The Spider’s ThreadRyunosuke Akutagawa

One day, the Buddha was strolling alone on the brink of the lotus pond of paradise.

The lotus flowers in bloom in the pond were all as white as pearls, and the golden pistils and stamens in their centers ceaselessly filled the air with ineffable fragrance.

It was morning in paradise.Presently the Buddha stood still on the brink of the pond and through an opening

among the leaves which covered the face of the water, suddenly beheld the scene below.

As the floor of Hell lay directly beneath the lotus pond of paradise, the river of the Threefold path to eternal darkness and piercing peaks of the Needle Mountain were distinctly visible through the crystal water, as through a stereopticon.

Then his eyes fell on a man named Kandata, who was squirming with the other sinners in the bottom of the hell.

This Kandata was a great robber who had done many evil things, murdering and setting fire to houses; but he had to his credit one good action. Once while on his way through a deep forest, he had notice a little spider creeping along beside the road.

So, quickly lifting his foot, he was about to trample it to death, when he suddenly thought: “No, no, as small as this thing is, it too has a soul. It would be rather a shame to kill it inconsiderately,” and he spared the spider’s life.

And he looked down to the Hell, the Buddha remembered how this Kandata had spared his spider’s life. And in return for this, he delivered him out of the hell.

Fortunately, when he looked around, he saw a spider of paradise spinning a beautiful silvery thread on the lotus leaves.

The Buddha quietly took up the spiders thread in his hand. And he let it straight down to the bottom of Hell far below through the opening among the pearly white lotus flowers.

Here Kandata had been rising and sinking with the other sinners in the Pool of Blood on the floor of Hell.

It was pitch black everywhere and when at times a glimpse was caught of something rising from the darkness, it turned out to be a gleam of the peaks of the dread Needle Mountain. The stillness of the grave reigned everywhere and the only thing that could be heard now and then was the faint sighing of the sinners. This was because such sinners who had come down to this spot had already been worn out by the other manifold tortures of Hell and had lost even the strength to cry out loud.

So great a robber though he was, Kandata, choking with blood could do nothing but struggle in the pool like a dying frog.

On this day, when Kandata lifted his head by chance and looked up in the sky above the Pool of Blood, he saw a silver spider’s thread slipping down toward him from the high, high heavens, glittering slightly in the silent darkness just as if it feared the eye of man.

Rowell L. BandongGrade IX- Iodine Page 1

When he saw this, his hands clapped themselves with joy. If clinging to this thread, h climbed as far as it went, he could surely escape Hell.nay, I fall went well, he might even enter Paradise. Then he would never be driven on to the Needle Mountain or sunk in the Pool of Blood.

As soon as these thoughts came into is mind, he grasped the thread tightly in his two hands and began to climb up and up with all his might. Because he was a great robber, he had long been thoroughly familiar with such things.

But hell is nobody knows how many myriads of miles removed from Paradise, and strive as he might, he could not easily get out. After climbing for a while, he was finally exhausted and could not ascend an inch higher.

Since he could do nothing else, he stopped to res, and hanging on to the thread, looked far, far down below him. Now, since he had climbed with all his might, the Pool of Blood, where he had just been, already much to his surprise was hidden deep down in the darkness. And the dreaded Needle Mountain glittered dimly under him. If he went up at this rate, he might get out of Hell more easily than he had thought.

With his hand twisted into the spider’s thread, Kandata laughed and exulted in a voice such as he had not uttered during all the years since coming here. “Success! Success!”

But suddenly he noticed that below on that thread, countless sinners were climbing eagerly after him, up and up, like a procession of ants.

When he saw this, Kandata simply blinked his eyes for a moment with his big mouth hanging foolishly open in surprise and terror.

How could that slender spider’s thread, which seemed as if it must break even with him alone, ever support the weight of all those people?

If it should break in mid- air, even he himself, after all this effort in reaching this spot, would have to fall headlong back into Hell.

But mean while hundreds and hundreds of sinners were squirming out of the dark Pool of Blood and climbing with their might in a line up the slender, glittering thread. If he did not do something quickly, the thread was sure to break in two and fall. So Kandata cried out in a loud voice:

“Hey, you sinners, this spider’s thread is mine. Who gave you permission to come up it? Get down! Get down!

Just at that moment, the spider’s thread, which had shown no sign of breaking up to that time, suddenly broke with a snap at that point where Kandata was hanging. Without even time to utter a cry, he shot down and fell headlong into the darkness spinning swiftly around and around like a top.

Afterward, only the spider’s thread of Paradise, glittering and slender, hung short in the moonless and starless sky.

Rowell L. BandongGrade IX- Iodine Page 2