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| Prince Siddhartha's [Central Asian/Scythian/Saka] mother, Maha Maya Devi, depicted in India |
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| A "mother" is much more than one gives birth, she nurtures: Mother Maha Pajapati Gotami |
Isn't there a grammatical error in the title? No, there is not. For it is not the Buddha's mother we are discussing. It is all three of them and therefore this shall be the Buddha's
Mothers' Day.
Which three? There is, of course, the Buddha's biological birth mother,
Maha Maya (Queen Maya, "Great Illusion"). She was reborn on earth, gave birth to the Bodhisatta (Buddha-to-be), and passed away seven days later.
Prince Siddhartha Gautama (
Siddhattha Gotama) was
mothered -- adopted, raised, and cared for intensely -- her sister,
Queen Pajapati Gotami, King Suddhodana's co-wife. She for her efforts years later was rewarded with a very rare distinction: she became
the world's first Buddhist nun,
Ven. Maha Pajapati Gotami, and she became enlightened.
Most Buddhists interested in history or genealogy will know this much, as much as it may come as a surprise to others. But there was a third very important mother figure in the Buddha's life. The texts call her
Nakulamata the Gahapatani,
mata meaning "mother").
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| Why did Siddhartha's mother pass after a week? Legend has it that the only she took rebirth on Earth in the human plane from Tusita on the fortunate deva plane was to give birth to him. Mission accomplished. She then returned to that world. And the Buddha went to Tavatimsa (Sakka's Heaven of the Thirty-Three) to hear him teach the Abhidhamma as the Buddha, leading to her and many other devas' attainments of insight and enlightenment. |
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The story goes that one day as the Buddha was walking in northern India with his attendant Ven. Ananda (his Scythian/Shakyian cousin or possibly son in some traditions), he came by a village. And there sat the elderly "Nakulamata" and "Nakulapitu," mother and father. Seeing the Awakened One, they became overjoyed and started to shout, "Son! Son! After a long time, you finally found time to visit us!"
Ananda became confused because the Buddha did not correct them. He warmly greeted them like a son. They lamented that he had been away so long, leaving them alone, but at least now he was back. Ananda's consternation grew. "What do they mean in calling you 'son,' venerable sir? Surely, your mother is in Kapilavatthu, the Land of
Sakas [
Shakyas or
Indo-Scythians]."
Then the Buddha explained that for 500 ("many") lives, these two had been his parents, and indeed this woman many, many times through many rebirths had been his mother.
- Nakulamata appears on a list of the Buddha's eminent lay females. The story goes that a father and mother (husband and wife) were householders in Sumsumaragiri in the Bhagga country. When the Buddha visited their village, staying in Bhesakala Forest Grove, they went to see him. They immediately fell at his feet, calling him "son" and asking why he had been away so long. It is said that they had been the Bodhisatta's parents for 500 previous births and his close relatives for many more. The Buddha taught them, and they became stream enterers (the first stage of enlightenment). The Buddha visited their village again when they were old. They entertained him, telling him of their devotion to one another in this life and many previous lives, asking for instruction on the sort of karma that would keep them together in the afterlife (many future rebirths). The Buddha referred to this in the assembly of the monastic community, declaring them the most intimate companions among his disciples. More: Nakulapita Gahapati and Nakulamata Gahapatani
- Eight qualities of women, Nakulamata (AN 8:48)
- "Marriage" (Guide To Buddhism A To Z)
The Awakened One came back home and taught them, and they became awakened. Therefore, the Buddha offered the greatest thing any son or daughter could do for a mother or father:
dhamma-dana.
