AVADANA/JATAKA
TABLE OF CONTENTS:
Sigala Jataka
Mati Posaka
Jataka
Story of King Sivi
Vidhura Jataka
Story of King Surupa
Story of Bhuridatta
Kaccapavadana
Cula Nandiya Jataka
Kancanakkhanda Jataka
King Padmaka Jataka
Story of Manohara
Story of
Mandhatar
Samuddavanija
Jataka
Story
of
the Sibi King
Story
of
the Dharma Seeker
Story of Sambula
Story of
Rudrayana
Story of
Bhallatiya
Valahassa
Jataka
Story
of Maitrakanyaka
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The Story of
the Bodhisattva's birth as a tortoise is featured in the reliefs of the
first gallery balustrade, where a total of five panels present the
culminating scenes from a story called the Kaccapavadana.
In the Hindu
scriptures, the great sage Kasyapa (Sanskrit for toroise) is the father
of Aditya, the Sun. The solar nature of Kasyapa is particularly
appropriate representation for a past life of the Sakyamuni, who was
sometimes called the "Kinsman of the Sun" (Adityabandu). (1)
“There is a
curious custom connected with the relief of the turtle carrying the
shipwrecked people on its back. The many little figures have given
visitors the association with ‘a big family.’ The long neck of a
turtle, moreover, is often connected with a penis. Visitors to the
royal cemeteries at Kuta Gede, not far from Yogyakarta, may remember
the pond with its several turtles. In front of the Borobudur relief
showing the turtle, offerings of flowers and incense, for the sake of
childbearing, are often seen.” (2)
After a sea
monster had destroyed their sailing vessel, a group of shipwrecked
merchants were rescued by the Bodhisattva is his past life as a
tortoise, who allowed them to climb onto his back so that he could
carry them safely back to land. Tired from the strenuous swim, the
Bodhisattva quickly fell asleep. Upon awakening from his nap, the
Bodhisattva overheard the starving merchants say that they wished they
could eat the tortoise. Out of compassion for the hungry mariners, the
Bodhisattva offered his own body to the merchants as food.
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This story the
Master told about his cousin Devadatta while dwelling in the Bamboo
Grove (Venuvana). One day the brethren were talking amongst themselves
in the Hall of Truth: "Friend, the man Devadatta is harsh, cruel, and
tyrannical, full of baneful devices against the Supreme Buddha. He
flung a stone and even used the aid of Nagagiri against the Master.
There is no pity and compassion in him for the Tathagata!"
When the Master entered the Hall of Truth, he asked what they were
talking about. After the brethren told him, he said: "This is not the
first time, Brethren, that Devadatta has been harsh, cruel, and
merciless. He was so before."
The Buddha then related the following old-world tale:
 Once upon a time, when Brahmadatta
was king of Benares, the
Bodhisatta became a Monkey named Nandiya, or Jolly, and dwelt in the
Himalaya region with his youngest brother Jollikin. The two were in
charge of a band of eighty thousand monkeys. In addition, they had to
care for their blind mother in her home.
One day after leaving their mother in her lair in the bushes, the two
brothers went amongst the trees in search of sweet wild fruit of all
kinds so that they could sent it back home to her. But the messengers
that they despatched failed to deliver the fruit to their mother.
Tormented with hunger, she dwindled down to mere skin and bone.
When the Bodhisattva saw her in this deplorable condition he said:
"Mother, we sent you plenty of sweet fruits. Why then are you so thin?"
"My son, I never got it! "
The Bodhisatta pondered. "While I look after my herd, my mother will
perish! Therefore I must leave the herd to look after my mother."
Turning to
Jollikin, he said: "Brother, do you tend the herd, and I will care for
our mother."
"Nay, brother," replied Jollikin, "What care do I have for ruling a
herd? I too will care for only our mother!"
As the two brothers were of one mind, they leaving the herd, and
brought their mother down out of Himalaya. Taking up their abode in a
banyan tree of the borderland, they took good care of her.
At that time there was a certain Brahmin living at Takkasila. He had
received his education from a famous teacher who had the power of
divining the signs on a man's body. One day one of the Brahmin's pupils
announced that he would forthwith depart.
"My son, you are harsh, and cruel, and violent," replied the Brahmin.
"Not prospering during all seasons alike, such persons shall eventually
meet dire woe and their own destruction. Therefore, be not harsh, nor
do that of which you will afterwards repent." With this counsel, the
teacher let the pupil go.
