.). Mahātittha, the
'great ford,' was a brahmin village in Magadha.
186 Titthiyārāma, near the Jeta Grove at Sāvatthi.
187Defined in the Pitakas as meaning Buddhas, Silent Buddhas, and their
disciples. This judgment is the subject of Ang. Nik., i. 23-26.
188 Mahā-Kassapa became the leader of the Buddhist Order when the Buddha had
passed away. According to the Apadāna, Kassapa was identical with Pippali, her
husband, and had been her husband in three former lives. Kassapa was either
the family name or the personal name; Pippali either the personal or the local
name. See Dialogues, i. 193. His story is fully told in the Commentary on the
Psalms of the Brothers, and in that on Ang. Nik., i. 23.
189 The metaphor is not Buddhist. The Pali reads 'by these three wisdoms'
(etāhi tīhi vijjāhi). See Ps. xxii. 26. The case of Bhaddā is noteworthy as
being the only one where wife and husband–united for so many ages–act in
harmony up to the day when, having aided each other in donning the religious
dress, they leave the world together, then part on their several ways to the
Buddha, enjoying thereafter good comradeship in the Order. So she in the
Apadāna:
'Thereafter soon I won the rank of Arahant.
Ah! well for me who held the friendship wise and good
Of glorious Kassapa.'



Next: Canto V. Psalms of Five Verses