The Perfection of Ethics (6th)

“Then again when I was

the king of deer named Ruru,

in appearance I was like burnished gold,

focused on the highest ethics.

There was a pleasant, delightful region,

free of humans,

so I went there and stayed

on a lovely bank of the Ganges.

Then a man upstream,

harassed by creditors,

fell into the Ganges, thinking,

‘I live or I die!’

Day and night in the Ganges

he was swept along the stream,

crying out pitifully,

along the middle of the Ganges.

When I heard the sound

of his pitiful crying,

I stood on the Ganges bank

and asked, ‘What man are you?’

When asked he explained

to me his own deed:

‘I was so scared of my creditors,

I jumped in the great river!’

Taking pity on him,

surrendering my own life,

I entered and dragged him out

in the darkness of the night.

When I knew he had recovered,

I said to him,

‘I ask of you one favor:

tell no-one about me.’

But once he had returned to the city,

for the sake of money he told when asked.

Taking the king,

he drew close to me.

All that I had done

was related to the king.

When the king heard this,

he fitted his arrow, thinking,

‘Right here I shall kill

this ignoble betrayer of a friend.’

I protected him,

substituting myself:

‘Let him be, great king.

I shall carry out your pleasure.’

I guarded my ethics,

not my life.

For then I was ethical,

because it was solely for awakening.”