[361. {364.}1 Kesarapupphiya2]
I was a sorcerer3 [back then,]
on a Himalayan mountain.
I saw the Spotless One, Buddha,
Great Famed One, walking back and forth. (1) [3191]
At that time I having placed4
three kesara flowers on [my] head,
I approached [him], the Sambuddha,
[and] did pūjā to Vessabhu. (2) [3192]
In the thirty-one aeons since
I did that [good] karma back then,
I’ve come to know no bad rebirth:
that’s the fruit of Buddha-pūjā. (3) [3193]
The four analytical modes,
and these eight deliverances,
six special knowledges mastered,
[I have] done what the Buddha taught! (4) [3194]
Thus indeed Venerable Kesarapupphiya Thera spoke these verses.
The legend of Kesarapupphiya Thera is finished.
Apadāna numbers provided in {fancy brackets} correspond to the BJTS edition, which contains more individual poems than does the PTS edition dictating the main numbering of this translation.↩
“Kesara-Flower-er.” Kesara can refer to the punnāga tree (Sinh. domba) as well as the mūnamal or muhuṇa mal tree, Mimusops Elengi. The present poem gives no context for deciding which of the two is intended here; BJTS glosses the term as domba-mal, but I leave it untranslated as a result.↩
vijjādharo, “spell-knower”↩
lit “made”↩