Mangala: Chapter One
The Argument
Ajahn Amaro
December 30, 2008
This book is respectfully and lovingly dedicated to my teachers, Ajahn Chah & Ajahn Sumedho, to whom I owe great gratitude for the incalculable spiritual blessings they have brought into this world; and to Karl Gjellerup, the insightful and visionary groundbreaker who responded to the call for Buddhist poets to “do their work,” and thus wrote ‘The Pilgrim Kamanita’ – may the efforts that he made bring him to the perfect peace of Nirvana.
Twas life’s bright game
And Death was ‘he.’
Walter de la Mare
Ding Dong Bell, 23
The blessèd end of all things eternal:
do you know how I attained it?
Grieving love’s deepest suffering
opened my eyes:
I saw the world end.
Richard Wagner
Götterdämmerung (original version)
Author's Note
This story is intended to be both a partner to the novel ‘The Pilgrim Kamanita,’ written by Karl Gjellerup in 1906, and a tale that stands on its own. There is no need to have read the earlier book in order to make sense of this one, however, should you wish to go to the source from which many of the characters and scenes of this tale have sprung, an English version of it is to be found on this same website, at www.abhayagiri.org/main/book/366/.
This book is being published here as a ‘serial novel,’ which is to say that it that it will appear one chapter at a time, on the first day of every month, over the next couple of years. The plan is that, after the entire twenty-six chapters of the story have been released, a PDF file of the complete book will be posted, and available for free download within this website at www.abhayagiri.org/main/teacher/C14.
The worst thing that could happen to a story to be read for pleasure is to have it surrounded by footnotes and appendices. This is true; but it’s also true that some readers might like to know: “Did this come from the Buddha?” “Where can I find the rest of that quote?” “That tradition sounds interesting, I wonder what it symbolises?” What we have done, therefore, is to create an appendix of notes and references, outlining the sources of the derived material that has been used.
The main body of the text is not marked in any way to indicate these notes; however, if you are curious about a certain passage, go to the last page of the chapter, look for the page and quotation in question and see if there’s a comment or reference for it. This way, if you just want to read the story and ignore the rest you can easily do so, or, if you are interested in finding out more and checking the facts, the origins are mostly outlined there for you. We will also be delighted to hear of any mistakes, omissions or unwanted intrusions that any reader might find in these notes – feedback will be helpful for any future editions.
Also, gentle reader, please note that the original author (Karl Gjellerup) switched freely between using Sanskrit (the language of the Northern Buddhist and Hindu scriptures) and Pali (the language of the Southern Buddhist scriptures) during the course of his tale. In our efforts to be true to his original style we have maintained this mixture of usage.
Amaro Bhikkhu
Abhayagiri Monastery
December 2008
Chapter One – The Argument
t is not easy to evade the King of Death – even when he is only being embodied by a rambunctious three-year-old chasing his sisters in the rain.It was the monsoon burst; after months of dust and parched anticipation it had arrived, at last, that morning. A stiff breeze had preceded it, then huge steel-blue, grey and black piles of churning cloud had appeared marching from the south-west. The roar of wind and approaching rain had then suddenly been lost amidst the shouts of joy from people all over Ujjeni and the ferocious drumming of the deluge as it began its tattoo on the buildings and streets of the town.
As it pounded onto the roofs of Kamanita’s palace, the water ran in haphazard spumes straight off the eaves and arced wildly in the wind as it gushed from over-loaded downspouts. The children were in heaven as they rushed and darted, soaked to the skin, around the courtyard where they were playing off-ground He.
“I am He! I am He!” yelled little Krishna, vainly trying to raise his voice above the roaring of the water. He dashed fiercely after his sister Amba who, squealing with glee jumped up onto a stone bench before he was able to tag her. He searched for other quarry. Kambha and Khina, the twins, were taunting him from the edge of the low wall, just below the eave and out of the rain, when suddenly Tamba, his other sister, made a leap from the edge of the fountain and ran right across his path. When he took off in pursuit the other girls all left their perches, their yelps and cries also swamped by the all-abounding thunderous clamouring rain.
