The Hawk and the Dove

Between two small rivers near the Yamuna, King Ushinara was holding a sacrifice so great that people said he had outdone Indra himself.

Indra heard of it. So did Agni, the fire into which the king's offerings were poured. The two gods decided to see for themselves what this king was worth. Indra took the shape of a hawk. Agni took the shape of a dove.

The king was seated on the sacrificial ground when a dove dropped out of the sky and landed on his thigh. It pressed itself against him, shaking. A moment later a hawk came down and settled in front of him.

"All the kings of the earth call you a just man," said the hawk. "Then why are you keeping my food from me? I am starving. That bird was given to me as my meal. Do not imagine you are doing right by holding on to it."

"This bird came to me in terror, asking for its life," said the king. "Look at it tremble. To abandon one who has come for shelter is as bad as the worst of crimes. I will not do it."

The hawk was not finished. "Every creature lives by food, king. A man can lose what he loves most and live on, but nobody lives without eating. If I die, my mate and my young die after me. You save one life and throw away many. A right that tramples another right is no right at all. Weigh the two, and choose the heavier."

The king looked at the hawk with new respect. "You speak so well about what is right that I wonder if you are Garuda, king of the birds. But tell me, how can giving up one who begs for help ever be right? You want food. I will give you better food and more of it. An ox, a boar, a deer, a buffalo. Name it."

"I do not want an ox or a boar," said the hawk. "Hawks eat doves. That is how the world was made. Give me the dove, and do not lean on a plantain stem as if it were a pillar."

"Then take my kingdom," said the king. "Take anything I own. But this bird I will not hand over, whatever you say."

The hawk was quiet for a moment.

"If you care for the dove so much," it said, "cut flesh from your own body. Weigh it on a balance against the bird. When the two are equal, give me that, and I will be content."

"I count that as a kindness," said the king. "It shall be done."

A balance was set up. The dove sat in one pan. The king took a blade, cut a piece of his own flesh and laid it in the other.

The dove was heavier.

He cut again, and added the second piece to the first. Still the pan with the dove hung low. He cut again and again, piece after piece, and each time the little grey bird outweighed everything he gave.

At last there was no more flesh he could cut. So the king climbed into the pan himself.

Then the hawk spoke in another voice.

"I am Indra, good king. The dove is Agni, who carries the butter of every sacrifice to the gods. We came to your sacrificial ground to test you. Because you cut the flesh from your own body for the sake of one who asked your shelter, your fame will outshine every other, and it will last as long as people speak of you."

Indra rose into the sky. And King Ushinara, the sage Lomasha told the Pandavas, went up to heaven in a shining body when his time came.

"Look," said Lomasha, pointing. "That is the place where he lived."

Later in the same book of the Mahabharata, the old sage Markandeya tells the story again. This time the king is Shibi, the son of Ushinara, and the dove has a great deal to say.

The gods had agreed to try King Shibi's goodness. Agni became a dove and flew as if for his life. Indra became a hawk and chased him. The dove fell into the king's lap as he sat on his throne.

The court priest was alarmed. "A dove falling on a man's body is a bad omen," he said. "Let the king give away wealth to turn the danger aside."

Then the dove itself spoke up. "I am not really a dove. I am a sage who has studied all the Vedas, letter by letter. I have come to you for my life. Do not give me to the hawk."

The hawk had its own argument. "Who knows what we were in other births? This dove may once have been your father. That is no reason to come between me and my food."

"Has anyone heard birds speak like men before?" said King Shibi. "A man who gives up a frightened creature to its enemy finds no shelter when he needs it himself. The rain does not fall for him in season. Hawk, let my people bring you a bull cooked with rice."

"I want no bull," said the hawk. "The gods gave me this dove today."

"Then tell me what I can do for you, and I promise to do it."

"Cut from your right thigh as much flesh as the dove weighs."

The king cut from his right thigh. The dove was heavier. He cut from every part of his body, and the dove was heavier still. So he climbed onto the scale himself, and he felt no grief at all.

"Saved," said the hawk, and vanished.

The king turned to the dove. "Who was that?"

"He is Indra," said the dove. "And I am Agni, whose banner is smoke. We came to try you. I will make the scars of your wounds the colour of gold, and sweet to smell. You will rule long. And from your side a son will be born, and he will be called Kapotaroman."

The Buddhists knew this king too. In the old Pali book of the Buddha's former births he is King Sivi of Aritthapura, and the Buddha says, "I myself was King Sivi." There is no dove in this telling and no Agni. The test is harder to watch.

King Sivi gave away six hundred thousand coins every day, and it did not satisfy him. One morning he thought, "I have given everything that is outside me. I want to give something that is part of myself. If anyone asks for my heart, my flesh, my blood or my eyes today, he shall have it."

Sakka, king of the gods, the same Indra under his Buddhist name, read the thought. He came to the alms hall as an old blind brahmin.

"I am blind, great king," he said, "and you have two eyes. Give me one."

"You asked for one," said the king. "I give you both."

The whole city begged him not to. "Give gold," said his ministers. "Give pearls, horses, elephants. Not your eyes."

"A man who promises a gift and takes it back puts his own neck in a snare," said the king. He called his surgeon, Sivaka. Three times the surgeon stopped and said, "Think again, my king. I can still undo it." Three times the king said, "Be quick."

So the king was blind, and the brahmin walked out of the city seeing.

Some days later the king sat by a lotus pool, intending to give up his throne. He heard footsteps.

"I am Sakka," said a voice. "Choose a boon."

"I am blind. I ask only for death."

"I cannot give anyone eyes," said Sakka. "But speak the truth about your gift, and the truth will."

"Whoever comes to ask of me is dear to me," said the king. "If that is true, let my eye return."

An eye returned. He spoke again, and the second returned, and the Jataka says that with those eyes he could see through rock and wall.