‘Lord, you oppose a direct order from the Maharajah! I am the only commander of these troops!’
There is a brief hesitation amongst the horsemen. Then the bows are lowered under the stern gaze of the Maurya.
‘Twenty horsemen forward! Now take Tulya prisoner!’
‘Lord, that deplorable lipi is not the order of the Maharajah!’ wails the hunter, desperation palpable in his inflamed eyes.
‘Seize Tulya and take him to prison!’
A short but ferocious struggle ensues. Obedient to the holy Maharajah, Tulya refuses to give up, and draws a large fighting blade. But he is no equal to the superior forces. He tries to resist more fiercely. Like a mad man he lashes his great arms out in all directions while screaming: ‘This is the will of the Maharajah!’ Two horsemen drop down in the sand and a chakra strikes Tulya. Fatally wounded, he falls to the ground. Kunala kneels by him, aghast … He had not meant for this to happen!
‘Thank you, Tulya, for your courage, your loyalty, Tulya!’
‘Lord …’ Tulya whimpers through his last breath. ‘The order … is false!’
‘The secret seal cannot be false, my friend!’
‘Lord, it is false! Diti … stay with … the Ra …’
‘I will take care of Diti and her children, my Tulya!’
Tulya is borne away. The Kumara then orders the troops to return to the camp. Deeply touched, he turns away with tears in his eyes at the loss of his friend, a deeply loyal one. His glance, as if frozen in mourning, is directed to Surya, which has almost run its course. He raises his hands to Rohita:
‘O, Sun Goddess,
Queen of heaven and earth,
Bestower of light,
Bestower of strength,
Holy, holy art thou!’
He turns to the surgeon: ‘Do what has been ordered!’
As the stretcher carrying the grievously mutilated Raja moves forward towards the palace, the gathering crowd could no longer contain its emotion. All follow the sorrowful procession, a loud moaning rising through the throng. As the wailing for the suffering that has been wrought upon the beloved Raja goes on, lamentations rise towards the sun, which with its fiery glow of evening-red is setting behind the woods of the Indus valley. The white monastery, high up on the hill, is bathed in a burnished glow, as if a blush of shame shrouds over the land at the miserable deed, perpetrated upon the beautiful young Kumara.
Philon and Zetes, too, had sped excitedly towards the Hathial. Their faces reflect their deep horror as they see the Kumara, great sadness visible around his dark eyes. When Tulya fights back with all his might, joy reappears on their faces. But it does not last long … a sneering laugh of Philon.
‘Where is the compassion of the Buddha now, O, Zetes? And this … from the Buddhist Maharajah! Hollow words! The proud lotus jerked out from her stem! Poor, handsome King of Taxila, the fate of Oedipus! He also wished for the well-being of all creatures, just as the Kumara, he had the same benevolent love for his people. Kunala, who thought his faith and that of India, was so much more humane than ours! The Hyppolythos of India! Poor, sweet Rani Kanchanamala! Doubly punished!’
‘Can you comprehend this foolish obedience of such a strong man?’ asks Zetes.
‘It is the foremost rule of the Buddhist teachings: unconditional obedience to the parents. But what kind of holiness is this from the Buddhist Emperor! His own son! Barbaric, Zetes!’
‘Let us not judge. Is it not for both, the people as well as for the Emperor, that the teachings of the Tathagata sound like a pealing gantha in the vihara, which stirs but does not penetrate their souls! The ghosts of the past haunt through the spirits, like a black cloud, obscuring the new Light.’
‘This deed of the ‘compassionate Emperor’ extinguishes the Light of the Buddha for me! What worth does such a faith have?’
‘You cannot judge the Buddha by his followers!’
Quickly the darkness rises up from the quiet trees of the Hathial towards the still glowing heavens. The slender figure of the young Rani hastens out of the palace towards the procession. A shriek of fathomless pain splinters the trembling evening air.
‘Kunala! Kunala!’ She approaches the stretcher. The servants wait.
‘What has happened?’
‘Give me your hand, Kancha. Do not be afraid, my Kancha. I lost the light from my eyes but gained the Light of the Tathagata.’
‘Your eyes!’ She reaches out to touch the bandage around his head. It is then that she realises the full reality of the truth about the rumour and falls unconscious next to the stretcher.
