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NARRATIVE TALE IN JAIN LITERATURE
of the dream, his mother advises him to disguise himself as a monk and sacrifice a number of animals to the "family goddess" (obviously Kāli). The king naturally refuses to slaughter, but is prepared to make a compromise. He has a cock made of dough, and this fowl is beheaded in front of the image of the goddess, whereupon he eats the "meat" of the cock. Owing to this he brings upon himself a bad Karman,23 in consequence of which he has to go through various animal births (peacock, antelope, fish, sheep) with his mother, until at length, reborn as a pair of fowls; they have the good fortune to hear the sermon of a famous monk, remember their previous births, and in their next existence, born as the twins of a queen, to become monk and nun. At the end of their lives they enter heaven as gods.
On the whole it is rather tiresome always to follow the wanderings of the same persons from one rebirth to another, the one always killing the other, the one going to heaven and the other to hell or being reborn as an animal, in one instance even as a coconut-palm. However, we also meet with some interesting tales, romantic love-stories, such as that of Sanatkumāra and Vilāsavati, who are reunited after a long separation and after inexpressibly sorrowful adventures (shipwrecks etc.). The story, too, of Dharana and Lakṣmi is a pretty fairy-romance, full of adventures on land and sea, with many familiar fairy-tale motifs. Thus we find here the motif of the ungrateful wife: Dharana and Lakṣmi are wandering in the forest. The woman is nearly dying of thirst. Dharana draws blood from his arm, and cuts off some flesh from his thigh, so as to nourish his wife. Soon afterwards, nevertheless, she tries to get rid of her husband, in order to follow a robber, to whom she has taken a fancy.24
The destinies in the course of the reincarnations are often passing strange. A merchant is reborn as a pig in his own house and is slaughtered for the festive meal. Reborn in the same house as a snake, he remembers his previous
23. For, is the belief of the Jainas, even sins of thought have their consequences.
24. See above, p. 130 of Vol-I.
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