falsely claim to be walking. Explain what you mean by
this, great monk: how is it that you have stopped and I
have not.”
And he answered me:
“Angulimāla, I have stopped forever: I abstain from
doing harm to living things; I am at rest and wander in
Samsāra no more. But you, you who still rage against all
living things, must wander ceaselessly from one place of
suffering to another.”
I answered again:
“That we wander forever, I have of course heard
— but that about standing still, about wandering no more,
I do not understand. Venerable Sir, please explain to me
what you have just expressed in these few words. See, I
have put my spear from me and solemnly swear to grant
you peace.”
“For the second time, Angulimāla,” he said, “you
have sworn falsely.”
“For the second time?”
“The first time it happened was at that false Rite of
Truth.”
That he should have known of that secret matter
was not the smallest of these marvels to me; but, without
pausing over that, I made haste to defend my crafty deed.
“My words, Venerable Sir, were certainly somewhat
ambiguous on that occasion but I swore nothing
false — only the sense was misleading. That, however,
which I swear to you now is true literally and in fact.”
“Not so,” he answered, “for you can grant me no
peace. It would be good, however, for you if you allowed
yourself to experience peace instead.”
As he spoke thus, he turned round and motioned
to me with a friendly gesture to approach.
“Willingly, Venerable Sir,” I humbly said.
“Listen, then, and pay close attention.”
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He sat down in the shade of a large tree and bade
me seat myself before him. He began to teach me of
wholesome and unwholesome deeds, and of their conse‐
quences, all the time explaining everything as fully to me
as when one speaks to a child. I had not listened to words
so brimming with deep wisdom since I had sat in the
forest by night at the feet of Vājashravas, of whom I have
already spoken to you and whose name, I imagine, you
have also heard from others.
But when this holy man now revealed to me that
no arbitrary heavenly power but our own hearts alone,
with the thoughts and deeds emanating from them, cause
us to be born now here, now there, at one time on earth,
at another in heaven and then again in hell — I could not
help thinking about Vājashravas and of the way in which
he had proved to us by reasons of common sense, and by
reference to the sacred writings, that there could be no
such hell‐punishments. And that all the passages in the
sacred writings having reference to such, had been inter‐
polated by weak and cowardly people in order that by
such threats they might terrify the strong and courageous,
and protect themselves from the violence of the latter.
“Vājashravas was never quite able to convince
me,” I thought, “I wonder whether this monk will be able
to do so — here stands opinion against opinion, scholar
against scholar. For even if this monk should be one of the
great disciples of the Son of the Sākyans, yet Vājashravas
was also highly thought of by his own followers and now,
after his death, is even worshipped by the common
people as a saint. Who, then, is to decide as to which of
these two is in the right?”
“You are no longer attending to what I say,
Angulimāla,” said the monk, “you are thinking of
Vājashravas and his erroneous doctrines.”
Much astonished, I acknowledged the truth of
265
what he said.
“So you, Venerable Sir, also knew my friend
Vājashravas?”
“People showed me his grave outside the city gate,
and I saw foolish travellers offering up prayers there
under the delusion that he was a saint.”
“So he is no saint, then?”
“Well, if he seems one to you, let us visit him and
see how it fares now with his sainthood.”
He said this as though it were a matter of going
from one house to another.
Thoroughly taken aback, I stared at him. “Visit him?
Vājashravas? How is that possible?”
“Give me your hand,” he said, “and I shall enter
into that state of meditative absorption by the aid of which
the path that leads to the gods and that which leads to the
demons becomes visible to a steadfast heart. Then we
shall follow in his track and what I see, you shall also see.”
I gave him my hand. For some time he sat there
perfectly still, his eyes cast down, the vision directed
inward — I was conscious of nothing. Suddenly, however,
I felt as a swimmer would feel when the demon who
dwells in the waters seizes his arm and draws him down,
so that the blue heavens and the trees on the bank disap‐
pear and the waves meet over his head, and darkness that
grows ever deeper closes round him on every side.
From time to time, however, tongues of flame
flared up around me and a mighty roaring thundered in
my ears. Finally, I found myself in what seemed to be a
vast cave, where it was quite dark save for the fitful illumi‐
nation furnished by the fleeting gleam of countless light‐
ning flashes. When I had grown somewhat accustomed to
the darkness, I discovered that these flashes were the
reflections of steel spearheads, which darted hither and
thither as though lances were being wielded by invisible
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