khemaka

An arahant. Once, when he lay very ill at the Badarikārāmā, near Kosambī, some monks, staying at the Ghositārāma, sent one of their number, Dāsaka, with a message to Khemaka, inquiring whether he managed to bear his pains. Dāsaka returned with the reply that he did not; he was sent again to ask if Khemaka had seen the self in the five khandhas; when Dāsaka returned with the answer that he had not, be was sent a third time to ask whether Khemaka was an arahant. “No,” came the answer, and Dāsaka had to visit him a fourth time with the inquiry, What did Khemaka mean by self? In exasperation Khemaka came himself to Ghositārāma and explained how, even when the Noble Disciple has put away the five lower fetters, there still clings to him a subtle remnant of the “I” conceit. It is said that as a result of the sermon Khemaka himself and sixty others became arahants. SN.iii.126ff.