12.4 The Story about the Elder, the Mother of Kumāra Kassapa
Kumārakassapamātuttherīvatthu

“For the self is the friend of self,” this Dhamma teaching was given by the Teacher while he was in residence at Jetavana with reference to the mother of Elder Kumāra Kassapa.

4a Birth of Kumāra Kassapa

It seems that she was the daughter of a rich man in the city of Rājagaha. From the time she reached the age of reason, she sought permission to go forth, but although she asked her mother and father again and again, she failed to obtain from them permission to go forth. {3.145}

On reaching marriageable age, she married, went to live in her husband’s household, and amid the cares of the household life proved a devoted wife. Now in no long time she conceived a child in her womb. But she knew not that she was pregnant. Winning the favor of her husband, she asked to go forth and obtained his permission to do so. So, not knowing that she was pregnant, he conducted her with great pomp to the community of bhikkhunīs, and obtained for her the going forth at the hands of the bhikkhunīs belonging to the faction of Devadatta.

After a time the bhikkhunīs observed that she was pregnant. They said: “What does this mean?” She replied: “Noble sisters, I know not what this may mean, but this I know for certain, that my chastity is unimpaired.” So the bhikkhunīs conducted her to Devadatta, and said to him: “This bhikkhunī went forth through faith. We know not when she conceived this child. What, therefore, shall we do?” Devadatta thought only: “Let not reproach be cast upon the bhikkhunīs who receive instruction from me.” Therefore he said: “Expel her from the Saṅgha.” When the young bhikkhunī heard those words of [29.357] Devadatta, she said: “Noble sisters, do not ruin me. I did not go forth at the instance of Devadatta. Come, conduct me to the Teacher at Jetavana.”

Accordingly they took her with them, went to Jetavana, and laid the matter before the Teacher. Now, although the Teacher knew that she had conceived the child when she was living in the world, yet, for the purpose of disproving the false accusation, he summoned King Pasenadi Kosala, Mahā Anāthapiṇḍika, Culla Anāthapiṇḍika, Visākhā the female lay disciple, and other great personages, giving the following orders to the Elder Upāli: “Go clear this young woman of the charge against her in the midst of the fourfold assembly.”

The elder caused Visākhā to be summoned before the king and put the case into her hands. Visākhā caused a curtain to be drawn about the young woman, and within the curtain made an examination of her hands, feet, {3.146} navel, belly, and extremities. Then she computed the months and days, and perceiving that the young woman had conceived the child when she was living in the world, informed the elder of that fact. Thereupon the elder proclaimed her innocence in the midst of the fourfold assembly. After a time she brought forth a son, strong and mighty, for whom she had prayed at the feet of the Buddha Padumuttara.

Now one day, as the king was passing near the community of bhikkhunīs, he heard the cry of a child. “What is that?” he asked. “Your majesty,” they replied, “a certain bhikkhunī has given birth to a child; that is the sound of his voice.” So the king took the boy to his own house and committed him to the care of his daughters. On the day appointed for the naming of the child, they gave him the name Kassapa. But because he had been brought up in princely state all the people called him Kumāra Kassapa (Prince Kassapa).

One day on the playground he struck some boys. They cried out: “We have been struck by that one who is motherless and fatherless.” Kassapa immediately ran to the king and said to him: “Your majesty, they say I have neither mother nor father; tell me who my mother is.” The king pointed to his daughters and said: “There are your mothers.” But the boy replied: “I have not so many mothers as that; by right I should have only one mother; tell me who she is.” The king thought to himself: “It is impossible to deceive this boy.” So he said to him: “Dear boy, your mother is a bhikkhunī, and I brought you here from the bhikkhunīs’ monastery.”

No more than this was needed to arouse deep emotion in the heart [29.358] of the boy. He immediately said: “Dear friend, obtain for me admission to the Saṅgha.” – “Very well, dear boy,” replied the king. So with great pomp he conducted the boy to the Teacher and had him go forth. After he had taken higher ordination he became known as Elder Kumāra Kassapa. Receiving a subject of meditation from the Teacher, he went forth to the forest. But although he strove and struggled with might and main, he was unable to develop distinction. So, thinking to himself: “I will obtain a subject of meditation from the Teacher better suited to my needs,” he returned to the Teacher and took up his residence in Andha Grove.

