Kaṇha Jātaka

The Buddha told Jātaka No. 440, as the Jātaka Atthakatha records it, at Kapilavatthu. He was walking in the Banyan Park with a company of monks when he smiled. The elder Ānanda asked why. The Buddha answered that long ago a sage named Kaṇha had lived meditating on that very spot, and that his virtue had shaken the dwelling of Sakka, king of the gods. He then told the whole story.

When Brahmadatta reigned in Benares, a wealthy brahmin with no children took up vows and prayed for a son. His wealth was eighty crores, eight hundred million in coin. The Bodhisatta was conceived as his son. Because of his dark complexion the child was named Kaṇhakumāra, which means young Blackie.

At sixteen he was sent to Takkasilā to study the arts. He came home, was given a suitable wife, and in time inherited his father's property.

One day Kaṇha was going through the treasure houses when he read a golden plate. It recorded how much wealth such-and-such an ancestor had gathered, and how much another. He saw that every one of those owners had passed away and left the wealth behind.

He decided that the better part was to give. For seven days he gave alms generously, and the Atthakatha says his store did not shrink. Then he renounced all and went to the Himālaya.

In the Himālaya Kaṇha took up the ascetic practices. He lived at the foot of a tree in the open air, sat or lay on the ground. He took only what the tree itself gave according to the season: fruit, flowers, leaves and bark. The Atthakatha counts thirteen such practices. Through them he gained supernormal knowledge and perfect meditative absorption.

The power of his virtue made Sakka's throne grow hot. Sakka understood that either his own merit was spent or a great being was practising nearby. He came down to the tree where Kaṇha was sitting. He wanted to test whether the sage would grow angry when mocked for his dark colour and his plain food.

Sakka first spoke in verse. He said, in effect, that Kaṇha was black and lived on poor fare. Kaṇha answered in verse, calmly. A person is not black by skin, he said. If one does wrong, then one is black.

Sakka was pleased and offered a boon. Kaṇha asked only for what a renunciant needs. He asked to be without malice, hatred, covetousness and lust. He then spoke at length about these four faults and their evil effects, and Sakka was greatly impressed.

Sakka offered a further boon, and Kaṇha asked that no disease should mar his peace. Sakka offered once more. This time Kaṇha asked that no creature should be harmed on his account, in body or in mind.

Not once did he ask for food or comfort, a better dwelling, or any reward. Seeing this, Sakka granted all he had asked. He made the tree bear fruit perpetually, and returned to his heaven. Kaṇha kept up his meditation, and after his life he went to the Brahma world.

The Buddha ended the story by identifying the birth. Anuruddha was Sakka, and the Buddha himself was Kaṇha the wise.

Jātaka No. 440 turns an ordinary insult around. Sakka mocks a man for the colour of his skin, and the sage replies that blackness belongs to deeds, not to the body.

What he then asks for is a short list. No hatred, no malice, no covetousness, no lust, no illness to disturb him, and no creature harmed because of him. It is a modest request, and it marks a person who has already learned what is worth having.

The Buddha smiled in the Banyan Park because the place itself remembered this. A past Bodhisatta had sat there, been mocked, and answered with a clear mind. For the monks walking with him, the smile pointed out that the ground beneath their feet had once held a sage who wanted nothing from a god except a gentler heart.