Indian Epics Blog

The portal to a strange realm  (source) Parashurama concentrated on the mirror in front of him. He closed his eyes and recited the mantras that would grant him passage to the spirit realm. When he opened his eyes he was no longer in the attic. He was in front of a stone portal in a strange swamp, filled fog and the smell of decay. Will-o'-the-wisps drifted through the fog, dimly lighting the area. There was no chirping of crickets or bullfrogs, no call of egrets or heron. The swamp was dead silent. Parashurama breathed in as hard as he could and blew, clearing out the fog for hundreds of yards. He was able to clearly see a cobblestone path leading (he presumed) out of the swamp. He began to follow it, occasionally stopping to blow back the fog which was creeping its way back towards him. After walking like this for hours, he came to a large abandoned city of stone. As he walked through the streets of the city, translucent human figures materialized before him. They appe...

(source) Howdy again everyone, NitroDubbz here. Today I'm going to be reading more Jatakas. Most of these are new so I have quite a bit of new material to cover. Owl: Not much of a moral to this one, basically the crows don't like the owl because the owls frown. Merchants: Thrifty merchant vs. Foolish merchant, you can guess who comes out on top in this story. Basically the foolish merchant is eager to leave and doesn't think carefully about what needs to be done, he ends up paying the price, and the thrifty merchant ends up getting all of his stuff after he dies. Elephant Girly-face: A kind and gentle elephant learns by example. I suppose the moral of this one is that people are influenced by their environments and the people around them. Prince and the water sprite: I'm not really sure about this one. I guess that being virtuous will always be rewarding? I guess the water sprite was the test of character that best determine...

(source) Howdy everyone, NitroDubbz here again with more reading notes.  Today I read some Jatakas, which are stories of the different lives (incarnations) of Buddha. They are fables which usually have an explicit moral that they try to teach. Most of these I had already read earlier in the year, but I'll cover the four new ones. The Merchant story Basically there's an honest and a dishonest merchant. The dishonest merchant ends up losing out on a really good deal because of his dishonesty. The Ox A man mistreats his ox, which then refuses to work for him. The next day he treats it well and it happily pulls for him. The Quails Quails team up to keep from being caught, but eventually the begin fighting amongst themselves, which makes them easy prey.  Measure of  Rice A king fires a fair price-setter and hires one that is easily influenced, that way the king can get everything for practically free. But then someone bribes the p...