Tirthankar Mahavir

Author(s): Kumarpal Desai
Publisher: Jaybhikkhu Sahitya Trust

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of Lord Mahavira, they thought that he must have been a prince who had turned into an ascetic after renouncing the crown and the kingdom for the welfare of the whole world. The boys were worried about Mahavira taking this road. They knew that the road passed through the forest where the cobra Chadakaushika hid itself. They shuddered at the thought of the cobra's poisonous rays burning Mahavira to ashes. Radiant heat was generated from the cobra's eyes when it stared at the sun. Then when it looks at any person, that person would be burnt to ashes by the radiant poisonous heat. Usually cobras have poison in their fangs but Chandakaushika had poison in its eyes. The shepherd boys said to Mahavira, "O revered saint, please do not take this route. Go by the other route. There lives a dreadful cobra called Chandakaushika in the forest. A person's burnt to ashes as soon as the cobra looks at him. The trees around the Kanakakhala hermitage have dried and the whole forest trembles with fear when the cobra appears. Those who travel by this road never return. So we request that you to use the other road that lies just outside the Kanakakhala hermitage."
Mahavira listened to them patiently without any sign of fear on his face. He remained calm and composed. He consoled and pacified them and continued his journey on the deserted and dreadful road. His aim was to awaken the cobra to spiritual and wholesome living. No one could swerve Mahavira from his decided course of action and goal.
In his previous birth the cobra Chandakaushika had been an ascetic who was well known for his severe austerities. Once the ascetic was very angry with his pupil and rushed to strike him. But he dashed against a pillar of the monastery and lost his life. After several births, he was bom as a human being. He was called Chandakaushika and became the chief tapasa ascetic, the head of five hundred tapasa ascetics.
One day he saw some princes plucking fruits from the trees in the compound of the hermitage. He lost his temper and rushed towards them with an axe in his hand. But in his blind rage and fury, he could not see a pothole in his way. He fell into the pothole and his own axe struck him on his head and he died on the spot. In the next birth he was born as a cobra emitting poisonous heat from its eyes. The cobra was also known as Chandakaushika - the same name as in the last birth.
This clearly demonstrates how an increasing degree of anger generates