Bhaktisandesam

[Guest guest]

Hari-Om

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Hinduism / Stories from Ancient India

THE LEGEND OF THE RICE

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In the days when the earth was young and all things were better than

they now are, when men and women were stronger and of greater beauty,

and the fruit of the trees was larger and sweeter than that which we

now eat, rice, the food of the people, was of larger grain.

 

One grain was all a man could eat; and in those early days, such,

too, was the merit of the people, they never had to toil gathering

the rice, for, when ripe, it fell from the stalks and rolled into the

villages, even unto the granaries. And upon a year when the rice was

larger and more plentiful than ever before, a widow said to her

daughter " Our granaries are too small. We will pull them down and

build larger. "

 

When the old granaries were pulled down and the new one not yet ready

for use, the rice was ripe in the fields. Great haste was made, but

the rice came rolling in where the work was going on, and the widow,

angered, struck a grain and cried, " Could you not wait in the fields

until we were ready? You should not bother us now when you are not

wanted. "

 

The rice broke into thousands of pieces and said " From this time

forth, we will wait in the fields until we are wanted, " and from that

time the rice has been of small grain, and the people of the earth

must gather it into the granary from the fields.

 

 

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Jai Shree Krishna !