This story is quite entertaining, a little bit like Hollywood movie, it will make you all smile.
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Thera Sundarasamudda: The Beautiful Temptress
[From Bhikkhu Pesala and Daw Mya Tin,MA]
While residing at the Jetavana monastery, the Buddha uttered Verse (415) of this book, with reference to Thera Sundarasamudda.
Sundarasamudda was a young man of a wealthy family of Sāvatthī. One day, seeing all the people going to the Jetavana monastery bearing gifts, he decided to accompany them. As he listened to the Buddha teach the Dhamma he wished to go forth, and after the discourse sought permission. The Buddha told him to obtain his parents’ permission, which he did. Having gone forth and taken the higher ordination, he decided to leave Sāvatthī and stay at Rājagaha which was forty-five yojanas away from Savatthi, to practise meditation. One day, when there was a festival, his parents saw the other young men enjoying themselves, and started weeping, thinking of what their son had given up. As they were weeping, a beautiful courtesan came to them and asked what the matter was. On hearing about their son, the courtesan said, "If I could make your son leave the Order and return to the life of a lay man how would you reward me?" The parents answered that they would make her rich. The courtesan then asked for a large sum of money and left for Rajagaha with a number of followers.
At Rajagaha, she rented a house with seven-tiered pinnacles on the route where Thera Sundarasamudda would come on his alms-round. She prepared good food and waited for him. On the first few days, she offered alms-food to the thera at the door of her house. Later, she invited him to come inside. Meanwhile, she paid money to some children to come and play just outside the house about the time the thera usually came on his alms-round. This gave her the excuse that it was very dusty and noisy on the ground floor; with this excuse she invited the thera to the top floor to have his alms-food. The thera consented and went up and as soon as he had entered the room, the courtesan closed the door. Then she started seducing the thera. She said to the thera, "Venerable Sir! Please be my youthful and energetic husband, and I will be your dearly beloved wife. After our long and happy wedded life we can both leave it to enter the Order and strive our very best to attain Nibbana." When he heard these words the thera suddenly realized his mistake and got alarmed. Then he said to himself, "Indeed, by being negligent and unmindful I have made a great mistake."
At that instant, the Buddha saw from his Perfumed Chamber what was happening to Thera Sundarasamudda at Rajagaha. He called the Venerable Ananda and said to him, "Ananda! On an upper storey of a pinnacled building in Rajagaha, there now goes on a struggle between Sundarasamudda and a courtesan; but in the end the thera will be the winner." After saying this to Ananda, the Buddha sent forth his radiance to the thera, made him feel his presence, and said, "My son! Be resolute and get rid of love of wealth and sensual pleasures."
Then the Buddha spoke in verse as follows:
A Saint Has Given Up Sense-Desires
Who in this world, giving up sense-desires,
would renounce worldly life and become a homeless one,
he who has destroyed sense-desires and becoming — I call a Saint.415
On the conclusion of the verse, Bhikkhu Sundarasamudda gained Arahantship together with the psychic powers, and escaped through the roof of the house, descending at Sāvatthī, where he paid homage to the Buddha.
When the monks were discussing these events, the Buddha told them that this was not the first time that Sundarasamudda been enticed by his craving for sweet tastes, in a former life too he had done the same. Then he related the Vātamiga Jātaka.
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Vatamiga Jataka
The Bodhisatta was once born as Brahmadatta, king of Benares. He had a gardener named Sanjaya. A vatamiga(antelope) used to visit the royal park, and the king asked Sanjaya to catch it. Sanjaya put honey on the grass where the animal fed, and, in due course, the animal came to eat out of his hand. He was thus able to entice it right into the palace, where he shut the door on it. The king marvelled that a vatamiga, who was so shy that if it once saw a man it would not visit the same place for a week after, should allow itself to be caught by greed.
The story was related in reference to a monk(Sundarasamudda's past life), who was enticed back to the lay life by a slave girl. Sanjaya is identified with the slave and the vatamiga(antelope) with the monk.
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Love Buddha's dhamma,
yawares/sirikanya
