Notes

1.

This passage also appears at DN 11. — Ed.

2.

The word used here for "truly gone" is tathagatako (translated by E.M. Hare in the PTS edition as "gone for good"), and this story helps us considerably in understanding how the Buddha used the epithet "Tathagata" to describe himself.

His given name was Siddhattha; as a wandering ascetic he went by his mother's clan name, Gotama; he was known throughout his world as the sage of his father's family, or Sakyamuni; and when enlightened he became known as Buddha, the Awakened One. His followers most often referred to him as Bhagavant, or "Blessed One," but the name he almost always used for himself was Tathagata.

Tathagata has always been an awkward word to translate. Tatha on its own means something like "so," "thus," or "in this way"; and gata is the past participle of the verb to go, and simply means "gone." We therefore often find the phrase translated in the texts as "Thus-gone" or "the Thus-Gone one." The commentator Buddhaghosa lists eight different ways the word can be construed (Digha Atthakatha 1.59), and in the process engages in some characteristically creative etymology.

I admit to having never really understood the import of the term Tathagata — until I came across this story. With the image of the bird released by the sailors, searching for land upon which to alight, a number of things began to fall into place.

To begin with we should recognize two ways the expression is used: one referring to the Buddha as a being who will no longer be reborn, and the other describing how the consciousness of an awakened person still in this world relates to the object of experience.

Sometimes when one of the arahants passes away, Mara like a dark cloud can be seen searching for where their consciousness has become re-established (i.e., reborn). In such cases, the Buddha says of the arahant that their consciousness is "not stationed anew anywhere" (e.g., SN 22.87). In this sense the Buddha is clearly using the epithet "Tathagata" to mean that he will not be reborn again — like the bird leaving the ship without returning, his consciousness does not alight again in any of the worlds to become re-bound with another body.

But there is also a sense in which the phrase aptly describes the nature of the awakened mind here in this life. When his questioners try to pin the Buddha down about whether his consciousness survives after death, he rebukes them by saying that even here and now the consciousness of a Tathagata is untraceable, since there is no means of measuring or knowing it (e.g., Sn 1074). The awakened mind is said to be unattached to anything in the world — like a bird that does not alight upon and thus get bound to any object of experience.

In fact learning to un-attach the mind from its fetters is a good deal of what insight meditation training is all about. The Satipatthana Sutta, for example, (the main text that gives instructions for insight meditation) states that when practicing mindfulness properly a person "abides independent, not clinging to anything in the world" (MN 10). The householder Anathapindika, just before his death, received instructions from Sariputta urging him to train himself thus: "I will not cling to what is seen, heard, sensed, cognized, encountered, sought after, and examined by the mind; my consciousness will not be dependent on any of that" (MN 143).

All this combines to suggest that a crucial aspect of the Buddha's teaching is the notion of consciousness being unattached to mental or physical objects. In moment-to-moment practice this means letting go of attachments and letting experience be simply what it is. Perhaps with proper practice we can live as a bird freely circling the ship of our body and our world, rather than as one imprisoned in a cage on its deck.

3.

Perhaps this is a true story — perhaps Steadfast is a name for the entire planet, not just a mythological tree. How else might we explain the earth's great forbearance and continued beneficence in the face of the rapacity and destruction we have wrought upon her? I think Gaia, the deity inhabiting the abode of our lovely Earth, was taught this lesson by Sakka in ancient times, and has with great patience and dignity put up with the worst we can render. If this is true, then she will not give us a sign when we have gone too far — perceiving this is our own responsibility.

Like every Buddhist story, this one works on many levels simultaneously. It is no accident that the great tree has five branches, or that the word used for each portion is khandha — the term designating the five aggregates of form, feeling, perception, formations and consciousness. The man eating his fill of fruit is manifesting greed, craving or desire, and his breaking of the branch represents hatred, anger or aversion. These are two of the three poisonous roots out of which all unwholesome action arises (the third — ignorance — is always present when others occur). Thus the entire image is representative of a person being wronged by another or facing the eruption of their own latent tendencies for harmful action.

Notice that the story does not teach the "evil man" the folly of his ways, since there is often nothing one can do to avoid such people or such inclinations in oneself. The teaching is more about our response to transgression. Sakka's point is that it is self-centered to react petulantly to such an affront, and that the only suitable response is with kindness and generosity — to oneself as well as to others. As the Dhammapada so aptly says, "Never at any time in this world are hostilities resolved by hostility; but by kindness they are resolved — this is an eternal truth" [Dhp 5].

This teaching is given to Dhammika, a monk who complains of his treatment by certain laypeople. The Buddha reflects the situation back upon Dhammika, who as it turns out does not treat his fellow monks very well. It is an occasion to teach Dhammika, with the help of this story, the "dhamma of a recluse," which boils down to "not returning the insult of the insulter, the anger of the angry or the abuse of the abuser."