PSALMS OF THE BRETHREN
Canto I.
Psalms of Single Verses
VI
Sīta-Vaniya
Translated from the Pali by Mrs. C.A.F. Rhys Davids.
Public Domain
This is the psalm of the venerable Brother Sambhūta. He was reborn at Rājagaha as the son of an eminent [12] brahmin, and named Sambhūta.[1] With his three friends, Bhūmija, Jeyyasena and Abhirādana, he heard the Exalted One preach the Norm, and left the world to enter the Order. While practising the systematic meditation of 'mindfulness respecting the body,' he stayed continually in Sīta-Vana (Cool Wood), and thus became known as Sīta-Vaniya (Cool Woodlander).
And seeing bhikkhus passing by on their way to see the Exalted One, he said: 'Friends, worship the Exalted One for me with speech of mine, and say to him thus' (showing the Master his uninterrupted concern with the Norm):
[6] There is a brother who to Cool Wood gone doth dwell
Alone, content, in meditative ecstasy,
Victorious, no more by creeping dread dismayed,
He mindful watcheth over sense with courage high.
Thus verily did the venerable Brother Sīta-vaniya utter his psalm.
[1] This cannot be the Sambhūta of CXCII, verse 9. Of the friends, we meet (probably) only with Bhūmija in Saṅy., ii. 39.
