Chakkammuvaeso

Author(s): Madhusudan Modi
Publisher: Oriental Institute

Page 60

Li
own Rayanasanca thamati. She had
asked her why
There was a mountain called Ruppayagiri on the eastern side of the Meru. [K. 2.) In a town Rayaṇasancaya, there ruled a yakşa-king named Maội. sekhara. He had a wife named Subhamati. She had a dream that a god was taking birth through her. During her pregnancy, the king asked her why she appeared so thin and what her desire was. She said that she wanted to go to the Aştāpada mountain and other places of Worship, bathe the idols of the Jinas and apply them fragrant substances. They went there and did so and descended from the peak of that mountain with great joy. [K. 3. ] When they were in the thicket of the forest, they smelt a very obnoxious smell. The queen asked where the smell came from. The king directed her attention to an ascetic who was practising penance there and told her that the bad smeli came out from his body, as a result of his past actions. The queen insisted that his body should be washed and cleaned. [K. 4.] Again the king pursuaded her not to insist upon washing his body. But the queen remained firm in her resolve. They brought water from a stream and washed him. [K. 5. ] Then they annointed his body with fragrant substances like camphor, sandal-paste, black aloe etc. The ascetic remained motiopless in his meditation. The king and the queen went to their town in their air-car. On this side, attracted by the fragrance, the bees came in swarms, upon the body of the ascetic, covered his body and stung him. (K. 6.] After a fortnight, the yakşa-king came to that place in his air-car with his wife and retinue to pay his homage to the Jina. The queen asked him why the ascetic they washed was not seen there. The king replied that a black shoot in that place was perhaps an indication. They came down and to their sorrow they found the ascetic, on the point of death, eaten away by bees. They drove off the bees. The ascetic got the absolute knowledge and died after four seconds. [K. 7.] The king, before the ascetic died, begged his pardon. The ascetic replied that a man must suffer for what he had done in his past birth; but a person, not liking a dirty-smelling ascetic, himself must suffer from the dirty smell. As a matter of fact, sinful persons, afflicted with pride and following wrong doctrines were dirty, he said. The queen understood that she had sinned and had displeased the ascetic, and that to get his pardon, she should please him. [K. 8. ] She bowed to him with tears in her eyes and requested him to pardon her sin. He replied that he had already pardoned her but one must suffer at least for once the consequence of one's action. Having heard that the king and the queen went back to their town. The queen gave birth to a son afterwards. [K. 9.] The king named him Kalyāņa. When he was young, the king entrusted his kingdom to him and along with his wife, the king became a monk. Both of them after penance died. The queen was reborn as Madaņāvali the daughter of king Puşpadanta and Subhadrā, at Vajjayantpura on the Vaitādhya mountain. The king could not find a proper husband for his beautiful daughter. Then he instituted a Svayamvara ceremony for her where he invited all the kings. [K. 10.)