Jataka 308
Javasakuṇa Jātaka
The Fleeing Bird
as told by Eric Van Horn
originally translated by H.T. Francis and R.A. Neil, Cambridge University
originally edited by Professor Edward Byles Cowell, Cambridge University
Here we have another opportunity to demonize Devadatta. In this story we have a compassionate but wise and wary woodpecker who helps an injured lion. But the lion turns out to be not very grateful.
“Kindness as much.” The Master told this story while he was living at Jetavana. It is about the ingratitude of Devadatta.
He ended it by saying, “Not only now but in former days did Devadatta show ingratitude,” and with these words he told a story of the past.
Once upon a time when Brahmadatta was reigning in Benares, the Bodhisatta was reborn as a woodpecker in the Himālaya country.
Now a certain lion, while devouring his prey, had a bone stick in his throat. His throat swelled up so that he could not take any food and severe pains set in.
There was this woodpecker perched on a bough. He was intent on seeking its own food. He saw the lion and asked him, “Friend, what ails you?” The lion told him what was the matter, and the bird said, “I would take the bone out of your throat, friend, but I dare not put my head into your mouth for fear you should eat me up.”
“Do not be afraid, friend. I will not eat you up. Only save my life.”
“All right,” said the bird, and he told the lion to lie down on his side. Then the bird thought, “Who knows what this fellow will do?” And to prevent the lion from closing his mouth, the bird fixed a stick between his upper and lower jaw. Then, putting its head into the lion’s mouth, he struck the end of the bone with its beak. The bone fell out and disappeared. The woodpecker drew his head out from the lion’s mouth, and with a blow from his beak knocked out the stick. Then he hopped off and sat on the top of a bough.
The lion recovered from his sickness, and one day he was devouring a wild buffalo which he had killed. The woodpecker thought, “I will now put him to the test to see if he is trustworthy.” And perching on a bough above the lion’s head, he started to converse with him. He uttered the first stanza:
Kindness as much as in us lay,
To you, my lord, I once did show.
On us in turn, we humbly pray,
On me a trifling boon bestow.
On hearing this the lion repeated the second stanza:
To trust your head to a lion’s jaw.
A creature red in tooth and claw,
To dare such a deed and be living still,
Is token enough of my good will.
The woodpecker on hearing this uttered two more stanzas
From the base ingrate hope not to obtain
The due requital of good service done.
From bitter thought and angry word refrain,
But haste the presence of the wretch to shun.
With these words the woodpecker flew away.
Figure: The wise bird and the ungrateful lion
The Master, his lesson ended, identified the birth: “At that time Devadatta was the lion, and I was the woodpecker.”