Tamba was quick on her feet so Krishna, being the youngest and thereby smallest of the group, was unable to get anywhere near her: too fast, too nimble. As he chased her, the others had also come teasingly close, calling, “Yah Death! King of Death, you can’t catch me!” Suddenly, as he twisted and made a lunge to try and tag Khina, his left leg gimped awkwardly under him and he crumpled to the ground; he curled on his side on the stone paving slabs clutching his ankle while the warm rain streamed down his face and over his body, clad in thin summer cloth.
Tamba was the first to react. She jumped down from the cleft in the wall but, knowing her little brother’s tricky and mischievous nature, just like that of his divine namesake, she hesitated briefly, her eyes instinctively narrowing with suspicion. Amba meanwhile, as soon as she realized that he was hurt, rushed to help.
As she knelt beside him and lowered her head to his ear, the running water dripping off her nose and down her cheeks, he burst into motion – rolling on his shoulder away from her while he deftly tagged her on the arm with his free hand: “You are He and I am free! You’re It, you’re It, you’re It!”
“You cheating little rat!” she swung herself at him, trying to get him right back, but before either she could reach him or he could get to the safety of an off-ground ledge, a piercing voice made itself heard above the din.
“Amba, Tamba, come here immediately! How many times do I have to tell you not to play with that odious little urchin, the colour of a demon, spawn of that little witch’s infidelity? If you touch him, you’ll end up just as black as he is!”
The two sisters were well-used to this sort of rebuke from their mother and had learned quickly to nod their heads and say sorry, and studiously to ignore the admonition. For in truth Krishna was only their half-brother: the girls were the children of Kamanita, the wealthy merchant, and his first wife Sita; when he had (so the story went) been persuaded that Sita was not able to ever bear him a son, he had taken a second wife, Savitri, and it was she who was the mother of Krishna and whom their own mother had just spoken of so harshly. So although to them he was simply their brother and companion in their many little escapades, to their respective mothers they were far removed from each other.
This distance was made all the greater through Savitri, by being the mother of Kamanita’s only son and heir to his estate, feeling that she therefore deserved the senior position in the household, and more pointedly Sita‘s belief that Kamanita was not the true father of Krishna, that the new wife had made a cuckold of him (and a laughing stock) as could be clearly seen by the fact that her son was as blue-black as the god Krishna – while both the mother and Kamanita were fair-skinned. It was a scandal and an outrage, as she told any- and everyone who would listen.
* * *
As can be the way of things, when Sita called out to her daughters, two other changes took place in the scene simultaneously: there was a momentary lull in the downpour, as if the rain was taking a breath before the next onslaught, and Savitri and one of her maids appeared at another entrance to the courtyard. This meant that not only had the children heard the words that Sita yelled at them but so had her arch-rival, the second wife.
For a moment, all stood still. Everyone present seemed to take in what had just happened and, in that second of empty pause, decided how to respond, or at least reacted with blind feeling: Kambha and Khina, the granddaughters of Kolita, the house steward, melted away behind a pillar and slipped out of the courtyard by the gardener’s door. Amba and Tamba felt embarrassed for their mother, but both meekly looked down at the ground and hurried to her side, under the shelter of the covered walkway surrounding the yard. Krishna mostly felt disappointed that the game had been stopped, just when he had made that ever-so-clever move and had tagged Amba. Sita felt her lips tighten in defiance and her pulse begin to strengthen. Savitri felt a surge of rage and indignation erupting within her breast – since the time that her beloved son was born she had heard whisperings, and the gossip of the family and townsfolk, reported to her by her friends and through the servants – but this was the first time she had heard the accusations directly, with her own ears.
