Buddha’s Wisdom Converts Angry Person: The Story of Sleeping at Ease | Buddhist Tales

Linked Discourse 7.1 With Dhananjani

So I have heard. 

At one time (in old India), the Buddha was staying near Rajagaha, in the Bamboo Grove, the squirrels’ feeding ground.

Now at that time a certain brahmin lady of the Bharadvaja clan named Dhananjani was devoted to the Buddha, the teaching, and the Sangha, community of Buddha's disciples. Once, while she was bringing her husband his meal, she tripped and expressed this heartfelt sentiment three times:

“Homage to that Blessed One, the perfected one, the fully awakened Buddha!

Homage to that Blessed One, the perfected one, the fully awakened Buddha!

Homage to that Blessed One, the perfected one, the fully awakened Buddha!”

When she said this, the brahmin said to Dhananjani:

“That’d be right. For the slightest thing this lowlife woman spouts out praise for that bald ascetic. Now, lowlife woman, I’m going to refute your teacher’s words!”

She replied:

“Brahmin, I don’t see anyone in this world—with its gods, Maras, and Brahmas, this population with its ascetics and brahmins, its gods and humans—who can refute the words of the Blessed One, the perfected one, the fully awakened Buddha. But anyway, you should go. When you’ve gone you’ll understand.”

Then the brahmin of the Bharadvaja clan, angry and upset, went to the Buddha and exchanged greetings with him. When the greetings and polite conversation were over, he sat down to one side, and addressed the Buddha in verse:

“When what is slain do you sleep at ease?

When what is slain is there no sorrow?

What is the one thing whose killing you approve?”

Buddha replied:

“When anger’s slain you sleep at ease.

When anger’s slain there is no sorrow.

O brahmin, anger has a poisonous root and a honey tip.

The noble ones praise its killing,

for when it’s slain there is no sorrow.”

When he said this, the brahmin said to the Buddha, “Excellent, worthy Gotama! Excellent! As if he were righting the overturned, or revealing the hidden, or pointing out the path to the lost, or lighting a lamp in the dark so people with clear eyes can see what’s there, worthy Gotama has made the teaching clear in many ways. I go for refuge to the worthy Gotama, to the teaching, and to the the Sangha, community of Buddha's disciples. May I receive the going forth, the ordination in the worthy Gotama’s presence?”

And the brahmin received the going forth, the ordination in the Buddha’s presence. Not long after his ordination, Venerable Bharadvaja, living alone, withdrawn, diligent, keen, and resolute, soon realized the supreme end of the spiritual path in this very life. He lived having achieved with his own insight the goal for which gentlemen rightly go forth from the lay life to homelessness.

He understood: “Birth is ended; the spiritual journey has been completed; what had to be done has been done; there is nothing further for this place.” 

And Venerable Bharadvaja became one of the perfected one, an arahant.

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