11.4 The Story about Many Vain Bhikkhus

11.4 The Story about Many Vain Bhikkhus
Sambahula-Adhimānikabhikkhūnaṁ Vatthu

Dhp 149

CST4: Sambahulaadhimānikabhikkhuvatthu

Burlingame: A Company of Over-Confident Monks

Some bhikkhus attained absorption and thinking they had Awakened they went to see the Buddha; the Buddha sent them to the charnel ground, and when they saw female corpses they realised they still had lust; the Buddha then gave them this teaching.

Keywords: Overestimation, Meditation, Death, Radiant Image

“Like discarded white gourds,” [29.335] {3.111} this Dhamma teaching was given by the Teacher while he was in residence at Jetavana with reference to a company of vain bhikkhus.

It seems that five hundred bhikkhus received a subject of meditation from the Teacher, went forth to the forest, and after striving and struggling, induced a state of absorption. Thereupon they thought to themselves: “By not indulging the defilements, we have fulfilled our religious duties. Let us inform the Teacher of the virtues we have acquired.” With this thought in mind, they set out.

When they arrived outside the gate, the Teacher said to Elder Ānanda: “Ānanda, these bhikkhus have no occasion for entering and seeing me. {3.112} Let them first go to the charnel ground and then come back and see me.” The elder went and told those bhikkhus what the Teacher had said.

Instead of asking: “Why should we have to go to the charnel ground?” they said to each other: “The far-seeing Buddha must have seen a reason.” Accordingly they went to the charnel ground and viewed the corpses there. For the corpses which had lain for one or two days, they conceived a repugnance; but the bodies laid there immediately after death, fresh and moist, excited their passions. At that moment they realized that the defilements still existed within them.

Thereupon the Teacher, still remaining seated in the Perfumed Chamber, sent forth a radiant image of himself, and as it were spoke face to face with those bhikkhus, saying: “Bhikkhus, is it fitting that upon beholding such an assembly of bones you should take pleasure in the pollutants?” So saying, he pronounced the following verse:

149. Yānimāni apatthāni alāpūneva sārade
kāpotakāni aṭṭhīni, tāni disvāna kā rati?

Like discarded white gourds
thrown away in autumn
are these grey bones; seeing
them, why is there delight?

At the end of the teaching those bhikkhus just as they stood there attained Arahatship, and having gone and praised the Fortunate One, they worshipped him.