Scene from the Simhala Avadana Jataka StoryAjanta Caves,Gupta Period, 5th Century CE
The story of Simhala, the merchant's son, is quite instructive. Simhala sought his father's permission to travel abroad and to establish his business overseas. But he, along with others, we're shipwrecked on the island of Tamradvipa. The island was inhabited by cannibalistic ogresses who disguised themselves as beautiful women. Here we see Simhala sitting in a tent with a stunningly beautiful woman, an ogress. Having lured the shipwrecked merchants, the ogress makes a meal out of them. Seeing their pathetic condition, a Bodhisattva in the form of a flying horse rescues many of the merchants including Simhala. Simhala comes back home. But an ogress follows him to his Kingdom. She appears before the King and tells him that Simhala has abandoned her and her child in an island. She asks for justice. Simhala tells the King that she is, in fact, an ogress who should be banished from the kingdom. The King refuses to do so. At night the ogress invites her other friends from the island. They kill the King and the people. The kingdom is destroyed.
Similar story is also found in Homer's Ulysses.
The story is a warning about how beautiful ideas creep into a Kingdom, how these innocuous ideas takeover the kingdom and destroy it. But these ideas are like the Trojan Horse which we bring into our Kingdom with jubilation and fanfare. Only to realise how these ideas of exclusiveness, of 'we' versus 'them' have eventually torn the fabric of our society and nation. The great destruction by such 'beautiful ideas' leaves the nation desolate and destroyed. Like Simhala we should be discerning enough to banish such 'beautiful ideas' from amongst our midst.
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