From Ramayan: Uttara Kanda
Every
day, King Ram used to sit in his council hall and ask brother Luxman to go
outside the hall gates and see if there was anyone with a grievance. If there was,
the person would be brought inside and his wrongs redressed.
One
day, a dog was waiting outside. Ram called him in and asked him what he wanted.
The dog replied that he had been hit on the head by a Brahmin, so that the
Brahmin can go through the road. Ram asked the council to decide some
punishment but the court said that a Brahmin could never be punished so Ram
asked the dog to decide on some way to redress his wrongs. The dog insisted
that the Brahmin should be given an honorable position, as the spiritual head
of a certain monastery.
When
questioned about this strange punishment, the dog replied, “Your majesty, in my
previous birth, I held that particular position and though I was honest and
sincere, the post is so full of pitfalls that when I died, I was forced to take
this birth, as a dog. Can you imagine the plight of the Brahmin in such a post,
who has an uncontrollable temper as well"
No comments:
Post a Comment