No. 456.

JUNHA-JATAKA.

"O king of men," etc. This story the Master told while dwelling at Jetavana about the boons received by Elder Ananda. During the twenty years of his first Buddhahood the Blessed One's attendants were not always the same: sometimes Elder Nagasamala, sometimes Nagita, Upavana, Sunakkhatta, Cunda, Sagala, sometimes Meghiya waited upon the Blessed One. One day the Blessed One said to the Brethren: "Now I am old, Brethren: and when I say, Let us go in this way, some of the Brotherhood go by another way, some drop my bowl and robe on the ground. Choose out one Brother to attend always upon me." Then they uprose all, beginning with Elder Sariputta, and laid their joined hands to their heads, crying, "I will serve you, Sir, I will serve you!" But he refused them, saying, "Your prayer is forestalled! enough." Then the Brethren said to the Elder Ananda, "Do you, friend, ask for the post of attendant." The Elder said, "If the Blessed One will not give me the robe which he himself has received, if he will not give me his dole of food, if he will not grant me to dwell in the same fragrant cell, if he will not have me with him to go where he is invited: but if the Blessed One will go with me where I am invited, if I shall be granted to introduce the company at the moment of coming, which comes from foreign parts and foreign countries to see the Blessed One, [96] if I shall be granted to approach the Blessed One as soon as doubt shall arise, if whenever the Blessed One shall discourse in my absence he will repeat his discourse to me as soon as I shall return: then I will attend upon the Blessed One." These eight boons he craved, four negative and four positive. And the Blessed One granted them to him.

After that he attended continually upon his Master for five and twenty years. So having obtained the preeminence in the five points , and having gained seven blessings, blessing of doctrine, blessing of instruction, blessing of the knowledge of causes, blessing of inquiry as to one's good, blessing of dwelling in a holy place, blessing of enlightened devotion, blessing of potential Buddhahood, in the presence of the Buddha he received the heritage of eight boons, and became famous in the Buddha's religion, and shone as the moon in the heavens.

One day they began to talk about it in the Hall of Truth: "Friend, the Tathagata has satisfied Elder Ananda by granting his boons." The Master entered, and asked, "What are you speaking of, Brethren, as ye sit here?" They told him. Then he said, "It is not now the first time, Brethren, but in former days as now I satisfied Ananda with a boon; in former days, as now, whatsoever he asked, I gave him." And so saying, he told a story of the past.