Epics of India MLLL 4993

Fort comme un boeuf on  Wikimedia This is a continuation of my Eastern Stories and Legends notes. These are all Jataka tales, or stories of the Buddha’s past lives. Most of these tales demonstrate important morals or lessons to live by, and they also show what happens to those who are not kind to others. In addition, they reward those who do kind things for others, and all the stories show the gentle nature of the Buddha. Two of these tales were very similar, and both were about Bulls. In each, the Bulls have been brought up by kind masters who they wish to repay in some way. The Bulls (who are each living a separate life of the Buddha) decide that they will work to bring some income to their masters. In the first tale, The Bull That Demanded Fair Treatment , the Bull tells his master to bet with another man. The bet was to be that if the Bull could pull a determined heavy wagon load, then the other man would pay the master. The master agrees to this,...

Buddha as King on  Wikimedia This week, I read Eastern Stories and Legends, and these are all Jataka tales. Jataka tales are tales about the Buddha’s past lives. I realized that I had read many of these stories in previous units. It is interesting to see how these tales changed according to different authors. I will discuss the ones that I had not read before here. The majority of these tales incorporate important morals to live by and demonstrate the effect that kindness can have on one's life and others' lives. I had never read The Spirit That Lived in a Tree before. In this tale, the Buddha is the spirit living within a 600,000 year old tree. He also rules over many other trees who would would be able to feel his pain if he were to experience it, almost like a collective consciousness. When a greedy king decides that he wants to have the most extravagant palace that only rests upon one column instead of several, he calls for this ancient, worshiped tr...