Makaranda Madhukar Anand Mahendale Festshrift

Author(s): M A Dhaky, Jitendra B Shah
Publisher: Shardaben Chimanbhai Educational Research Centre

Page 231

220
Siegfried Lienhard
Makaranda
chains and thrown in prison. And so it happened when, one day, a large caravan with five hundred shipwrecked merchants went ashore on Sri Lanka. The witches again sported in games of love with the merchants, who were easily lured into their nets. The eldest witch chose the eldest merchant as her friend. After the latter had fallen into a deep sleep, she went to the witches' prison in order to slay the men held captive there and to eat their flesh. When she returned and they both again embraced, the merchant noticed that her body emitted a coldness, and immediately suspected that the friendly being must in reality be a dangerous witch who ate human flesh. The next day, when he revealed the truth to his men, only two hundred fifty believed his words of warning, and thus only one half of the trading company fled. Now, the Bodhisattva, i. e. the future Buddha, had been born at this time in the form of a white-coloured horse, and it was on Sri Lanka, as it happened, that he was sojourning, eating grass. When he compassionately called out three times to see whether anybody was there who wanted to return home, the fleeing men made themselves known immediately. At the horse's invitation some climbed on his back, while others clasped his tail, and still others held their place with folded hands. The Boddhisattva saved them all, but the witches ate the two hundred and fifty merchants who remained behind.
As we see, in this Jātaka the horse Valāha, or Valāhassa, is identified with the Venerable One, whereas in the version of the legend contained in the Gunakārandavyūha and in the Newārī version, the rescuing horse is taken to be a manifestation of Avalokitesvara. As for the plot, the episodes of the first part of the later versions differ only slightly from the events recounted in the Valāhassajātaka. Substantial differences can be seen, in the main, only in those particular elements which lead gradually, after the pairs have been formed, to the flight of the merchants. Whereas in the later versions it is the caravan leader who leaves his bed at night and, having come to the witches' prison, recognizes the extreme threat of the situation, in the Pāli narrative, the eldest witch having stolen off for a short time, it is the renewed embrace which triggers the eldest merchant's plan to flee. Those who carry the action forward in the version in Pāli are again the five hundred tradesmen and witches as well as, in the last part, the Buddha, reborn as a miraculous