# The king's elephant and the thieves

- Teacher: Ajahn Brahm
- Type: Story
- URL: https://beingmindfulstories.com/stories/brahm-jataka-elephant-and-thieves
- Themes: conditioning, environment, companionship, character
- Life situations: bad influences, choosing friends, changing character

## Synopsis (editorial summary)

A king's fine elephant turns wilful and troublesome, and no trainer can fix it. A wise minister camps by its stall and discovers that thieves meet behind it every night to plan robberies; their negative talk has changed the elephant's character. The thieves are arrested, and the king has monks meditate, chant and discuss Dhamma behind the stall each evening for weeks — and the elephant becomes peaceful and calm like the monks.

## The story, as told by Ajahn Brahm (verbatim captions)

this old story from the time of the Buddha, it's one of my favourite stories, of this elephant. And this elephant was a really nice elephant. He belonged to the king. Now, in those days elephants were like your Mercedes or BMWs. You know, that's what you used to travel around the place with. So if you had a really good elephant, that was like having like a Ferrari car or something, your prized vehicle. And so he was a really nice elephant and always been very obedient and very compliant. Until one day, the elephant started getting a bit cranky. You know, it wouldn't do what he was told. And he would not, sort of, go where he was asked to go, and start to really mess around. Just like when the elephant keeper was cleaning up, you know, behind the elephant, that's when the elephant would poo all over the elephant keeper. If you've seen how much an elephant poos, that's a lot of poo. So the people looking after the elephant thought: ‘The elephant must be sick, it must have some sort of virus or something, that it's misbehaving; it's not its usual character’. And they took the elephant doctor there – so it was a girl elephant – they took the elephant doctor there and they tried everything and nothing worked, and then they maybe thought it was the elephant equivalent of menopause, you know what it’s like, sometimes. (laughter) Anyway, elephants don't have menopause. (laughter) And it was just… they couldn't figure out what was wrong with this elephant. And so in the end… according to this story, the Buddha's previous life, he was a minister and he said ‘I'll check this out’. So what he did was actually go to the elephant stall and just stay there overnight, trying to find out what was going on. In the middle of the night he was woken up, the minister. There was some sort of weird sound behind the elephant stall in the middle of the night. Now, if you woke up in the middle of the night and you heard weird sounds from behind your cottage, would you go outside to check or would you hide under your blankets? (laughter) Number one, you don't have anything to fear around here, Ajahn Brahm’s here, so you're perfectly safe, guaranteed, money-back guarantee. And you don't pay any money anyway. Well, except the deposit which is a donation, but you can get that back if you really want to, but you're perfectly safe. So he decided to go and check it out. So he crept round the back of the elephant stall, and what he found there – there was a gang. You know, these bad people, you know, robbing and extorting money from others. They were meeting there every evening, because it was quiet, to plan all the stuff they were gonna do that evening. And he realized the cause of the elephant's problems. Because the elephant was actually picking up on what they call ‘the bad vibes’ of these crooks and gangsters. Even though the elephant couldn't understand, you know, the English or whatever language they were saying, still he could pick up, sort of, the character of these bad people. And night after night after night, the elephant had picked up this bad character and had started to become a bad elephant himself or herself. And the minister just had all those gangsters arrested the next night, he told the king, and he replaced them with monks! So the monks had to meet there every evening, you know, do some meditation, a bit of chanting, discussing of Dhamma and stuff like that. And after a few days the elephant came back to its normal character. Just because of the good influence of others

## Teaching point

Our minds are conditioned by the company and environment we keep.

## Reflection (in the spirit of Ajahn Brahm's talk)

A king's gentle elephant turned wild because thieves met beside its stall each night to plot. Replace them with chanting, meditating monks, and it calmed again. We soak up the company and talk around us. If you've grown edgy and grumpy, look at who and what you're spending your evenings with.

## Source

- [Elephant Story - the importance of being with peaceful people | Ajahn Brahm](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Uu750LG7U0) (Buddhist Society of Western Australia) — watch from 0:01 to 3:46: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Uu750LG7U0&t=1s

Other tellings of this story:

- [The Process of Rebirth | Ajahn Brahm | 03-04-2009](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EWFSAFHpx_U) (Buddhist Society of Western Australia) — watch from 27:53 to 30:43: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EWFSAFHpx_U&t=1673s
- [Buddhism and Ghosts | Ajahn Brahm | 10 March 2023](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_9fga9-6vFM) (Buddhist Society of Western Australia) — watch from 38:39 to 41:09: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_9fga9-6vFM&t=2319s
- [3 Overcoming thinking - Ajahn Brahm](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nlB3uksRV8M) (BSWA Retreats 2011-15 & Media) — watch from 1:55 to 5:47: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nlB3uksRV8M&t=115s
- [Why Do People Do Bad Things? | Ajahn Brahm | 17-06-2011](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PaEI0Z2tesA) (Buddhist Society of Western Australia) — watch from 10:55 to 14:30: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PaEI0Z2tesA&t=655s
- [Ajahn Brahm's New Year's Eve Talk | 1 Jan 2016](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z1zQwOceuVk) (Buddhist Society of Western Australia) — watch from 6:40 to 10:01: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z1zQwOceuVk&t=400s
- [Teenagers Are Aliens | Ajahn Brahm | 26 October 2012](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HSzGDO6RAeQ) (Buddhist Society of Western Australia) — watch from 7:47 to 9:25: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HSzGDO6RAeQ&t=467s
- [Dealing with discrimination and stigma | Ajahn Brahm | 31-10-2014](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G_zH9qerjJQ) (Buddhist Society of Western Australia) — watch from 13:08 to 15:40: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G_zH9qerjJQ&t=788s