‘Call her servants!’ cries Kunala fearfully.
They rush towards Kanchanamala, raise her carefully and assist her into the palace. The others follow in silence. While the maidservants look after the unconscious Rani, the helpless blind one listens keenly.
When the tormented Rani comes to senses, she lets out a shriek. ‘Where is my spouse!’
‘Here, Kancha!’ He sits up, wanting to go to her in the shrouded darkness. Then he hears her weeping in bewildered desperation: The grief that he did not want to avert!
The Kumara’s hardy constitution helps him to recover quickly. After a few days the pain decreases. Everyone tries to ease his suffering and it is a consolation to him to know that his work is appreciated. In contrast, so he thinks, to his revered father.
When Kanchanamala recovers from her numbness—which struck her down for a long time—she asks to see Kunala so she can experience the full reality of what happened to her husband. She wants to know what guilt it was, that justified such a terrible punishment. She kneels down by his bed. Tears flow down her cheeks but no sound betrays her pain.
‘Tell me …’
Kunala is sober as he narrates what happened.
‘Why did you conceal it from me?’ she asks, frozen.
‘Because then I would have lacked the courage to obey father.’
‘You were not the one who was to obey but the government of Taxila! You lost your eyes, and I lost them, too … they were my joy!’
‘Hold back your tears, my beloved Kancha. Do not yield to the pain. I miss my eyes which merely beheld maya, but have received the unfailing eyes of wisdom, which shall take me to eternal bliss, to Nirvana. Everyone collects the fruit of his deeds in this world. What has been my karma that this fate was destined for me? I do not know, but I will not complain about that which was inevitable. What the world gives us we accept graciously, what it takes away we must regard as penance for our guilt. Life is joy, but even more suffering; love is also suffering. I was ordained for the highest dignity in this country, but that was born in pain and suffering. Now I have gained the sovereignty of the Law that erases all sadness. Your great love has wished to support me in my highest endeavour, to be like my father. Be now my companion in my pursuit to be as the Buddha, to abandon all evil and so open up to all that is good. Help me, Kancha, to keep my thoughts pure. I miss my eyes but will gain the purification of my spirit.’
‘In this way you could hail the loss of all your senses. No all-wise, all-divine spirit can have intended the senses to be destroyed! Man was given his senses to take part in life, the mind to control the impure temptations to which the senses may lead us. Thereafter we ourselves must find and establish the harmony of life. The senses are the gateways to our mind. You were not meant to destroy them! The Buddha wishes no mortification, neither surrendering to our senses; the Buddha wants the golden middle-path, which we have to pursue in complete awareness and with all our senses: this is how harmony in man is born. The Buddha retained his senses right up to his death. Why should you have to do without yours?’
Kunala remains silent for a long time. Finally he says: ‘Kancha, an immense weight has been lifted off me: that of the pain of existence. A great strength was required of me, a will, a conviction, the insight and capability of the highest person in India, such as my father’s. I only had the right intention, my Kancha, and that made the experience of my weakness an
unbearable burden and a bitter suffering. Now burden and suffering have dropped away and I see with my inner eye, that it is right and just like this. Father has put me to the test and turned me down. He who will one day bear the responsibility of many peoples for the world, Kancha, must sense within the power of being capable of bearing that responsibility. I wish to go to my father.’
‘And once again become the victim of the demon.’ she replies coldly.
Kunala jumps. ‘You mean …’
‘You do not think so? Can in such a great man as your father, turn an all-powerful love, suddenly to hate? Because of a few—shall we say, mistaken—measures? And they were not mistaken! Certainly not in the eyes of the Maharajah!’
‘Under the influence of the …’
‘Yes!’ Kancha does not even let him finish. ‘Did she not say that Yama would erase you from the earth?’
‘Poor father! I will tell him, that I do not feel punished.’
‘Perhaps, she will then ruin you entirely!’
‘I will give my father the choice of either receiving me or not.’
‘She may be able to forestall it!’
‘My Kancha! You judge a woman who cannot defend herself.’
