There are four places of regular and fixed occurrence (in the history
of) all Buddhas: - first, the place where they attained to perfect
Wisdom (and became Buddha); second, the place where they turned the
wheel of the Law;[20] third, the place where they preached the Law,
discoursed of righteousness, and discomfited (the advocates of)
erroneous doctrines; and fourth, the place where they came down, after
going up to the Trayatrimsas heaven to preach the Law for the benefit
of their mothers. Other places in connexion with them became
remarkable, according to the manifestations which were made at them at
particular times.
The country of Kapilavastu is a great scene of empty desolation. The
inhabitants are few and far between. On the roads people have to be on
their guard against white elephants[21] and lions, and should not
travel incautiously.
NOTES
[1] Kapilavastu, "the city of beautiful virtue," was the birthplace of
Sakyamuni, but was destroyed, as intimated in the notes on last
chapter, during his lifetime. It was situated a short distance north-
west of the present Goruckpoor, lat. 26d 46s N., lon. 83d 19s E.
Davids says (Manual, p. 25), "It was on the banks of the river Rohini,
the modern Kohana, about 100 miles north-west of the city of Benares."
[2] The father, or supposed father, of Sakyamuni. He is here called
"the king white and pure" ({.} {.} {.}). A more common appellation is
"the king of pure rice" ({.} {.} {.});" but the character {.}, or
"rice," must be a mistake for {.}, "Brahman," and the appellation=
"Pure Brahman king."
[3] The "eldest son," or "prince" was Sakyamuni, and his mother had no
other son. For "his mother," see chap. xvii, note 3. She was a
daughter of Anjana or Anusakya, king of the neighbouring country of
Koli, and Yasodhara, an aunt of Suddhodana. There appear to have been
various intermarriages between the royal houses of Kapila and Koli.
[4] In "The Life of the Buddha," p. 15, we read that "Buddha was now
in the Tushita heaven, and knowing that his time was come (the time
for his last rebirth in the course of which he would become Buddha),
he made the necessary examinations; and having decided that Maha-maya
was the right mother, in the midnight watch he entered her womb under
the appearance of an elephant." See M. B., pp. 140-143, and, still
better, Rhys Davids' "Birth Stories," pp. 58-63.
[5] In Hardy's M. B., pp. 154, 155, we read, "As the prince
(Siddhartha, the first name given to Sakyamuni; see Eitel, under
Sarvarthasiddha) was one day passing along, he saw a deva under the
appearance of a leper, full of sores, with a body like a water-vessel,
and legs like the pestle for pounding rice; and when he learned from
his charioteer what it was that he saw, be became agitated, and
returned at once to the palace." See also Rhys Davids' "Buddhism," p.
29.
[6] This is an addition of my own, instead of "There are also topes
erected at the following spots," of former translators. Fa-hien does
not say that there were memorial topes at all these places.
[7] Asita; see Eitel, p. 15. He is called in Pali Kala Devala, and had
been a minister of Suddhodana's father.
[8] In "The Life of Buddha" we read that the Lichchhavis of Vaisali
had sent to the young prince a very fine elephant; but when it was
near Kapilavastu, Devadatta, out of envy, killed it with a blow of his
fist. Nanda (not Ananda, but a half-brother of Siddhartha), coming
that way, saw the carcase lying on the road, and pulled it on one
side; but the Bodhisattva, seeing it there, took it by the tail, and
tossed it over seven fences and ditches, when the force of its fall
made a great ditch. I suspect that the characters in the column have
been disarranged, and that we should read {.} {.} {.} {.}, {.} {.},
{.} {.}. Buddha, that is Siddhartha, was at this time only ten years
old.
[9] The young Sakyas were shooting when the prince thus surpassed them
all. He was then seventeen.
[10] This was not the night when he finally fled from Kapilavastu, and
as he was leaving the palace, perceiving his sleeping father, and
said, "Father, though I love thee, yet a fear possesses me, and I may
not stay;" - The Life of the Buddha, p. 25. Most probably it was that
related in M. B., pp. 199-204. See "Buddhist Birth Stories," pp. 120-
127.
[11] They did this, I suppose, to show their humility, for Upali was
only a Sudra by birth, and had been a barber; so from the first did
Buddhism assert its superiority to the conditions of rank and caste.
Upali was distinguished by his knowledge of the rules of discipline,
and praised on that account by Buddha. He was one of the three leaders
of the first synod, and the principal compiler of the original Vinaya
books.
[12] I have not met with the particulars of this preaching.
[13] Meaning, as explained in Chinese, "a tree without knots;" the
/ficus Indica/. See Rhys Davids' note, Manual, p. 39, where he says
that a branch of one of these trees was taken from Buddha Gaya to
Anuradhapura in Ceylon in the middle of the third century B.C, and is
still growing there, the oldest historical tree in the world.
[14] See chap. xiii, note 11. I have not met with the account of this
presentation. See the long account of Prajapati in M. B., pp. 306-315.
[15] See chap. xx, note 10. The Srotapannas are the first class of
saints, who are not to be reborn in a lower sphere, but attain to
nirvana after having been reborn seven times consecutively as men or
devas.
