The Kathá Sarit Ságara; or, Ocean of the Streams of Story
my nativity prognosticated that I should be a thief, so my father,
afraid that that would come to pass, instructed me diligently in
the law. Though I studied the law, I was led by association with bad
companions to take to a career of thieving. For who is able to alter
the actions of a man in his previous births?
"Then I was one day caught among some thieves by the police, and taken
to the place of impalement, in order to be put to death. At that
moment a great elephant belonging to the king, which had gone mad,
and broken its fastening, and was killing people in all directions,
came to that very place. The executioners, alarmed at the elephant,
left me and fled somewhere or other, and I escaped in that confusion
and made off. But I heard from people that my father had died on
hearing that I was being led off to execution, and that my mother
had followed him. Then I was distracted with sorrow, and as I was
wandering about despondent, intent on self-destruction, I happened to
reach in course of time this great uninhabited wood. No sooner had I
entered it, than a celestial nymph suddenly revealed herself to me,
and approached me, and consoling me said to me; 'My son, this retreat,
which you have come to, belongs to the royal sage Vinítamati, so your
sin is destroyed, and from him you shall learn wisdom.' After saying
this, she disappeared; and I wandered about in search of that royal
sage, but not being able to find him, I was on the point of abandoning
the body, out of disappointment, when I was seen by you."
When Somasúra had said this, that royal sage took him to his own hut,
and made himself known to him, and honoured him as a guest; and after
he had taken food, the kingly hermit, among many pious discourses,
told him, as he listened submissively, the following tale, with the
object of dissuading him from ignorance.
Story of Devabhúti.
Ignorance, my son, is to be avoided, for it brings harm in both
worlds upon men of bewildered intellects: listen to this legend of
sacred story. There lived in Panchála, of old time, a Bráhman named
Devabhúti, and that Bráhman, who was learned in the Vedas, had a
chaste wife named Bhogadattá. One day when he had gone to bathe,
his wife went into the kitchen-garden to get vegetables, and saw a
donkey belonging to a washerman eating them. So she took up a stick
and ran after the donkey, and the animal fell into a pit, as it was
trying to escape, and broke its hoof. When its master heard of that,
he came in a passion, and beat with a stick, and kicked the Bráhman
woman. Accordingly she, being pregnant, had a miscarriage; but the
washerman returned home with his donkey.
Then her husband, hearing of it, came home after bathing, and
after seeing his wife, went, in his distress, and complained to
the chief magistrate of the town. The foolish man immediately had
the washerman, whose name was Balásura, brought before him, and,
after hearing the pleadings of both parties, delivered this judgment,
"Since the donkey's hoof is broken, let the Bráhman carry the donkey's
load for the washerman, until the donkey is again fit for work. And
let the washerman make the Bráhman's wife pregnant again, since he
made her miscarry. Let this be the punishment of the two parties
respectively." When the Bráhman heard this, he and his wife, in their
despair, took poison and died. And when the king heard of it, he put to
death that inconsiderate judge, who had caused the death of a Bráhman,
and he had to be born for a long time in the bodies of animals.
"So people, who are obscured by the darkness of ignorance, stray
into the evil paths of their vices, and not setting in front of them
the lamp of sound treatises, of a surety stumble. When the royal
sage had said this, Somasúra begged him to instruct him further,
and Vinítamati, in order to train him aright, said, "Listen, my son,
I will teach you in due order the doctrine of perfections."
Story of the generous Induprabha.
There lived a long time ago in Kurukshetra a king of the name
of Malayaprabha. One day the king was about to give money to his
subjects in a time of famine. But his ministers dissuaded him from
doing so, out of avarice; thereupon his son Induprabha said to him;
"Father, why do you neglect your subjects at the bidding of wicked
ministers? For you are their wishing-tree, and they are your cows
of plenty." When his son persisted in saying this, the king, who
was under the influence of his ministers, got annoyed, and said to
him--"What, my son, do I possess inexhaustible wealth? If, without
inexhaustible wealth, I am to be a wishing-tree to my subjects,
why do you not take upon yourself that office." When the son heard
that speech of his father's, he made a vow that he would attain by
austerities the condition of a wishing-tree, or die in the attempt.
Having formed this determination, the heroic prince went off to a
forest where austerities were practised, and as soon as he entered
it, the famine ceased. And when Indra was pleased with his severe
austerities, he craved a boon from him, and became a wishing-tree
in his own city. And he seemed to attract the distant, and to summon
suitors with his boughs stretched out in all directions, and with the
songs of his birds. And every day he granted the most difficult boons
to his petitioners. And he made his father's subjects as happy as if
they were in Paradise, since they had nothing left to wish for. One day
Indra came to him and said to him, tempting him; "You have fulfilled
the duty of benefiting others; come to Paradise." Then that prince,
who had become a wishing-tree, answered him, "When these other
trees with their pleasing flowers and fruits are for ever engaged in
benefiting others, regardless of their own interests, how can I, who
am a wishing-tree, disappoint so many men, by going to heaven for the
sake of my own happiness?" When Indra heard this noble answer of his,
he said, "Then let all these subjects come to heaven also." Then the
prince, who had become a wishing-tree, replied, "If you are pleased
with me, take all these subjects to heaven; I do not care for it:
I will perform a great penance for the sole object of benefiting
others." When Indra heard this, he praised him as an incarnation
of Buddha, and being pleased, granted his petition, and returned to
heaven, taking those subjects with him. And Induprabha left the shape
of a tree, and living in the forest, obtained by austerities the rank
of a Bodhisattva.
