ally seen one. They told him that it was just their way of referring
to those huge, striped tigers who devoured anyone failing to make
it through the forest by nightfall. They invited him to return with
them to their village and spend the night there. He could then
have a meal the next morning and continue on his journey.
Telling them that he intended to continue walking anyway,
Ãcariya Chob refused to return to the village. Concerned for his
safety, they insisted that, no matter how fast he walked, by having
started this late in the day he could not possibly reach the other
side before nightfall and would end up stranded in the middle of
that vast forest. But, determined to press ahead, he refused to be
deterred. They asked him if he was afraid of tigers. He acknowl-
edged that he was but said it was irrelevant: he intended to go in
any case. They insisted that the tigers there never ran away from
people. If he encountered one, he was sure to lose his life. If he
wanted to avoid being attacked by man-eating tigers, he should
wait until morning to proceed further. He replied that should his
kamma dictate that he was destined to be eaten by tigers, then
that’s the way it would be. If, however, he was destined to con-
tinue living, then the tigers wouldn’t trouble him.
Taking leave of the villagers, Ãcariya Chob resumed his jour-
ney, feeling no qualms about dying. No sooner had he begun to
enter the forest than he noticed that both sides of the trail he was
on were covered with claw prints, where tigers had been scratch-
ing in the earth. He saw piles of tiger scat scattered all along the
trail – some of it old, some of it quite fresh. As he walked along
doing meditation practice, he observed these telltale signs, but he
wasn’t afraid. By the time he had reached the very middle of the
forest, darkness had closed in all around him.
jacob rumans
(Jacob Rumans)
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