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VASUDEVA'S MARRIAGE WITH KANAKAVATI Sermon (646-647)
'Look you! A human birth is very hard to attain for living beings wandering in existence. After obtaining it, action must be fruitful, like a self-sown tree. You, intelligent, should take the fruit of a human birth, the dharma of the Arhats, whose fundamental principle is compassion to living beings and which offers emancipation.'
After he had described the pure dharma, nectar to the ears of the listeners, the sage said to the (Brahman) abbot, to destroy his doubt: The dharma which was taught you by Davadanti, it is the same as this. She speaks as a traveler on the road of the Arhats' dharma, not otherwise. Virtuous, a follower of the Arhats from birth, she showed you proof. At that time when the cloud was raining, it was kept away from the trench-line by her. Because of her virtue and devotion to the Arhats, even gods were always near her and she had good fortune even in the forest. In the past the caravan of the caravan-leader was protected from thieves by her merely by a shout. What power in the future?'
At that time a god came there, very magnificent. He paid homage to the kevalin and said to Bhaimi, his voice not terrifying: 'Mistress, I was a disciple, Karpara, of the abbot in this hermitage and I was unequaled in sharpness of penance. The ascetics in the hermitage did not honor me even when I accomplished the penance of five fires and did not even commend me in words. Then I left the hermitage from pride and quickly went elsewhere, possessed by the demon of anger. Walking fast at night in dense darkness I fell into a mountaincave like an elephant into a pit.
Then as I fell on mountain-crags, all my teeth were broken into a thousand pieces, like old oyster-shells. I stayed in that condition for seven days, injured by the fall on the crags. The ascetics did not even talk about me, like a bad dream. On the contrary, when I had left the place, like a snake a house, there was great happiness on the part of the ascetics. On my part,
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