"So those, who are devoted to charity, attain success, and now I have
told you the doctrine of the perfection of charity; hear that of the
perfection of chastity."
Story of the parrot, who was taught virtue by the king of the parrots.
A long time ago there lived on the Vindhya mountain a continent king
of parrots, named Hemaprabha, who was an incarnation of a portion of a
Buddha, and was rich in chastity that he had practised during a former
birth. He remembered his former state and was a teacher of virtue. He
had for warder a parrot named Chárumati, who was a fool enslaved to
his passions. Once on a time, a female parrot, his mate, was killed by
a fowler, who was laying snares, and he was so much grieved at being
separated from her, that he was reduced to a miserable condition. Then
Hemaprabha, the wise king of the parrots, in order by an artifice
to rescue him from his grief, told him this false tale for his good;
"Your wife is not dead, she has escaped from the snare of the fowler,
for I saw her alive a moment ago. Come, I will shew her to you." Having
said this, the king took Chárumati through the air to a lake. There
he shewed him his own reflection in the water, and said to him;
"Look! here is your wife!" When the foolish parrot heard that, and saw
his own reflection in the water, he went into it joyfully, and tried
to embrace and kiss his wife. But not being embraced in return by his
beloved, and not hearing her voice, he said to himself: "Why does not
my beloved embrace me and speak to me." Supposing therefore that she
was angry with him, he went and brought an ámalaka fruit, and dropped
it on his own reflection, thinking that it was his beloved, in order
to coax her. The ámalaka fruit sank into the water, and rose again to
the surface, and the parrot, supposing that his gift had been rejected
by his beloved, went full of grief to king Hemaprabha and said to him,
"King, that wife of mine will not touch me or speak to me. Moreover
she rejected the ámalaka fruit which I gave her." When the king heard
that, he said to him slowly, as if he were reluctant to tell it,
"I ought not to tell you this, but nevertheless I will tell you,
because I love you so much. Your wife is at present in love with
another, so how can she shew you affection? And I will furnish you
with ocular proof of it in this very tank." After saying this, he
took him there, and shewed him their two reflections close together
in the tank. When the foolish parrot saw it, he thought his wife was
in the embrace of another male parrot, and turning round disgusted,
he said to the king, "Your Majesty, this is the result of my folly
in not listening to your advice: So tell me, now, what I ought to
do." When the warder said this, king Hemaprabha, thinking that he
had now an opportunity of instructing him, thus addressed him; "It
is better to take Háláhala poison, it is better to wreathe a serpent
round one's neck, than to repose confidence in females, a calamity
against which neither charms nor talismanic jewels avail. Females,
being, like the winds, very changeful, and enveloped with a thick
cloud of passion, [214] defile those who are walking in the right
path, and disgrace them altogether. So wise men, of firm nature,
should not cleave to them, but should practise chastity, in order to
obtain the rank of sages who have subdued their passions." Chárumati,
having been thus instructed by the king, renounced the society of
females, and gradually became continent like Buddha.
"So you see, those that are rich in chastity deliver others; and,
now that I have instructed you in the perfection of chastity, listen
to the perfection of patience."
Story of the patient hermit Subhanaya.
There lived on the Kedára mountain a great hermit, named Subhanaya,
who was for ever bathing in the waters of the Mandákiní, and was
gentle and emaciated with penance. One night, some robbers came there
to look for some gold, which they had previously buried there, but
they could not find it anywhere. Accordingly, thinking that in that
uninhabited place it could only have been carried off by the hermit,
they entered his cell and said to him: "Ah! you hypocritical hermit,
give up our gold, which you have taken from the earth, for you have
succeeded in robbing us, who are robbers by profession." When the
hermit, who had not taken the treasure, was falsely reproached in
these words by the robbers, he said, "I did not take away your gold,
and I have never seen any gold." Then the good hermit was beaten
with sticks by those robbers, and yet the truthful man continued to
tell the same story; and then the robbers cut off, one after another,
his hands and his feet, thinking that he was obstinate, and finally
gouged out his eyes. But when they found that, in spite of all this,
he continued to tell the same tale without flinching, they came to
the conclusion that some one else had stolen their gold, and they
returned by the way that they came.
The next morning a king, named Sekharajyoti, a pupil of that
hermit's, who had come to have an interview with him, saw him in
that state. Then, being tortured with sorrow for his spiritual guide,
[215] he questioned him, and found out the state of the case, and had
a search made for those robbers, and had them brought to that very