Mahākapi Jātaka

Once upon a time when Brahmadatta reigned in Benares, a brahmin husbandman in a village of Kāsi, after ploughing his fields, loosened his oxen and began to work with a spade. The oxen, while cropping leaves in a clump of trees, escaped little by little into the forest. The man, discovering that it was late, laid aside his spade to look for his oxen. And not finding them, he was overcome with grief.

He wandered about the forest, seeking them, until he entered the Himalaya region. There he lost his bearings. He roamed about for seven days without any food. Then he saw a tiṇḍuka tree (an ebony tree that has sweet fruit). He climbed up it to eat the fruit. But he slipped off the tree, falling sixty cubits (about 90 feet or 27.5 meters) into a hell-like abyss where he spent ten days.

At that time the Bodhisatta was living as a monkey. And while eating wild fruits, he saw the man. And after practicing lifting with a stone, he hauled the fellow out. Then, while the monkey was sleeping, the man hit his head with a stone. The Great Being sprang up and perched on a branch of the tree. He cried, “Ho! Sir! You walk on the ground. I will just point out the way from the top of the tree and then I will be off.” So he rescued the fellow from the forest, set him on the right road and then he disappeared in the mountainous region.

The man, because he had misbehaved towards the Great Being, became a leper, and even in this world he appeared as a preta (hungry ghost) in human form. For seven years he was overcome with pain.

In his wanderings to and fro, he found his way into the Migācira park in Benares. He spread a plantain leaf in the enclosure where he lay down, half maddened by his suffering. At that moment the King of Benares went to the park. And as he walked about, he saw the man and asked him, “Who are you, and what have you done to bring this suffering on yourself?” And he told the King the whole story.

The Master, to make the matter clear, said:

A King of Kāsi who, they say,

O’er great Benares once held sway,

With courtier friends the road to cheer

Unto Migācira drew near.

A brahmin there the King did see

—A walking skeleton was he—

His skin was white with leprous blood

And rough like gnarled ebon wood.

Astonished at the piteous sight

Of this sore troubled, luckless wight,

“Alas! poor wretch,” he cried, “declare

What name ‘mongst ogres you do bear.”

“Your hands and feet are white as snow,

Your head is whiter still, I know,

Your frame with leprous spots o’ergrown,

Disease has marked you for its own.

“Your back like spindles in a row

A long unequal curve does show,

Your joints are as black knots, I glean,

Your like before was never seen.

“From where you came, so travel-worn,

Mere skin and bones, a wretch forlorn,

By heat of blazing sun oppressed,

By thirst and hunger sore distressed?

“With frame so marred, an awful sight,

Scarce fit to look upon the light,

Your very mother—no, not she

Would care her wretched son to see.

“What dreadful deed was yours, I pray,

Or wrongfully who did you slay?

What the offence I want to know,

Reduced you to this state of woe?”

Then the brahmin said:

I’ll tell you, sir, and tell you true

Even as a good man should do.

For one that never does speak lies

Is praised in this world by the wise.

Once in a lonely wood I took my way,

Seeking my cows that late had gone astray.

Through pathless tracts of jungle, fitting home

For the wild elephant, I heedless roam.

Lost in the maze of this vast wilderness,

From thirst and hunger suffering sore distress,

For seven long days I wander thro’ the wood

Where the fell tiger rears his savage brood.

E’en rankest poison I was glad to eat

When lo! a lovely tree my gaze did meet.

O’er a sheer precipice it pendent swung,

And fragrant fruit from all its branches hung.

Whate’er had fallen to the wind’s cold touch

I greedily devoured and relished much,

Then, still unsated, I climbed up the tree,

“That way,” I thought, “lies full satiety.”

I ne’er had tasted such ripe fruit before,

And stretching forth my hand to gather more,

The branch, on which my body rested, broke,

As though clean severed by the woodman’s stroke.

With broken bough head over heels I went,

With nought to check me in my swift descent

Over the side of rocky precipice,

Without escape from bottomless abyss.

