Saɱyutta Nikāya
I. Sagātha Vagga
6. Brahmā Saɱyutta
The Book of the Kindred Sayings
I. Kindred Sayings with Verses
6. The Brahmā Suttas
Translated by Mrs. Rhys Davids
Assisted by Sūriyagoḍa Sumangala Thera
Public Domain
I
Sutta 9
Tudo Brahmā
[9.1] THUS HAVE I HEARD:
The Exalted One was once staying near Sāvatthī, at Jeta Grove, in Anāthapiṇḍika's Park.
On this occasion the Kokālikan bhikkhu[1] was afflicted, suffering and very ill. Then Tudu, the independent Brahmā,[2]when the night was far spent, shedding radiance with his effulgent beauty over the entire Jeta Grove, drew near to the Kokālikan bhikkhu.
And, standing in the air, he spoke thus to the Kokālikan:
'Put thy heart's trust, Kokālika, in Sāriputta and Moggallāna! Lovely are Sāriputta and Moggallāna!'
Who art thou, friend?'
'I am Tudu, independent Brahmā.'
'Wast thou not, friend, declared by the Exalted One to be a Never-Returner?
Why then, what dost thou in that thou hast returned to this world?
Behold what a mistake thou hast herein committed!'[3]
[188] [Tudu:—]
"In sooth to every man that's born
A hatchet grows within his mouth,
Wherewith the fool, whene'er he speaks
And speaks amiss, doth cut himself.
He who the blameworthy doth praise,
Or who the praiseworthy doth blame,
Builds by his mouth his evil doom,
And by that doom he finds no weal.
Trifling the evil luck[4] of one
Who by the dice doth lose his wealth.
But greater far his evil luck,
Taking his all and eke himself,
Who 'gainst the Blessed Saints on earth
Doth set his heart at enmity.
For vaster epochs doth he go —
A hundred thousand years and eke[5]
Thirty and six, and yet five more —
To life in purgatory, who,
In thought and word on wrong intent,
Utters abuse of Ariyans."[6]
[2] See above, § 6, n. 1. B. states that this deva had been the tutor of the ailing man, and that having won, as man, to the Third Fruition (that of never returning to earth), he was after death reborn in Brahmā world (to pass utterly away in some 'higher' heaven).
[3] Comy.: The Kokālikan thought: 'he comes to chide me, not discerning the boil on his own forehead.' Tudu perceives the wretch is too ill for admonishing, and pronounces over him the sweeping assertions in the versss.
[4] Kali, rendered here also as 'evil doom.'
[5] On these epochs: nirabbuda and abbuda —see § 10. I have no olue to the curiously untidy precision of the periods stated. For pañca read pañca ca.
[6] The verses, repeated in § 10, occur (1) in A. v, 171, where §§ 9 and 10 form one sutta; (2) in Sn. ver. 657-60; (3) in A. ii, 3, the first gāthā excepted.