After arriving in Benares, the youth married and settled down. Unable
to earn a livlihood by any other means, he eventually decided to live
by his bow. After departing Benares to earn his living as a huntsman,
he and his family took up residence in a border village. Thereafter he
ranged the woods girt with bow and quiver, supporting himself and his
family through the sale of the flesh of the various forest beasts that
he slew.
One day as he was heading home after a fruitless day of hunting in the
forest, he spied that very banyan tree where the two monkey brothers
lived with their old, blind mother.
"Perhaps," he thought, "there may be something over there."
Sitting just behind that tree were the two brothers together with their
mother. When they saw that cruel man coming their way, they hid amongst
the branches and thought: "If he sees our old, blind mother, what will
he do?"
When the cruel man came up to that banyan tree and saw the old, blind
mother monkey, he thought to himself: "Why should I return home
empty-handed?"
When the Bodhisattva saw that cruel man lifting up his bow to shoot his
mother, he said: "Jollikin, my dear. This man is going to shoot our
mother! I must save her life. When I am dead, you must take care of
her."
Then the Bodhisattva came out hiding and called out to the hunter: "0
man, don't shoot my mother for she is old, blind, and weak. Kill me
instead!"
After the hunter had agreed to spare his mother, the Bodhisattva sat
down in a place within bowshot and allowed the man to pitilessly slay
him. But as soon as the cruel man had shot the Bodhisattva dead, the
hunter raised his bow once again and prepared to strike down the mother
monkey as well.
When Jollikin saw this, he thought to himself: "Yon hunter wants to
shoot my mother. Even if she only lives one day more, she will have
received the gift of life. Therefore I will trade my life for hers."
Accordingly, he came down out of the tree's branches, and said: "0 man,
please don't shoot my mother! I shall trade my life for hers. Shoot
me--take both us brothers, but spare our mother's life!"
When the hunter consented, Jollikin squatted down within bowshot range,
and allowed the hunter to kill him.
Then thinking of his children at home, the hunter went back on his
promise and shot the monkey mother dead. After hanging all three bodies
on his carrying pole, he set out for home.
At that very moment, a thunderbolt struck the hunter's own house,
burning up his wife and two children, sparing nothing but the
dwelling's roof and bamboo uprights. As soon as the hunter entered his
home village, a resident sadly told him what had happened. Overcome
with sorrow for the loss of his wife and children, the hunter dropped
his game pole and his bow, threw off his garments. Wailing with
outstretched hands, he ran home naked.
When the hunter entered the remains of his house, the bamboo uprights
broke and the roof fell down and crushed his head. As the earth yawned
open to reveal the flames of hell, the hunter recalled his master's
warning: "This is the teaching that the Brahmin Parasariya gave to me!"
Lamenting his fate, the hunter uttered the following stanzas:
"I call to
mind my teacher's words:
so this was what he meant!
Be careful to do nothing of which you might repent.
Whatever a man does,
the same he in himself will find:
The good man, good;
and the evil man that evil he has designed.
For our deeds are all like seeds,
bringing forth fruit in kind."
Lamenting thus, he fell into the earth, thereafter coming to life in
the very depths of hell.
When the Master had ended his discourse concerning how Devadatta had
formerly been harsh, cruel, and merciless, he identified the Birth with
these words: "In those days Devadatta was the hunter, Sariputta was the
famous teacher, Ananda was Jollikin, the noble Lady Gotami was the
mother and I was the monkey Jolly." (4)
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"When
gladness fills the heart and fills the mind,
When righteousness is practised peace to win,
He who so walks shall gain the victory
And all the fetters utterly destroy."
While the Master
was staying at Savatthi he told the following story about a a young
gentleman who tradition says gave his heart to the precious Faith and
became a Brother after hearing the Master preach.
After that young man fhad decided to become a monk, his teachers and
masters proceeded to instruct him in the whole of the Ten Precepts of
Morality, one after the other. They expounded to him the Short, the
Medium, and the Long Moralities, set forth the Morality which rests on
self-restraint according to the Patimokkha, presented the Morality
which rests on self-restraint as to the Senses, and expojunded upon the
Morality which rests on a blameless walk of life as well as the
Morality which relates to the way a Brother may use the Requisites.
Thought the young beginner, "There is a tremendous lot of this
Morality and I shall undoubtedly fail to fulfil all that I have vowed.
What is the good of being a brother at all, if one cannot keep the
rules of Morality? Would not the better course be to re-enter the world
of a householder, take a wife and rear children, and live a life
devoted to almsgivinig and other good works?"
