Jāgara Jātaka

The Buddha told this story at Jetavana about a lay disciple who had entered the First Path. This man set out from Sāvatthī along a forest road, travelling with a caravan of carts. At a certain pleasant watered spot, the leader of the caravan unyoked his five hundred carts, arranged food, and took up lodging there. The men lay down here and there to sleep.

The lay disciple did not lie down. He practised walking meditation at the root of a tree near the caravan leader. Five hundred robbers had planned to plunder the caravan. They came with various weapons, surrounded it, and waited. They saw the lay disciple at his walk and waited for him to go to sleep before they began the plunder. He went on walking all night.

At dawn the robbers threw away the sticks, stones, and other weapons they had picked up. As they left, they called out to the caravan leader. They told him he was the owner of his property only because he had kept his life, and he had kept his life owing to the man who kept awake so diligently. They said he should pay honour to that man. The caravan men rose early and saw the stones and other things the robbers had thrown away. They understood what they owed to the lay disciple and gave him honour.

The lay disciple reached his destination and did his business. Then he returned to Sāvatthī and went on to Jetavana. There he saluted the Tathāgata (the Buddha) and sat at his feet. When the Buddha invited him to declare himself, he told what had happened. The Buddha said that it was not he alone who had gained special merit by waking and watching, for wise people of old had done the same. At the lay disciple's request, the Buddha told an old story. It is recorded as No. 414 of the Jātaka collection.

Once, when Brahmadatta was reigning in Benares, the Bodhisatta was born in a brahmin family. When he grew up, he learned all the arts at Takkasilā (a renowned center of learning) and then returned home and lived as a householder. After a time he left his house and became an ascetic. Soon he reached the faculty of meditation. He lived in the Himalaya region, using only the standing and walking postures, and he walked all night without sleeping.

A spirit lived in a tree at the end of the ascetic's walk. It was pleased with him. It spoke the first stanza from a hole in the trunk, putting a question: who is it that wakes when others sleep, and sleeps while others wake? Who can read my riddle, and who will answer it? The Bodhisatta heard the spirit's voice and answered in verse. He said that he was the one who wakes while others sleep and sleeps while others wake, and that he could read the riddle and answer it.

The spirit asked again: how is it that you wake while others sleep, and sleep while others wake? How do you read my riddle, and what answer do you give? The Bodhisatta then explained the point. Some people forget that virtue lies in stern sobriety, and when such people sleep, he said, he is awake. In others, passion, vice, and ignorance have ceased to be, and when such people are awake, he sleeps. So it is that he wakes while others sleep and sleeps while others wake.

When the Great Being gave this answer, the spirit was pleased. It spoke the last stanza in his praise, saying that it was good that he woke while others slept and slept while others woke, and good that he read the riddle and gave the answer. Making the Bodhisatta's praises in this way, the spirit entered its abode in the tree.

After the lesson, the Buddha identified the Birth. At that time, he said, the tree spirit was Uppalavaṇṇā (later a foremost nun among the Buddha's disciples) and the ascetic was himself.

The Jāgara Jātaka, No. 414, rests on a riddle with two meanings. In the frame story, wakefulness is literal. A lay disciple's discipline, walking mindfully through the night, protected a whole caravan without his saying a word. In the story of the past, wakefulness is moral. The ascetic is awake to what ordinary people sleep through, while he rests among those whose passion, vice, and ignorance have already come to an end. The verses suggest that being truly awake is a matter of virtue and understanding, and that this vigilance is a form of care for others as well as oneself. The verses also warn that those who forget sober virtue are asleep even when their eyes are open. This is the practice of heedfulness, kept up through the night and through a life.