Part 8: Fate of Bhadrā

Sugrīva bowed to the muni and asked, “Blessed One, where has she, who gave the poison to my noble son, gone?” The muni replied: “She ran away into a forest and was handed over to a village-chief by robbers who had seized her ornaments, et cetera. Then she was sold by the village-chief to a merchant and, running away, she was burned in great forest-fire. As she died absorbed in cruel meditation,^[1] she went to the first hell. Ascending (from that), she will be the wife of an outcaste. Killed by a co-wife cutting her throat, because she was pregnant, she will enter an animal-birth, after she has gone to the third hell. She will experience endless pain of existence of this sort from the crime of giving poison to your son who had right-belief.”

The king said: “Blessed One, the one for whose sake she did this, her son, remains here. She alone has gone to hell. Shame on that! This worldly existence is cruel with love, hate, et cetera. I shall undertake mendicancy, a means for abandoning it.”

Sumitra bowed to the king: “Shame on me, the cause of the acquisition of such karma^[2] by my mother. Master, permit me to become a mendicant now. Who would wish to dwell in such exceedingly cruel worldly existence?” The king restrained by his command his son speaking so, installed him in the kingdom, and took the vow himself. Then Ṛṣi Sugriva went away with the omniscient; and Sumitra went with Citragati to his own city. He gave some villages to Padma, Bhadrā’s son, but he, evil-minded, was not satisfied with these and slipped off somewhere.

One day Citragati, eagerly desired by his father, took leave of Sumitra with difficulty and went to his own city. Always occupied with pūjās to the gods,^[3] attendance on gurus, penance, study, and self-restraint, he delighted his father exceedingly.

Footnotes and references:

[1]:

Raudradhyāna. See I, n. 8.

[2]:

Bandhakarma. See I, p. 450.

[3]:

Cf. III, n. 28 for these duties, which arc really six. Liberality (dāna) is omitted here.