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RELIGION AND PHILOSOPHY OF THE JAINAS
go with my father to hear the sermons of a Jaina monk who happened to visit our town in those days. He delivered his sermons in a lecture-hall specially built by my community. On one day, we went to the lecture-hall half an hour earlier than the appointed time. After taking our seats, I began to look with curiosity at some paintings on the walls of the lecture-hall. One of them struck me most. It was the picture of a man holding steadfast the branch of a huge banyan tree in the midst of a large well and an elephant standing at the brink of the well and trying with its mighty trunk to catch the man. At the bottom of the well there was a huge boa with its mouth open, ready to swallow the man. On each side of the well at the bottom there were four snakes with their hoods expanded, furiously hissing and ready to sting the man. Two rats, one white and one black, were eatir
the trunk of the banyan tree. On the top of a branch there was a honey-comb with a swarm of bees. The elephant while trying to catch the man moved that branch to and fro and caused some drops of honey to fall on the lips of the man. A monk, the minister of religion, stood on the opposite side of the elephant in his white garments, offering help to rescue the man from the well and from the attack of the elephant. And all this was in the midst of a forest. I could not understand the meaning of the painting. i gazed at it for five minutes, ten minutes, fifteen minutes and still could not understand the meaning. Then I asked my father, “Papa, this picture seems to be very strange; what does it mean ?" He at once said, “Will you be able to understand it, even if I tell you what it is ? I think you will. Once upon a time this man whom you see in the picture hanging in the well was travelling from place to place with a party and they happened to pass through a thick forest full of wild beasts and robbers. While they were in the midst of the forest, some robbers attacked them. They all fled for their lives in different directions; this man too did the same but he lost his track and while he looked back to see where he was, he saw that this elephant was furiously running after him. He saw that if he could not find some shelter, he
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