Puranic Encyclopaedia: A Comprehensive Dictionary with Special Reference to the Epic and Puranic Literature c9.3684

c9.3684

One day the teacher was sleeping on the seventh storey of the building and his disciple Vāgbhaṭa was massaging his legs. The boy soliloquised that fate had destined him to massage the legs of a Musalman. Instantly he cried bitterly, and the teacher awoke and understood that the boy was not a Muslim, and tried to cut his head. The boy thought: “The four Vedas and the six Śāstras say that there is a god. If it is true no harm will come to me.” Then he jumped out of the window. In consequence of this jump, he became a little lame and no other harm befell him. He swam across the river and reached the other side and told the Brahmins everything. The Brahmins asked him what he imagined when he jumped from the seventh storey. He replied “I jumped with this imagination. The four Vedas and the six Śāstras say that there is a god. If it is true no harm will come to me.” As soon as the boy finished the Brahmins became angry and they all got up. They said “You went wrong in using the doubtful ‘if’, instead of the affirmative ‘As’. The Brahmins joined together and expelled him from the society. The boy thought of going somewhere. “But there won’t be another chance for somebody else to go and learn medical science from the Muslim physicians. So before going from here I must make the fruits of my efforts available to these people.” Thinking so he lived there for a little longer. He lived there without mingling with the Brahmins, cooking his food. It is believed that Vāgbhaṭa wrote ‘Aṣṭāṅgasaṅgraha’ and ‘Aṣṭāṅgahṛdaya’, during this period.