Question

Answer the following question in 80-100 words:

“The life of mortals in this world is troubled and brief and combined with pain ….” With this statement of the Buddha, find out the moral value that Kisa Gotami learnt after the death of her child.

Answer 1

Kisa Gotami was the mother of her only son and was grief-stricken when he died. Initially, she was only thinking about her grief and was, therefore, asking for a medicine that would bring her son back to life. When she met the Buddha, he asked her to get a handful of mustard seeds from a house where no one had died. He did this purposely to make her realize that there was not a single house where no beloved had died and that death is natural. When she went to all the houses the second time, she felt dejected that she could not gather the mustard seeds. Then, when she sat and thought about it, she realized that the fate of men is such that they live and die. Death is common to all. This was what the Buddha had intended her to understand.