120. The Story of Being Released from Bondage

When the Buddha was living in the Jeta Grove, the Buddha related this story regarding the Brahmin girl Ciñcā. Its present story is explained in the Mahāpaduma-Jātaka in the twelfth book [No. 472].

[After the Buddha’s attainment of enlightenment, the Jains and other ascetics found that their gains had fallen. Therefore, the Jain recluses became upset and angry, and they hatched a conspiracy to defame the Buddha. Ciñcā, the Brahmin girl, became their instrument. In accord with the conspiracy, she came from home toward the Jetavana monastery every evening wearing a red cloth. Then she slept at a recluse’s home, and returned to her home each morning as if she were a person coming from Jetavana monastery. People asked, “Where did you go?” She answered, “Do not care about where I go. Do not think about me.” And she behaved so as to create doubts in people’s minds about her.

She continued in this fashion for four months. By doing this, she led people to believe that she was no doubt coming from the Buddha’s chamber. She used to say, “Now I am one month pregnant.” “Now I am two months pregnant.” “Now I am three months pregnant.” And so forth.  When ten months had passed like this, she pretended to be a woman who was about to deliver a baby.⁷ Then she went to the Buddha having stuffed something around her belly, and when Buddha was preaching, in the middle of the congregation she accused the Buddha, saying, “Ah, you are preaching here as if a person who is innocent. I am now ten months pregnant and I have to deliver my baby. I have no home in which to deliver. Why do you not prepare the food and other items that I need for my delivery of the baby? Mention it to King Kosala or to millionaire Anāthapiϯika and arrange someplace for me to stay.”

The Buddha said, “Oh sister, the truth of this incident is known by both of us. Except for the two of us, who will know the truth?” At the same moment, there came four deities as rats. They scurried up her body, and cut the strings holding what was tied around her belly. The cloths that were tightened there fell down to the ground.

Everyone started to censure her. People attacked her because she had falsely accused the Buddha. And they kicked her out of the hall. Suddenly there came a big fire from hell (Avici), and the ground opened and took her.]

Regarding this, there was then discussion in the preaching hall. The Buddha revealed the story of the past thus:

Once the Enlightenment Being was born as a Brahmin advisor to King Brahmadatta, who ruled in Benares. He had a very beautiful queen who loved him very much. Because the king loved her so much, he once said to her, “For whatever you desire, you may ask.” The queen responded, “I have everything I want. I have nothing to ask. And so, I ask you not to look at any other woman with passion. That is my boon.” The king said, “Since there are 16,000 beautiful women in my possession, I may not be able to give that boon.” She then pleaded, again and again. Very ardently, she continued to so plead. Finally, the king was unable to say “no” to her, and agreed.

While they were living in such a manner, deeply in love with one another, there was a riot in a remote village. His minister could not settle it. Finally, the king went there with his fourfold army. Before he left, he summoned his queen and said, “War is doubtful. It is difficult to bring women to the battlefield. One cannot retreat quickly with women beside you. Therefore, I cannot take you to the battlefield. Stay at home.” The queen said, “No. Let me come with you.” But the king was steadfast.

Then the queen said, “If such be so, please inform me of all news every Yojana.⁸” The king and queen both agreed to this. And the king left, asking his ministers to look after the queen. The chief Brahmin advisor undertook her protection within the confines of the city. Every Yojana the king sent a messenger to inform her of his affairs, and to inquire about her well being.

When each messenger came, the queen asked, “Why did you come?” Each messenger replied, “I came to inquire about your safety and happiness.” Thereupon the queen summoned each to her chamber, was intimate with each of them, and then sent each back. Meanwhile, on the battlefield, the king won. During his thirty-two Yojana long trip, the queen was intimate with thirty-two messengers. Coming back, he also sent thirty-two messengers, and each of these was also intimate with the queen. The queen in this way was intimate with sixty-four messengers.

