No. 281.

ABBHANTARA-JATAKA.

"There grows a tree," etc.--This story the Master told in Jetavana, about the Elder Sariputta giving mango juice to the Sister Bimbadevi. When the Supreme Buddha inaugurated the universal reign of religion, whilst living in a room at Vesali, the chief wife of the Gotama with five hundred of the Sakiya clan asked for initiation, and received initiation and full orders. Afterwards the five

hundred Sisters became saints on hearing the preaching of Nandaka. But when the Master was living near Savatthi, the mother of Rahula thought to herself, "My husband on embracing the religious life has become omniscient; my son too has become a religious, and lives with hire. What am I to do in the midst of the house? I will enter on this life, and go to Savatthi, and I will live looking upon the Supreme Buddha and my son continually." So she betook herself to a nunnery, and entered the order, and went and lived in a cell at Savatthi, in company of her teachers and preceptors, beholding the Master and her beloved son. The novice Rahula came and saw his mother.