Psalms of the Brethren CCLXIII: Moggallana the Great

We forest-dwellers, beggars all,
Pleased with the scraps placed in our bowl,
The hosts of Mara we can smash
If we have well learned self-control.

We forest-dwellers, beggars all,
Pleased with the scraps by which we’re fed,
Mara and hosts let’s sweep away,
As elephant a rush-built shed.

We who at root of shady tree
Work at our task persistently,
Pleased with the scraps placed in our bowl,
The hosts of Mara we can smash
If we have well learned self control.

We who at root of shady tree
Work at our task persistently,
Pleased with the scraps by which we’re fed,
Mara and hosts let’s sweep away,
As elephant a rush-built shed.

Thou with that little hut of framework bony
And flesh encased by sinewy stitchery: —
Fie on thee, fie! thou full of smells unseemly,
Finding thyself in limbs that are not ‘thou.’

O bag of muck enwrapped in skin! O witch
With ulcered breast! nine are the streams
That on thy body trickle night and day;

Thy body nine-streamed and malodorous,
Maker of bonds: — that let a bhikkhu shun
As one would ordure, would he fain be clean.

Did but folk know thee as thou art, as I
Do know thee, they would shun thee from afar
As they would shun a cesspool in the rains.

Yea, O great hero, even so it is
As thou, O holy friar, hast pronounced.
And herein many miserably fail
And faint, as in a swamp an aged ox.

He who would fancy he can paint the sky
With yellow, or maybe some other hue,
Is to defeat foredoomed, and only that.

My heart is like that sky, beyond thy reach,
For it is well controlled within and calm.
Wherefore bring not thine evil thoughts to me,
As bird that flies bewildered into flame.

Behold the tricked-out puppet-shape, a mass
Of sores, a congeries diseased, teeming
With many purposes and plans, and yet
In whom there is no power to persist.

O! then was terror, then was mighty dread,
Then stiffened hair and quivered creeping nerve,
When he, endowed with every crowning grace,
The venerable Sariputta passed away.

O transient are our life’s experiences!
Their nature ’tis to rise and pass away.
They happen in our ken, they cease to be.
O well for us when they are sunk to rest I

They who our fivefold organism see
As something other,’ not the self, not soul,
They penetrate the delicate things [of truth]
As arrow-point doth pierce a tip of hair.

They who behold our life’s experience
As something other,’ not the self, not soul,
They’ve pierced the subtle [mysteries of truth]
As arrow-point doth pierce a tip of hair.

As one down-smitten by impending sword,
As one whose hair and turban are aflame,
So let the brother, mindful and alert,
Go forth, all worldly passions left behind.

As one down-smitten by impending sword,
As one whose hair and turban are aflame,
So let the brother, mindful and alert,
Go forth, all lust of living left behind.

By Him advised, who, perfectly evolved,
For the last time a mortal body bore,
My foot uplifting with my toe I shook
The Terrace by Migara’s Mother built.

Nothing hath this to do with tepid slackness,
Not by a little toil canst gain Nibbana,
Deliverance from every tie and chain.

See this young brother, this among you peerless!
Mara and all his host hath he defeated,
And [therefore] weareth he his final frame.

The lightnings flash e’en in the rocky cave,
Smiting Vebhara’s crest and Pandava,
And in the mountain-bosom hid, a child
Of the incomparable Master sits,
Ardent in contemplative ecstasy.

The seer calm and serene, dead to the world,
Whose dwelling is remote, aloof from men,
The heir of Buddha, Wake and Chief of all,
Greeted with honour by great Brahma’s self;

Behold him, calm, serene, dead to the world,
The sage who dwells remote, aloof from men,
The heir of Buddha, Wake and Chief of all: —
Brahmin, give greeting low to Kassapa!

He who a hundred generations back
Can trace descent, all brahmin ancestors,
Himself as graduate and Yeda-wise,
Again, again among mankind reborn,

Though he as teacher in the Vedas three
Past -master rank, wouldst honour him for that,
To him thy homage were not worth a straw.

He who before he breaks his fast can touch
Mental emancipation’s eight degrees,
In grade ascending and so back again: —
Then, only, cometh forth to seek for alms: —

Assault thou not a bhikkhu such as this.
Refrain from digging up thyself, [thy good]!
Appease, brahmin, and gratify thy mind
In [contemplating] such an arahant.
Swiftly lift up thy hands and greeting give.
Set not that head of thine in jeopardy.

He doth not yet behold the blessed Norm
Who hath eternal living in his train;
From course precinct he wandereth afar,
Straying in error’s devious dangerous ways.

Like to a worm obscene besmeared with dung,
He walloweth in the tainted things of life,
Plunged in pursuit of favours and of gain,
Bare [of true profit] goeth Potthila.

