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SANATKUMĀRACAKRICARITRA
171
"I will set the dish on another man's back and feed you," the king replied to the muni. He, angered, repeated, "If you set the very hot dish of rice-pudding on his back, I shall eat, o lord of kings; otherwise, I shall certainly go away with my desire unaccomplished.”
The king consented because he was a Vaisnava. What kind of discernment have men outside the Jaina teaching? At the king's command his (Jinadharma's) back was given to the Brāhman while he ate and he endured the heat of the dish like an elephant a forest-fire. “This is the result of my former action, nothing else. May it be destroyed by this (result), a friend,” he reflected for a long time.
When he had eaten, the pudding-dish was pulled up from his back together with blood, flesh, fat, and serum, like an inlaid brick with mud. Jinadharma, learned in the religion of the Jinas, went home, summoned his people, all of them, and bestowed and begged forgiveness for all faults. Jinadharma made a pūja in the shrine, went to the monks and adopted mendicancy according to rules. He left the city, ascended a mountain-top, made final renunciation, and practiced kāyotsarga for two weeks (facing) the east. He performed kāyotsarga in the other directions also, though' torn by birds, vultures, herons, et cetera, with their beaks.
Incarnation of Sanatkumāra as sakra (65) Enduring the pain in this way, engaged in the namaskāra (to the Pañcaparameșthins), he died and became the Indra in the heaven Saudharma.
Birth of Asitākṣa as Airāvana (66) The three-staved ascetic died and, because of his servant-karma, became the elephant Airāvana, the vehicle of Sakra.
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