The Brahmin and The Cobra

A brahmin named Mitra Sharma lived in a small village, and one day he performed rituals for a rich farmer who gave him a goat as a gift. When he was returning to his village, carrying the goat on his back, three crooks spotted him. The crooks were starving and wanted to cook the goat as their meal, so they hatched the plan to take away the goat from the brahmin.

The plan was to scare the brahmin so that he left the goat and ran away. To do this, one of the crooks met the brahmin on the way and asked why a pious person like the brahmin was carrying a dog. The brahmin gets indignant and carried forward with the goat. The second crook then asked the brahmin why he had a dead calf on his shoulders, and the brahmin lost his temper again and walked away.

But now the brahmin was puzzled, and a seed of doubt had crept in his mind. Lastly, the third rogue met the brahmin and he named the goat a pig and asked why a sacred priest was carrying a profane pig. This made the brahmin very anxious as by now he started wondering if the animal was actually a monster who changed shapes from time to time. He was extremely frightened and left the goat on the road to run away to his home.

The crooksThere was a Brahmin called Haridatta who had a farm in a certain town. He was hard-working. But despite his hard work on his farm, his farm did not produce enough for him to prosper.

One day, while working in the farm, he could not bear the heat anymore and decided to rest under the shade of a tree in his farm. Beside the tree, there was an anthill. While he was resting there, a cobra emerged from the anthill with his hood raised.

Observing this, he thought, "This cobra must be the deity of the farm. From today, I will worship and offer oblations to the cobra. Perhaps, the cobra will bless the farm with a rich produce."

The Brahmin brought milk on a plate and offered it in front of the anthill and said, "I was not aware of your presence, O protector of my farm, please forgive me and accept my offering."

As was the tradition, he went home after he made the offering. The next day, when he came to the anthill, he saw a gold coin on the plate he had offered milk in. He accepted the gold coin as a blessing from the cobra.

This went on for a long time. Every day, the Brahmin would offer milk to the cobra and received a gold coin in the plate he offered the milk in. He started growing rich.

After some time, the Brahmin needed to visit another village. In order that the worship of the cobra was not hampered, he instructed his son to offer milk to the cobra every day, and keep the blessing the cobra gives in return.

Following his instructions, the Brahmin`s son did offer milk to the cobra in due time and went home. When he returned next day, he was astonished to find a gold coin lying in the plate.

He thought, "If the cobra gives a gold coin every day, there must be lots of gold coins inside the anthill. I can take out all the gold coins if I kill the cobra."

The next morning, instead of offering milk, the Brahmin`s son waited for the cobra to emerge from the anthill and hit the cobra with a stick in an attempt to kill him. The cobra fought back angrily as it was not a deadly blow, and bit the Brahmin`s son. He died from the poison, and his body was cremated in the very farm by their relatives.

When the Brahmin returned, he heard what had happened and that his son had died. His relatives wanted to kill the cobra for revenge.

The Brahmin was indeed aggrieved for his son`s death, but did not favour his behaviour that led to his death. He did not blame the cobra, and defended the cobra`s action.

The next morning, the Brahmin went to offer milk to the cobra as usual. He stood near the anthill and started praying. On hearing this, the cobra came out of the anthill and confronted him.

The cobra said, "Look at yourself. You have even forgotten your son`s death and have come here out of the greed for a gold coin! You do not come here out of respect, but for greed. Our friendship cannot last any longer now".

The cobra continued, "I bit your son in retaliation to his attack. He got greedy for gold and died. What he did was out of his youthful rashness, but how can you forget his death? Take a look at the funeral pyre, and take a look at my injured hood."

The cobra gifted the Brahmin with a diamond this time, and said, "Shattered love cannot be restored with a display of affection. Never come here again!"

The Brahmin went home with the diamond, and grieved his son`s foolishness and his death, and did not return to the cobra again.

The wise indeed say:

Greed crosses all borders of reasoning and ends in disaster. then came together and carried the goat, laughing at the stupidity of the so-called highly educated brahmin. Thereafter they happily feasted on the goat.

The Brahmin Carrying the Goat

The Brahmin and the Crooks Moral
The story conveys the message that acquiring bookish knowledge is not sufficient but one should also have common sense. The story also tries to tell us that some beliefs of our caste system can sometimes be easily used against us; since the crooks tried to play with the "sacred" image of brahmins and the not-so-sacred pigs and dogs to make the brahmin get rid of the goat.