Stories for children – 1

Lets read a story told by Sri Ramakrishna Paramahamsar for us.

There was a great learned man in a village near River Ganges in India. He was so good with his studies, that we can say that there was nothing he did not know. But he had a problem. He was a proud man and could not respect anybody. Even worse, he used to pull others to conversations and usually end it in verbal fights. Worst of all, he used to insult many unlearned people in his village publicly.

Once that learned man was riding across River Ganges in a manually rowed boat. As usual the learned man pulled the boatman to a row about his knowledge on Ramayana, Mahabharata, Bhagavatham, astrology, Laws, Dharma, etc. The boatman replied innocently and with great reverence, of his ignorance to the learned man.

Our learned man started to insult the boatman about his ‘ignorance’ and wasted life devoid of ‘learning’.

In a short while, the weather changed to a storm making the boat unstable on the waters of the mighty river. The boatman asked the
learned man on his capability to swim. He could escape the storm and river by swimming to safety but the learned man needed to find his own way. Alas, the learned man had not learned the life skill of swimming! Due to the emergency situation, the boatman swam away to his safety leaving the haughty learned man to suffer in the waters. It is clear that at least if the learned man had been more polite and respectful to the individual skills of the boatman with water and not insulted him, the boatman could have attempted to save his life.

From this we learn that we should never talk rudely to others and behave politely in all situations with everyone.