110 



JOUKNAL, K.A.S. (CEYLON). [Vol. VIII. 



Khadirangara Jataka (40) which Mr. Davids — J ike so many 

 Pali scholars who seem to think things are made clearer by 

 giving them a name already identified with something else- 

 calls the " Fiery Furnace." Its design is to recommend 

 liberality, especially giving to monks, by the example of 

 a rich man who would not allow any terrors of the powers 

 of evil to deter him for giving, but stepped boldly forward 

 to fill the mendicant's bowl, although a pit of burning acacia 

 charcoal eighty fathoms deep, supernatually produced by 

 Mara, to deter him from liberality, was burning and raging 

 between them. A gigantic lotus in this case reared itself 

 through the flames, and, standing on its petals, he filled 

 the bowl in safety. 



Thus, those which have the most directly Buddhist 

 connection, Makhadeva, Nigrodhamiga, Katthahari, and 

 Khadirangara — to which may be added the important Kula- 

 waka — are the best as well as, in all probability, the oldest. 

 It is around these, and such as these, that the fables proper 

 and tales of merely general application have been gathered, 



Professor Kunte's Classification.— Professor Kiinte pro- 

 poses a classification of the central stanzas or gathas 

 which will be given below. (P. 121.) 



The Niddna Kathd. — The stories which have been thus 

 described or classified may be read at length in Mr. Rhys 

 Davids' book, and in our appendices. But the reader must 

 be made aware that in our Jataka Book the stories them- 

 selves are prefaced by a most important historical (or 

 mythical) introduction, the Nidana Katha, which contains 

 the received account of the preparation, many ages back, for 

 the coming of the Buddha Gotama, the previous lives of him 

 who was to be that Gotama, and to become Buddha, and, 

 thirdly — most important of all — the birth and life of Gotama, 

 ■ — his early history, renunciation of his home, search after 

 wisdom, his attainment of Buddhahood, and the commence- 

 ment of his teaching. This has nothing further to do with 

 the Jatakas than that it was in the course of his teaching 

 that he told them ; but it is a most important part of Buddhist 

 literature, and reckons as part of the " Jataka Commentary.'' 

 It will be often alluded to in the critical papers. 



Moral value. — I will pass on now to a remark or two on 

 the moral value of our book. What is to be said on its 



