Paumacariya 112

English (machine translation) 112

Language: English

112.1

Then the foremost Vidyādharas, having learned of all that news, / swiftly arrived at the city of Sāketa along with their wives.

112.2

Then the lord of Laṅkā, Vibhīṣaṇa, along with Sugrīva and his sons, / and the son of Candrodara, likewise the prominent Śaśivardhana,

112.3

these and many other foremost Vidyādharas, having tearful eyes, / entered the royal palace and made profound salutations to Rāma.

112.4

Then, having dejected faces and performing the proper formalities on the bare ground, / they sat down before Padma, bowed their hands, and addressed him:

112.5

“Even though, O great-souled one, this wretched sorrow is dispelled only with difficulty, / nevertheless, helplessly, you must abandon it at our word.”

112.6

Having spoken just so, all the Vidyādharas remained silent; / then Vibhīṣaṇa, skilled in offering consolation, spoke [these] words:

112.7

“Bodies of all living beings, O Rāghava, are like water bubbles; / they arise and perish when they attain various wombs.

112.8

Indras together with the guardians of the world, though experiencing supreme pleasures, / when their merit is exhausted, they too fall and experience sorrows.

112.9

Those [beings] are born into this human body, unsteady as a drop of water on grass, exceedingly foul-smelling, / O highly renowned one—what understanding can there be in ordinary people?

112.10

When another dies, one grieves excessively out of delusion; / entering into the jaws of Death oneself, one does not grieve at all for one's own self.

112.11

From the very moment a living being is born, from that very moment, / seized like a deer, he is held by Death with its dreadful mouth.

112.12

Behold, O Lord, the supreme recklessness of the world, fearless as it is! / It does not fear Death, even though its punishment has always been fierce.

112.13

There is no place in the world of living beings, even of the measure of a third of a sesame husk, / where a soul has not been born, and where it has not met death.

112.14

Setting aside the Jinas alone, all the three worlds together with gods and asuras / are mown down by Death, O Lord, just as grass is by an ox on that very day.

112.15

Wandering in saṁsāra, the soul somehow or other obtains human status; / bound by affection for kin, it does not take heed of life draining away.

112.16

Even if held by his mother, even if protected by weapons, / nevertheless, O king of men, an unaccomplished man is snatched away by Death.

112.17

In the infinite saṁsāra, multitudes of kin have been obtained here by embodied souls; / O master, they are more numerous even than the sands of the Indus and the ocean.

112.18

And the foul matter that has been drunk in hells by sinful living beings— / if collected together, it would surpass even the expanse of the Svayambhūramaṇa ocean.

112.19

"A son becomes a father, O best of Raghus, and a daughter too becomes a mother in another life. / A relative becomes a foe: this is the nature of saṃsāra, O Lord!

112.20

Having understood that suffering which the soul has obtained many times in the Ratnaprabhā [hell] and elsewhere, / what noble man would not abandon delusion?

112.21

If even persons like you, O Rāghava, are distressed by delusion, / what conception, O lord, can there be of the fortitude of ordinary men?

112.22

Thus it is proper to abandon one's own body, the abode of the faults of passion; / why then do you not cast off the body of another, O lord, making your mind completely pure?"

112.23

Thus ends the one hundred and twelfth chapter in the Paümacariya, entitled 'The Speech of Vibhīṣaṇa on the Separation from Lakṣmaṇa'.

Linked texts (1)

Paümacariya — Vimalasūri, Māhārāṣṭrī Prakrit