Now a bhikkhu who, in the time of the Buddha Kassapa, had performed his meditations alone and had attained the fruition of the Non-returner, and had been reborn in the world of Brahma returned from the world of Brahma, and asked Kumāra Kassapa fifteen questions, but sent him away with the words: “None other than the Teacher can resolve these questions. Go to the Teacher and get their solution.” Kumāra Kassapa did so, and at the end of the answers to the questions he attained Arahatship. BG: See MN 23. {3.147}

4b Mother and Son Meet

Now for twelve years following Kassapa’s retirement from the world, tears streamed from the eyes of the bhikkhunī, his mother. With face wet with the tears she shed because of the suffering caused her by separation from her son, she went on her rounds for alms. One day she saw her son the elder in the street. Crying out: “My son! My son!” she ran to meet him, and falling at his feet, rolled on the ground. Milk streamed from her breasts, and her robe was wet, as she rose from the ground and took the elder in her arms.

The elder thought to himself: “If she receives kindly words from me, it will mean her undoing; therefore I will speak harshly to her.” So he said to her: “What are you about? Can you not put away human affection?” Thought the mother: “How like a brigand he talks!” And she said to him: “Dear son, what say you?” But he only repeated again the same harsh words. Thereupon she thought: “Ah, because of him I have not been able to restrain my tears for twelve years! But he has hardened his heart towards me; why should I have anything to do with him any more?” And then and there, [29.359] uprooting affection for her son, on that very day she attained Arahatship.

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Some time afterwards the bhikkhus began a discussion in the Dhamma Hall: “Devadatta all but destroyed Kumāra Kassapa, who had the supporting conditions for Stream-entry, and the bhikkhunī, his mother; but the Teacher became their refuge. Oh, how great is the compassion of the Buddhas for the world!” {3.148}

At that moment the Teacher approached and asked them: “Bhikkhus, what subject are you discussing now, as you sit here all gathered together?” When they told him, he said: “Bhikkhus, this is not the first time I have been their refuge and defense. I was their refuge in a previous state of existence also.” So saying, he related in detail

The Birth Story about the Deer (Named) Nigrodha Ja 12. AJ: I include the story here, the commentary has only the verse.

In the past, when Brahmadatta was reigning in Benares, the Bodhisatta was born a deer. At his birth he was golden of hue; his eyes were like round jewels; the sheen of his horns was as of silver; his mouth was red as a bunch of scarlet cloth; his four hoofs were as though lacquered; his tail was like the yak’s; and he was as big as a young foal. Attended by five hundred deer, he dwelt in the forest under the name of king Nigrodha (Banyan). And nearby him dwelt another deer also with an attendant herd of five hundred deer, who was named Sākha (Branch), and was as golden of hue as the Bodhisatta.

In those days the king of Benares was passionately fond of hunting, and always had meat at every meal. Every day he mustered the whole of his subjects, townsfolk and countryfolk alike, to the detriment of their business, and went hunting.

Thought his people: “This king of ours stops all our work. Suppose we were to sow food and supply water for the deer in his own pleasure gardens, and, having driven in a number of deer, to fence them in and deliver them over to the king!” So they sowed in the pleasure gardens grass for the deer to eat and supplied water for them to drink, and opened the gate wide. Then they called out the townsfolk and set out into the forest armed with sticks and all manner of weapons to find the deer. They surrounded about a league of forest in order to catch the deer within their circle, and in so doing surrounded the haunt of the Nigrodha and Sākha.

As soon as they perceived the deer, they proceeded to beat the trees, bushes and ground with their sticks till they drove the herds out of their lairs; then they rattled their swords and spears and bows with so great a din that they drove all the deer into the pleasure gardens, and shut the gate. Then they went to the king and said: “Sire, you put a stop to our work by always going hunting; so we have driven deer enough from the forest to fill your pleasure gardens. Henceforth feed on them.”

Hereupon the king betook himself to the pleasure gardens, and in looking over the herd saw among them two golden deer, to whom he granted immunity. Sometimes he would go of his own accord and shoot a deer to bring home; sometimes his cook would go and shoot one. At first sight of the bow, the deer would dash off trembling for their lives, but after receiving two or three wounds they grew weary and faint and were slain.

