The Samyutta Nikaya
The Grouped Discourses
Samyutta Nikaya IV.19
Kassaka Sutta
The Farmer
Translated from the Pali by Thanissaro Bhikkhu.
At Savatthi. Now at that time the Blessed One was
instructing, urging, rousing, & encouraging the monks with a Dhamma
talk concerning Unbinding. The monks -- attentive, interested, lending
ear, focusing their entire awareness -- were listening to the Dhamma.
Then the thought occurred to Mara,
the Evil One: "Gotama the contemplative is instructing, urging,
rousing, & encouraging the monks with a Dhamma talk concerning
Unbinding. The monks -- attentive, interested, lending ear, focusing their
entire awareness -- are listening to the Dhamma. What if I were to go to
Gotama the contemplative to obscure his vision?"
Then Mara the Evil One, taking on the form of a farmer
with a large plowshare over his shoulder, carrying a long goad stick --
his hair disheveled, his clothes made of coarse hemp, his feet splattered
with mud -- went to the Blessed One and, on arrival, said, "Hey,
contemplative. Have you seen my oxen?"
"And what are your oxen, Evil One?"
"Mine alone is the eye, contemplative. Mine are
forms, mine is the sphere of consciousness & contact at the eye. Where
can you go to escape me? Mine alone is the ear...the nose...the
tongue...the body.... Mine alone is the intellect, contemplative. Mine are
ideas, mine is the sphere of consciousness & contact at the intellect.
Where can you go to escape me?"
"Yours alone is the eye,
Evil One. Yours are forms, yours is the sphere of consciousness of contact
at the eye. Where no eye exists, no forms exist, no sphere of
consciousness & contact at the eye exists: there, Evil One, you cannot
go. Yours alone is the ear...the nose...the tongue...the body.... Yours
alone is the intellect, Evil One. Yours are ideas, yours is the sphere of
consciousness & contact at the intellect. Where no intellect exists,
no ideas exist, no sphere of consciousness of contact at the intellect
exists: there, Evil One, you cannot go."
[Mara:]
Of what they say,
'This is mine';
and those who say,
'Mine':
If your intellect's here,
contemplative,
you can't escape
from me.
[The Buddha:]
What they speak of
isn't mine,
and I'm not one of those
who speak it.
Know this, Evil One:
you won't even see
my tracks.
Then Mara the Evil One -- sad & dejected at
realizing, "The Blessed One knows me; the One Well-gone knows
me" -- vanished right there.
---o0o---
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