THE GREAT CHRONICLE OF BUDDHAS
1244
Having seen the Venerable KaccÈna, the gardener went to the King and informed: ‚Great
King, our master, the Purohita KaccÈna, became a monk and visited the royal garden.‛
King CaÓÉapajjota went to the garden and made obeisance to the Venerable, who had
finished his meal, with five kinds of veneration and sat at a suitable place and asked:
‚Venerable Sir, where is the Exalted One?‛ When the Venerable answered: ‚Noble King,
the Buddha Himself has not come yet. He has just sent me." The King asked again:
‚Venerable Sir, from where did you get the meal today?‛ In replying to the King's question
appropriately, Venerable KaccÈna told the King all about the hard-earned merit of the lady
who was his alms-food giver.
Having provided the Venerable with accommodations, King CaÓÉapajjota invited him to
the next day’s meal and returned to the palace where he called up the lady, the food donor,
by royal order and made her his Chief Queen. This was only the acquisition of wealth and
happiness in the present life by the lady as the result of the first impulsive (
pathama-
javana
) wholesome volition.
(Herein the meaning is: in performing
dÈna
such as food-offering, there are seven
impulsive moments concerning great wholesome volition (
mahÈ
-
kusala-cetanÈ
). Of
them, the first impulsive volition results in the present life, if there are favourable
circumstances. Hence, the first impulsive volition is called
diÔÔha-dhamma
vedaniya-kamma
, ‚deed resulting in the present life.‛ The seventh impulsive
volition result in the second life, if there are favourable circumstances. Hence it is
called
upapajja-vedaniya-kama
, ‚deed resulting in the immediately following life.‛
The volition of the middle five impulsions results in successive lives from the
third, if there are favourable circumstances. Hence, any volition of these middle
five impulsion is called
aparÈpariya-vedaniya-kamma
, ‚deed resulting in
successive lives.‛ It means deed resulting in successive existences.
(‚When a deed brings about its result‛, the result is of two kinds:
bhava
and
bhava-
samÈpatti
. The resultant mental aggregates and the body formed by
kamma
that
emerged at the time of conception (
paÔisandhi
) and at the time of growing (
pavatti
)
are called
bhava
result. The mental aggregate and the body generated by
kamma
are called
patti-bhava
. Various forms of wealth enjoyed in life are called
bhava-
samÈpatti
result.
(Of the three kinds of resulting deeds, the
upapajja-vendaniya-kama
and
aparÈpariya-vedaniya-kamma
bring fully their respective
bhava
-result and
bhava-
samÈpatti
result. As regards the first impulsive volition or the deed resulting in the
present life, when it results presently, it brings only
bhava-samÈpatti
, i.e., various
forms of wealth to be enjoyed in that life, but not
bhava
because that result has
already given by
janaka-kamma
that had created conception as its result in this life.
Therefore, the first impulsive volition or the deed resulting in the present life of
the lady in question brought her only the
bhava-samÈpatti
result which was wealth
and property in the same existence.)
From that time onwards, King CaÓÉapajjota did great honour to Venerable KaccÈna.
Pleased with the teaching of the Venerable, many became monks in his presence. Since
then, the whole city of UjjenÊ had been overwhelmed with the colour of the robes and
blown by the breeze caused by the movements of going and coming of the monks. The
Queen conceived a son and when she gave birth to him after ten months, the prince was
named GopÈla after his grandfather. Subsequently the Queen became well-known by the
name of GopÈlamÈtÈ in relation to her son. As Queen GopÈla-mÈtÈ was so impressed by
the Venerable KaccÈna, she built a big monastery for him, in the garden of KaccÈna-vana
and donated it to him with the King's permission. Having made the people of UjjenÊ
faithful in the Buddha's dispensation, the Venerable returned to the Buddha.
(c) Etadagga Title achieved
At a later time, while staying at Jetavana, in the assembly of monks, the Buddha spoke in
praise of Venerable KaccÈna and declared him foremost (
etadagga
), in connection with the
three discourses: (1) the
MadhupiÓÉika Sutta
, (2) the
KaccÈna-peyyÈla
and (3) the
PÈrÈyana