Yonder behold where Sariputta goes
So nobly fair! Emancipated he
By contemplation rapt, and purity,
And all his inner self is well composed.

Exempt from moral scathe, all fetters broke,
In higher Vedas versed, slayer of Death,
Worthy that men should bring him offerings;
Incomparable held for great reward.

See how they stand, those thronging deities
Of mystic potency and glorious,
Ten times a thousand, Brahma’s ministers,
Acclaiming Moggallana reverently: —

‘Hail thou, humanity’s aristocrat!
Glory to thee, thou highest among men!
Perished for thee are the intoxicants,
And thou, O lord, most worthy art of gifts!

In honour held by men and gods alike,
Uprisen as the conqueror of death,
As lotus from the water takes no smear,
So thou in changing world dost not adhere.’

He who e’en in a moment by a thousand ways can take
Purview of all the world, as were he Brahma’s very self.
Yea, here’s a brother versed in power of magic who doth see
What time doth suit [for gods and men] to die and come to be.

Now Sari’s son by wisdom, virtue, self-control
Excelleth all; here let this brother stand supreme.

But I can instantly innumerable times
Create a living shape; skilled to transform myself
As other, yea, all magic power have I at will.

He of the Moggallanas, in the Rule of Him
Who stands alone, hath perfected his powers;
In contemplative ecstasy and higher lore
Expert, valiant and self-controlled hath burst his bonds,
As doth the elephant a rotten fibre rope.

The Master hath my fealty and love,
And all the Buddha’s ordinance is done.
Low have I laid the heavy load I bore;
Cause for rebirth is found in me no more.

The Good for which I bade the world farewell,
And left the home to dwell where is no home,
That highest good have I attained and won,
And all that bound and fettered me is gone.

What sort of hell was it where Dussi cooked
In anguish, when he injured Vidhura,
Disciple, holy Kakusandha too?

’Twas the infernal realm of iron spikes,
A hundred points, each dealing bitter pain.
This sort of hell it was where Dussi cooked
In anguish, when he injured Vidhura,
Disciple, holy Kakusandha too.

If thou a brother who can tell thus much—
Disciple of the Buddha — dost assail,
Black - hearted sprite! to misery thou must go.

Far in the midst of ocean, palaces
Have stood an geon, exquisite, with hue
Of beryl-stones, flashing like crests of flame.
There dance full many nymphs in divers hues: —

If thou a brother who can tell thus much —
Disciple of the Buddha — dost assail,
Black - hearted sprite! to misery thou must go.

Incited by the Buddha’s self I wrought,
With all the Bhikkhu-Order looking on,
My foot uplifting, with my toe I shook
The Terrace by Migara’s Mother built.

If thou a brother who can tell thus much, etc.,
. . . (verse 1191) thou must go.

I who my foot uplifting, with my toe
Caused Vejayanta’s terraced fane to shake,
Rigid as iron by my magic power,
And thro’ the deities sent thrill of dread: —

If thou a brother who can tell thus much, etc., . . . thou must go.

He who in Vejayanta’s terraced fane
Did take Sakka the deity to task: —
‘Come, friend, and didst thou really understand
Release through end of craving [taught to thee]?’
To whom Sakka made answer truthfully —

If thou a brother who can tell thus much —
Disciple of the Buddha — dost assail,
Black - hearted sprite! to misery thou must go.

Who catechized great Brahma’s very self,
Seated in conclave in Sudhamma s hall: —
‘Come tell me, friend, hast thou to-day the views
Which in the days gone by were views of thine?
Or seest thou now the glory of thy heaven,
How age by age it all is passing by?’

‘My lord, no longer do I hold the views,
Which in the days gone by were views of mine.

I do behold the glory of my heaven,
How age by age it all is passing by.
To-day I hold it false what once I said: —
‘I am eternal; permanent am I!’

If thou a brother who can tell thus much, etc., . . . thou must go.

Who in emancipation [’s ecstasy]
Hath touched great Neru’s topmost pinnacle,
Pubbavideha’s forest world hath seen,
And men that live on that remotest plain: —

If thou a brother who can tell thus much, etc., . . . thou must go.

Fire doth not think: Lo! I will burn the fool!’
But if the fool lay hands on blazing fire,
The fire must burn and he must needs be burned.

Thus, Mara, thou on One who Thus hath Come
Hast made attack, but ’tis to thine own hurt,
As when a foolish child doth touch the fire.

Demerit hath the Evil One begot,
Who made attack on One who Thus hath Come.
What? dost imagine, O thou Evil One,
That evil brings thee not its sure reward?

Aroint thee, Mara, from the awakened mind I
Against the brethren cease thy wicked plots.

Thus in the forest of Bhesakala
Did Mara by a Brother censured stand.
Thereat the rated imp, dejected sore,
E’en where he stood, did vanish quite away.