Section outline
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Lesson 1.4.1 Rohinītherīgāthā, Part One – That Is Why They Are So Dear to Me
The Rohinītherīgāthā provides a selection of lovely verses from the collection of the Khuddakanikāya, which are called Theragāthāpāḷi and Therīgāthāpāḷi. Here a girl named Rohinī, who regularly supports the Bhikkhus, gets lectured by her father, a wealthy Brahmin of Vesālī filled with negative prejudices about monks. He presents his complaints about her generosity by using the interrogative pronoun kena: “Why are those Samaṇas so dear to you?” (Kena te samaṇā piyā?). Rohinī makes use of the opportunity to praise the good qualities and noble conduct of the monks by turning the interrogative into the demonstrative tena by reciting the incomparable qualities of the monks in verses. After every verse, she concludes with what gave rise to the title of this sub-chapter: “That is why those Samaṇas are so dear to me!” (Tena me samaṇā piyā!).