[771]
A losing throw for the wise, a winning throw for fools
do they prove who have gone through the Vedas, Ariṭṭha;
through want of scrutiny [fools take] what is mirage by nature [as real],
but the strands of illusion do not carry off the man of wisdom.
The Vedas afford him no protection —
the man who betrays his friends, the destroyer of growth (bhūnahu);
nor does the fire, though duly tended, protect
the mortal with hatred within him, whose deeds are ignoble.
Even should mortals, with all their wealth and their possessions,
set alight every stick of wood, mingled with grass,
it would burn and never be sated, its blaze without equal:
who could make that knower of two tastes (dirasaññū) replete?
Just as milk is of a nature to change,
becoming curds and then butter also,
even so is fire of a nature to change:
only when yoked to exertion does the heat mount up.
No fire is seen to have entered within
sticks of wood, whether dry or fresh:
unless it is churned out by a man with the fire-sticks (araṇī),
the fire — Jātaveda — is not born; without that act it is not born.
For if fire dwelt hidden within
sticks of wood, whether dry or fresh,
then all the forests in the world would wither away,
and the dry sticks would burst into flame.
If a man makes merit (puñña) by feeding
the smoke-crested, splendid one with wood and grass,
then charcoal-burners, salt-boilers, cooks,
and even burners of corpses would make merit.
And if these too make merit,
having gratified here both recitation (ajjhena) and the fire,
[then in truth] no one in the world makes merit
when, a man, he feeds the smoke-crested, splendid one.
For how should one who is revered by the world
eat what is of disagreeable odor, unwanted by the many —
the very thing that mortals turn away from —
how should the knower of two tastes eat what is so despised?
Some say the Crested One [fire] is among the gods;
the Milakkhas, for their part, call water a god:
all of these alike speak falsely —
fire is not one among the gods, nor is water.
Though it is without faculties, insentient of body —
Vessānara, the doer of work for the people —
having tended that fire, how should one go to a good destination (sugati)
while committing evil deeds?
Those with a livelihood at stake here declare,
"Brahmā, the vanquisher of all, is the fire's attendant":
if he is all-powerful and wields all mastery, to what end
would the uncreated worship the thing that he created?
A thing laughable, unable to bear scrutiny, untrue —
[the brahmins] of old contrived it for the sake of honors;
and when gains and honors had not appeared for them,
they framed, by means of living creatures [offered up], a "doctrine of peace."
"Study for the noble ones [the brahmins], the earth for the lords of men,
the plough for the vessas, and service for the suddas" —
each has come to what was severally assigned:
these [ordinances], they say, were made by the Wielder of Power (vasī).
And if this word were true,
even as it has been spoken by the brahmins,
then none but a khattiya would ever obtain kingship,
none but a brahmin would train in the words of the mantras,
none other than a vessa would ever ply the plough,
and a sudda would never be released from serving another.
But because this word is untrue —
it is falsehood these belly-servers utter —
those of little wisdom put their faith in it,
while the wise see through it for themselves.
For khattiyas levy tribute upon the vessas,
and brahmins go about with knives taken up;
a world like that — churned up, split asunder —
why does Brahmā not set it straight?
For if he is lord over the whole world —
Brahmā, the mighty, master of beings, [lord] of creatures —
why did he ordain misfortune for the whole world?
Why did he not make the whole world happy?
For if he is lord over the whole world —
Brahmā, the mighty, master of beings, [lord] of creatures —
with illusion, with lying, and with intoxication too,
with unrighteousness — to what end did he fashion the world?
For if he is lord over the whole world —
Brahmā, the mighty, master of beings, [lord] of creatures —
then an unrighteous master of beings is he, Ariṭṭha:
for, righteousness (dhamma) existing, he ordained unrighteousness (adhamma).
"By slaying insects and moths, snakes and bees,
the worm and the fly, one is made pure" —
these indeed are observances of an ignoble kind,
the false [creeds] of many among the Kambojans.
English translation from the Pali (Siam Raṭṭha edition) — under review, not for citation.