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Reading Notes: More Jataka Tales, Reading A

Throughout this semester, I've read so many Indian epics, including so many stories of Ramayana and Mahabharata. The characters in those traditional Indian epics were fascinating. Nevertheless, I've found myself liking Jataka Tales even more although I really like Ramayana and Mahabharata stories. The biggest reason why I like Jataka tales so much is that each one of Jataka stories teaches readers some kind of life lesson or general wisdom. So I've decided to read more Jataka tales this week.


One of my favorite animals has always been monkey. Usually they are the symbol of cleverness and high intelligence like humans. But in the story of the stupid monkeys, it was different and that's why this story really caught my attention. It has a really interesting beginning. The king's gardener wanted to enjoy the king's holiday and delegate his work to monkeys.


I like how the gardener honestly admitted his intention without much cunning or tactic: "To-day my friends are having a holiday in the city, and I want to enjoy myself with them. Will you water the young trees so that I can go away?" Usually in stories like this, there are lots of lies and cunning involved to deceive and accomplish their purposes.


I also like how the chief monkey just took the gardener's delegation without asking for any kind of compensation. I thought perhaps this already showed stupidity of the monkeys. 


The monkeys asked the chief monkey is the trees are well-watered. But the chief monkey didn't know how to check that. He ordered to take an action without information anyway: "The Chief of the Monkeys had no good answer, so [26] he said: "Pull up each young tree and look at the length of its roots. Give a great deal of water to those with long roots, but only a little to those trees that have short roots.”


This sounded really silly, reckless, and careless.  When I was reading this story, I thought to myself, 'this kind of stupidity goes against the general clever image of monkeys. Hanuman wasn't like these.'


Again, even in this relative simple story, the Jataka tales teach some sort life lesson. For this one, I think it is 'don't take mindless and reckless actions without much thinking or evidences because they cause such grave harms.' Many people, not just these monkeys, act recklessly without thinking and regret mightily later. This Jataka story can warn people that it's important to think before act.
 

Stupid monkeys pulling up trees. Source: Stupid Monkeys







Bibliography:

Jataka Tales by Ellen C. Babbitt, illustrated by Ellsworth Young (1912).

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