The Wicked Ascetic

In one of his earlier lives, the Bodhisattva was born as a forest lizard. A wicked ascetic built a hut of leaves in the forest where the lizard lived and started living there himself. One day, the lizard crawled into the hut of the ascetic and seeing him meditating, paid his respects to him. From then on he started visiting the ascetic regularly.

One day, the ascetic ate a tasty meal prepared with lizard meat in the house of one of the villagers and decided to kill the forest lizard for a meal for himself. The next day the ascetic made the necessary arrangements and as soon as the lizard came into his hut, threw his staff at him. The wise lizard turned aside swiftly and the staff bounced off the wall and hit hard on the ascetic’s head. “Ouch…” cried the ascetic in pain and fell down unconscious in a pool of blood.

The author of this story is unknown and greatly appreciated!