Saying that he proposed to return to the lower state of a layman, he
told his superiors that he wished to return his alms-bowl and robes.
"Well, if this is what you have decided to do, then at least take leave
of the Buddha before you go," said the young man's superiors, after
which they brought him before the Master in the Hall of Truth.
"Why, Brethren," said the Master, "are you bringing this Brother to me
against his will?"
"Sir," they replied "he says that the wide scope of Morality is more
than he can ever hope to observe, and it is for this reason that he
wants to give back his robes and bowl. That is why we have brought him
to you."
"But why, Brethren," asked the Master, "did you burden him with so
much? He can do what he can, but no more. Do not make this mistake
again. Now leave me to decide what should be done in this case."
Then, turning to the young Brother, the Master said, "Come, Brother,
why concern yourself with the mass of Morality. Do you think you could
obey just three moral rules!"
"Oh, yes, Sir."
"Well now, watch and guard the three avenues of the voice, the mind,
and the body. Do no evil whether in word, or thought, or act. Cease not
to be a Brother, but go hence and obey just these three rules."
"Yes, indeed, Sir I will keep them," exclaimed the glad young man, who
then returned to be with his teachers. And as that young man kept to
these three rules, he thought to himself, "My instructors had
endeavoured to teach me the whole of Morality. But because they were
not the Buddha, I was unable to grasp that they were saying. The
All-Enlightened One, however, by reason of his Buddhahood and because
he is the Lord of Truth, has expressed Morality using just only three
rules concerning the Avenues, and thereby helped me to understand it
quite clearly."
Having gained clear insight in a few days that young man attained
Arahatship. When the Brethren heard of that young man's attainment,
they spoke about it in the Hall of Truth. How marvellous, they cried,
was the Buddha for having furnished thier Brother with just three rules
that embodied the whole of Morality, thus allowing the young man to win
Arahatship.
Then the Buddha entered the hall, and after enquiring as to the subject
of their duscussion, said, "Brethren, even a heavy burthen becomes
light if taken piecemeal, just as the wise and good of past times, upon
finding a huge mass of gold too heavy to lift, first broke it up so
that the treasure could be taken away piece by piece."
The Master then related the following story:
Once on a time when Brahmadatta was reigning in Benares, the
Bodhisattva came to life as a farmer in a village. One day he wbegan to
plough in a field where a village had formerly stood. In bygone days, a
wealthy merchant had buried in this very field a huge bar of gold. It
was as thick round as a man's thigh, and four whole cubits in length.
When the Bodhisattva's plough struck this gold bar, it stuck fast to
it. Thinking that it must be the spreading root of a tree, he began to
dig it out. But after discovering its real nature, he set to work to
clean the dirt off the gold.
At sunset when the day's work done, he laid aside his plough and gear,
and attempted to shoulder his treasure-trove so that he might walk off
with it. But unable to so much as lift it, the Bodhisattva sat down on
the ground in front of it and began thinking of how he might put this
newly-discovered treasure to good use.
"I'll use so much to live on, and bury so much as a treasure. So much
will I use to trade with, and so much will I give away to charity as
well as donate for the performance of good works," he thought to
himself. Accordingly, he cut the gold bar into four pieces.
His division of the gold made his burden far more easy to carry. In
this way he was able to carry the lumps of gold off to his home. After
a life that was punctuated by charity and other good works, he passed
away to fare thereafter according to his deserts.
His lesson ended, the Master recited the following stanza:
"When gladness fills the heart and fills the mind,
When righteousness is practised Peace to win,
He who so walks shall gain the victory
And all the fetters utterly destroy."
And when the Master had thus led his teaching up to the recent
Arahatship of the Brother as its crowning point, he revealed the
connection and identified the Birth by saying: "In those days I myself
was the man who discovered that nugget of gold."
Footnotes
(1) See Elements
of
Buddhist Iconography by Ananda K. Coomaraswamy. According
to both the Theravada and Mahayana schools of Buddhism, Kasyapa is also
the name of the Buddha immediately preceding the Sakyamuni.
(2) Ageless
Borobudur by Dr. A. J. Bernet Kempers, p. 119. The fertility
association also segues nicely with the Story of Agastya, in which
Sakra uses the name of Kasyapa several times to refer to the Great
Sage, who we have already seen has his own fertility associations. In
Buddhist art, a gold-colored Kasyapa is sometimes shown seated on a
lion, which serves as his celestial mount (vahana).
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