Reading Notes: Francis' Jataka Tales, Part B

The jataka tale that I enjoyed the most from this collection, from the set which was assigned for part A, was "The Value of a Brother." There are a few reasons I liked this story in particular. First, however, a quick summary: 

Three robbers plunder people living in a certain part of the forest near Kosala. The villagers then go to search them out, but find no one but three brothers ploughing a field. Frustrated, the villagers accuse the brothers of being the robbers (similar to some groundless accusations in the United States, as a community needs someone to hold responsible. I read Just Mercy in high school). The brothers are then unceremoniously arrested and imprisoned. A woman in the court of the king bewails their imprisonment, and the king allows her to demand one of them to be released to her after she tells him that they are her brother, husband, and son. The woman elects the brother, because he is the only irreplaceable one of the three. The king, impressed by her decision-making, releases all three, and thus the innocent brothers are saved from certain death.

This is an interesting take on what is important in society. The family, as the functional unit of most sociopolitical structures, is stretched to the limit of the woman having to choose which part of the family is most important. In seeming defiance of a woman's need for a husband, stated in the story juxtaposed with her being 'nothing' even if she also had eight brothers, the woman in the story argues for the man she calls her brother, because she cannot get another. This is pretty cool, seeing how cultural norms are inverted by logic and placed in the frame of a fable.

My sister *might* need this. Source.

Bibliography: Francis, H.T. Jataka Tales. Here.