Chuli

Chuli is a devout sage whose ascetic practice leads to a consequential act of blessing: he grants a son to a young woman who has served him and comes to him with a direct plea. The brief episode presents him as both a practitioner of penance and a figure able to answer a request for offspring without marriage.

Identity and Ascetic Practice

Chuli is introduced as a sage living in Kanyákubja, a town identified by that borrowed name. The narrative calls him exceptionally devout and says that he spends his days in rites of penance. This establishes ascetic discipline as the defining circumstance of his life and the basis for his authority in the episode.

Service and the Request for a Son

A young woman has spent a long time near Chuli, serving him meekly and reverently. Pleased with her care, he speaks with his minister; the surrounding episode then presents the woman as a suppliant who says she lives unmarried and asks Chuli to give her a son. Her request makes the episode's central exchange explicit: service and reverence precede a plea for motherhood, rather than a marriage being described as the means to it.

The Boon and Its Significance

Chuli hears the prayer favorably and gives the woman a son, described as exceeding fair and as Chuli's spiritual child. The account thus links his penance and the gratitude he expresses for care to a specific outcome: the granting of a child. Beyond this act, the supplied evidence does not establish Chuli's later life or the child's subsequent story.