Buddhist Stories: “A Certain Monk,” Part 4 of 6, Sept. 28-29, 2015

So the Buddha said, “Monk, that is the place you should not run away from. That is exactly the place you should go and stay.” “Restrain your thoughts alone. Do not concern yourself with anything else, for thoughts are very unruly.” “The mind is very hard to check. And swift it falls on what it wants. The training of the mind is good. And mind, so tamed, brings happiness.” So tame your minds. Don’t care about anything. Just check yourself first. Control yourself first before you control everybody else. And that monk, after being admonished by the Buddha, went to that same place, and did not think thoughts concerned with exterior things. And then, the great female lay disciple looked with divine vision, and seeing the elder, meaning the monk. And at once, she prepared wholesome food and gave it to him. Once having received wholesome food, in but a few days, the elder, meaning the monk, attained arhatship. So now, he considered within himself like this: “Has she been a support to me in my present state of existence only, or has she been a support to me in other lives as well? As I have passed from one state of existence to another in the round of existences.” So with this thought in mind, he recalled a hundred states of existence less one. So, he saw that this female lay disciple had been his wife. And her affections had been set on other men in another lifetime. And she had caused him to be deprived of life. She saw that the monk had been seeing her sins in the past lives. And now she wondered whether or not, in some of these 100 lives, whether she had been doing something good as well to him. She said inside her, “Discern further and consider the matter.” And then by the power of the divine ear, the monk immediately heard what she said. So he did research further into the past existences and then he called upon his mind his 100th state of existence. Just like her. And perceived that, in that state of existence, she had spared his life. Just like now. Filled with joy, then he thought to himself, “This female lay disciple had indeed rendered great assistance to me.” Then and there, reciting the questions relating to the Four Paths and the Fruits, he attained the remainderless element of Nirvana.