‘A Demon!’ sharply and loudly she spews out the word. All of a sudden she thinks about the other woman who, like her, has been hit by disaster. Has he not thought about her? She must speak to Kunala about it. Or, must she spare him this thought for a while, as he is in a most sensitive state? Their lives and thoughts are so entwined, though, that he seems to sense her reflections.
‘How is Diti?’
‘The blow has struck hard. A widow once again! It is almost unbearable for her. Tulya was her support and love.’
Kunala remains silent for a long time. Then he says: ‘Have her come.’
Diti enters silently and kneels before the Kumara.
‘Give me your hand, Diti. Tulya’s last thoughts were for you. He wished you to stay with the Rani. He died because he was my loyal friend, Diti.’
Diti presses his hand against her forehead and sobs.
While Kunala is recovering, Sudinna, as prime minister, is given the task of governing Taxila. Important cases are discussed with the Kumara and the Rani. Kunala spends most of his time, though, with his purohita and with one of the thousand monks who had attended the great council of Pataliputra. In this way the Raja attempts to dive deeper into the teachings of the Buddha. Brahmin scholars are also invited to come for meetings, in which Kancha is always present. Then a new shock comes one day. Suddina arrives at the new palace, very excited.
‘Lord …I received a message from Minister Radhagupta!’
Kunala shivers, and Kancha quickly puts an arm around him.
‘Read, Suddina!’ The Raja is deeply moved. ‘From when?’
‘The first week of Phalguna2.’
‘That is more than three months after the previous one! Read, Sudinna!’
‘The sacred Maharajah lets his beloved son know that he has recovered from the months-long, serious illness, through the good care of the Agramahisi. Through her wisdom and that of the prime minister, the interests of the realm have been duly served. Furthermore I must report to you, high Kumara, that your Father has charged me with informing you that he expresses his high approval of all of your decisions taken as viceroy of the West. He states that they are a testimony to the just and humane insight of Your Merciful Highness. He regrets that his illness has prevented him from answering your lipis earlier. He also did not feel it to be urgently necessary as the events in the West were unfolding so well and peacefully. May Rudra protect the health of the Kumara and the high Rani, as blessing for the work that has yet to be done for the people of the Punjab. Sampadi is growing up to be a healthy young lad.
In name of the sacred Maharajah,
Radhagupta.’
Deeply touched, the three sit together, wild thoughts racing in their minds. So, the Maharajah does not know anything of the lipi in Karttika! Neither does Radhagupta know. Then who does! There is but one of the three named in the lipi, who could.
‘I must speak to Father!’ the Kumara bursts out.
‘Do you know who has the most influence in Pataliputra?’ asks Kancha, who is the first to regain her composure.
‘That influence has to be destroyed, Kancha!’
‘Destroyed! The good care of the Agramahisi: how far does that ‘good care’ go! Her ‘wisdom’! How greatly the Maharajah regards it!’
‘The Maharajah must know what has happened here, high Rani, and only the Kumara can inform him correctly.’
‘I will go back, come what may. My father will hear from me that I feel I have been freed of a heavy burden. How else could he bear what happened to me?’
Kancha could not find peace anywhere. Rebellious in thought, she wanders through the palace. In the provisions room where along the walls pots and vats filled with honey, oil and ghee and plates of fruit are neatly arranged, a woman is busy grinding rice. The woman bows to the Rani.
‘Stand up, Minda, your face is sad. What is your sorrow?’
‘Because of the suffering of you and the good Kumara. Why do you not ask the gods to restore his eyes, high Rani?’
Kancha smiles sadly. ‘Where, and how, Minda?’
‘Have you not heard of the miracle of the great Bhallar stupa, high Rani?’ Kancha looks at her enquiringly. ‘A woman, leper, went there to pray, to be healed. Dirt and mud from the rains covered the great square and the stupa. Immediately the leper set to work, to clean the holy place. When everything was gleaming in Surya’s sunlight, she picked the most beautiful flowers in the forests and fields, and scattered the blossoms all over the square and stupa, so that bhikshus and upasakas could walk the pathas in joy. From that day onwards, the sick woman was healed and her beauty restored completely. This is what the bhikshu from the monastery on the mountain told the people.’
