⏑⏑−⏑⏑¦−⏑−⏑−−¦¦⏑⏑−−⏑⏑¦−⏑−⏑−− Aupacchandasaka
iti
dur-labham-artham-ūcivāṁsaṁ tanayaṁ vākyam-uvāca
śākya-rājaḥ |
⏑⏑−⏑⏑¦−⏑−⏑−−¦¦⏑⏑−−⏑⏑¦−⏑−⏑−−
tyaja
buddhim-imāṁ
ati-pravttām-avahāsyo 'ti-mano-ratha-kramaś-ca
|| 5.36
5.36
To the son who had
expressed such a difficult purport
The Śākya king told
his command:
“Abandon this idea,
which goes too far!
A way of high-flown
fancy is ridiculous.”
COMMENT:
When his son had spoken
these words, whose meaning is difficult to catch, the Śākya king
told him his command....
When I went to bed last
night, this was how my translation of the first line stood.
Translating dur-labham-artham as “meaning that is difficult to
catch” follows from the ambiguity of BC5.35, some of whose
difficult hidden layers I endeavoured to dig down to in yesterday's comment. "Whose meaning is difficult to catch" is a literal translation, and it accords with EBC's
original translation: When his son uttered a speech so hard to be
understood, the king of the Śākyas thus replied....
When I came to comment
on today's verse this morning, however, I began by noting that:
On the surface
dur-labham artham refers to the guarantee the prince has requested
and so dur-labham artham means an aim which is difficult to be
obtained, a thing which is hard to realize; hence EHJ “a matter so
hard of fulfillment;” and PO “such a hard request.”
It then occurred to me,
on further reflection, that if I went with the translation that first
struck me as obvious (“When his son had spoken these words, whose
meaning is difficult to catch, the Śākya king told him his
command....”) I would have the satisfaction of a translation that
justified my comment of yesterday, but at the expense of having
blotted out the ostensible meaning as perceived by EHJ and PO.
The compromise,
therefore, is a somewhat stilted literal translation of dur-labham artham ("a difficult purport") which is not
unduly biased either to the ostensible meaning as EHJ and PO read it,
or to the real meaning as EBC and I read it.
While still discussing
the nuts and bolts of the translation, I should note a textual issue
in the 4th pāda. The old Nepalese manuscript seems to have either
ati-mano-ratha-kramaś-ca (as per EBC's text) or ati-mano-rathaḥ
kramaś-ca. EHJ amended this (based on a conjecture by Luders) to
ati-mano-ratho-'kramaś-ca.
EHJ rejected EBC's
avahāsyo 'ti-mano-ratha-kramaś-ca as difficult to translate. EBC himself translated “extravagant desires are only ridiculous,” seeming to
take the ca as an expletive ("only"), and ignoring krama. Following EBC
in taking ca as an expletive, avahāsyo 'ti-mano-ratha-kramaḥ would
seem to mean to me to be fairly readily translatable as “The way of
high-flown fancy is ridiculous.”
EHJ translated his own
ati-mano-ratho-'kramaś-ca as “An extravagant wish is ridiculous
and unfitting.” PO followed EHJ with “An extravagant wish is
improper and extreme.” EHJ notes that krama means 'the proper,
natural order of things.' Akrama could therefore mean 'impossible' as
contrary to the natural order of things, but the more normal sense
seems to be 'unfitting.'
Initially, especially
in view of the ca, I decided to accept EHJ's amendment, in which
case, considering that √kram
includes the meaning of “to be practicable,” I thought to
translate: A high-flown fancy is
ridiculous and impracticable! – a statement which I know from
bitter experience to be all too true.
On further reflection,
however, I have decided to follow EBC's text as closer to the
original manuscripts.
To turn to the real
gist of the verse, on the surface the king's words represent his
upping of the ante in his disagreement with his son, i.e., the king's shifting
from reasoned argument that began with the diminutive term of
endearment tāta (my darling son) in BC5.30, but which now takes on a
more intimidating and critical tone.
But I think below the surface,
once again, the command of the Śākya king Śuddodhana is presaging
the Buddha-dharma of the Śākya king Gautama.
That being so, the
king's imperative in the 3rd pāda tyaja buddhim-imāṁ
ati-pravṛttām, “Abandon this idea, which goes too far!” or
“Abandon this overly ambitious idea!” is intimately connected
with the Buddha's ultimate teaching on the night before he died,
which, as I have discussed many times in these comments, was
alpecchu-saṁtuṣṭaḥ (Ch: 少欲-知足;
Jap: SHOYOKU-CHISOKU) – wanting little and being content (see
SN16.38 below).
I come back to this
teaching so often not because I am such a master of it, but on the
contrary because I am so very slow on the uptake that I need to
constantly remind myself of it. I need to constantly remind myself how I wish to be now, as opposed to how I
have habitually been in the past... which is to say vaultingly
over-ambitious – ever since I was top of my class at primary school
and suffered the misfortune of skipping the last year there in order
to go to an elitist independent secondary school, where I learned to
expect great things of myself. The result of such excessive ambition
has been a subjective unhappiness which George Soros correctly identifies as a
gap between who I think I am and who I really am.
