The Second Treatise on the Perfections – 2834 

 

the city. The wife of a wealthy man of Bārāṇasī bought the fish, and when its 
stomach was cut open, a beautiful baby was found inside the fish. Since she had 
no child of her own and was longing for one, she was extremely delighted, 
saying to herself: “This is my very own.” 

When the strange news reached the parents at Kosambī, they hurried to Bārāṇasī 
to claim their son. But the lady of Bārāṇasī refused to give him back, saying: 
“The baby came to us because we deserve him. We cannot return him to you.” 
When they went to court to settle the dispute, the judges gave their verdict that 
the baby belonged equally to both pairs of parents. In this way, the baby had two 
mothers and two fathers, on account of which he was named Bākula, 

bā

 = two, 

kula

 = family, hence a boy of two families. 

It was a miracle that the boy was not harmed though he was swallowed by a fish. 
The miracle was due to the power of the knowledge of the path of a Arahat 
(

Arahatta-magga-ñāṇa

) which was certainly to be attained by Bākula in that 

very existence, or, maybe it was due to the influence of the glorious knowledge 
of the perfections (

pāramī-ñāṇa

) that was inherent in the boy and that would 

enable him to attain without fail the knowledge of the path of a Arahat in that 
very life. Such power is said to be the power concerning miraculous phenomena 
due to the influence of imminent supermundane wisdom (

ñāṇa-vipphāra-iddhi

). 

Novice Saṅkicca 

Novice Saṅkicca was conceived by the daughter of a householder of Sāvatthī. 
The mother died when she was about to give birth to the baby. While her body 
was being cremated, it was pierced with iron spikes so that it might burn better. 
A spike hurt the baby’s eye, and the baby cried. Knowing that the baby was still 
alive, people took the body down from the funeral pyre, cut open the stomach 
and took out the baby. The baby grew up in due course and at the age of seven 
became an Arahat. 

The boy’s miraculous escape from death was also attributed to the power of the 
knowledge of the path of an Arahat (

Arahatta-magga-ñāṇa

), or it was attributed 

to the influence of the power of the boy’s inherent knowledge of the perfections 
(

pāramī-ñāṇa

) that helped him attain the knowledge of the path of an Arahat 

(

Arahatta-magga-ñāṇa

). 

5. Power by the pervasion of concentration (

samādhi-vipphāra-iddhi

). The 

miraculous phenomenon that occurs when one is about to enter upon, is entering