One morning a young mother went to a lake to bathe. Before entering the water, she placed her little baby under the shade of a large tree. While she was in the lake, she saw a strange lady playing with the child very affectionately. This lady said to the mother, "Do you mind my playing?"
"No, no, no," said the mother.
The child itself was not so happy, but from a distance the mother could not see her child's discomfort. She continued bathing, swimming and so on. All of a sudden, she saw that the lady was taking away her child. She quickly came out of the water. In the meantime, the stranger had covered a considerable distance. The mother ran and ran and ran to recover her child. When at last she caught up to the stranger, they had a fight. Alas, the stranger was much stronger than the mother.
The poor mother cried and cried, "Please give me my child."
The stranger insisted, "No, it is my child."
They went on fighting and the little child was in between the two. Meanwhile, some villagers who heard the mother's screams came rushing to the scene. The mother cried, "Please help me! She is abducting my child."
The stranger said, "This is clearly my child."
What could the villagers do? They did not know whom to believe. Finally they said, "Let us take these two ladies with the child to the wisest man in the village." The wisest man in the village happened to be a very, very old doctor. For years and years he had guided the villagers in all their problems. When they all arrived at his house, somebody explained the situation to him. The real mother was crying pitifully, but the other lady was screaming for justice and only pretending to have genuine love and concern for the child.
The village doctor said, "Ah, it is a very difficult problem. I hope I can succeed in solving it." Then he asked both the ladies, "Tell me honestly, whose child is it?" Both of them claimed it was their own. So the doctor made a small circle on the ground and placed the child in the middle. Then he told both ladies, "One of you will grab the child's arms and the other will grab its legs. When I give the signal, both of you will start pulling. Whichever one is able to pull the child out of the circle towards her will be declared the winner."
Both ladies agreed to this arrangement. As soon as they started pulling the child's arms and legs, the child started crying pitifully. The real mother immediately released her grip. She cried, "How can I do this kind of thing to my child!"
The false mother easily pulled the child towards her. She was so happy. Dancing with joy, she said, "Look, I have won, I have won! So it is mine!"
"Wait a minute," said the doctor. "Have you truly won?"
"Yes," said the lady. "You told us that whoever wins this tug-of-war will keep the child."
The old doctor said, "No, only a mother's heart is full of concern for her child. The real mother was supposed to fight, but she saw that her child was getting hurt. How could she deliberately hurt her child? This child belongs to the loser."
The other lady got furious. She said, "You did not keep your promise!"
The old doctor said, "My promise? It was my wisdom to catch you. I knew from the beginning that this was not your child."
As soon as he said this, the bad lady started running very fast in the direction of the forest. Nobody could catch her. Then the old doctor said, "She is an asura." This wise doctor was the Bodhisattva, the Lord Buddha, in one of his previous incarnations.From:Sri Chinmoy,The sage Bhrigu tests the cosmic gods, Agni Press, 2002
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