She knew that she was utterly innocent. She had been an untouched maiden when she had been wed to Kamanita and she had been impeccably faithful to him ever since. Even after he had left the household and disappeared nearly two years ago, she had not so much as looked at another man longingly or even had the thought pass through her mind. As far as she and (she hoped) all the gods and spirits were aware she had been the perfect wife and mother to Kamanita’s son.
It was undeniable that the boy was an astonishingly dark colour. She had been as surprised as everyone in Ujjeni when he was born, and, in a somewhat fruitless attempt to counterbalance his striking blackness, when his naming ceremony had been held she had insisted on his being called Komudi – after the full moon called ‘white lotus’ in the month of Kattika in which he was born. As might be expected however, although she insisted on using this name with him, she was the only one to do so, everyone else—had either called him Kanha (‘Blackie’) in the local dialect, or more usually Krishna, meaning the same thing but the more commonly used since it was, auspiciously, the name of the great and famous deity, in the language of the ancient scriptures.
It was also somewhat predictable, if not unavoidable, that Krishna would have acquired such a nickname since his two half-sisters had also been given theirs through their own unusual complexions – Amba (meaning ‘Mango’) having been born with rich golden-hued skin, and Tamba (meaning ‘Copper’) having both a distinctly reddish-chestnut cast to her colouring and auburn lights in her hair – especially so when the sun shone through it from behind.
It was only a second or two that passed after Sita’s outburst but, in that moment, the years of shame unjustly applied to her, of frustration and self-righteous wrath, built to a head and burst forth; Savitri was incandescent.
“Who are you calling ‘witch’ you foul-mounted, noxious excuse for a mother?! And how dare you accuse our husband of being such a fool that he doesn’t even know if a child is his own!!! In the name of and before all the gods in heaven, I attest that our master, Kamanita, is the true father of my son – and he would swear it before you and all the gods as well, if he were here and had heard your foul and poisonous accusations.
“You are a selfish, jealous and evil jade, ignorant even of the most basic ways of nature. Everyone knows that people have children now and then who are vastly different from their parents, and with dark skin, just like Kamanita’s son. Why, even the Lord Krishna, who was as dark as my son, had parents who were fair-skinned. It happens all the time. The Lord Buddha too – in past lives of his, they say, was also born with black skin, although of brahmin parents. So, not only does the colour of my
son’s skin not imply that our husband was not his father, it might well instead fortell the fact that he is destined to be a great minister of state, or a warrior like the Divine Lord, or even a holy sage.”
The torrent of words gushed forth as if a gate in her heart had opened and the dammed up feelings of those difficult years had at last been allowed to be heard. As she was speaking the twins, Kambha and Khina, had raced off to tell their grandfather, Kolita, that there was big trouble afoot. He tried to gather his wits and now scurried rapidly to the courtyard where the confrontation between the two wives was unfolding.
Savitri had not allowed Sita to get a word in edgewise as yet, so intense and unrelenting was her rage. They were also face to face by this time so not even the pounding of the rain all around them was able to buffer the exchange. “I have tolerated your gross and unwarranted abuse for long enough. I will not stand it for a day longer; I refuse to spend another night under the same roof with you. I don’t believe my son is safe with you anywhere around.”
As she spoke, and Sita took in the full force of this wave of vehement passion, a tangle of different feelings swirled within in her: anger, indignation, fear, spite, protectiveness and, to her surprise, joy – for it sounded to her from the other woman’s words that she was going to leave the palace and relinquish the claim of her son to their husband’s fortune. “So, she won’t spend another night under the same roof,” Sita reflected, “splendid! At last there’ll be some peace around here again…”
This thought had hardly had time to form before the self-satisfaction turned to a nauseous flux in her belly and then to a rage of her own. For her rival had turned to address Kolita, the steward of the estate, and was talking to him with a level gaze and defiantly emphatic tone: “When our master, Kamanita, left this palace to take up the religious life, you were the only one he spoke to of his plans before he departed—is that correct?”