- The Gift of the Dharma — the giving of enlightening teachings, known as dhamma-dāna — according to the Buddha, surpasses all other gifts. This type of giving, sharing, generosity includes those who elucidate the Buddha’s teachings, such as monastics who recite sutras from the Tripitaka or preach sermons or explain them, teachers of meditation, unqualified persons who at least encourage others to keep precepts, or helping support teachers of Dharma and meditation. The most common form of giving is material support, charity, donations, gifts of food, money, robes, shelter, and medicine [41]. More
- Treasury of the Buddha's Discourses: Appreciation of parents' love
- Buddhist attitude towards parents in Theravada Buddhism (drarisworld)
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Other "mothers" in Buddhism
It's not hard to get woo-woo. It's easy. Behold: Y'know, come to think of it, Siddhartha had another mother who saved him,
Mother Nature (
Bhumi,
Tierra,
Gaia,
Urth,
Mat Zemlya). One day, the wandering ascetic was striving and struggling under the bodhi tree. Mara didn't worry, didn't bother to step in. But then Siddhartha remembered that at age 7, at the
Ploughing Festival of the
Scythians/
Sakas, he spontaneously entered meditative absorption (
jhana) from past life practice. The wandering ascetic realized that this was the way to awakening, to enlightenment, and faulted himself for fearing
pleasure (
piti), realizing that the bliss that results from absorption is blameless and supersensual.
He determined to take up
samadhi (practice of the four material absorptions), which his first yoga teachers, Alara Kalama and Uddaka Ramaputta, had taught him six years earlier.
Mara took notice. He began to intervene as an obstacle. He took on the form of an ogre (
yakkha, rakshasa), chief of an entire army of ghouls and monsters to chase him off his meditation seat at the base of that tree. Mara challenged the ascetic: "What gives you the right to sit there on my spot? Get out of here!" Rather than fearing or fleeing, ascetic Siddhartha made a
mudra (hand gesture), pointing at his
Earth Mother (
earth witnessing mudra).
- Kisa Gotami: The mother who could not let go: After losing her only child, she became desperate, unhinged, and asked if anyone could help her. Her sorrow was so great she went crazy until a man out of kindness pointed her to the Buddha, the Master Physician, to bring her child back to life. He would have medicine, she was assured, and he did.
- Ven. Patacara, foremost exponent of the Vinaya: A harrowing and unbelievable story of childbirth, motherhood, and loss has been attributed to her in some ancient Buddhist texts and in others has been attributed to Kisa Gotami.
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| Siddhartha, Sujata, and Punna at offering |
He was born under a sal tree as his mother gave birth, Queen Maya, gave birth standing like a tree spirit/dryad (
salabhanjika). Then he went into spontaneous absorption sitting in the shade of another tree at the Ploughing Festival, age 7. Then years later as a wandering ascetic, leaving the
Group of Five wandering ascetics, he continued his struggling under another tree. But now it was too late; he had gone too far and was collapsing, malnourished and exhausted by his striving through painful austerities. Who should appear but a woman,
Sujata, who pledged to make offerings to a tree [spirit] if she could become a mother. Realizing a miracle had occurred and she was now pregnant, she took an offering of milk rice to emaciated Siddhartha, mistaking him for the spirit of that tree. This kept him from dying, turned him around, led to him renouncing extreme austerities, and put him on the road to
buddhahood, supreme awakening with the ability to teach.
- Sujata (Sujātā, Nandabala) was a farmer's wife, who offered dana in the form of food (kheer, a milk-rice pudding) for the wandering ascetic Siddhartha under a big old tree, ending his six years of asceticism. Sujata's servant/attendant, Punna, had gone to clean up around the tree ahead of the offering when she spotted Siddhartha under the tree and mistook him for a dryad in the flesh. His emaciated appearance did not look human, but rather he seemed as withered as bark.
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| Had this mother not stepped in to nurture him? |
Wrongly believing him to be tree-spirit who had granted Sujata's wish to get pregnant, Punna ran to get Sujata, who came with the offering. That gift (dana) gave him enough strength to cultivate his path-of-practice, the Middle Way that avoids extremes of sensual indulgence and extreme asceticism, develop the absorptions (jhana) that temporarily purify the heart/mind and give rise to supernormal perception, and attain enlightenment (bodhi) by systematic practice of Dependent Origination, after which he became known as the Buddha, the "Awakened One" [1, 2, 3]. Why was Sujata so fortunate as to generate such incredible merit? It is said that in a previous life, she had met Padumuttara Buddha, who made a certain predicting that one day she would be the first lay disciple of a future buddha [4]. Now it had come to pass because by going for guidance (sarana) to him, she preceded even the man on the road as the Buddha went to find the Group of Five at Isipatana and teach them. More
Mother of the household: Rahulamata
One need not stop here when traveling Woo-Woo Road. There was another key mother in Siddhartha and the Buddha's life, namely,
Princess Yasodhara (
Bimba Devi), Prince Siddhartha's wife and the mother of their child, Prince Rahula.
