Reading Notes: Twenty Jataka Tales Reading part B

Image: Deer, Quotesgram

I loved the first story from Reading B of Twenty Jataka Tales. It was about this woman who found two baby pigs on the side of the road and picked them up to bring home with her. She took care of them like they were her own children. Several years later, there came a time when the village needed more meat and asked the woman for her pigs. The lady called the two pigs in the opposite order she usually did when it was feeding time to try and warn them of the danger. One of the pigs came when they were called, and the other said this poem that magically made the men from the village happy. In the poem, it talked about the perfume that never fades away, which is love. The pigs ended up being taken in by the King and lived there until he died. Why did they have to leave the woman though? Wouldn't their happy ending include her?

Another good story was about a beautiful deer that was silent and lived deep in the forest. One day the King was riding in the forest and spotted the deer and tried to get his horse to catch up to it. However, the deer (named Sarabha) could leap over a chasm that the king's horse couldn't. Sarabha, however, saw that he had caused the King to be trapped in the chasm, so he went down into the rocks and pulled the King out. As a favor, the King offered the palace to Sarabha, but the only thing Sarabha wanted was for hunting to not be allowed in the forest he called home.

The last story I'm thinking about making a story about was the one where some travelers shipwreck on an island. They try and find someone to help them, but they only find beautiful women. They become entranced by these women and live with them for a while. One night, one of the men realized that the women were goblins in disguise and that they needed to get off the island. Luckily, a magical unicorn came and brought them home.

Bibliography: Twenty Jataka Tales by Noor Inayat. Link to Reading Guide