PSALMS OF THE BRETHREN
Canto II.
Psalms of Two Verses
CLXIV
Mogharājan
Translated from the Pali by Mrs. C.A.F. Rhys Davids.
Public Domain
Reborn in this Buddha-age in a brahmin's family, and named Mogharājan,[1] he studied under the brahmin Bāvariya. Growing distressed, he became an ascetic. He was one of the sixteen, Ajita and others, who was sent by Bāvariya to the Master to interview him.[2] When Mogharājan had asked his question and been answered, he attained arahantship.
Thereafter he acquired distinction by wearing rough cloth which caravaners, tailors and dyers had thrown away. Wherefore the Master assigned him the first place among those who wore such rough clothing [he thereby realizing his aspiration made many ages ago].[3]
At another time, from want of care and through former karma, pimples and the like broke out and increased on bis body. Judging that his lodging was infected, he spread out a couch of straw in the Magadha fields, and there, though it was winter, he lodged. Of him, waiting one day [152] upon the Master, and paying his respects, the latter of his courtesy inquired in the following verse:
[207] Well, Mogharājan, thou skin-sufferer,
Thou blest of heart and constantly serene,
Cometh the time when winter nights are cold,
And thou a brother poor - how wilt thou fare?
[208] Thus asked, the Thera explained the matter to the Master:
Rich are the cornfields of the Magadhese,[4]
And thriving, every one, I've heard it said.
My little straw-built canopy doth please
Better than others' way of finding ease.
[1] This curious name (= futile king) seems to be nowhere explained. The one so named in Saṃy. Nik., i. 23, seems to be a deva, but a verse by a Mogharāja-Thera in Milinda, ii. 359, is one of those not incorporated in this Canon.
[2] See Sutta-Nipāta, verses 976-1031, 1116-1119. Cf. also XX (Ajita), and the varied 'Bāvarī,' 'Bāvariya-brahmano.'
[3] Ang. Nik., i. 25.
[4] On the large fields of Magadha see my 'Early Economic Conditions in Northern India,' JRAS, 1901, p. 860. Khetta, the collective singular, has here become khettāni, but cf. p. 153.