Finally, the king came near the city and camped overnight. He informed the chief Brahmin advisor the news of his arrival. The chief advisor decorated the city to welcome the king and his army. And he went to the palace to inform the queen of the king’s arrival. The queen, seeing the beauty of his body, said, “Come and sit on the bed.” The advisor, who was the Enlightenment Being, said, “Your majesty, the king who is your husband is handsome. I am both afraid of him, and of what might befall me in my next birth.” When she heard this, she said, “Were not those sixty- four messengers who came to me also afraid of the king the same as you are? And were they also not afraid of their next birth?” Then the advisor said, “Even though I have reached my present age, I have never seen a woman with such a lustful mind. Therefore, please do not speak to me in this way.” She said, “If you say ‘no’ to me, then I will ask the king to behead you complaining that you have asked me to be intimate with you.” The advisor, who was the Enlightenment Being, said, “Not only in one life, but also in a thousand lives, even if you have me beheaded, I will not agree to your desires.” Saying so, he left.

The queen got angry. She scratched her body everywhere, and applied oil to the wounds. Wearing a dirty garment, she lay in her bedroom.  She told her servant girls that when the king comes and asks about her, to tell him that she was sick and was lying in her bed.

The Enlightenment Being went forward to welcome the king and his army, who returned to the city triumphantly with a very big procession. The king came into the palace after circumambulating the city and not seeing the queen in the palace, he asked the servant girls about her. They said she was sick. Then the king went into her sleeping room and saw that she was lying in bed. Touching her back, he asked how she was feeling. After asking her two or three times, she turned around toward him and replied, “Ah, your lordship also has come. Now I am with my husband.” Hearing these words, the king asked, “Why do you speak so?” Then she complained about the advisor, saying, “He did what no husband would ask him to do.” And she showed her bruises to the king. The king got very angry, and ordered his security people to handcuff the Brahmin advisor and to kill him.

The security people, hearing these words, took the Brahmin advisor and brought him to the place of execution beating the death drums. Then the Enlightenment Being thought, “This happened because of the queen. But I must use my common sense here.” Thinking so, he said to the executioners, “I know many places where wealth is hidden. Please do not kill me until I show them to the king.” Then they asked, “What can you show the king?” The advisor said, “Because of me, the king has much wealth hidden. If you kill me, he will lose all this wealth not knowing where it is.  Therefore, my death will be a big loss for him.”  The executioners heard this, and thought, “He says the truth.” So they took him back to the king.

On seeing him, the king asked, “You, Brahmin, without having fear or shame did such a bad deed. Why did you do it?” The Enlightenment Being said, “Your lordship, I never did such a thing. From the earliest time I can remember, I have never even killed a louse.  I have never even taken so much as a piece of grass that was not given.  I have never looked at another’s woman with lustful thoughts, and have never looked at another’s woman with head raised.⁹ Even in jest, I have never said falsehoods.  I have never tasted alcohol, even as little as would be on a blade of grass.  The sixty-four messengers are the people who misbehaved with the queen. Even though she trapped me in the same way, I did not get involved. That is why she complained about me.”

On hearing this, the king summoned all the sixty-four messengers and also the queen.  He questioned them as to whether or not this was true.  They all admitted to their wrongdoing. The king ordered all of them to be killed. But the Enlightenment Being said, “Your lordship, these people did what the queen requested. Therefore, it is not right to punish them.”  And they were saved from punishment, and were retained in their positions. And he said further, “This is the nature of women. Therefore, it would be correct to excuse the queen as well.” He in this way saved her also.

Finally he thought, “All this happened to me as I was in the life of a householder. Therefore, it would be good to renounce lay life.”  Thinking so, while his relatives cried, giving up all his wealth behind him, he went to the Himalayan forest and became ordained as an ascetic. After meditating there, he generated the fivefold higher knowledge and the eightfold high achievements of concentration. After his death, he was born in the Brahma world.

Buddha said, “The queen at that time was Ciñcā. The king was the Venerable Ānanda. And the advisor Brahmin was myself, the Buddha.” And in this way he ended the story of release from bondage [bandhanamokkha].

The moral: “Truth always conquers.”

120. The Story of Being Released from Bondage

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