Dabba enters Nirvāṇa (SA-2.15)

Thus have I heard, once, the Buddha was staying in Rājagaha in the Bamboo Grove of Kalanda.

At that time the monk Dabba went to where the Buddha was. Among a great number of people, he paid homage at his feet and said: “World-honored One! I am to enter Nirvāṇa now. Please allow me to do so in your presence.” Having been asked in this way three times, the Buddha answered: “Enter Nirvāṇa then. I do not hinder you.” Then the monk Dabba displayed the eighteen kinds of miraculous transformation. He rose up in the air, appeared in the east in all four postures, and turning various colours: green, yellow, red, white etc. One moment he appeared like water, then like a mass of fire. He made his upper body emit water and his lower body fire, then he made his upper body emit fire and his lower body water. One moment his body appeared huge, covering the sky, then it appeared minute. He walked on water as if on land, he passed through earth as if through water. In the south, west and north he did the same. Having finished this, while still hovering in the sky, he entered the fire-blaze samādhi. Bursting into flames in a great mass of fire he entered Nirvāṇa, leaving nothing behind. It was like fine oil burning cleanly away without remainder.

There the World-honored One spoke this verse:

“As from a glowing piece of iron /
struck by a hammer sparks fly up;
looking for them, once dispersed, extinguished /
no one knows where they have gone.

Attaining true liberation /
is just like this:
once rid of afflictions, /
the quicksand of desires,
no one knows /
whither he went.”

When the Buddha had finished speaking, the monks, having listened to what he had said, were happy and remembered it well.

Translation by Marcus Bingenheimer, 2005–8 (minor revisions 2009). First version published in Buddhist Studies Review vol. 23.1 (2006). The translations used here were revised by the translator and published in his Studies in Āgama Literature—with Special Reference to the Shorter Chinese Saṁyuktāgama, Dharma Drum Buddhist College, 2010.

Translated from the Taishō text of the CBETA-Database (Version Feb. 2006). All sutta titles added by the translator.

This series of translations were part of the project “A Digital Comparative Edition of the Bieyi za ahan jing” conducted at the Chung-hwa Institute for Buddhist Studies (中華佛學研究所) and the Dharma Drum Buddhist College (法鼓佛教研修學院), funded by the Chiang Ching-kuo Foundation for International Scholarly Exchange (蔣經國國際學術交流基金會). The full project, including parallel Chinese, Pali, and Sanskrit texts, is available online here.

Used with kind permission of the translator.

Prepared for SuttaCentral by Bhikkhu Sujato.