________________
38
DÂDISTÂN-Î DÎNÎK.
thus : 'Why do the dogs and birds gnaw this organised body, when still at last the body and life unite together at the raising of the dead ?' 8. And this is the reminding of the resurrection and liberation, and it becomes the happiness and hope of the spirit of the body and the other good spirits, and the fear and vexation of the demons and fiends.
CHAPTER XVII. 1. The sixteenth question is that which you ask thus : What is the purpose of giving up a corpse to the birds ?
2. The reply is this, that the construction of the body of those passed away is so wonderful that two co-existences have come together for it, one which is to occasion endurance (dêr pada yinidano) and one which is to cause conflict (nipôrdinida no), and their natures are these, for watching the angels and averting the demons. 3. After appertaining to it the life-so long as it is in the locality of the place of the body-and the demons of dull intellects, who are frightened by the body, are just like a sheep startled by wolves when they shall further frighten it by a wolf?. 4. The spirit of the body, on account of being the spiritual life (hů ko) for the heart in the body, is indestructible; so is the will which resided therein, even when they shall release it from its abode.
5. In the same way the body of those who are
Assuming that â han stands for a hang. 2 This last clause is a quotation, slightly altered, from Vend. XIX, 108, 109.
Pahl.
Digitized by Google