Trishasti Shalaka Purusa Caritra Part 6

Author(s): Hemchandracharya, Helen M Johnson
Publisher: Oriental Research Institute Vadodra

Page 284

244
CHAPTER NINE on the throne for which he asked and delivered the royal insignia to him. King Puņdarika received a sādhu's equipment from him and, after taking initiation himself, pureminded, wandered as a mendicant.
‘His vow broken, emaciated, he seeks food, like a poor man,' ridiculed thus by his attendants, Kandarika became exceedingly angry in his heart. “First I shall eat and later I shall kill, et cetera these ridiculers,' thinking, he went in the house. He ate three kinds of food—the worst, medium, and the best-as he liked, up to his neck, like a young pigeon at daybreak. During the night because of staying awake from the food and because of the excessive food that was indigestible, a kind of cholera developed and he had great pain. His stomach was swollen like a leather bag filled with air; his breathing was obstructed; and there was severe burning with thirst.
Thinking, “He is a wicked man with a broken Vow,' his ministers had no medical attendance called in and he, suffering, thought, 'If I live through the night somehow, at dawn I shall execute all these ministers and their families.' Thus with a black soul-color and engaged in cruel meditation, he died and was born a hell-inhabitant in the seventh hell, Apratișthāna.
With the thought, ‘By good fortune the long-desired dharma has been taken and I shall practice it in the presence of a good guru,' Puņdarika set out for a good guru. After reaching the presence of a good guru, Muni Pundarika took the vow again and broke his fast of three days. Injured by cold, harsh food taken at the wrong time, soft, worn out by the blood dripping from his feet from walking on the ground, seated on a couch of grass, after asking for a shelter in a village, he thought, When shall I take initiation under a guru ? '188 Making the act of propitiation completely, absorbed
188 236. He had first taken the vows by himself, so he took them again under a guru. I am told that it is customary to repeat the vows at the time of death. Hence, his question was equivalent to asking when would he die.