Week 3 Story: The Earth Shall Provide

        Once, there was a farmer and his wife. On this farm, there were cows, horses, chickens, and pigs, but there were no children. The couple found happiness in their work and had great love for one another, but there was a gap in their lives that they could not fill. Try as they might, they could not have children. The wife was especially depressed by this. She longed for the joy of motherhood. The farmer wished for a child as well, but he also worried who would take care of them when they grew old. They experimented with many natural remedies and prayers to all kinds of gods of different religions.

        On a particularly dreary morning, an old witch wandered out of the woods and knocked on the couple’s door. The farmer’s wife, a very kind woman, allowed her in and offered some food. The witch gratefully accepted. When she had finished eating, she looked gravely at the wife’s stomach. 

        “Something is not right there,” the witch gestured a wrinkled hand at the woman’s abdomen. “I sense a darkness. You have been trying for children?”

        The woman nodded quietly. “Do you have a remedy?” she asked of the witch.

        “Sacrifice that mare I saw outside. Let its blood soak into the earth and the lord of fertility shall provide.” With this being said, the witch thanked the woman for the meal and disappeared back into the woods. 

        Over the years of struggling with infertility, the couple had watched that mare give birth to foal after foal. It made sense that this fertile animal’s sacrifice might bring children to them. The woman immediately went to her husband, who had been working outside, and told him of what the witch had said. He was doubtful and hesitant at first, but his wife was insistent. So that night, they did as the witch had said. 

        Weeks later, the wife received her monthly menstruation, and they thought that all of their efforts had been for nothing. They dried their tears and carried on with the work of the farm. The farmer went out to plough the field where the mare had been killed and the blood had soaked into the ground. As he was doing this, he noticed some of the dirt was moving, as though something was writhing underneath the surface. This frightened him and he called his wife over to see what was happening. Next, there were muffled cries and a tiny hand broke through the surface of the ground. The woman rushed forward and scooped the infant out from the earth. They wept and held the child between them, finally feeling fulfilled.

Author's Note: 

        For this story, I kind of combined two sections of the Ramayana readings. In the original story for the first part, a king (Rama's dad) is unable to impregnate any of his four wives, so he does a horse sacrifice. The horse wanders happily for a year before one of the wives kills it. In the second story, Sita explains her life story, including how she was born, to a sage's wife. Apparently her father was ploughing and Sita popped up out of the ground. After this, she explains how she met Rama and how she chose to join him when he was cast from the throne.

        There was obviously a little more detail to both stories, but I thought that the infertility, horse sacrifice, and random child growing from the earth would combine well into a story of its own. I stuck more with the first story, but wanted to use that aspect of Sita's birth from the second one. I didn't make the setting clear, so that part could be the same as the original. 

Image Information: Witch, Source: Pexels

Bibliography: 

        "Dasharatha's Sons" from Indian Myth and Legend by Donald A. Mackenzie (1913), web source.

        "Anasuya" from Ramayana, The Epic of Rama, Prince of India, by Romesh Dutt (1899), web source.