The story of Angulimala continues….
One day, Ven Angulimala went on his alms round and saw a woman in pain, having problems delivering her baby. When he returned to the monastery, he related the matter to the Buddha.
The Buddha asked him to go back to the woman and say to her: “Sister, since I was born, I do not know of having intentionally killed a sentient being. By this truth may you be well, and so may the child in your womb.” Ven Angulimala responded that that would be a lie, since he had killed many sentient beings. Then the Buddha told him to say instead, “Sister, since I was born by the Noble Birth, I do not know of having intentionally killed a sentient being. By this truth may you be well, and so may the child in your womb.” This was indeed a truth because becoming a bhikkhu means being “born by the Noble Birth.”
Ven Angulimala went back to the woman and repeated what he had been told to say. By this act of truth, he was able to help the woman and her child was delivered safely.
Later, Ven Angulimala became an arahant. Still, he could not escape the bad karma of his days of killing. On one of his alms rounds, sticks and stones thrown by people would land on and wound him, although they were not intentionally meant to hit him. The Buddha told him that he had to endure this as the fruit of his bad karma, otherwise he would suffer much more. Thus we can see that no one can escape one’s karma—not even an arahant—so long as he still dwells in samsara.