The herd of deer told this to the Bodhisatta, who sent for Sākha and said: “Friend, the deer are being destroyed in great numbers; and, though they cannot escape death, at least let them not be needlessly wounded. Let the deer go to the block by turns, one day one from my herd, and next day one from yours – the deer on whom the lot falls to go to the place of execution and lie down with its head on the block. In this wise the deer will escape wounding.” The other agreed; and thenceforth the deer whose turn it was, used to go and lie down with its neck ready on the block. The cook used to go and carry off only the victim which awaited him.

Now one day the lot fell on a pregnant doe of the herd of Sākha, and she went to Sākha and said: “Lord, I am with young. When I have brought forth my little one, there will be two of us to take our turn. Order me to be passed over this turn.” – “No, I cannot make your turn another’s,” said he, “you must bear the consequences of your own fortune. Begone!”

Finding no favour with him, the doe went on to the Bodhisatta and told him her story. And he answered, “Very well; you go away, and I will see that the turn passes over you.” And therewithal he went himself to the place of execution and lay down with his head on the block. The cook cried out on seeing him: “Why here’s the king of the deer who was granted immunity! What does this mean?” And off he ran to tell the king. The moment he heard of it, the king mounted his chariot and arrived with a large following. “My friend the king of the deer,” he said on beholding the Bodhisatta, “did I not promise you your life? How comes it that you are lying here?”

“Sire, there came to me a doe big with young, who prayed me to let her turn fall on another; and, as I could not pass the doom of one on to another, I, laying down my life for her and taking her doom on myself, have laid me down here. Think not that there is anything behind this, your majesty.”

“My lord, the golden king of the deer,” said the king, “never yet saw I, even among men, one so abounding in patience, loving-kindness and sympathy as you. Therefore am I pleased with you. Arise! I spare the lives both of you and of her.”

“Though two be spared, what shall the rest do, O king of men?” – “I spare their lives too, my lord.” – “Sire, only the deer in your pleasure gardens will thus have gained immunity; what shall all the rest do?” – “Their lives too I spare, my lord.” – “Sire, deer will thus be safe; but what will the rest of four-footed creatures do?” – “I spare their lives too, my lord.” – “Sire, four-footed creatures will thus be safe; but what will the flocks of birds do?” – “They too shall be spared, my lord.” – “Sire, birds will thus be safe; but what will the fishes do, who live in the water?” – “I spare their lives also, my lord.”

After thus interceding with the king for the lives of all creatures, the Great Being arose, established the king in the five precepts, saying: “Walk in righteousness, great king. Walk in righteousness and justice towards parents, children, townsmen, and countryfolk, so that when this earthly body is dissolved, you may enter the bliss of heaven.” Thus, with the grace and charm that marks a Buddha, did he teach the Dhamma to the king. A few days he tarried in the pleasure gardens for the king’s instruction, and then with his attendant herd he passed into the forest again.

And that doe brought forth a fawn fair as the opening bud of the lotus, who used to play about with Sākha deer. Seeing this his mother said to him: “My child, don’t go about with him, only go about with the herd of the Nigrodha deer.” And by way of exhortation, she repeated this verse:

Associate with Nigrodha,
associate not with Sākha,
better is death with Nigrodha,
than is having life with Sākha.

Then said the Teacher, identifying the characters in the Birth Story: “At that time Sākha was Devadatta, and Sākha’s herd was the retinue of Devadatta; the doe that reached her turn was the bhikkhunī; her fawn was Kumāra Kassapa; and the Nigrodha, the king of the deer, who offered his life for the doe with young, was I myself.”

And praising the bhikkhunī for uprooting affection for her son and for establishing herself as a refuge for herself, he said: “Bhikkhus, inasmuch as the goal of heaven or the goal of the paths which one man has earned for himself cannot become the property of another, therefore self is the refuge of self. How can one man be the refuge of another?” So saying, he pronounced the following verse:

160. Attā hi attano nātho, ko hi nātho paro siyā?
Attanā va sudantena nāthaṁ labhati dullabhaṁ.

For the self is the friend of self,
for what other friend would there be?
When the self has been well-trained, one
finds a friend that is hard to find.

At the end of the teaching many reached the fruition of Stream-entry and so on.