Deep Commentary

These two Dhammapada verses were taught by the Buddha at Jetavana Monastery in connection with Venerable Vaṅgīsa. According to the story, in Rājagaha there was a brahmin named Vaṅgīsa who could tap the skulls of the dead and tell where they had been reborn. A group of other brahmins used Vaṅgīsa to deceive people and take their money. They dressed him in an unusual way and led him from place to place, spreading word of his ability. People came, offering money according to their means, and asked him to tell where their deceased relatives had gone. In this way they wandered from one place to another, exploiting people’s faith for profit. One day they arrived in Sāvatthī and stayed near Jetavana Monastery. Seeing people going to hear the Buddha teach, they tried to stop them and persuade them to visit Vaṅgīsa instead. After a debate, they finally agreed to bring Vaṅgīsa to meet the Buddha. The Buddha knew the situation clearly. When they arrived, he placed five skulls in a row and asked Vaṅgīsa to identify them. Four skulls belonged to people who had been reborn in different realms, and Vaṅgīsa answered correctly in each case. The fifth skull, however, belonged to an Arahat. When the Buddha asked about it, Vaṅgīsa had to admit that he did not know. He then asked the Buddha to teach him this knowledge. The Buddha did not immediately grant the request, but said that he would teach him only if he renounced worldly life and became a monk. Vaṅgīsa agreed, and the Buddha gave him a meditation subject. Before long, Vaṅgīsa attained Arahatship. When we are born, we do not know where we have come from; when we die, we do not know where we will go. Both our coming and going are obscure to an unawakened mind. This is the condition of ordinary human ignorance. When someone dies, relatives naturally want to know where that person has been reborn. This is a common human feeling. Even people who hated one another during life may feel grief and longing after death. At that moment, their deeper feelings may reveal themselves. Hatred is often the reverse face of attachment. Because life is so short and everyone must eventually die, why should we keep struggling, competing, and causing one another more suffering? It is better to treat one another with kindness while we are still alive, so that when death comes, there will be no regret. Death is only a change into another stage of the journey. Whether the next destination is peaceful or painful depends on the karma we create now. If we create harmful causes, painful results will follow. If we create wholesome causes, peaceful results will follow. If our actions are mixed, the results will also be mixed. This is the law of cause and effect. To understand what causes we created in the past, we can look at the results we experience now. To understand what fruits we may receive in the future, we should carefully examine the actions of body, speech, and mind that we are creating now. In ordinary life, when people move to a new home, they want a safe, stable, peaceful, and pleasant place. But wanting such a place is one thing; having the conditions to obtain it is another. In the same way, everyone wants to be reborn in a good and peaceful realm after death. Yet we must ask ourselves whether the causes we are creating now correspond to the result we hope for. Do we have enough merit and wholesome conduct to inherit a peaceful future? Everything depends on our own actions. Happiness or suffering, good or bad, should be examined through the three karmic doors of body, speech, and mind. If these three create wholesome karma, then both now and in the future we will enjoy wholesome results. Everyone must one day move from this address called life; no one can remain here forever. Therefore, we should prepare a better spiritual destination for the journey ahead. Yet in the deepest sense, the true address of peace and happiness is here and now. The story also shows how some people take advantage of circumstances to deceive others for money. Such people exist in every age. Human psychology is strange: even when we know that some people advertise false claims for profit, we may still occasionally fall into their traps. Some people are deceived not once but many times. Life contains countless traps, and sometimes we become like innocent lambs caught in them. Each experience of deception brings pain. Perhaps the traps are skillfully laid, making us unable to see clearly. But for the wise, things are different. Vaṅgīsa could not deceive the Buddha’s clear and subtle wisdom. In the end, he bowed before the Buddha, asked to be ordained, and attained liberation. This reminds us that not everyone can be deceived, and that deception may bring painful consequences far greater than any temporary gain.