Buddhist birth stories; or, Jataka tales, Volume 1
Religion
Buddhist birth stories; or, Jataka tales, Volume 1
Jataka stories, English
But the Great Being collected scraps of food. And when he perceived
there was enough to support him, he left the city by the gate at which
he had entered. And seating himself, facing towards the East, under
the shadow of the Paṇḍava rock, he began to eat his meal. His stomach,
however, turned, and made as if it would come out of his mouth. Then,
though distressed by that revolting food, for in that birth he had
never even beheld such food with his eyes, he himself admonished
himself, saying, “Siddhattha, it is true you were born in a family
where food and drink were easily obtainable, into a state of life where
your food was perfumed third-season’s rice, with various curries of the
finest kinds. But ever since you saw one clad in a mendicant’s garb,
you have been thinking, ‘When shall I become like him, and live by
begging my food? would that that time were come!’ And now that you have
left all for that very purpose, what is this that you are doing?” And
overcoming his feelings, he ate the food.
The king’s men saw this, and went and told him what had happened.
Hearing what his messengers said, the king quickly left the city,
and approaching the Bodisat, was so pleased at the mere sight of his
dignity and grace, that he offered him all his kingdom.
The Bodisat said, “In me, O king! there is no desire after wealth
or sinful pleasures. It is in the hope of attaining to complete
enlightenment that I have left all.” And when the king gained not his
consent, though he asked it in many ways, he said, “Assuredly thou wilt
become a Buddha! Deign at least after thy Buddhahood to come to my
kingdom first.”
This is here concisely stated; but the full account, beginning, “I sing
the Renunciation, how the Wise One renounced the world,” will be found
on referring to the Pabbajjā Sutta and its commentary.
And the Bodisat, granting the king’s request, went forward on his
way. And joining himself to Āḷāra Kāḷāma, and to Uddaka, son of Rāma,
he acquired their systems of ecstatic trance. But when he saw that
that was not the way to wisdom, he left off applying himself to the
realization of that system of Attainment.[198] And with the intention
of carrying out the Great Struggle against sin, and showing his might
and resolution to gods and men, he went to Uruvela. And saying,
“Pleasant, indeed, is this spot!” he took up his residence there, and
devoted himself to the Great Struggle.[199]
And those five mendicants, Kondanya and the rest, begging their way
through villages, market towns, and royal cities, met with the Bodisat
there. And for six years they stayed by him and served him, while he
was carrying out the Great Struggle, with different kinds of service,
such as sweeping out the hermitage, and so on; thinking the while, “Now
he will become a Buddha! now he will become a Buddha!”
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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