3.7.9. Travelling (MIL3.7.9)

The king said: ‘Is there any one, Nāgasena, who can go with this bodily frame to Uttara-kuru or to the Brahma world, or to any other of the four great continents (into which the world is divided)?’

‘Yes, there are such people.’

‘But how can they?’

‘Do you recollect, O king, having ever jumped a foot or two feet across the ground?’

‘Yes, Nāgasena, I can jump twelve feet.’

‘But how?’

‘I fix my mind on the idea of alighting there, and at the moment of my determination my body comes to seem light to me.’

‘Just so, O king, can the Bhikkhu, who has the power of Iddhi, and has the mastery over his mind, when he has made his mind rise up to the occasion, travel through the sky by means of his mind.’

‘Very good, Nāgasena!’

The Questions of King Milinda, translated from the Pali by T.W. Rhys Davids.

Part 1 (to section 5.4.10) was originally published as Volume xxxv of “The Sacred Books of the East”, Oxford, The Clarendon Press, 1890.

Part 2 (from section 5.5.1) was originally published as Volume xxxvi of “The Sacred Books of the East”, Oxford, The Clarendon Press, 1894.

This SuttaCentral edition was prepared by Bhikkhu Sujato based on the digital text of the Internet Sacred Text Archive. The work of the Sacred Text Archive to make this text publically available is gratefully acknowledged.

In preparing this edition minor editorial changes have been made. The structure has been adapted to agree with the Mahāsaṅgīti Pali text as found on SuttaCentral. In addition, the corrections proposed by the translator in the “Addenda et Corrigenda” of the original editions have for the most part been adopted.

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Prepared for SuttaCentral by Bhikkhu Sujato.