“Er, yes M’am, I was the only one there; I tried to stop him but…”
“Yes, we know, but he wouldn’t listen. Now he said to you ‘I leave this house and my estate in your care until my son is grown to manhood’ is that correct?”
“Er, well, yes M’am.”
“That being the case, with my son as the sole heir, and inheritor of the family honour, I demand that you throw this woman and her brats out of my son’s house – she has insulted the master and has besmirched the good name of this noble line. I have declared that my son and I will not pass another night under the same roof as this malicious and evil harridan. See to it,” she said, fixing the anxious and gentle retainer with a glare of icy keenness, “that they are dispatched by this evening. And keep your eyes peeled as to what goes with them. The master would not be happy if the gold and silver and jewelry, that are the property of his son, went wandering by way of greedy hands.”
“Oh dear, Oh my…errr… Well, the law certainly supports you, M’am but… Oh dear…”
“Don’t worry, Kolita,” Sita barked. “Don’t you worry; you’d have to chain me to the pilasters here if you wanted to get me to stay.”
The curious, conflicting emotions that Sita had been feeling had, by now, resolved themselves into a single sturdy cord – there was no more tangle – it was vividly clear that she and her children should leave this poisoned place forthwith and, if there was to be any future for them at all, she had to find her husband and learn from him, by his sworn testimony in a solemn Rite of Truth before the whole pantheon of gods, whether he was indeed the father of this boy. Or whether, as she strongly suspected, through his well-known passivity and dislike of conflict, he had known of his second wife’s infidelity, but had let it pass since it had at least provided him (and his eager family) with the much desired son.
There was also some doubt in her heart, as well as for many others, as to whether Kamanita had really gone off to become a wandering religious seeker, a yogi treading the dusty paths of India.
He had never expressed much in the way of religious feelings, right up until the night he left. He had been a wealthy merchant and indeed, even on the fateful night that he had departed he had seemed very far from any spiritual concerns, rather he had been solely bent on trying to protect his precious property. He had been ready to fight to the death, with the aid of some hired blades and free-lancers, against Angulimala and his gang of bandits who had threatened to attack his palace.
The hired men who were questioned later said that Kamanita had been genuinely expecting the clash but the bandits had never come: “He looked just like a man before a battle who didn’t really want to fight – if he was acting, he could make a career out of it ‘cos he sure convinced me…” According to Kolita, Kamanita had simply announced to him at dawn, once it was clear that Angulimala was no danger, that he had decided to take up the wandering monk’s life; but was Kolita telling the truth about that, and about the bequest to his son? Certainly girls rarely inherited property – they have their dowries at marriage – but maybe it was a plot… Kolita had the master killed and had agreed to split the spoils with that witch Savitri… But Kolita cannot even kill a mosquito and loses sleep if he has put too much ghee from the stores onto his flat-bread at lunch…
* * *
It was impossible to know what had ‘really’ happened but the best Sita could do now for herself and her daughters, in fact as far as she could see the only thing she could do was to set out and find her errant husband. Whether he was a monk or living as a merchant somewhere else, or whether he was indeed dead, somehow she would find him and learn of the truth what she could. If she had stopped to think it all through rationally, she would have seen that there were all sorts of flaws in this plan but she was in a state that did not allow much rationality – they needed to get out and this was the only pathway she could see.
If this had all happened earlier, her first thought would have been to go back to her parents’ house, just down the street, as this was the usual mode of escape from an unworkable marriage situation. The fortunes of her father, the great merchant Sañjaya, had waned, however – this situation in no small part due to being out-competed by Kamanita’s sharp business practices – and her whole family had upped and moved to Savatthi, the capital of Kosala. For, not only had Sañjaya seen Kamanita’s wealth expanding while his shrank, but he also realized that, with the birth of a son to Kamanita’s second wife, his last hopes of tapping into that fortune were gone. Thus they had moved – lock, stock and barrel – to Savatthi to make a fresh start with the capital and merchandise that they had, and Savatthi was far, far away.
