The Taming of Angulimala

Angulimala was the most feared man in the realm. Tricked by a corrupt teacher into believing he needed to kill a thousand people to achieve spiritual power, he lived in the forest, murdering travelers. To keep count, he cut off one finger from each victim and wore them as a bloody garland around his neck (hence his name, Anguli-mala: finger-garland). He had 999 fingers. He needed one more.

One morning, the Buddha walked silently toward the perilous forest. Villagers begged him to turn back, warning him of the monster. The Buddha simply smiled and kept walking.

From the bushes, Angulimala saw the lone monk. 'My thousandth victim!' he thought. Drawing his sword, he sprinted after the Buddha. But a strange thing happened. The Buddha was walking at a normal, slow pace, yet Angulimala, running at top speed, could not catch up to him.

Exhausted, dripping with sweat, the killer finally screamed, 'Stop, ascetic! Stop!'

The Buddha did not break his gentle stride. He turned his head and said calmly, 'I have stopped, Angulimala. I have stopped forever. It is you who has not stopped.'

The killer froze, bewildered. 'What do you mean?'

'I have stopped harming all living beings,' the Buddha explained. 'My mind is at absolute rest. But you are running, driven by ignorance, hatred, and violence. You have not stopped.'

Those words struck Angulimala like lightning. The sheer, immovable peace of the Buddha shattered the killer's psychotic delusion. He dropped his sword, fell to his knees, and wept. He asked to become a monk. The Buddha accepted him. Angulimala eventually became an Arhat (enlightened one), proving that no mind is too corrupted to be purified by Dhamma.