Khanti - Wat Pah Nanachat

The brahmin got back on his horse and rode back the
way he came until he caught up with the monk. ‘You lied. You
told me that you got something in my house and you didn’t.
You’re not only a stupid Buddhist monk, but you’re a lying
Buddhist monk as well.’
He was very angry. The monk answered him calmly,
‘No, I didn’t lie. I have been on alms round to your house for
seven years and received nothing at all. Today, for the first
time I received something from its inhabitants: some words of
abuse. It’s a start. While considering that I smiled.’
At these words, something shifted in the mind of the
brahmin. He suddenly became inspired by the monk, as he
reflected on how the monk had been patiently coming to his
house every day for seven years without once being given any
food for his daily meal, and now on being abused rather than
getting angry, felt grateful. The Brahmin got down off his
horse bows and asked for forgiveness. Then he said,
‘Venerable Sir, tomorrow, would you please accept food at my
house?’
The brahmin went home and told his wife that
tomorrow morning together with their seven-year old son, she
should put food in the monk’s bowl. It became a daily practice.
The young boy put food in the bowl every day, and filled with
faith took ordination as a novice, became a monk, became an
arahant, and became Venerable Nagasena, one of the pillars of
Indian Buddhism.
It seems that the elders who gave the monk the
punishment knew that a baby with great parami had been born
to a hostile brahmin family, and this was their means of
creating a connection between the child and the Sangha. This
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