Ja 267 Kakkaṭajātaka cf. Morris in Contemporary Review 1881, vol. 89, p. 742; Cunningham, Stūpa of Bharhut, p1. xxv. 2.
The Birth Story about (the Immense) Crab (3s)
In the present a landowner goes into the country and is attacked by thieves, but his wife manages to secure his release. The Buddha tells a story of an immense crab who used to kill elephants, and how, when an elephant was once caught by the crab, his mate flattered the crab, and secured her husband’s release, which led to the crab’s destruction.
The Bodhisatta = the elephant (vāraṇa),
the laywoman = his elephant wife (kareṇukā).
Keywords: Faithfulness, Animals.
“Gold-clawed creature.”
We are told that a certain landowner of Sāvatthi, with his wife, was on a journey into the country for the purpose of collecting debts, when he fell among robbers. Now the wife was very beautiful and charming. The robber chief was so taken by her that he purposed killing the husband to get her. But the woman was good and virtuous, a devoted wife. She fell at the robber’s feet, crying, “My lord, if you kill my husband for love of me, I will take poison, or stop my breath, and kill myself too! With you I will not go. Do not kill my husband uselessly!” In this way she begged him off.
They both got back safe to Sāvatthi. Then it occurred to them as they passed the monastery in Jetavana, that they would visit it and salute the Teacher. So to the perfumed cell they went, and after salutation sat down on one side. The Teacher asked them where they had been. “To collect our debts,” they replied. “Did your journey pass off without mishap?” he asked next. “We were captured by robbers on the way,” said the husband, “and the chief wanted to murder me; but my wife here begged for me, and I owe my life to her.” Then said the Teacher, “You are not the only one, layman, whose life she has saved. In days of yore she saved the lives of other wise men.” And then at his request the Teacher told a story of the past.
In the past, when Brahmadatta was king of Benares, there was a great lake in the Himālayas, wherein was a great golden crab. Because he lived there, the place was known as the crab lake. The crab was very large, as big round as a threshing floor; it would catch elephants, and kill
Now the Bodhisatta was conceived by the mate of an elephant, the leader of a herd, living nearby this crab lake. The mother, in order to be safe till her delivery, sought another place on a mountain, and there she was delivered of a son; who in due time grew to years of wisdom, and was great and mighty, and prospered, and he was like a purple mountain of collyrium.
He chose another elephant for his mate, and he resolved to catch this crab. So with his mate and his mother, he sought out the elephant herd, and finding his father, proposed to go and catch the crab.
“You will not be able to do that, my son,” said he.
But he begged the father again and again to give him leave, until at last he said: “Well, you may try.”
So the young elephant collected all the elephants beside the crab lake, and led them close by the lake. “Does the crab catch them when they go down, or while they are feeding, or when they come up again?”
They replied, “When the beasts come up again.” “Well then,” said he, “do you all go down to the lake and eat whatever you see, and come up first; I will follow last behind you.” And so they did.
Then the crab, seeing the Bodhisatta coming up last, caught his feet tight in his claw, like a smith who seizes a lump of iron in a huge pair of tongs. The Bodhisatta’s mate did not leave him, but stood there close by him. The Bodhisatta pulled at the crab, but could not make him budge. Then the crab pulled, and drew him towards himself. At this in deadly fear the elephant roared and roared; hearing which all the other elephants, in deadly terror, ran off trumpeting, and dropping excrement. Even his mate could not stand, but began to make off.
1. “Siṅgī migo āyatacakkhunetto,
Aṭṭhittaco vārisayo alomo,
Tenābhibhūto kapaṇaṁ rudāmi,
Mā heva maṁ pāṇasamaṁ jaheyyā ti.”
“Hornéd creature having extended eyes, bones for skin, lying in water, hairless, overcome by him I cry wretchedly, you should not abandon me, dear as life.”
In this connection, hornéd creature means a golden creature with horns. There is some ambiguity about how to interpret this, as siṅgī means both golden and horned. With his two claws doing the duty of a horn, because of this he is horned, this is the meaning.
Creature, a crab is meant here by taking all the living beings as a whole.
Having extended eyes, here an eye in the sense that it sees, a guide It seems in English we do not have many useful synonyms for eye, but in Pāḷi there are numerous: eye, (nt.) akkhi, cakkhu, nayana, locana, netta, of which two are used here. in the sense of leading, what are considered extended eyes, his guides, this is having extended eyes, long eyed, this is the meaning.
Having bones doing the duty of skin, this is bones for skin.
Overcome by him, overcome, overwhelmed by that creature having been grabbed and fixed.
I cry wretchedly means having become pitiful I cry, I wail.
You should not abandon me, having met with such a disaster, being like your own life, you should not abandon your dear master.
Then his mate turned round, and repeated the second verse to his comfort:
2. “Ayya na taṁ jahissāmi, kuñjaraṁ saṭṭhihāyanaṁ,
Pathabyā cāturantāya suppiyo hosi me tuvan-ti.”
“Dear sir, I will not abandon you, elephant of sixty years, by the four quarters on the earth you are the one most dear to me.”
In this connection, of sixty years, after sixty years of life, the strength of elephants falls away, I do not abandon him who lost strength, who met with this disaster, do not fear, having come to the ocean in the four directions, through being based on the four quarters of this earth, you are most dear to me.
In this way she encouraged him; and saying: “Noble sir, now I will talk to the crab a while to make him let you go,” she addressed the crab in the third verse:
3. “Ye kuḷīrā samuddasmiṁ, Gaṅgāya Yamunāya ca,
Tesaṁ tvaṁ vārijo seṭṭho, muñca rodantiyā patin-ti.”
“Those crabs in the ocean, and in the Ganges and the Yamunā, of these you’re the best born in water, through my cries free my husband.”
This is the meaning: whatever crabs in the ocean, or in the Ganges, or in the Yamunā, of all these the handsomest, the greatest, the best, the supreme is you. Because of this I beg you: free my master through my cries.
As she spoke thus, the crab’s fancy was smitten with the sound of the female voice, and forgetting all fear he loosed his claws from the elephant’s leg, and suspected nothing of what he would do when he was set free. Then the elephant lifted his foot, and stepped upon the crab’s back; and at once his eyes startled out. The elephant shouted the joy-cry. Up ran the other elephants all, pulled the crab along and set him upon the ground, and trampled him to mincemeat. His two claws broken from his body lay apart. And this crab lake, being near the Ganges, when there was a flood in the Ganges, was filled with Ganges water; when the water subsided it ran from the lake into the Ganges. Then these two claws were lifted and floated along the Ganges. One of them reached the sea, the other was found by the ten royal brothers while playing in the water, and they took it and made of it the little drum called Ānaka. The Asuras found that which reached the sea, and made it into the drum called Āḷambara. These afterwards being worsted in battle with Sakka, ran off and left it behind. Then Sakka caused it to be kept for his own use; and it is of this they say, “There is thunder like the Āḷambara cloud!”
When this discourse was ended, the Teacher declared the Truths, and identified the Jātaka, at the conclusion of the Truths both husband and wife attained the Fruit of the First Path.