Dhp V : Fools

Long for the wakeful is the night.

Long for the weary, a league.

For fools

unaware of True Dhamma,

samsara

is long.

If, in your course, you don’t meet

your equal, your better,

then continue your course,

firmly,

alone.

There’s no fellowship with fools.

‘I have sons, I have wealth’–

the fool torments himself.

When even he himself

doesn’t belong to himself,

how then sons?

How wealth?

A fool with a sense of his foolishness

is–at least to that extent–wise.

But a fool who thinks himself wise

really deserves to be called

a fool.

Even if for a lifetime

the fool stays with the wise,

he knows nothing of the Dhamma–

as the ladle,

the taste of the soup.

Even if for a moment,

the perceptive person stays with the wise,

he immediately knows the Dhamma–

as the tongue,

the taste of the soup.

Fools, their wisdom weak,

are their own enemies

as they go through life,

doing evil

that bears

bitter fruit.

It’s not good,

the doing of the deed

that,   once it’s done,

you regret,

whose result you reap crying,

your face in tears.

It’s good,

the doing of the deed

that,   once it’s done,

you don’t regret,

whose result you reap gratified,

happy at heart.

As long as evil has yet to ripen,

the fool mistakes it for honey.

But when that evil ripens,

the fool falls into

pain.

Month after month

the fool might eat

only a tip-of-grass measure of food,

but he wouldn’t be worth

one sixteenth

of those who’ve fathomed

the Dhamma.

An evil deed, when done,

doesn’t–like ready milk–

come out right away.

It follows the fool,

smoldering

like a fire

hidden in ashes.

Only for his ruin

does renown come to the fool.

It ravages his bright fortune

& rips his head      apart.

He would want unwarranted status,

preeminence among monks,

authority

among monasteries,

homage

from lay families.

‘Let householders & those gone forth

both think that this

was done by me alone.

May I alone determine

what’s a duty, what’s not’:

the resolve of a fool

as they grow–

his desire & pride.

The path to material gain

goes one way,

the way to Unbinding,

another.

Realizing this, the monk,

a disciple to the Awakened One,

should not relish offerings,

should cultivate            seclusion

instead.