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Thig 2.31 min read

Sumaṅgala’s Mother

Sumaṅgalamātātherīgāthā

Translated by Bhikkhu Sujato · Pāli: Mahāsaṅgīti Tipiṭaka · Public domain (CC0) via SuttaCentral

  • 0.1Therīgāthā 2.3Verses of the Senior Nuns 2.3
  • 0.2DukanipātaThe Book of the Twos

0.3SumaṅgalamātātherīgāthāSumaṅgala’s Mother

1.1“Sumuttikā sumuttikā,I’m well freed, well freed,11.2Sādhumuttikāmhi musalassa;so very well freed from the pestle!21.3Ahiriko me chattakaṁ vāpi,My shameless husband was most certainly a mushroom,31.4Ukkhalikā me deḍḍubhaṁ vāti.my mortar wafted like an eel.4

2.1Rāgañca ahaṁ dosañca,Greed and hate sizzle and hiss2.2Cicciṭi cicciṭīti vihanāmi;as I squelch them.2.3Sā rukkhamūlamupagamma,Having gone to the root of a tree,2.4Aho sukhanti sukhato jhāyāmī”ti.I meditate happily, thinking, “Oh, what bliss!”

3.1… Sumaṅgalamātā therī ….

Translator’s notes

  1. This verse, like Thig 1.11, hinges on double entendres of kitchen drudgery and sex, and hence is playfully ambiguous. It is a Buddhist counterpart to Rig Veda 1.28, which parallels the act of sex with the pounding of mortar and pestle, situating the ritual in the kitchen.

    The nun here is presumably the mother of the Sumaṅgala at Thag 1.43, whose verses are similar.

    ↩ thig2.3:1.1

  2. The pestle (musala) is the male, routinely paired with the female mortar (Śathapatha Brāhmaṇa 7.5.1.38).

    ↩ thig2.3:1.2

  3. The mortar was sixteen inches of rock hard wood (ŚB 1.1.4.7 and Eggeling’s note). I don’t think calling it a mushroom is meant as a compliment. On the other hand, if vāpi (“most certainly”) is emended to vāti (or vāyi), it is the wind that causes erections (Bu Pj 1:10.17.6, cf. RV 1.28.6), “my husband inflated like a mushroom” (which pops up out of nowhere).

    ↩ thig2.3:1.3

  4. I prefer “mortar” for ukkhalikā as the complement of “pestle”. Compare Sanskrit ulūkhala (or ulūkhalaka) throughout RV 1.28, and also ŚB 7.5.1.22, “the mortar is the womb of all breaths”. If the sense “little cauldron” is preferred, see ŚB 6.6.2.8, “the cauldron is female, the fire male” (also ŚB 7.1.1.42). The two terms are used in the same passage in this sense at ŚB 7.5.1.26.

    Deḍḍubha is a “water-snake” or eel (Kd 15:29.2.2). But it is also a spelling of “drum”, in which case we might emend vāti to vādi, yielding “my mortar was drum-sounding”, as the mortar “sounds” when pounded like the “drum of victors” (RV 1.28.5).

    For vāti in the sense, “waft an odor”, see Vv 38:6.3.

    ↩ thig2.3:1.4