Paŋsukūla Chapter, the Forty-Ninth

[478. {481.}1 Paŋsukūlasaññika2]

The Blessed One named Tissa was
a Self-Become One, Foremost Man.3
Leaving [behind] his robe of rags,
the Victor entered [his] dwelling.4 (1) [5031]

Taking [my] bow which had been stretched,5
wandering for the sake of food,6
with7 a circular sword8 [as well,]
I entered into the grove [then]. (2) [5032]

There I saw [the Buddha’s] rag-robe,
stuck up in the top of a tree.9
Throwing down the bow right there,
having pressed my hands on [my] head, (3) [5033]

happy, with pleasure in [my] heart,
and with a huge [amount of] joy,
remembering the Best Buddha,
I worshipped [his] robe of rags [then].
In the ninety-two aeons since
I worshipped that rag-robe [back then,]
I’ve come to know no bad rebirth:
that is the fruit of worshipping. (4) [5034-5035]10

My defilements are [now] burnt up;
all [new] existence is destroyed.
Like elephants with broken chains,
I am living without constraint. (5) [5036]

Being in Best Buddha’s presence
was a very good thing for me.
The three knowledges are attained;
[I have] done what the Buddha taught! (6) [5037]

The four analytical modes,
and these eight deliverances,
six special knowledges mastered,
[I have] done what the Buddha taught! (7) [5038]

Thus indeed Venerable Paŋsukūlasaññika Thera spoke these verses.

The legend of Paŋsukūlasaññika Thera is finished.

  1. 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.↩

  2. “Rag-robe Perceiver”↩

  3. aggapuggalo↩

  4. or, “the monastery”: vihāraŋ↩

  5. reading vitataṃ with BJTS for PTS tiyantaŋ (‘with three strings” [?])↩

  6. reading bhakkhatthāaya cchariṃ ahaṃ with BJTS for PTS akkhitto yamaliŋ ahaŋ (“struck by a pair”)↩

  7. gahetvāna, lit., “taking”↩

  8. maṇḍalaggaŋ↩

  9. I follow the cty and BJTS Sinhala gloss in taking dumagge as duma + agge. It would also be possible to take it as du + magge, “on a bad road”. Cf. v. [592] above for a case comparable to the latter. Though I do follow it here, the cty and BJTS reading rather begs the question how the Buddha’s rag robes got up in the tree.↩

  10. PTS omits the first two feet of [5035] (“In the ninety-two aeons since/I worshipped that rag-robe [back then,”) and adds the second two feet of it to [5034], treating its v. 4 as a six-footed verse.↩