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The Magic Bird-Heart
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Pravarasena the wonder gem, the magic shoes and Māgadhikā. Pravarasena was made heir-apparent.
7.1. The tale is narrated by Jambūsvāmin's queen Nāgasenā. to illustrate how great harm results from too much greed, be it in the matter of earning wealth or earning religious merit. With this she tries to support her point that even as a householder one has sufficient scope for practising religion, and so one need not be quite greedy about it and adopt monkhood. It will be seen that the actual plan and purpose of the tale has in reality hardly any connection with the objective it is pressed here to serve. Like so many illustrative tales in Jain narrative literature, this one also is. borrowed from the stream of the then current popular stories and made to fit in an alien frame. The introductory section of the tale here, with the quite familiar motif of the jealous favourite queen driving the step-sons to leave the kingdom is an obviously later. addition.
7.2. We may note the following points in this version : (1) Two princes, brothers, stung by insult and injustice, leave
their house and kingdom and start to go abroad to try
their luck. (2) On their way in a dense forest, while they are spending
night under a banyan tree, the presiding deity of the tree presents the younger brother, who is keeping the watch, two wonder-gems: One, bringing kingship, is for the elder; the other, bringing desired wealth and amenities, is for the younger. The deity teaches him the proper rite that
should 'accompany the act of wishing. (3) Afterwards, the brothers reach a city. The younger hands
over to the elder the kingship-gem and teaches him
the rite. (4) They ask boons from the respective gems. Through the
power of the wealth-gem they are served with sumptuous meals, dresses etc. by eight heavenly damsels, who disappear after the service.
