Dhammapada

SR No.: 007674
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: Max Muller
Publisher: Oxford
Publication Year: 1881
Total Pages: 2540
Language: English
Classification: Book_English
File Size: 45 MB

Page 570

VI.
MAHẬ-PARINIBBÂNA-SUTTA.
I13
'Let Khanna say whatever he may like, Ananda, the brethren should neither speak to him, nor exhort him, nor admonish him?'
5. Then the Blessed One addressed the brethren, and said: 'It may be, brethren, that there may be doubt or misgiving in the mind of some brother as to the Buddha, or the truth, or the path, or the way. Enquire, brethren, freely. Do not have to reproach yourselves afterwards with the thought, "Our teacher was face to face with us, and we could not bring ourselves to enquire of the Blessed One when we were face to face with him."'
And when he had thus spoken the brethren were silent.
6. And again the second and the third time the Blessed One addressed the brethren, and said: 'It may be, brethren, that there may be doubt or misgiving in the mind of some brother as to the Buddha, or the truth, or the path, or the way. Enquire, brethren, freely. Do not have to reproach yourselves afterwards with the thought, “Our teacher was face to face with us, and we could not bring ourselves to enquire of the Blessed One when we were face to face with him.”
And even the third time the brethren were silent.
1 Compare Kulla Vagga I, 25–31: IV, 14, 1: XI, 1, 12-14. Khanna is represented as an obstinate, perverse man; so destitute of the proper esprit de corps' that he dared to take part with the sisterhood, and against the brotherhood, in a dispute which had arisen between them. But after the social penalty here referred to had been duly imposed upon him, even his proud and independent spirit was tamed; he became humble : his eyes were opened ; and he, also, attained to the supreme goal of the Buddhist faith.
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