Habitually I tend to
think that I was born in the mould of my paternal great uncle, Sir
Eugene Cross, Mr Ebbw Vale, the older brother who my
grandfather hero-worshipped and seemed to hope that I might somehow
emulate. On a good day in France, sitting outside on my lonesome and
listening to the birds sing, I realize that I was really born much
more in the mould of my clog-wearing maternal great-grandfather,
Bill Haworth, labourer in a Blackburn paint factory, who used to go
on solitary walks on his days off, as Mr Nobody.
In light of such reflection,
I considered translating ati-pravṛttām as “overly ambitious.”
But on second thoughts a more strictly literal translation of
ati-pravṛttām might be “excessively purposing” or “going too
far” (as per EHJ: “Give up this idea which goes too far”). In
any event, there is much more to ati-pravṛttām than can be
conveyed by any of these translations – which is why I persist with these comments.
In the Buddha's
teaching, pravṛtta, “purposing,” carries connotations not only
of ambition on the grand scale but also of end-gaining in all the
seemingly insignificant little acts of everyday life –
connotations, in short, of doing (pravṛtti) as opposed to non-doing
(nivṛtti). Hence:
The many and various disappointments of men, like old age, occur as long as their doing goes on (pravṛttau). SN16.10
And this, the suffering of doing (pravṛtti), in the world, has its cause in clusters of faults which start with thirsting -- / The cause is certainly not in God, nor in primordial matter, nor in time; nor even in one’s inherent constitution, nor in predestination or self-will. // SN16.17 // Again, you must understand how, due to this cause, because of men's faults, the cycle of doing goes on (pravṛttiḥ), / So that they succumb to death who are afflicted by the dust of the passions and by darkness; but he is not reborn who is free of dust and darkness. // SN16.18 //
Giving oneself to this path with its three divisions and eight branches -- this straightforward, irremovable, noble path -- / One abandons the faults, which are the causes of suffering, and comes to that step which is total well-being. // 16.37 // Attendant on it are constancy and straightness; modesty, attentiveness, and reclusiveness; / Wanting little (alpecchatā), contentment (tuṣṭiḥ), and freedom from forming attachments; no fondness for worldly activity (loka-pravṛttāv-aratiḥ), and forbearance. // SN16.38 //
Comprehend, therefore, that suffering is doing (pravṛttiṃ); witness the faults impelling it forward (pravartakān); / Realise its stopping as non-doing (nivṛttim); and know the path as a turning back (nivartakaṃ). // SN16.42 //
VOCABULARY
iti:
thus
dur-labham
(acc. sg. m.): mfn. difficult to be obtained or found , hard , scarce
, rare
labh:
to take , seize , catch ; catch sight of , meet with , find ; to
perceive , know , understand , learn , find out
artham
(acc. sg.): m. aim, purpose ; sense , meaning , notion
ūcivāṁsam
= acc. sg. m. perfect participle vac: to speak , say , tell
tanayam
(acc. sg.): m. a son
vākyam
(acc. sg.): n. speech , saying , assertion , statement , command ,
words
uvāca
= 3rd pers. sg. perf. vac: to speak , say , tell , utter
, announce , declare , mention , proclaim , recite , describe
śākya-rājaḥ
(nom. sg. m.): the king of the Śākyas
tyaja
= 2nd pers. sg. imperative tyaj: to abandon, give up
buddhim
(acc. sg.): f. the power of forming and retaining conceptions and
general notions , intelligence , reason , intellect , mind ,
discernment , judgement; an opinion , view , notion , idea
imām
(acc. sg. f): this
ati-pravṛttām
(acc. sg. f): excessively purposing; going too far ; unduly injurious
ati-:
ind. excessively , too
pravṛtta:
mfn. set out; purposing or going to , bent upon (dat. loc. , or
comp.) ; hurting , injuring , offending ; n. (with karman n. action)
causing a continuation of mundane existence
ava-hāsyaḥ
(nom. sg. m.): mfn. to be derided , exposed to ridicule , ridiculous
ava-
√ has: to laugh at , deride
ati-mano-ratha-kramaḥ
(nom. sg. m.): a way of proceeding [based on] excessive wishing; a
course [led by] over-ambition
ati-:
(ind. prefix) too much, undue, excessive
mano-ratha:
m. " heart's joy " ; a wish , desire (also = desired
object); fancy , illusion ; the heart compared to a car
krama:
m. a step ; going , proceeding , course ; the way ; uninterrupted or
regular progress , order , series , regular arrangement , succession
; method , manner
√kram:
to step , walk , go , go towards , approach ; to proceed well ,
advance , make progress , gain a footing , succeed , have effect ; to
be appliable or practicable
ati-mano-rathaḥ
(nom. sg.): m. an excessive fancy ; desiring too much
akramaḥ
(nom. sg. m.): mfn. not happening successively , happening at once ;
m. want of order , confusion
ca:
and
父王告太子 汝勿説此言
如此四事者 誰能保令無
汝求此四願 正爲人所笑
且停出家心 服習於五欲
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