THE GORY TALE OF A VARANASI PRINCE

had occasion to revisit the Jatakas recently and was much struck by the ferocity of the Maha Sutasoma Jataka, which is Number 537 in the Pali canon.

- RENUKA NARAYANAN

Why were such stark stories told, I wondered. But the answer was apparent at once. The Jatakas were cautionary tales meant to teach the dreadful consequences of vice and why destructive habits should be shunned.

This story goes that the Buddha, in a previous birth as a Bodhisattva, was a prince and sent to study at Taxila university. His best friend there was the prince of Varanasi. The Bodhisattva was the topper and tutored his friend. Eventually, they both went home and became kings. The prince of Varanasi never ate a meal without meat and continued doing so as king.

One day, some dogs got into the royal kitchen and ate up all the meat. The terrified cook didn't know what to do. He rushed to a cemetery, cut off a part of a freshly-buried corpse, and cooked that. The king found it so delicious that he questioned the cook closely and the cook confessed. But instead of being properly revolted, the depraved king told him to serve human flesh every day. The Jataka says this unnatural desire was because the king had been a goblin in his previous birth who frequently ate human flesh.

The cook was ordered to source flesh from the prisoners in the city jail. This went on until the prison was empty. Then the cannibal king told his cook to drop a bag with one thousand coins in the street and take anyone who picked it up to be cooked. But soon, people learned it was a trap and avoided all unclaimed bags—which sadly reminds us of warnings against terrorist bombs in unclaimed bags today.