Jataka 435
Haliddirāga Jātaka
The Wise Father
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 is another story in which a young recluse is tempted by a seductress. It seems that this happened a lot!
“In lonesome forest.” The Master told this story while he was at Jetavana. It is about a youth who was tempted by a certain coarse maiden. The introductory story will be found in the Cullanārada Birth (Jātaka 477).
Now in the old legend this maiden knew that if the young recluse should break the moral law, he would be in her power. Thinking to trick him and bring him back to the haunts of men, she said, “Virtue that is safe-guarded in a forest, where the qualities of sense such as beauty and the like have no existence, does not prove very powerful. But it bears abundant fruit in the haunts of men, in the immediate presence of beauty and the like. So come with me and guard your virtue there. What have you to do with a forest?" And she uttered the first stanza:
In lonesome forest one may well be pure,
’Tis easy there temptation to endure.
But in a village with seductions rife,
A man may rise to a far nobler life.
On hearing this the young recluse said, “My father has gone into the forest. When he returns, I will ask his leave and then accompany you.”
She thought, “He has a father, it seems. If he finds me here, he will strike me with the end of his carrying pole and kill me. I must be off.” So she said to the youth, “I will start out on the road before you, and I will leave a trail behind me. You are to follow me.”
Once she left him, he neither fetched wood nor brought water to drink, but he just sat meditating. When his father arrived, he did not go out to meet him. So the father knew that his son had fallen into the power of a woman. He said, “Why, my son, did you neither fetch wood nor bring me water to drink nor food to eat. Why do you do nothing but sit and meditate?”
The youthful recluse said, “Father, men say that virtue that has to be guarded in a forest is not very fruitful, but that it brings great fruit in the haunts of men. I will go and guard my virtue there. My companion has gone forward, bidding me to follow. So I will go with my companion. But when I am living there, what types of men should I befriend?” And asking this question he spoke the second stanza:
This doubt, my father, solve for me, I pray,
If to some village from this wood I stray,
Men of what school of morals, or what sect
Shall I most wisely for my friends affect?
Then his father spoke and repeated the rest of the verses:
One that can gain your confidence and love,
Can trust your word, and with you patient prove,
In thought and word and deed will ne’er offend.
Take to your heart and cling to him as friend.
To men capricious as the monkey kind,
And found unstable, be you not inclined,
Though to some wilderness your lot’s confined.
Avoid foul ways, e’en as you would keep clear
Of angry serpent, or as charioteer
Avoids a rugged road. Sorrows abound
Whene’er a man in Folly’s train is found.
Consort not you with fools—my voice obey—
The fool’s companion is to grief a prey.
Figure: The father’s wisdom
Being thus admonished by his father, the youth said, “If I go to the haunts of men, I will not find sages like you. I dread going there. I will live here in your presence.” Then his father admonished him still further and taught him the preparatory rites to induce deep meditation. And before long, the son developed the Faculties and Attainments, and with his father became destined to birth in the Brahma World.
The Master, his lesson ended, taught the Four Noble Truths. At the conclusion of the teaching, the young recluse who longed for the world attained to fruition of the First Path. Then the Master identified the Birth: “In those days the young recluse was the worldly-minded brother, the maiden then is the maiden now, and I was the father.”
