Jataka 367
Sāliya Jātaka
The Story of Sāliya
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
Surprise. Here we have another in the “Devadatta is bad” series. But the moral is interesting. The evil you cast onto others will—karmically speaking—always come back to bite you. And in this story, it literally does.
“Who got his friend.” The Master told this story while he was living in the Bamboo Grove. It is in reference to a saying that Devadatta could not even inspire alarm.
When Brahmadatta was reigning in Benares, the Bodhisatta was born into the family of a village householder. And when he was young, he played with other boys at the foot of a banyan tree which was at the entrance of the village.
There was a poor old doctor at that time who had no practice. He strayed out of the village to this spot, and he saw a snake asleep in the fork of a tree. The snake had its head tucked in. He thought, “There is no living for me to earn in the village. I will cajole these boys and make the snake bite them, and then I will get something for curing them.” So he said to the Bodhisatta, “If you were to see a young hedgehog, would you seize it?” “Yes, I would,” he said.
“Look, there is one lying in the fork of this tree,” said the old man.
The Bodhisatta, not knowing it was a snake, climbed up the tree and seized it by the neck. But when he found it was a snake, he did not allow it to turn upon him. He got a good grip on it, and he hastily flung it away from him. It fell on the neck of the old doctor. It coiled around him and bit him so severely that its teeth sank into his flesh. The old man fell down dead on the spot, and the snake made its escape.
People gathered together around him. The Great Being expounded the Dharma to the assembled multitude. He repeated these verses:
Who got his friend to seize
A deadly snake, as hedgehog, if you please,
By the snake’s bite was killed
As one that evil to his neighbor willed.
He that to strike is fain
The man that never strike you back again,
Is struck and lies down low,
E’en as this wretch sore hurt by deadly blow.
So dust that should be thrown
Against the wind, back in one’s face is blown.
And ill designed to one
That holy is, and has no evil done,
On the fool’s pate at last
Recoils, like dust when thrown against the blast.
Figure: Evil deeds come back to bite you
The Master here ended his lesson and identified the birth: “At that time the poor old doctor was Devadatta, I was the wise youth.”
