Sage and the sword

Long time ago, there was a Sage. He used to live in an ashram. Away from the brightness and comforts of the city. Near the nature, taking only as much from the nature as was absolutely required.

The king of the state happened to pass by the ashram. He stayed there for a couple of days and wanted to give a parting gift to the sage. For some weird reason, he decided to give his sword, one of his prized possessions, to him as a gift. Sage was on a vow of silence on that day. He could not have argued with the king. He just smiled politely and asked the king to keep the sword in a corner of his hut.

Days passed by. The sword continued to be kept in a corner of sage’s hut. Ignored by most of the people around him. The sage, however, felt a strange attraction towards it. It was a sword that the king had taken from a rival king after a long and hard battle. Folklore was that, Indra (The God of rain) had gifted this sword to the rival king. It used to have an aura around it.

Curiosity got the better of the sage one day and he lifted the sword. He pulled the shining sword out of its cover. He was spellbound by its beauty. He started doing that (removing the sword out of its cover and admiring it for a while) once in a while. Soon enough, this became a daily routine for him. After a month or so he started liking the sword so much that he started taking it everywhere he went.

Ashram had a few rules. One of them was that everyone had to collect food from the jungle by oneself. (Note that I said “collect”. The people in the Ashram were not even allowed to pluck the fruits from the trees. They just used to “collect” the fruits that had fallen off the trees). The sage realized that he would save some time if he used his sword to cut fruits off the tree. Well, it was not really a very wise use of sword, and the sword was not the right tool for this job. But he had begun to like the sword and wanted to use it. So he started using the sword to get the fruits off the trees. He really liked the way the sword made its way through the branches of the tree. Just like a hot knife cuts through the butter.

Soon enough, the landscape started to show changes. The vicinity of the Ashram was not as green as it used to be. But the sage was too happy with his sword to notice that small change.

The Ashram used to have a daily meditation period. Sage and all his pupils used to gather around a tree and meditate for a while. The silence of that meditation period was only broken by the chirping of the birds on the tree and the sound of other animals grazing nearby. Normally, sage used to love animals. But this was a time in the day when animals irritated him. Sometime after he started keeping sword with him, he thought of a solution. He cut the branches that were home for most of the birds. He shooed the animals away by swaying his sword.

Life seemed just perfect now! Sure, there were no animals in the Ashram anymore, but people at-least had an interruption free meditation period. The sage was really happy. Obviously, the sword had contributed a lot to his new-found happiness. Reasonably, sage’s love for his sword grew with time.

The sage was getting old now. His health was deteriorating. He was falling sick more often than before. On one such day, when the weather was not all that good and so was sage’s health, the sage was lying on his cot in his hut. He asked one of his pupils to get him some hot water. What the sage did not realize was that even his pupil was not in best of his health that day. The pupil was taking a long time to get the job done. This started annoying the sage. Meanwhile, the pupil was busy searching for firewood in the jungle. He could not find much firewood that day and came back to the Ashram. It took him a long time to get the sage the hot water that he asked for. Sage was angry enough by this time. He realized that the water not hot enough. This really enraged him. He stood up, unsheathed the sword, and in the fit of his rage, beheaded the pupil.


The sage was arrested. He was shackled by the iron chains and was brought to the court of law, along with the sword, that was the weapon of the murder. King and the sage saw eye to eye. The sage did not say anything. He had decided to remain silent for the rest of his life.

The sage did not have to say anything. The king had understood everything. He had realized that he was as guilty of that crime as the sage was. Both had learnt their lessons.


Power corrupts. It is really amazing, nothing short of miraculous, how a very small amount of power can corrupt the noblest of minds very effectively. It attracts. One starts using it with a noble cause in mind. But then one gets used to it. That’s when the switch happens.

This is the reason why, in some organizations, power is considered taboo. People high in the hierarchy are considered just more responsible and not more powerful. People who have the power don’t show it, let alone use it. I have seen my father reason very patiently with people, 5 levels down in the hierarchy below him, for hours. I used to wonder then. Now I understand.

BTW, these are the organizations known for having people that go above and beyond their roles and achieve things that none considered possible. I certainly do not think that it's a co-incidence.


Power should be given to those, who consider it taboo. People who wash their hands, mourn and meditate for a day each time they have to use it.