67. Seated Buddha in hall of Buddhas,

date unknown, Wat Suthat, Bangkok,

Thailand, gilt bronze.

 

 

[The Wheel of the Dharma begins to turn]

And when the Blessed One had set the Wheel of Dharma in motion, the earth deities cried out: “At Varanasi, in the Game Refuge at Isipatana, the Blessed One has set in motion the unexcelled Wheel of Dharma that cannot be stopped by priest or contemplative, deity, Mara or God or anyone in the cosmos.” On hearing the earth deities’ cry, the deities of the Four Kings’ Heaven took up the cry…the deities of the Thirty-three…the Yama deities…the Tushita deities…the Nimmanarati deities…the Paranimmita-vasavatti deities…the deities of Brahma’s retinue took up the cry: “At Varanasi, in the Game Refuge at Isipatana, the Blessed One has set in motion the unexcelled Wheel of Dharma that cannot be stopped by priest or contemplative, deity, Mara, or God or anyone at all in the cosmos.”

So in that moment, that instant, the cry shot right up to the Brahma worlds. And this ten-thousand fold cosmos shivered and quivered and quaked, while a great, measureless radiance appeared in the cosmos, surpassing the effulgence of the deities.

Then the Blessed One exclaimed: “So you really know, Kaundinya? So you really know?” And that is how Venerable Kaundinya acquired the name Ajnata-Kaundinya – Kaundinya who knows.

[SN LVI.11]

 

The Buddha declared that he had arrived at these convictions, not by study of the Vedas (the Hindu texts) or from the teachings of others, but by the light of reason and intuition alone. Initially, these teachings were difficult for his old disciples to accept. However, after spending long hours discussing them with him, asking their questions and hearing his answers, these men became the first to acknowledge Gautama in his new role. It was the aged Kaundinya, ready for his release from life, who first openly gave in his adhesion; but the others also, after many talks with the Buddha, sometimes separately, sometimes together, soon accepted in its entirety his plan of salvation.