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The Tales in Mahabharata
113
It is obvious that the central motif in all the four tales - two native and two from other countries - is the same, the wide differences as to the details which an out the motif into fullfledged stories betray their independent origins, which fact, in view of the sameness of the motif, is a sure sign of the tales being purely fictitious popular folk-tales.
An important difference in the forms of these tales will be interesting to note. The European form of the tale is that of an episode, since there are no supernatural elements occuring in it. The Egyptian tale presents the motif in the garb of a myth. The Sphinx symbolises death. We fear death until we have not known the nature of life. Once we know that the human life is comparable to a day, it rises, it shines, it sets, we are no longer afraid of the black abyss of the night - that endless void of death. (Does it imply a hope of rebirth also ? Does it show the very unstable, very momentry, transitory nature of life thus making one indifferent to it ? For us, it is only a matter of guess) Death remains no Death. So viewed, the tale tries to explain the nature of life and death symbolically, which makes it a myth. The two pative forms, particularly the second one with the Yakşa in it, are almost fairy-tales, “The fairy-tale's miracles occur on the material plane; on the spiritual plane (affec tions, characters, justice, love) law abides ... In the fairy-tale, the youngest son the ugly duckling, the Cinderella, submits patiently until heaven in the shape of the fairy godmother) stoops to virtue's aid. Fairy land is the happy hunting ground of children."131 The miracle of the four brothers dying and coming back to life is on the material plane only; the law on the spiritual plane - Yudhisthira's complying with the taboo of the Yaksa rewarded with the life of one brother, and his sense of jugtice and propriety in asking Mādrī's son Nakula back to life rewarded with the lives of all the brothers - abides. Instead of the youngest, here we find the eldest succeed. ing. Heaven stoops to virtue's aid, not in the shape of the fairy godmother, but in the form of Yakşa -- the progenitor father (or the ancestor). The story-land is an easy learning ground for the psychological children. The two tales thus show almost all the characteristics of a fairy-tale. Even Stith Thompson would agree that "the hero-tale may be....00 more than an ordinary folk-tale of wonder, which wo generally know as the fairy-tale. Our term is inaccurate, since most of the tales thus described have nothing to do with fairies but only with marvels of all kinds" 132 Both the tales of Yudhisthira show these characteristics completely; they are folk--talos of wonder, they tell of the marvels, but Stith Thompson would not allow them to be called fairy-tales without reservations. “The fairy-tale is more nearly pure fiction than any other folk-tale form, since it is not bound by any religious belief or any demands of truth to life."133 How can we say of these two tales that they are not
131 DWLT, p.115. 132 ibid. p.125. 133 ibid.
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