121. Sereyyaka (THA-AP123)

I was a learned mantra-knower
who had mastered the three Vedas.
While standing in the open air
I saw the Leader of the World,

wandering the woods like a lion,
untrembling like a tiger-king,
the Great Sage, like an elephant,
a mātaṅga in three-fold rut.

Picking up some jasmine flowers,
I tossed them up into the air.
By the power of the Buddha,
they fully surrounded him there.

The Great Hero stood unmoving,
the World-Leader, Omniscient One.
On all sides they scattered flowers,
thus covering the Bull of Men.

There a canopy of flowers
with stems inside and blossoms out
having covered him for a week
afterward then disappeared.

And having seen that miracle,
marvel making hair stand on end,
I pleased my heart in the Buddha,
the Well-Gone-One, the World-Leader.

Due to that pleasure in my heart,
incited by my wholesome roots,
for one hundred thousand aeons,
I’ve come to know no bad rebirth.

In the fifteen-thousandth aeon
there were five more than twenty men,
wheel-turning kings with great power,
all known as Cīnamāla then.

The four analytical modes,
and these eight deliverances,
six special knowledges mastered,
I have done what the Buddha taught!

Thus indeed Venerable Sereyyaka Thera spoke these verses.

The legend of Sereyyaka Thera is finished.

Translated by Jonathan S. Walters.

Whitman College, 2017

Legends of the Buddhist Saints (Apadāna) is released under the Attribution, Non-Commercial, Share Alike license.

This is the first-ever complete translation of Apadāna into a Western language.

For more information, visit apadanatranslation.org

Prepared for SuttaCentral by Ayya Vimala.