[7] The city of ‘Royal Palaces;’ ‘the residence of the Magadha kings from Bimbisâra to Aśoka, the first metropolis of Buddhism, at the foot of the Gṛidhrakûṭa mountains. Here the first synod assembled within a year after Śâkyamuni’s death. Its ruins are still extant at the village of Rajghir, sixteen miles S.W. of Behâr, and form an object of pilgrimage to the Jains (E. H., p. 100).’ It is called New Râjagṛiha to distinguish it from Kuśâgârapura, a few miles from it, the old residence of the kings. Eitel says it was built by Bimbisâra, while Fâ-hien ascribes it to Ajâtaśatru. I suppose the son finished what the father had begun.
[8] See note 7.
[9] One of the five first followers of Śâkyamuni. He is also called Aśvajit; in Pâli Assaji; but Aśvajit seems to be a military title = ‘Master or trainer of horses.’ The two more famous disciples met him, not to lead him, but to be directed by him, to Buddha. See Sacred Books of the East, vol. xiii, Vinaya Texts, pp. 144–147.
[10] One of the six Tîrthyas (Tîrthakas = ‘erroneous teachers;’ M. B., pp. 290–292, but I have not found the particulars of the attempts on Buddha’s life referred to by Fâ-hien), or Brahmânical opponents of Buddha. He was an ascetic, one of the Jñâti clan, and is therefore called Nirgranthajñâti. He taught a system of fatalism, condemned the use of clothes, and thought he could subdue all passions by fasting. He had a body of followers, who called themselves by his name (Eitel, pp. 84, 85), and were the forerunners of the Jains.
[11] The king was moved to this by Devadatta. Of course the elephant disappointed them, and did homage to Śâkyamuni. See Sacred Books of the East, vol. xx, Vinaya Texts, p. 247.
[12] See [chap. xxv, note 3]. Jîvaka was Âmbapâlî’s son by king Bimbisâra, and devoted himself to the practice of medicine. See the account of him in the Sacred Books of the East, vol. xvii, Vinaya Texts, pp. 171–194.
CHAPTER XXIX.
GṚIDHRA-KÛṬA HILL, AND LEGENDS. FÂ-HIEN PASSES A NIGHT ON IT. HIS REFLECTIONS.
Entering the valley, and keeping along the mountains on the south-east, after ascending fifteen le, (the travellers) came to mount Gṛidhra-kûṭa.[1] Three le before you reach the top, there is a cavern in the rocks, facing the south, in which Buddha sat in meditation. Thirty paces to the north-west there is another, where Ânanda was sitting in meditation, when the deva Mâra Piśuna,[2] having assumed the form of a large vulture, took his place in front of the cavern, and frightened the disciple. Then Buddha, by his mysterious, supernatural power, made a cleft in the rock, introduced his hand, and stroked Ânanda’s shoulder, so that his fear immediately passed away. The footprints of the bird and the cleft for (Buddha’s) hand are still there, and hence comes the name of ‘The Hill of the Vulture Cavern.’
In front of the cavern there are the places where the four Buddhas sat. There are caverns also of the Arhats, one where each sat and meditated, amounting to several hundred in all. At the place where in front of his rocky apartment Buddha was walking from east to west (in meditation), and Devadatta, from among the beetling cliffs on the north of the mountain, threw a rock across, and hurt Buddha’s toes,[3] the rock is still there.[4]