Thag 16.8 - Thag 16:8 Aṅgulimāla Translated by Ṭhānissaro Bhikkhu Source: https://www.dhammatalks.org/suttas/KN/Thag/thag16_8.html License: CC-BY-NC-4.0 License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ Copyright: Copyright 2014 Ṭhānissaro Bhikkhu, Revised edition 2017 License notice: Copyright 2014 Ṭhānissaro Bhikkhu, Revised edition 2017 This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 Unported. To see a copy of this license visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/. “Commercial” shall mean any sale, whether for commercial or non-profit purposes or entities. Questions about this book may be addressed to Metta Forest Monastery Valley Center, CA 92082-1409 U.S.A. Additional resources More Dhamma talks, books and translations by Ṭhānissaro Bhikkhu are available to download in digital audio and various ebook formats at dhammatalks.org. Printed copy A paperback copy of this book is available free of charge. To request one, write to: Book Request, Metta Forest Monastery, PO Box 1409, Valley Center, CA 92082 USA. Attribution: From Handful of Leaves, Ṭhānissaro Bhikkhu; https://www.dhammatalks.org/Archive/Writings/Ebooks/SuttaPitaka_251113.epub. Copyright 2014 Ṭhānissaro Bhikkhu, Revised edition 2017 This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 Unported. To see a copy of this license visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/. “Commercial” shall mean any sale, whether for commercial or non-profit purposes or entities. Questions about this book may be addressed to Metta Forest Monastery Valley Center, CA 92082-1409 U.S.A. Additional resources More Dhamma talks, books and translations by Ṭhānissaro Bhikkhu are available to download in digital audio and various ebook formats at dhammatalks.org. Printed copy A paperback copy of this book is available free of charge. To request one, write to: Book Request, Metta Forest Monastery, PO Box 1409, Valley Center, CA 92082 USA. Changes: Presentation only: original HTML markup reflowed into plain text; wording, numbering and source repetitions retained. No repetitions expanded. Completeness: ABBREVIATED. Every source-unit character is preserved, including introductions, notes and verse structure. Thanissaro's collection-level note explicitly states that repetitions were cut: https://www.dhammatalks.org/suttas/about.html. This is evidence about the translation method, not an assertion that every individual unit contains an omission; no repetitions reconstructed. Thag 16:8 Aṅgulimāla Aṅgulumāla’s story is told in MN 86. Aṅgulimāla: “While walking, contemplative, you say, ’I have stopped.’ But when I have stopped you say that I haven’t. I ask you the meaning of this: How have you stopped? How haven’t I?” The Buddha: “I have stopped, Aṅgulimāla, once & for all, having cast off violence toward all living beings. You, though, are unrestrained toward beings. That’s how I’ve stopped and you haven’t.” Aṅgulimāla: “At long last a greatly revered great seer for my sake has come to the great forest. Having heard your verse in line with the Dhamma, I will go about having abandoned evil.” So saying, the bandit hurled his sword & weapons over a cliff into a chasm, a pit. Then the bandit paid homage to the feet of the One Well-Gone, and right there requested the Going-forth. The Awakened One, the compassionate great seer, the teacher of the world, along with its devas, said to him then: “Come, monk.” That in itself was monkhood for him. * * * Aṅgulimāla: Who once was heedless, but later is not, brightens the world like the moon set free from a cloud.1 His evil-done deed is replaced with skillfulness: He brightens the world like the moon set free from a cloud.2 Whatever young monk devotes himself to the Buddha’s bidding: He brightens the world like the moon set free from a cloud. May even my enemies hear talk of the Dhamma. May even my enemies devote themselves to the Buddha’s bidding. May even my enemies associate with those people who—peaceful, good— get others to accept the Dhamma. May even my enemies hear the Dhamma time & again from those who advise endurance, forbearance, who praise non-opposition, and may they follow it. For surely he wouldn’t harm me, or anyone else; he would attain the foremost peace, would protect the feeble & firm. Irrigators guide the water. Fletchers shape the arrow shaft. Carpenters shape the wood. The wise control themselves.3 Some tame with a blunt stick, with hooks, & with whips But without blunt or bladed weapons I was tamed by the one who is Such. “Doer of No Harm” is my name, but I used to be a doer of harm. Today I am true to my name, for I harm no one at all. A bandit I used to be, renowned as Aṅgulimāla. Swept along by a great flood, I went to the Buddha as refuge. Bloody-handed I used to be, renowned as Aṅgulimāla. See my going for refuge! Uprooted is [craving], the guide to becoming. Having done the type of kamma that would lead to many bad destinations, touched by the fruit of [that] kamma, unindebted, I eat my food.4 They’re addicted to heedlessness —dullards, fools— while one who is wise cherishes heedfulness as his highest wealth.5 Don’t give way to heedlessness or to intimacy with sensual delight— for a heedful person, absorbed in jhāna, attains an abundant bliss.6 This7 has come well & not gone away, it was not badly thought through for me. From among well-analyzed qualities, I have obtained the best. This has come well & not gone away, it was not badly thought through for me. The three knowledges have been attained; the Awakened One’s bidding, done.8 Where once I stayed here & there with shuddering mind— in the wilderness, at the foot of a tree, in mountains, caves— with ease I now lie down, I stand, with ease I live my life. O, the Teacher has shown me sympathy! Before, I was of brahman stock, on either side high-born. Today I’m the son of the One Well-Gone, the Dhamma-king, the Teacher. Rid of craving, devoid of clinging, sense-doors guarded, well-restrained, having killed the root of evil, I’ve reached the end of the effluents. The Teacher has been served by me; the Awakened One’s bidding, done; the guide to becoming, uprooted; the heavy load, laid down. Notes 1. This verse = Dhp 172. 2. This verse = Dhp 173. 3. This verse = Dhp 80. 4. This verse illustrates the kammic principle stated in AN 3:101. This is one of the ways in which the Buddhist doctrine of kamma differed from that of the Jains. For them, a person could not reach arahantship without having suffered retribution for every kammic misdeed, a process that could take many lifetimes—in the course of which, one might create more bad kamma, delaying arahantship still further. But for the Buddhists, training in virtue, discernment, and the ability not to be overcome by pleasure or pain could take the mind to a state where the results of past bad kamma would “be experienced in the here-and-now, and for the most part would appear only for a moment.” In other words, in the Buddhist teaching, but not in the Jain, the state of the mind in the present plays a major role in how the effects of past kamma will be experienced. 5. This verse = Dhp 26. 6. This verse = Dhp 27. For a detailed discussion of “intimacy,” see SN 22:3. 7. “This” apparently refers to the abundant bliss mentioned in the previous verse. 8. The verses in MN 86 end here.