The Ascetic's Revenge

This story appears in the Abhidharma Mahāvibhāṣā Śāstra. There was once a king who kept company with a scholar of great renown and high social standing, though he never gave the man any official title—in today’s terms, he might have functioned as an advisor, or held some similar unofficial role. Whenever major state business arose, the king would consult the scholar, who would share his counsel, and the king always valued his perspective highly. After a while, though, the king cut off contact with him. The scholar was quietly bothered by this slight, so he headed out to the mountains and open countryside to clear his head, going for a walk. As he walked further and further into the mountains, he came upon a very ugly ascetic sitting in meditation. The scholar was no Buddhist, for one. He thought to himself, “This ugly man is inauspicious.” Gazing at the ascetic’s strikingly unsightly appearance, he said aloud, “I’ve been running into some inauspicious events lately, so I’m giving this inauspiciousness to you!” But how would he make this intention known? He took some impure substances—specifically excrement and urine—and placed them on the ascetic’s head, saying, “I’m giving you my inauspicious events!” Then the scholar left. When he got back, the king once again sent for him to discuss matters of state, and the scholar’s low mood soon cleared. Some time later, a prominent woman of the city—one so well-known she was no ordinary figure—also ran into a string of misfortunes, and was filled with regret and unhappiness. She happened upon the king’s favored scholar, and after they talked, she told him of her troubles. The scholar said, “Don’t worry. I had a run of bad luck myself once, and did such and such. You can do the same.” Sure enough, she went into the mountains, took a pile of dung, and placed it on the ascetic’s head, saying, “I’m giving you my unhappiness and inauspiciousness!” Then she left. When she returned home, her luck began to shift, and everything fell into place exactly as she wished. This time, to keep the account brief, the king also encountered some misfortunes, and he discussed them with the scholar. The scholar told him, “You can try doing such and such, just as I did.” The king, of course, wielded far more power and authority than an ordinary person—after all, most people only have average discernment. When he heard such a remedy existed, he went to try it for himself. “So that’s the trick? Wonderful,” he said, and had impure substances sent to the ascetic as well. After he did, his situation did indeed improve: all his misfortunes faded, and everything went according to his wishes. How could this method be so effective? The king hired a man to go up into the mountain every day and place impure substances on the ascetic’s head. Every time this happened, the ascetic—who had mastered meditative concentration and extinguished all desire-realm afflictions—was able to bear these acts without losing his composure. Of course, he had disciples who would wash him clean after each incident. But this time, the king’s hired man kept repeating the act day after day, until the ascetic could bear it no longer. He finally lost his composure, entered deep meditative absorption, and with a single focused thought, called forth a rain of massive boulders from the sky that turned the entire kingdom into a giant rock mountain, crushing the king, all his subjects, and countless others to death! This is the story as recorded in the Abhidharma Mahāvibhāṣā Śāstra. What does this story show us? It shows that even a non-Buddhist who practices only calm meditation can achieve the four dhyānas and eight samādhis, and that attaining these states makes it easy to gain supernatural powers. To an ordinary worldly person, someone with such powers would seem like a holy being—who would dare to look down on him? But when he encountered misfortunes, if people kept provoking and harassing him endlessly, his underlying afflictions would surface. Once they surfaced, he would retaliate, and carry out acts like this. This shows that practicing meditative concentration alone is not enough: afflictions still lie beneath the surface, one can still commit harmful acts, even murder. This is exactly the kind of thing that can happen. So for those of us who are Buddhists: if you have generated the mind of renunciation and the supreme bodhicitta, and wish to attain the holy path, you need to reflect on the practice you are following. Ask yourself: are you only practicing calm meditation? Think carefully about this: if your practice is limited to calm meditation alone, there is a flaw in this approach. Of course, you would only learn of this through studying the sūtras and śāstras; if you do not make a regular practice of studying them, you would never know this. You might tell yourself, “I’m just following what my teacher told me, my teacher instructed me to do this”—but your teacher may not be a reliable guide. You need to study the sūtras and śāstras, take the Dharma as your teacher, and rely on the Dharma rather than on individual people. The Yogācārabhūmi Śāstra teaches: “Rely on the Dharma, do not rely on individual people.” This means we take the Dharma as our teacher, not a person as our teacher. Why can we not take a person as our teacher? Because people can be deceitful! The Yogācārabhūmi Śāstra does not mince words here—it plainly states this truth: people have a deceitful nature, and cannot be fully trusted. The sūtras and śāstras were also spoken by people, but they were spoken by Buddhas and bodhisattvas. Buddhas and bodhisattvas never deceive any sentient being; they speak only the truth, so they are completely trustworthy. In this way, we come to understand that studying this way gives us a complete, gradual path to awakening—not a scattered, partial set of half-truths. No: we receive a complete, graduated path! If we practice with diligence, we have hope of attaining awakening.