12.8 The Story about the Elder Kāla

Dhp 164

Burlingame: The Jealous Monk

Elder Kāla was a good teacher but sought to prevent his supporter from listening to the Buddha, thinking she would abandon him; she went to listen anyway, and he followed her, thinking to persuade the Buddha not to teach deep teachings to her; the Buddha rebuked him and spoke a verse.

Keywords: Jealousy, Monastics, Listening to Dhamma, Reviling

“Whoever reviles the worthy teaching,” this Dhamma teaching was given by the Teacher while he was in residence at Jetavana with reference to Elder Kāla. [29.364]

In Sāvatthī, it seems, a certain woman used to minister to this elder with the tenderness of a mother for a son. Now the family who lived in the house next door went one day to hear the Teacher teach the Dhamma, and when they returned, they uttered words of praise, saying: “Oh, how wonderful are the virtues of the Buddhas! Oh, how pleasing is the teaching of the Dhamma!” After listening to their words of praise, this woman said to the elder: “Venerable Sir, I too wish to hear the Teacher teach the Dhamma.” But he dissuaded her from going, saying: “Do not go there.” Likewise on the second day and on the third day he dissuaded her from going, but in spite of his efforts to dissuade her, she still desired to hear the Teacher teach the Dhamma.

Now why was it that he dissuaded her from going? This, we are told, was the thought in his mind: “If she hears the Teacher teach the Dhamma, she will have no more use for me.” One day early in the morning, after she had eaten her breakfast, she observed the Observance Day and went to the monastery, enjoining the following command upon her daughter: “Dear daughter, minister faithfully to the noble elder.” When the elder came to the house, the daughter served him with food. “Where has the eminent female lay disciple gone?” asked the elder. “She has gone to the monastery to hear the Dhamma,” replied the daughter. {3.156}

When the elder heard that, the fire of hatred flamed up in his belly and consumed him. “Now she has broken with me,” exclaimed the elder, and went quickly to the monastery. When he saw the woman listening to the Teacher teach the Dhamma, he said to the Teacher: “Venerable Sir, this stupid woman does not understand your subtle discourse on the Dhamma. One ought rather to teach to her on the duty of almsgiving and on the moral precepts.”

The Teacher, perceiving his motive, said: “Vain man, because of your own wrong views, you revile the dispensation of the Buddhas. But in so doing you strive only to your own hurt.” So saying, he pronounced the following verse:

164. Yo sāsanaṁ arahataṁ Ariyānaṁ Dhammajīvinaṁ
paṭikkosati dummedho diṭṭhiṁ nissāya pāpikaṁ,
phalāni kaṭṭhakasseva attaghaññāya phallati.

Whoever reviles the worthy teaching
of the Noble Ones who live by Dhamma,
that stupid one, depending on wrong views,
like the bamboo when it bears fruit,
brings about his own destruction.

At the end of the teaching the female lay disciple was established in the fruition of Stream-entry, and those who had assembled also had benefit from the Dhamma teaching.