The Gray Hair

Long ago, in Mithila, in the land of Videha, there lived a good king named Makha Deva, who ruled justly. For eighty-four thousand years he was a prince, for as many more he helped to govern, and for as many again he was king. After he had lived a very, very long time, he said one day to his barber, “My good barber, whenever you find a gray hair on my head, tell me.”

A very long time passed, and then one day the barber found a single gray hair among the king’s jet-black locks. “There is a gray hair on your head, O king,” he said.

“Then pull it out, my friend, and put it in my hand.”

The barber plucked it out with golden tweezers and laid it in the king’s palm. The king still had eighty-four thousand years of life ahead of him. Even so, as he looked at the gray hair, he was deeply shaken, as though the King of Death were standing beside him or he were trapped in a burning house. “Foolish Makha Deva!” he thought. “Gray hairs have come to you, and still you have not freed yourself from the weaknesses and desires that spoil people’s hearts!”

The longer he thought about the gray hair, the more his heart burned within him. Sweat poured from his body, and even his robes felt heavy and unbearable. “This very day,” he thought, “I will leave the world and give myself to a holy life.”

He gave the barber a village whose income came to a hundred thousand. Then he sent for his eldest son. “My son, gray hairs have appeared on my head. I have grown old. I am finished with earthly hopes, and now I will seek heavenly things. It is time for me to leave the world. You must take the throne. I will live as a holy man in the garden called Makha Deva’s Mango Park and learn the ways of those whose hearts are at peace.”

When the ministers heard of his plan, they came and asked, “O king, why are you giving up the world?”

The king held up the gray hair and answered in verse:

These gray hairs on my head
are messengers from the gods,
a stern hand on the evening of my life.
It is time to turn to holy thoughts.

So that very day he laid down his crown and became a hermit. He lived in Makha Deva’s Mango Grove, as he had said, and for eighty-four thousand years he practiced perfect kindness toward every living thing and spent his days in meditation. When he died he was born in the Brahma heaven. When his time there came to an end, he was born in Mithila as a king called Nimi and brought his scattered family together. After that he became a hermit in that same Mango Grove, practiced perfect kindness toward all beings, and went back to the Brahma heaven.

Where this story comes from

This is the Makha-Deva Jataka, No. 9 in T. W. Rhys Davids’s Buddhist Birth Stories (1880). The book heads the tale with the first words of the king’s verse, “These grey hairs.”

The Buddha tells it at Jetavana when his monks are talking about his own Great Renunciation, his leaving of home and palace, to show that he had given up a throne in a former life too. He names the barber as Ananda, the prince as Rahula and King Makha Deva as himself. Just the story of the past appears on this page.

Read the original: Buddhist Birth Stories (Project Gutenberg)

Best for ages 6–8 — a tale about aging, mortality and a king’s decision to change his life; his distress may need gentle discussion.

A closer reading

The enormous lifespan makes the king’s response striking: he still has eighty-four thousand years left, yet one gray hair is enough to interrupt his habits. The point is not an ordinary timetable for aging, but the contrast between postponing change and recognizing that time is finite.

He has asked the barber to report the change and rewards him for doing so. Uncomfortable information is treated as useful service. He also names a successor before leaving, so renunciation includes a transfer of public responsibility rather than simply walking away from it.

Try this with the story

Choose three objects—the gray hair, golden tweezers and crown—and explain what each contributes to the king’s decision. Then identify one responsibility he completes before beginning his new way of life.

Think about it

• Why is one hair important despite the king’s remaining years?
• What does rewarding the barber show about receiving unwelcome news?
• How does the king arrange for others before leaving?

More stories like this

• The Happy Monk — a king who finds more joy as a hermit than on the throne
• The King’s White Elephant — a Jataka about a wise and gentle ruler
• The Banyan Deer (Nigrodhamiga Jataka) — another early Jataka of kindness to all living things