Jataka 351
Maṇikuṇḍala Jātaka
The Jeweled Earing
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
This story gives a rather sparse (!) account of what happened. Rather it just jumps to the punch line. But you can probably discern that a wicked counselor convinced the King of Kosala to take over the kingdom of our hero, Benares. But all turns out well when the King of Kosala repents and returns Benares to its rightful and righteous King.
“Stripped of all the joys of life.” The Master told this story while he was at Jetavana. It is about a counselor who was guilty of misconduct in the harem of the King of Kosala. The incident that gave rise to the story has been given in full before (Jātakas 282 and 303).
Here, too, the Bodhisatta became King in Benares. The wicked counselor called in the King of Kosala and got him to seize the kingdom of Kāsi and to throw the Bodhisatta into prison. The King of Benares was able to enter into deep samadhi. He sat cross-legged in the air. A fierce heat sprang up in the body of the marauding King, and he went to the King of Benares and repeated the first stanza:
Stripped of all the joys of life,
Jeweled earrings, horse and car,
Robbed of child and loving wife,
Nought your pleasure seems to mar.
On hearing him the Bodhisatta recited these verses:
Pleasures soon make haste to leave us,
Pleasures soon must all forego,
Sorrow has no power to grieve us,
Joy itself soon turns to woe.
Moons with new-born orb appearing
Wax awhile, to wane and die,
Suns with warmth all nature cheering,
Haste to set in yonder sky.
Change is this world’s law I see,
Sorrow has no pangs for me.
In this way the Great Being expounded the Dharma to the usurper king, and bringing his conduct to the test, repeated these stanzas:
The idle sensual layman I detest,
The false ascetic is a rogue confessed.
A bad king will a case unheard decide,
Wrath in the sage can ne’er be justified.
The warrior prince a well-weighed verdict gives,
Of righteous judge the fame for ever lives.
Figure: Begging foregiveness
So the King of Kosala gained the forgiveness of the Bodhisatta. He gave him back his kingdom and left for his own country.
The Master, having ended his discourse, thus identified the birth: “At that time Ānanda was the King of Kosala, and I was the King of Benares.”
