Apaṇṇaka Jātaka

The Buddha told Jātaka No. 1, as the Jātaka Atthakatha records it, at the Jetavana monastery near Sāvatthi. The occasion was a group of five hundred friends of the great lay supporter Anāthapiṇḍika. They were followers of other teachers, and one day the treasurer brought them to the monastery with offerings of garlands, perfumes, oil, honey and cloth.

After hearing the Buddha teach, these friends were moved. They took refuge in the Buddha, the Dhamma and the Sangha, gave generously, kept the precepts and observed the weekly fast days. For a while they came to the monastery with Anāthapiṇḍika again and again.

Then the Buddha travelled from Sāvatthi to Rājagaha. As soon as he had gone, the five hundred friends gave up their new faith and returned to their former teachers. Some seven or eight months later the Buddha came back to Jetavana, and Anāthapiṇḍika brought the same friends to him.

The treasurer told the Buddha plainly what had happened. The Buddha asked the friends whether it was true that they had left the Three Refuges, and they could not hide it. They confessed that it was.

The Buddha did not scold them harshly. He explained that nothing in all the worlds equals the Buddha, the Dhamma and the Sangha, and that those who take refuge in them are not reborn in states of woe. He taught that steady recollection of the Buddha, the Dhamma and the Sangha leads on toward the paths of liberation.

Then he said that people who seize on a false refuge are lost, as others were lost in a demon-haunted wilderness long ago. Those who held to the sure truth prospered in the very same place. Anāthapiṇḍika asked him to make that old story clear, and the Buddha began.

Long ago, when Brahmadatta was king of Benares, the Bodhisatta was born into a merchant family. As a grown man he travelled with five hundred loaded carts. In the same city lived another young merchant, a foolish man with little resource, who also had five hundred carts ready for the same road.

The Bodhisatta saw that a thousand carts on one road would strain the wood, water and grass. So he asked the other merchant whether he preferred to go first or last. The foolish merchant chose to go first, reasoning that he would get an untouched road, fresh grass and fair prices.

The Bodhisatta was glad to go last, and he had his reasons. Those ahead would level the rough road, and their oxen would graze off the coarse old grass. New sweet shoots would spring up behind them. Wells dug by the first caravan would be there for his own to drink from, and prices would already be settled.

So the foolish merchant set out in front. Journeying on, he came to a desert of sixty leagues, a waterless wilderness that was also haunted by goblins. He filled great jars with water, as sensible travellers do, and entered it.

When the caravan reached the middle of the desert, the goblin who ruled that place decided to make the travellers throw away their water. Then he could devour them when they were weak. By his magic he made a fine carriage drawn by white bulls.

He rode out with a dozen attendants, all dressed like lords who had just come through heavy rain. Their hair and clothes were dripping. They wore garlands of blue lotuses and white water-lilies and chewed the stalks. Their carriage wheels were caked with mud.

Because the wind blew toward the caravan, the foolish merchant was riding ahead of his column. The goblin greeted him kindly and drew aside. The merchant, noticing the lotuses and mud, asked whether it had rained on the road.

The goblin answered that just ahead lay a dark green belt of forest, where it rained constantly and every pool was full. He added that carrying water was now pointless. He told the merchant to break his jars and travel light. The foolish merchant believed him and had every jar smashed, keeping not even a handful.

The carts moved on, but no water appeared. Thirst wore the men down. At sunset they unyoked the carts, tied the oxen to the wheels and lay down without water for the animals or rice for the pot. In the night the goblins came out of their city and killed the exhausted men and oxen. They left only bones, and the loaded carts stood untouched. The tale places the whole disaster at the foolish merchant's door.

The Bodhisatta waited about six weeks and then started, with five hundred carts and as much water as he could carry. At the edge of the wilderness he gathered his men by drum and gave two orders. No one was to use even a palmful of water without his permission. No one was to eat any leaf, flower or fruit that he had not eaten before without asking him first.

When the goblin appeared in the same disguise, the Bodhisatta saw through him. This was the Waterless Desert, and the stranger had red eyes, an aggressive manner and cast no shadow. The Bodhisatta sent him away, saying that traders do not throw away their water until they see where more is to come from.

His own men were not so sure. They said that those travellers had worn lotuses and dripped with water, and they urged him to lighten the carts. The Bodhisatta halted the caravan and questioned them.

Had anyone ever heard of a lake in this desert? No. How far does a rain-wind carry? A league, and no one had felt one. How far can one see the crest of a storm-cloud, a flash of lightning or hear thunder? None of them had seen or heard any. He concluded that these were goblins, not men, and ordered the caravan to press on without wasting a drop.

Before the day was out they came upon the foolish merchant's five hundred carts and the remains of the men and oxen scattered around them. The Bodhisatta had his own carts drawn into a circle. He fed the men early and set the oxen down in the middle with the men around them.

He and the leaders stood guard with swords through all three watches of the night. At dawn he took the best of the abandoned goods in place of his own, reached his destination and traded at two or three times the value. He returned to Benares without losing a single man.

Back in the present, the Buddha drew the lesson for Anāthapiṇḍika and his friends. He spoke a stanza. It says that some declared the one sure truth, while false reasoners spoke otherwise, and that the wise should learn from this and hold firmly to the sure truth.

He then explained that walking by truth leads to happy rebirths and finally to arahatship, the final liberation from all rebirth, while walking by untruth leads to the four states of woe, the lower, painful rebirths as hell-being, animal, ghost, or demon. At the end of his teaching, all five hundred friends were established in the fruit of the first path, the first of four stages on the way to full awakening.

The Buddha then identified the birth. Devadatta was the foolish young merchant of that time, and his followers were the followers of that merchant. The followers of the Buddha were the followers of the wise merchant, and the wise merchant was the Buddha himself.

The tale of Jātaka No. 1 is not mainly about caravans. It is about how an untested claim can feel as comforting as water. The goblin never used force on the foolish merchant. He simply offered a pleasant story at the one moment when a pleasant story was fatal.

The Bodhisatta's safety came from patience and from asking plain, checkable questions. He did not trust the lotuses, the mud or the friendly voice. He trusted what he could verify, and he kept his water until he could see more. It is easy to see why the collection opens with this story.