4.2 The Story about the Elder Who Meditated on a Mirage
Marīcikammaṭṭhānikattherassa Vatthu
Dhp 46
CST4: Marīcikammaṭṭhānikattheravatthu
Burlingame: A Monk Attains Arahatship
Compare: Dhp-a 8.3
A bhikkhu who had been practising meditation saw a mirage, and realised this was similar to existence; he next saw froth on a river, with its bubbles bursting, and he realised existence is the same; the Buddha summed up his insight with a verse.
Keywords: Meditation, Insight, Impermanence
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“Knowing that this body is just like froth,” this Dhamma teaching was given by the Teacher while in residence at Sāvatthī with reference to a certain bhikkhu who meditated on a mirage.
This bhikkhu, we are told, obtained a subject of meditation from the Teacher and entered the forest for the purpose of practicing meditation.
On the way he saw a mirage. He said to himself: “Even as this mirage seen in the season of the heat appears substantial to those that are far off, but vanishes on nearer approach, so also is this existence unsubstantial by reason of birth and decay.” And fixing his mind on the mirage, he exercised himself in meditation on the mirage.
On his return, wearied with the journey, he bathed in the river Aciravatī and seated himself in the shade of a tree on the bank of the river near a waterfall. As he sat there watching great bubbles of foam rising and bursting, from the force of the water striking against the rocks, he said to himself: “Just so is this existence also produced and just so does it burst.” And this he took for his subject of meditation.
The Teacher, seated in his Perfumed Chamber, saw the elder and said: “Bhikkhu, it is even so. Like a bubble of foam or a mirage is this existence. Precisely thus is it produced and precisely thus does it pass away.” And when he had thus spoken, he pronounced the following verse:
46. Pheṇūpamaṁ kāyam-imaṁ viditvā,
marīcidhammaṁ abhisambudhāno,
chetvāna Mārassa papupphakāni,
adassanaṁ Maccurājassa gacche.
Knowing that this body is just like froth,
understanding it is like a mirage,
cutting off Māra’s flower-tipped arrows,
one should go beyond the King of Death’s sight.
At the conclusion of the verse the elder attained Arahatship, together with the analytic knowledges, and returned praising, glorifying and honouring the golden body of the Teacher.
