Sex, Marriage and Family in World Religions by Browning Green Witte

Author:Browning, Green, Witte [Browning, Green, Witte]
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

to his own son, since he knew dharma; to an evil man he was like Yama, king

of the dead, but to a good man he was like Soma. And, knowing dharma, that

son of Uttanapada married a woman named Bahula, of the race of Babhru, just

as the supreme Indra married Saci. His heart was always excessively affectionate

toward her, just as the moon’s heart always takes its place in the constellation

Rohini. His mind did not become attached to any other object; the heart of

that king depended upon her even in his dreams. Simply from looking at her

lovely body his eyes made his body hot; and when he touched her body, he

melted into her.

But the voice of the king, even though it was so loving, disturbed her hearing;

and she regarded even his great respect for her as a humiliation. She disdained

the garland that he gave her, and all the beautiful jewels. She would get up as

if half-drunk when he was drinking the finest liquor; and when the king was

eating and would hold her hand just for a moment, she would eat only a very

little food and show that she was not very happy. Thus, though he was so loving

toward her, she was not very loving toward him; but this simply made the

excessive passion of the king grow even greater.

Then, one day, when the king was engaged in drinking, and all the other

kings were looking on, and they were surrounded by courtesans and were being

serenaded by sweet sounds, he very respectfully placed in the queen’s hand a

Hinduism 263

drinking goblet full of wine. But she did not wish to take that goblet, and she

turned away, before the eyes of all the kings. That made the king furious; he

summoned a door-keeper, hissing like a snake—for she whom he loved had

repelled her unloved husband—and he said, “Door-keeper, take this hard-

hearted woman to a deserted forest and leave her there right away; do not

hesitate about this command of mine.” Then the door-keeper, regarding the

king’s command as something about which there must be no hesitation, put

the beautiful queen in a carriage and abandoned her in a forest. And when the

king had had her abandoned in the forest in this way, and she didn’t see him,

she considered that he had done her a great favour. But the king, the son of

Uttanapada, was tormented by his passion for her; his heart and soul ached,

and he found no other wife. He remembered her, with her lovely body, day

and night, ceaselessly. He carried on governing his kingdom, protecting his

subjects with dharma, caring for his subjects as if he were a father and they

were the sons sprung from his loins.

Then a certain Brahmin came there and with an aching heart said to the

king, “Great king, I am very unhappy; listen while I tell you about it, for the

cure for the sufferings of men comes from nowhere but the king. While I was

asleep, during the night, someone stole my wife, without even breaking open

the door of the house. You must bring her back.” The king

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