Dictionary of Pali Proper Names v2.c29.855

v2.c29.855

As the time for the announcement of their last birth approaches, all is excitement because of various signs appearing in the ten thousand world systems. The devas of all the worlds assemble in Tusita and request the Bodhisatta to seek birth as a human being, that he may become the Buddha. The Bodhisatta withholds his reply until he has made the Five Great Investigations (pañcamahāvilokanā) regarding time, continent, place of birth, his mother and the life-span left to her. Buddhas do not appear in the world when men live to more than one hundred thousand years or to less than one hundred. They are born only in Jambudīpa and in the Majjhimadesa, and only of a khattiya or brahmin clan. The Bodhisatta’s mother in his last birth must not be passionate or given to drink; she should have practised the pāramī for one hundred thousand kappas, have kept the precepts inviolate from birth, and should not be destined to live more than ten months and seven days after the conception of the Bodhisatta.