Her mind raced, and when she pondered where Kamanita might have gone to, the only place that came to mind was Kosambi, the capital of the nearby kingdom of Vamsa. She knew that he had been there once or twice, and that some major event had happened there for him. She suspected that he might have had a secret lover there – he never spoke of it consciously but often in his sleep he would mutter the name of the town with a sad and loving tone. Even if he heard the name ‘Kosambi’ in other people’s conversations, he would wince and fidget or release a quiet sigh. He would also often mumble the name ‘Vasitthi’ as he dreamt, so she half suspected that the so-called monk’s life was just an excuse to be rid of his tiresome family in Ujjeni and to take up again with his old flame in that far-off city.
This all passed through her consciousness in a flash and she there and then decided to aim for Kosambi, seek this lady called Vasitthi, and see if her husband was to be found there. “Kolita, if you and some of the maids will help us pack up a few of our belongings – we want to make sure we don’t take any little thing that is not ours – Amba, Tamba and I will set off for Kosambi this very day.”
“But M’am, your ladyship, it’s so awfully raining hard…” He begged and mumbled as he followed her fierce stride down the corridor. “Please M’am, the little ones, you can’t properly travel in weather like this sort. It’s so nasty. It’ll finish all you off…”
By the time that they had completed packing their things – Sita moving in severe, brisk bursts, the girls in shock, silent, numb, their limbs operating as if automatically – the good Kolita, in a very round-about manner of persuasion, had got them to agree to wait out the monsoon at the house of a cousin of his on the far north side of the town. The owner was away and he had entrusted it to be let out by Kolita.
The presence of the rains – now coming down steadily and turning the lanes to an impressive network of mud and puddles – and the promise (Kolita assured her it was quite legal, the girls, after all, were the legitimate children of Kamanita) that the rent for the house would come out of the general estate funds, and thereby from the pocket of the young master, made Sita see that this might not be such a bad idea after all. They could let the Rains finish and adjust themselves to their new, straitened circumstances, and plan as best they could for the road ahead.
As the rain finally eased off at dusk, the three, and a few helpful hands from the staff, made their way out into the street to begin their new lives. Krishna had momentarily slipped away from his mother, and stood forlornly at the gate, crying quietly, not knowing if he would ever see his beloved sisters again. He watched them go and bid his sad farewell.
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Notes and References:
Chapter 1
1. Page 6 — “I am He!”… It seems very likely that the word ‘He’ used for this children’s game (in this case ‘Off-ground He’) originally derives from the masculine pronoun, and the implication is that it is Death that ‘He’ is referring to. Walter de la Mare makes this association in one of his poems:
‘Twas life’s bright game,
And Death was ‘he.’
‘Ding Dong Bell,’ 23
When I played this game as a child the tagging person was known as ‘It’ rather than ‘He,’ but the neuter gender also fits in well with the idea that it is Death that is the catcher.
2. Page 7 —in the local dialect… In this story the language of the scriptures of the Southern Buddhist school, also known as Theravāda, is what is being referred to as ‘the local dialect’ – it is called Pali. It had no written script of is own and so Buddhist teachings were originally passed on from generation to generation by rote learning of texts in this language.
3. Page 7 —the language of the ancient scriptures… The language being referred to here is Sanskrit. This was a written language of the same period and it was used for all the sacred teachings of the Hindu religion, also known as ‘The Vedas’ – these books are what is being referred to here as ‘the ancient scriptures.’ Sanskrit was later employed to record Buddhist teachings as well.
4. Page 7 — The Lord Buddha… . in past lives of his… was also born with black skin… For example in the Kanha Jātaka, Jat §440: “In the womb of this brahmin’s wife was conceived the Bodhisatta, and from his black colour, they gave him on his naming day the name of ‘Kanha-Kumāra – Young Blackie.’