89. Bodhisaññaka (THA-AP91)

There was a great Bodhi festival
for the Blessed One Vipassi.
I attended that festival,
being a person who’d renounced.

Taking water strewn with flowers
I poured it on the Bodhi Tree.
“Freed, he will make all of us free;
Gone Out, he will make us go out.”

In the ninety-one aeons since
I watered that Bodhi Tree then,
I’ve come to know no bad rebirth:
the fruit of Bodhi-perception.

When thirty-three aeons had passed
there were eight wheel-turning kings,
lords over men who were all then
known as Udakāsecana.

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

Thus indeed Venerable Bodhisaññaka Thera spoke these verses.

The legend of Bodhisaññaka 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.