The depth of water in the pool beneath

Saved me from being rudely crushed to death,

So there, poor luckless soul, without a ray

Of hope to cheer me, ten long nights I lay.

At length a monkey came—long-tailed was he

And made his home in some rock cavity

And as he stepped from bough to bough, the brute

Did ever pluck and eat the dainty fruit.

But when my thin and pallid form he spied,

Touched with compassion for my woes, he cried,

“Alas! poor wretch, whom I see lying there

Thus overwhelmed with anguish and despair,

If man or goblin, who you are, declare.”

Then with due reverence I made reply,

“A man and doomed without escape am I.

But this I say, “All blessings light on thee,

If you can find a way of saving me.”

The monkey stepping on the height above

Carried a heavy stone, his strength to prove,

And when by practice he was perfect grown,

The mighty one his purpose thus made known.

“Climb you, good sir, upon my back and cast

Your arms about my neck and hold me fast.

Then will I with all speed deliver thee

From the stone walls of your captivity.'

I hearkened gladly, well remembering

The counsels of the glorious monkey-king,

And, climbing on his back, my arms I cast

Round the wise creature’s neck and held him fast.

The monkey then—so brave and strong was he—

Exhausted by the effort though he be,

From rocky fastness soon lifted up me.

And having hauled me out, the hero cried,

“I’m weary, stand as guard, sir, by my side,

While I just now in peaceful sleep abide.

“Lion and tiger, panther, beast, and bear,

If they should ever take me unaware,

Would kill me straight. To watch shall be your care.”

While, as I watched, he took a moment’s rest,

An ugly thought was harbored in my breast.

“Monkeys and such like deer are good to eat,

What if I kill him and my hunger cheat?

The beast if slain would furnish savory meat.

“When quenched, here no longer will I stay

But well provisioned for full many a day

Out from this forest I will find a way.”

Taking a stone his skull I well near broke,

But a lame hand put forth a feeble stroke.

The monkey quickly bounded up a tree,

And all stained with blood he regarded me

From far, with tearful eyes, reproachfully.

“God bless you, act not thus, I pray, with care,

For otherwise your fate, I dare declare,

Will long all others from such deeds beware.

“Alas! for shame. What a return is this

For having saved you from that dread abyss!

“Rescued from death you played a treacherous part

And evil has devised with evil heart.

“Vile wretch, beware lest sharpest agony

Springing from evil deed bring death to thee,

E’en as its fruit destroys the bamboo tree.

(The bamboo dies off after bearing fruit.)

“I trust you not, for you would do me ill,

Walk well in front that I may see you still.

“From ravening beast escaped, you may regain

The haunts of men, the path that stretches plain

Before your eyes, follow as you can gain.”

At this the monkey dried his tears, and sped

Up to a mountain lake, and bathed his head

From stain of blood—by me alas! ‘twas shed—

There too, with burning pains through him accursed,

I dragged my tortured frame, to quench my thirst,

But when to that blood-stained lake I came,

The crimson flood appeared one mass of flame.

All the liquid drop from it that did spew

My body, straight into a pustule grew,

Like a monster boil, in size and hue.

The sores discharging yield a loathsome smell,

And whereso’er I soon would gladly dwell

In town and countryside, all fly pell-mell.

Scattered by odors foul, the while they ply

Their sticks and stones, and “Come not you nearby

To us, poor wretch,” all men and women cry.

Such is the pain for seven long years I bear,

According to his deeds each man does fare.

May good be with you all that here I see,

Do not betray your friends. How vile is he

That does mistreat a friend with treachery.

All who on earth to friends have proved untrue,

As lepers here their misdeeds ever rue,

And when the body fails, in Hell are born anew.

And while the man was speaking with the King, even as he spoke, the earth opened its mouth, and at that very moment the man disappeared and was reborn in Hell. The King, when the man was swallowed up in the earth, left the park and entered the city.