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# Therigatha

## Chapter X -- The Eleven

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X.1 -- Kisagotami, The Woman with the Dead Child {excerpt: vv. 213-217, 220, 222-223}
[Hellmuth Hecker/Sister Khema, trans. From Buddhist Women at the Time of The Buddha (WH 292/293), by Hellmuth Hecker, translated from the German by Sister Khema, (Kandy: Buddhist Publication Society, 1982). Copyright ©1982 Buddhist Publication Society. Used with permission.]

> The Sage has emphasized and praised
> Noble friendship for the world.
> If one stays with a Noble Friend,
> even a fool will become a wise person.
> Stay with them of good heart
> for the wisdom of those who stay with them grows.
> And while one is staying with them,
> from every kind of dukkha one is freed.
> Dukkha one should know well,
> and how dukkha arises and ceases,
> and the Eightfold Path,
> and the Four Noble Truths.

> "Woman's state is painful,"
> declares the Trainer of tamable men.
> "A wife with others is painful
> and once having borne a child,
> some even cut their throats;
> others of delicate constitution
> poison take, then pain again;
> and then there's the baby obstructing the birth,
> killing the mother too."

> ...

> Miserable woman, your kin all dead
> and limitless dukkha you've known.
> So many tears have you shed
> in these many thousands of births.

> ...

> Wholly developed by me is
> the Eightfold Noble Path going to Deathlessness,
> Nibbana realized,
> I looked into the Mirror of the Dhamma.
> With dart removed am I,
> the burden laid down, done what was to be done,
> The elder nun Kisagotami,
> freed in mind and heart, has chanted this.

Revised: Fri 12 April 2002