Q
ueen Mahamaya, having carried the future Buddha in her womb for ten months as smoothly
as oil in a monk’s bowl, submitted her desire to visit relatives in the country of Devadaha to King Suddhodana, who granted her permission to proceed on her way, borne in a golden palanquin and surrounded by attendants. Between the countries of Kapilavatthu and Devadaha, in a beautiful grove of flowering sala trees called Lumbini, the queen was delivered, stretching out her hand and holding the branch of a sala tree that was bending toward her. At that moment the great Brahmas received the infant in a golden net, the four guardian gods on a black antelope skin and the royal ministers on a fine white royal cloth. The infant then stood on the ground and, taking seven paces to the north, spoke the words “I am the most exalted and excellent.” That same day the holy man Kaladevala, who could see whatever had happened in forty previous worlds and whatever would happen in forty future worlds, came to the palace to behold the Buddha-to-be. The child, on being carried near to pay reverence, raised both feet and placed them on the braided hair of the holy man, who smiled because he saw that the prince would become a Buddha and wept because he himself would not live to see that event. On the fifth day after the birth, Kondanna, who was the youngest of eight brahmins versed in the interpretation of signs, held up one finger—meaning that the child would surely become a Buddha—while the other brahmins held up two fingers, meaning that the child would become either a Buddha or a world emperor.
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