Kathakoca or Treasury of Stories

SR No.: 016059
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: C H Tawney
Publisher: Oriental Books Reprint Corporation New Delhi
Publication Year: 1975
Total Pages: 288
Language: English
Classification: Dictionary & Dictionary
File Size: 15 MB

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on the divine Arhat, and owing to his power I have no fear.' She then declared at length the real truth of the doctrine of the divine teacher, and made the leader of the caravan accept the Jaina faith. The hermits also, having now drunk the milk of true religion, reprobated their own religion as sour gruel, and adopted the Jaina faith. The leader of the caravan caused a city to be built there, and because five hundred ascetics had been converted, he named that city Tápasapura. There he had a temple of the Jina .made, and an image of the holy lord Çánti set up in it, and all spent their time in devout attention to the Jaina religion. One night, at twelve o'clock, Davadantí saw an illumination on the summit of the mountain. She saw gods ascending and descending. Their cries of triumph woke the inhabitants of the town. Davadantí ascended the mountain with them; there the gods had conferred the distinction of a keralin * on the hermit Simhakeçarin. After worshipping that hermit, they all sat down in front of him. Now, at that time Yaçobhadra, the spiritual guide of that hermit, came there. He, too, bowed before the kevalin, and sat down in front of him. The kevalin delivered a sermon on religion. At this juncture a god came there, illuminating the circle of the sky. He bowed before the kevalin, and said to Davadantí: 'My good lady, in this very wood of ascetics I was a pupil of the abbot; my name was Karpara, and I was a maintainer of the five sacred fires; but the ascetics were angry with me, so I went to another place, nursing anger in my heart against them. One night, as I was going along my path, blind with anger, I fell into a mountain chasm; my teeth struck against a point of crag and were broken; I remained where I fell for seven nights, overpowered by the pain caused by the breaking of my teeth; the other ascetics troubled themselves about me no more than if I had been a bad dream, much less did they think of rescuing me. On the contrary, the ascetics were especially delighted, as I had left the grove of ascetics,
* A possessor of unlimited knowledge.