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Historical Origin & Ontological Interpretation of Arbat Pārsva's Assoc.
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abodes of the Nāgas were swept away in the swift and forceful current of the divine river.
Buddha is also associated with snake; Mucalinda Nāga protected him during a storm. Images of Buddha with cobra-hoods over the head are known from sites like Nāgārjunikonda, Amarāvati, etc. At Bhārhut, the scene of Elāpatra Nāgarāja's visit to the Buddha is represented; at first Elāpatra is here shown in his serpent form and next in the anthropomorphic form with of course the snake-hoods attached behind his head.
The story about Mucalinda Nāga30 has some interesting parallels with the account concerning Dharana protecting Pārsvanātha. It is related at the starting portion of the Vinaya-pitaka that the Lord Buddha, after achieving enlightenment, once betook himself to the Mucalinda-tree, and sat cross-legged at the foot of that tree for seven days enjoying the bliss of enlightenment. At that time a huge cloud appeared out of season, and for seven days the cloudy weather prevailed as it also was with rain and a cold wind. The Mucilinda (Mucalinda), the serpent king, issued from his abode, and enveloping the body of the Blessed One seven times with his coils, kept his large hood spread over the Master's head, thinking to himself, "May no cold touch the Blessed One ........ no wind or heat come near the Blessed one." Now, at the end of seven days, the serpent king Mucilinda, seeing the sky clear and free from clouds, loosened his coils from the body of the Lord, and changing his own appearance into that of a brāhmaṇa youth, stood before the Blessed One, raising his joined hands and did reverence to him. The story of Mucilinda is also given later in the Nidānakathā 31 The Sanskrit text Lalitavistara (c. 4th-5th cent. A.D.)32 gives a slightly differing and indeed later version of the myth. Here the Buddha is protected not only by Mucilinda but also by a number of other Nagarājas who have come from the four directions. They all enveloped the Buddha with their coils and formed a canopy over his head with their crests. Also in the Mahāvastu the story is briefly related. 33
The story of the Buddha subduing the fiery dragon of Uruvilva is found in the Mahāvagga, i. 15; Vinaya Pitaka, Vol. I, pp. 24ff. S.B.E. Vol. XIII, pp. 118ff. (This miracle is also narrated in the Mahāvastu, Vol. III. pp. 428 ff.) The victory of the Buddha over the wicked Näga in the fire-hut is represented in a well-known basrelief on the eastern gateway at Sāñci. The Mucalinda story is also represented in a piece of sculpture from Sāñci, now in the local museum, and perhaps came from the southern gateway according to Vogel.
While the subduing of the fiery snake manifests the malefic, the Mucilinda in
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