Garland of the Buddha's Past Lives (Volume 2). Aryashura

      How can animals possess such conduct?

      How can they have such wide regard for virtue?

      Some design must lie behind your appearance.

You must practice asceticism in an ascetic grove!11 (33.31 [20])

Far from diminishing his purity the Bodhi·sattva’s rebirth as an animal therefore serves to accentuate his miraculous virtue still further by contrasting his conduct with normal animal nature. Furthermore, the virtue that the Bodhi·sattva displays as an animal throws into relief the immoral conduct of human beings. As the Bodhi·sattva states in ‘The Birth-Story of the Antelope’ (26.21): ‘Men’s hearts are, after all, usually ruthless and uncontrolled in their great greed.”12 It is thus men who normally act immorally in the narratives, especially by wronging or betraying the Bodhi·sattva, and who thereby display a behavior that is truly animal in quality in contrast to the Bodhi·sattva, whose animal nature is only apparent:

      How castigated I feel by

      his gentle yet wounding behavior!

      It is I who am the animal, the ox.

      Who is this creature, a sharabha but in form?

      (25.27 [14])

      The splendor of the Bodhi·sattva’s virtue is often paralleled by his physical beauty. Likewise the geographical lo- ________

cation of the animal stories is invariably set in forest scenes of exquisite charm. Sometimes compared with a delightful garden (28.9, 28.12), the forest is commonly portrayed as a mysterious realm of refined beauty in which the wild aspects of nature are often tamed.13

      The Bodhi·sattva is said to have once lived as a huge monkey who roamed alone on a beautiful slope on the Himavat mountain. The body of the mountain was smeared with the ointments of various glistening, multi-colored ores. Draped by glorious dense forests, as if by a robe of green silk, its slopes and borders were adorned with an array of colors and forms so beautifully variegated in their uneven distribution that they seemed to have been purposefully composed. Water poured down in numerous torrents and there was an abundance of deep caves, chasms and precipices. Bees buzzed loudly and trees bearing various flowers and fruits were fanned by a delightful breeze. It was here, in this playground of vidya·dhara spirits, that the Bodhi·sattva lived. (24.3)

Several stories emphasize the forest’s remote location and its lack of human contact.14 The idyllic beauty of the forest is, however, not solely enjoyed by animals. It is also shared with ascetics, whose virtue is said to have a powerful effect on their natural surroundings:

      The forest effortlessly produced flowers and fruits in every season and its spotless pools of water were adorned by lotuses and lilies. Through his residence there the Bodhi·sattva furnished the area with the auspiciousness of an ascetic grove. (28.9)

This association between animals and ascetics is a common motif in the “Garland of the Buddha’s Past Lives,” with various passages comparing the Bodhi·sattva in his animal rebirths to a renunciate yogi.15 The affinity between ascetics and animals is further accentuated by the fact that they possess a common antagonist: the human being living in ordinary society and, in particular, the king. Clashes between the forest and human society frequently occur in the narratives and are brought about in various ways, depending on how individual stories play on the dialectic between these two opposing, yet interacting, spheres. In “The Birth·Story of the Great Monkey’ (24), a man accidentally enters a remote area of the forest inhabited by the Bodhi·sattva after losing his way because of chasing a stray cow. Whereas in ‘The Birth-Story of the Goose’ (22), a king intentionally lures a flock of geese closer to the human realm in order to capture them. In the latter story, the motif of idyllic natural beauty takes on an added degree of complexity, as an artificial lake, said to rival the birds’ home in both appearance and resources, is built by humans as bait.16 Here human art, pregnant with connotations of deception and aggression, acts as a dangerous imitation of the natural world.

In other stories, kings come into contact with animals and ascetics through the beauty of the forest itself and the apt setting that this provides for kings to indulge in royal pleasures.17 Described as “playgrounds of Desire” (21.19 [7]), the same forest scenes that provide an idyllic environment for virtuous animals or ascetics in one context also provide sensual stimulation for licentious kings in another, an affinity particularly expressed by the resemblance be- ________

tween forests and royal gardens.18 In ‘The Birth-Story of Kshanti·vadin’ (28), a king thus enjoys wine, women and song among garden-like (28.9, 28.12) forests of exquisite beauty that also happen to be inhabited by an ascetic. The tension inherent in the joint use of the forest by both ascetic and king becomes strained when the king’s women, “smitten by the loveliness of the groves” (28.25), accidentally encounter the ascetic and listen to his sermons, the mere sight of him making them “feel overcome by his radiant ascetic power” (ibid.). While the ascetic’s intentions are of course entirely virtuous, the story seems keen to probe the conflict between the ascetic and royal spheres (and intensify the contrasting significance placed on the shared motif of forest beauty) by depicting the ascetic’s sermons as a form of pious seduction that threatens the king’s desire-based outlook. Indeed, it is precisely the king’s jealousy that leads him to treat “the ascetic like a foe” (28.55) and assault him.

      A similar conflict is expressed in “The Birth-Story of the Great Monkey’ (27), in which a fig-tree, depicted as the centerpiece of an idyllic forest scene, serves as the home of a harmonious community of monkeys in an “area seldom accessed by humans” (27.19). Here again the refined pleasures of a forest inhabited by virtuous animals act as a seduction for human beings driven by the negative emotions of desire, when a fruit from the fig-tree accidentally floats down a river to a royal party and intoxicates a king with its fragrant taste. The contrast between the (superior) pleasures of the forest and the (inferior) pleasures of human society is explored by the story in terms of differing levels of aesthetic and sensual quality:

      The combined scent of the bathing ointments,

      garlands, liquor and perfume of the women

      was dispelled by the fragrance of the fruit,

      delightful to smell and swelling with virtues. (27.9 [2])

The king develops such a strong greed for the fruit that he searches for the tree and attacks the monkeys living in it.19 This conflict between animals and humans (and between forest and society) is only resolved when the Bodhi·sattva saves his herd of monkeys by sacrificing his life to bring about their escape. The king is so impressed that he ceases his attack and the story concludes with the dying monkey instructing him on virtue. A similar resolution occurs in nearly all the stories in which animals or ascetics come into contact with ordinary human society:20 after an initial conflict, the virtuous conduct of the animal or ascetic wins through and the king (or another human character) is instructed on moral conduct or on the benefits of the renunciate path.

In the previous volume, we already had cause to mention the importance of the theme of kingship in the “Garland of the Buddha’s Past Lives.” A similar emphasis is shown in the present volume, in which twelve of the fourteen stories either depict some form of instruction of kings or explore the notion of ideal kingship.21 As is highlighted by