She did not stop becoming important when Prince Siddhartha renounced the world and left worldly riches, power, and fame behind. She took on a much more important role when she asked to ordain as a Buddhist nun with the Buddha's foster mother (stepmother, aunt, adoptive mother, primary caretaker) Queen Pajapati Gotami. The Buddha's former wife became famous in her own right as the fiercest spiritual disputant in all the land. It became her custom to travel to a town, set up a broom, and anyone who knocked it down was thereby challenging her to debating contest, all of which she won. So prominent was she that sexism in the monkhood (
bhikkhu sangha) seems to have led to reciters and scholar monks burying her in the texts by giving her many names: Yasodhara ("Gracious One"), Rahulamata ("Rahula's mother"), Ven. Kaccānā Bhikkhuni (later Theri), Bhadda ("Gentle") Kaccānā, Bhadra Kātyāyani, Sundari (not to be confused with the Buddha's sister,
Sundari ["Beautiful"] Nanda aka Janapada Kalyani),
and so on. (It seems Christians took the same tact in the Bible, burying Mary's significance by confusing various Marys).
Seven mothers of the Buddha?
Seven mothers are enough, but in addition to Maya, Pajapati,
Nakulamātā, Sujata, Bhumi, and Yasodhara (Bimba, Rahulamata), who would be the seventh? Certainly, there's a
devi (goddess, "shining one," angel, deity) out there who helped young Siddhartha and/or the Buddha, who nurtured him, supported him, saved him, or so encouraged him that he was able to accomplish his aim of supreme enlightenment (
samma-sam-buddhahood) to teach countless humans and
devas and help countless others by alleviating a mass of suffering.
Perhaps one could argue for
Prajnaparamita of Java (
Prajñāpāramitā Devī),
Kwan Yin (female
Avalokitesvara), brilliant
courtesan and supporter
Ambapali, a colorful
Tara,
Yeshe Tsogyal,
Goddess Marici, Ven.
Khema, Ven.
Uppalavanna -- his two foremost female monastic disciples -- or the
Queen of Heaven (
Saraswati, Shri
Lakshmi, Ma
Durga,
Maha Devi,
Rati,
Parvati,
Radha,
Matsu), whoever that
Heavenly Queen might be (
Guanyin or Virgin Mary), even if it turns out to be
Maya Devi in
Tusita.
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| Mothers so love their children that when they become novices (samaneras), they feed them. |
Mother Sutra: We've all been mothers?
(Mata Sutta, SN 15.14-19 PTS: S ii 189 CDB i 659)
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| Whatever greatness we achieve, it is often on the backs of our mothers, whom we rarely thank. |
Thus have I heard. The Buddha was staying in Savatthi, and there he said: "Inconceivable is the beginning of rebirth (
samsara). No beginning point is seen from which time beings, hindered by ignorance and fettered by craving, have been reborn and continue wandering on [from life to life, world to world, sphere to sphere].
"It is difficult to ever find a being who has not already been your mother at some time in the past or pother...
- a being who has not already been your father...
- your brother...
- your sister...
- your son...
- your daughter at some time in the past or other.
"Why? Inconceivable is the beginning of rebirth. No beginning is seen from which time beings, hindered by ignorance and fettered by craving, have been reborn and continue wandering on.
"Long have beings thus experienced suffering, experienced pain, experienced loss, swelling cemeteries — long enough to become disenchanted with all formation (composite fabricated things), long enough to become dispassionate, long enough to find release."
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