Answering King Bimbisāra (I)

Buddhacarita, Chapter Eleven: Answering King Bimbisāra

Having been comforted and urged with such gentle persuasion by King Bimbisāra, the prince answered him respectfully with thanks: "I am deeply moved by what you have said. You have grasped well what suits the ways of the world, and your words do not go against reason at all — one of so illustrious a lineage as yours, so accomplished a friend to those around him, speaking with an open and undivided heart — this is exactly how such counsel ought to be given.

Ordinary people of the world, mired in shallow habit, cannot dwell in true benevolence and righteousness; and those of meager virtue, moved only by their own immediate feelings — how could such people ever truly grasp what is renowned and excellent?

To carry on the tradition of one's own excellent forebears, honoring propriety and cultivating deference and respect, able amid hardship and difficulty to give aid without ever abandoning another — this alone is the true mark, in this world, of a genuinely excellent friend.

A good friend who freely shares his wealth is himself like a secure treasury; but wealth jealously hoarded and sealed away only for one's own benefit is certain to be lost before very long.

The wealth of a kingdom is no eternal treasure — it is generous giving that becomes a true work of merit; and giving it, besides, to a genuinely good friend, one need never regret its dispersal afterward.

Knowing now the depth of your own generous intent, I do not mean my answer as any contradiction of what you have said — I only wish, at this moment, to tell you plainly what I myself have come to see.

Fearing birth, old age, sickness, and death, and wishing to seek true liberation, I have already cast aside my own kin and parted from every bond of love and affection — how, then, could I possibly go back now and take up the practice of the five desires?

It is not fierce and venomous serpents, nor icy lightning, nor raging fire that I fear — it is only the realm of the five desires that I fear, for it is this alone that keeps my own heart circling in endless toil.

The five desires are themselves an ever-present thief, robbing a person of every fine and precious treasure within; they are deceptive and false, empty of any true substance, no different from an illusion conjured by magic.

Even to dwell on them for a moment is enough to lead a person into confusion — how much more so, then, to remain constantly immersed in them?

The five desires are themselves the greatest of obstacles, forever blocking the way to the Dharma of quiescent extinction.

Even the pleasures of heaven itself are not permissible for one who seeks this path — how much less, then, the desires found among mere human beings?

The five desires give rise only to a parched and unquenchable craving, one that never, in the end, reaches any point of true satisfaction.

It is like a raging wind driving a fierce fire — however much fuel is heaped upon it, it is never enough; and among every kind of wrongdoing in this world, none surpasses the realm of the five desires.

Sentient beings, in their foolishness and greed, take their pleasure and attachment in these things without ever perceiving this truth; but the wise, fearing the five desires as they do, never fall into such wrongdoing."

Even a king who rules over everything within the four seas still hopes for something further beyond them — craving and desire are like the great ocean itself, never once reaching any point of rest or satisfaction.

King Māndhātṛ, the wheel-turning sovereign, beneath whom it rained gold across the whole world, ruled over all four continents and still longed for the Trāyastriṃśa heaven besides; and when Śakra himself offered to share half his own throne with him, he sought, on top of even that, to bring about Śakra's very death and take the whole throne for himself.

Nahuṣa, having cultivated ascetic practice, became king over the very Thirty-Three Heavens; but giving himself over to indulgence, his heart grew arrogant and proud, and he had sages themselves draw his own chariot — and it was for this very act of reckless indulgence that he fell at once into the form of a great serpent.

King Vena, the wheel-turning sovereign, who wandered freely through the Trāyastriṃśa heaven, took a heavenly maiden as his own queen, and levied taxes even upon the gold belonging to the sages themselves; the sages, enraged, laid a curse upon him, and his kingdom was destroyed and his own life ended with it.

Bali once deposed the great Śakra; Nahuṣa in turn once deposed the great Bali; and Nahuṣa himself, in the end, was returned to subjection under Śakra once more — how, then, could the lordship of heaven itself ever be anything permanent?

No earthly kingdom is ever truly secure — it belongs only to whoever holds the greatest power at any given moment.

[Consider instead one who] wears simple garments of grass, eats only fruit, drinks only from flowing streams, lets his hair grow long enough to trail upon the ground, dwelling in silence, seeking nothing at all —

even such a one, cultivating austerities in this way, may in the end still be destroyed by desire; one ought to understand, then, that the realm of the five desires is the true enemy of anyone who walks this path.

Even the thousand-armed King Kārtavīryārjuna, of such great strength and valor that no enemy could stand against him, was slain by the sage Rāma — and this, too, came about entirely on account of greed and desire.

How much more so, then, for me, born of the kṣatriya caste — should I not also be dragged along by such desire? For to taste even a slight portion of these worldly desires is enough to let their offspring grow and multiply without end.

It is precisely this that the wise despise — who, then, would willingly swallow the very poison of desire?

Every manner of painful striving after gain is, in every case, driven on by greed alone; were there no such greed and desire at all, no such painful striving would ever arise in the first place.

The wise, seeing the fault inherent in such suffering, extinguish greed and desire entirely; for what the world calls "good" is, in every such case, nothing but an evil law in disguise — since it is precisely the craving and delight of sentient beings that gives rise to every kind of reckless self-indulgence, and this self-indulgence turns around to injure them in the end, so that at death they fall into the evil destinies.

What is gained only through diligent effort must also be guarded by diligent effort; and what is not so diligently maintained is lost of its own accord — no mere effort, however skillful, can hold on to it forever.

Such things are no different from something merely borrowed for a time, and the wise do not cling to them with craving; yet craving and desire, pursued through painful striving, only deepen one's own attachment once gained — and when the moment of their impermanent dispersal finally comes, the suffering that follows only grows all the greater. It is like holding a burning torch that turns and burns one's own hand — this is not something the wise ever cling to.

The foolish and the base, their hearts scorched by the poison of miserliness and greed, endure suffering their whole lives long, and never once attain any true peace or ease.

Greed and hatred are like a serpent's venom — by what possible reason would the wise ever draw near to them?

It is like painfully gnawing on a dry, bare bone — utterly without flavor, never satisfying one's hunger, and only wearing down one's own teeth for nothing; the wise do not even taste of such a thing.

Kings, bandits, floods, and fire all lay their separate claims on it, and even one's own wicked children will contend over shared wealth — it is just like a piece of rotting flesh, over which a whole flock of birds will fight one another; and greed for wealth is exactly the same in kind — the wise take no delight in it at all.

Wherever wealth has gathered together, there resentment and hatred most often arise as well; one must guard it oneself day and night, as a man fears a bitter enemy, or as a condemned criminal is led beneath the executioner's placard at the eastern market — a thing universally despised by human feeling.

Greed, hatred, and delusion are like a tall marker post, and the wise forever keep their distance from it; those who flee instead into the mountains, the forests, the rivers, and the seas most often meet with ruin there, and rarely find any true peace.

It is like fruit hanging from the high branches of a tree — those who grasp at it greedily most often fall to their deaths; and the realm of craving and desire is exactly the same — however visible it may be, it is difficult indeed to safely take hold of it.

Wealth sought through such painful and contrived means is hard to gather and easy to lose again, no different from what one obtains within a dream — how, then, could the wise ever imagine they could hold on to it for good?

It is like a pit of fire disguised beneath a false covering — whoever treads upon it is certain to be burned to death; the fire of craving and desire is exactly the same, and the wise never wander into it.

It is like those men Kaurava, Piśunananda, and Melitaṇḍa — no different from a butcher's own chopping block and knife: the very shape that craving and desire take is just the same, and this is not something the wise will ever take up.