Samudda-Vāṇija Jātaka

The Buddha told this story at Jetavana about Devadatta, who had gone down into the hell Avīci together with five hundred families of his followers. It is Samudda-Vāṇija Jātaka, No. 466 in the Pali Jātaka collection of the Khuddaka Nikāya, and its verses are preserved with the commentary that tells the tale. The frame story is a sober one, and it explains why the past-life tale was chosen.

After the two chief disciples left Devadatta and took many of his followers with them, he was overcome with distress. In his suffering he remembered the virtues of the Tathāgata, the Buddha. He reflected that for nine months he had thought ill of the Buddha, while the Master had never held a sinful thought toward him. He resolved to go and reconcile himself with the Master, and he had himself carried in a litter, travelling by night.

Ānanda told the Master that Devadatta was coming, and the Master replied that Devadatta would not see him. The same exchange was repeated when the party reached Sāvatthī. At the gate of Jetavana, as Devadatta approached the lake, the fruit of his deeds came to its full ripening. Wishing to bathe and drink, he stepped down from the litter, and the earth opened beneath him. Remembering the Buddha's virtues, he spoke a verse of refuge, and in the act of taking refuge he passed into Avīci with his five hundred families.

Some days later the monks were speaking in the Hall of Truth. They said that Devadatta, through greed for gain, had set his anger against the Buddha without cause and had paid no heed to the terrors of the future. The Master came in and asked what they were discussing. He told them that this was not the first time. In an earlier age, too, Devadatta had been so taken with present pleasure that he came to ruin with his followers.

Once, when Brahmadatta was king of Benares, there stood near the city a great town of a thousand carpenter families. The carpenters would promise to make a bed, a chair, or a house, and take a large advance. Then they proved unable to make anything at all. The people reproached every carpenter they met, and the debtors were harassed until they could no longer live there.

The carpenters decided to go to some foreign land. They went to the forest, cut down trees, built a great ship, and launched her on the river. They moored her about three-quarters of a league from the town. At midnight they returned for their families, brought them aboard, and made their way in due course to the open ocean. There they sailed at the will of the wind until they reached an island in the midst of the sea.

The island was rich with wild rice, sugar-cane, banana, mango, rose-apple, jackfruit, and coconut. An earlier castaway had taken possession of it and lived on its produce, growing stout and sturdy, naked, with long hair and beard. Seven brave men armed themselves and went ashore to explore, since if the place were haunted they would all perish. The castaway, content on cool silver sand, was singing that those who plough and sow in India had nothing to compare with his island.

The scouts heard him and followed the sound. His appearance alarmed them so much that they took him for a goblin and fitted arrows to their bows. He cried out that he was a man and begged for his life. Once they spoke together, he told them they had come as the reward of good deeds. He explained that the island needed no labour, and he gave one warning. The island was haunted by deities, who would be angered by the sight of human waste, so it must always be buried in the sand.

Among the thousand families were two master workmen, each at the head of five hundred. One was foolish and greedy for the best of everything. The other was wise and was not set on getting the best for himself. In time, living there, all grew stout and sturdy. Then they thought they had not been merry for a long time, and they made strong drink from sugar-cane juice.

Drunk, they sang, danced, and sported, and in their thoughtlessness they forgot the warning and fouled the island. The deities were angered that their playground had been made foul. They agreed that on the fifteenth day from then, at the rising of the full moon, they would bring up the sea and make an end of the intruders. They fixed the day among themselves.

A righteous deity among them could not bear to see the men perish. He made the island blaze with light and appeared in the air to the north, adorned in splendour. He told the carpenters that the deities were angry, and that in half a month the sea would be brought up to destroy them. Then another, cruel deity thought they might follow the warning. He appeared in the south and told them to stay, saying no flood would come and that they might enjoy the island for all generations.

The foolish carpenter told the others to trust the southern god, who promised safety. The northern god, he said, knew nothing. Five hundred families who loved good things agreed. The wise carpenter urged another way. He said they should not take for best or worst what they first heard, but listen to both, deliberate, and take the mean. If the southern deity spoke truly, a ship would cost them nothing. If the northern one did, they would embark and find safety.

The foolish carpenter mocked him, saying he saw a crocodile in a teacup, and told the wise man to take his ship and go. The wise man built the ship with his followers and loaded all the fittings. On the day of the full moon, as the moon rose, a wave came up from the ocean and rolled knee-deep over the island. He cast loose the ship. The others stayed seated, saying it would rise no higher. The water came waist-deep, man-deep, palm-deep, then seven palm-trees deep, and the foolish carpenter and his five hundred families were destroyed.

The Master added stanzas on the wisdom of foreseeing danger. He then identified the birth. Devadatta was the foolish carpenter, Kokālika was the unrighteous deity of the southern quarter, Sāriputta was the righteous deity of the north, and the Buddha himself was the wise carpenter.

The closing verses say that those who do the needed deed before the need arises will never come to suffering. The wise carpenter was not the one who found the island, and he was not the one with the loudest voice. He was the one who weighed both warnings and acted before the moment of crisis. The tale remains a gentle reminder to prepare early.