The Homeless One — Louise Ireland-Frey

The Blossom of Buddha A Novel of the Life of Gautama Based on the Pali Canon and Other Buddhist Scriptures Part II: The Homeless One Louise Ireland-Frey At the birth of the royal son of the Sakya clan of Kshatriyas in northern India some 2600 centuries ago, wise men were called to consult the stars regarding the child's fortune. Exclaiming over the astrological signs, the wise men prophesied that the babe would become either a Universal Monarch, governing all the great continents, or a Universal Teacher, teaching all nations. A group of eight wise men learned in the bodily signs predicted the same two possibilities, depending on whether the boy saw Four Signs sent by the gods: a sick man, an old man, a dead man, and a monk. The eighth and youngest prophesied that only one future was indicated: The boy would become a Universal Teacher. The child's father, King Suddhodana, resolved that his son should never see any of the Four Signs and instructed the palace household to keep all knowledge of these from the young prince. As the prince grew older, however, he became more and more frustrated with his imprisonment, for so he felt it. Eventually he did see the Four Signs, responding to each with deep emotional turmoil. When the king refused to allow him to go free to seek the remedies for sickness, old age, and death, the prince managed to escape by night with the aid of his charioteer and his old horse. Knowing nothing of the outside world except for the little that the monk had told him and what his charioteer had added, the erst-while prince set out alone to seek the answers to mankind's sufferings and to find the remedies, leaving his cousin-wife and baby in the care of the palace. Now he starts a new phase of life as a Homeless One, a mendicant, a wandering beggar.