The next day Kancha rides on Vida to the monastery on the high mountain. Upasakas fetch for the monks water from the wells at the foot of the mountain to the monastery above. Kancha, too, begins the trek. At the gate, she looks around her. Through the sharp transparent air she looks down on the vast plains of Taxila. The sharp sunlight gleams over the old and the new city, the Hathial, and in the many creeks that nourish the fertile land. Yonder … Kunala’s mighty army. On the other side rise the high mountains of the Hymavant, their sparkling white crowns against the endlessly deep heaven.
The old abbot of the monastery welcomes Kancha with reverence. He is a holy Arhat because he has vanquished all sin in him.
‘What gives us the honour of your visit, high Rani?’
‘I seek comfort for my husband and me, honourable Arhat: Why had the Kumara to be punished like this? Do you know, as a holy Arhat, of his previous lives?’
The abbot takes her to the monastery’s court, around which the monks’ cells are located. In the middle stands a gilded statue of the Bodhisattva. A verandah lines the cells above, coloured in bright red, blue and yellow. Climbing the sculpted stairs, they reach the upper gallery and the abbot’s cell.
‘You look for consolation, high Rani, for the great suffering that has befallen a good man. Does not true comfort lie in the good man himself? In his pursuit, his struggle with and the victory over evil, in the achievement of complete compassion through inner purity, moral strength and the triumph of self-discipline?’
‘That concerns his karma and later rebirths, honourable Arhat!’
‘You wish to know his guilt from previous lives!’ He thinks a moment. ‘Listen. In Kashi lived a king who loved to hunt in the Hymavant. Once he captured five hundred deer in a chasm between rocks. He thought: ‘If I kill them, much meat will be lost.’ That is why he had all the animals’ eyes put out so they could not flee. In this way, he preserved the gazelle meat for a long time. The king did penance for his bad karma by spending many years in hell and afterwards his eyes were removed in many subsequent incarnations.’
�
��Kunala?’ asks Kancha, in dismay. But the Arhat replies with another question.
‘Would it give you comfort, high Rani, if what you feel as fate has its roots in the sin incurred in previous lives?’
‘No! Kunala’s spirit is full of compassion and benevolence!’
‘But are we not all part of the All-spirit and in the same way part of the unreasonable will of nature, for which we have to do penance?’
‘No, holy Arhat! The Buddha teaches that only compassion can free a person from suffering and death. How can the All-spirit then, asking our compassion, be itself so merciless to require an eye for an eye? Tales, honourable Arhat! To give a sound reason to the unreasonableness of the world! Neither you nor I understand the meaning of it! And no one will ever understand. Unless, perhaps, after death. And maybe, not even then!’
‘I have no comfort for you, high Rani, but you will find it within yourself.’
‘Can a lost eye be restored by the gods, honourable Arhat? The Bhallar stupa …’
‘Tales, high Rani!’ replies the Arhat earnestly.
‘Did a demon impose this irrevocable suffering, your reverence?’
‘That is a question to be asked in Pataliputra, high Rani.’
Kancha climbs down from the mountain monastery and, lost in her tormenting thoughts, rides back to the city.
Kunala discusses with Kancha how they will travel to Pataliputra. To keep Tishya Rakshita unaware of their return he wishes to enter the palace in Pataliputra unobtrusively. Suddina is asked to take care that the Raja and Rani can travel together with a well-guarded caravan to Mathura or Kausambi. From there they will then see. Sudinna is charged with the governance and Bhata with the army.
24
THE ARDUOUS JOURNEY
arly one morning in Phalguna a huge caravan of camels leaves the city of Taxila through the Ashoka-gate. They are laden with splendid purple fabrics, glassware from Phoenicia, art objects of gold from Saba in Arabia, and precious carpets from Iran. On three of the animals, known for their rhythmic gait, three travellers are riding dressed in spotless white garb, a blind Brahmin man and two women. One of them, through her unapproachable demeanour, restricts all approach; the other arouses feelings of compassion by her distressed features and the way she nurtures a sweet young lad. The strangers are not known to the others in the caravan; all of them are told, however, to treat with great respect the wise one with the veena and his beautiful Brahmin wife, who tends to her blind husband with such great care. An escort of horsemen under Ketu’s command has joined the caravan to serve as her guard. The sarthavaha, Ketu, and a few maidservants are the only ones who know the secret of the blind man.
Ashoka the Great Page 105