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Meeting Narad
171
The Munis went away traversing through the sky; but their words fell on the ears of our Gurudev. He sat up on his bed greatly shocked. His compassionate heart was grieved to hear this. He felt greatly sad; and thought :
“How strange! What did I hear? These are great Munis who have discarded all attachments. They are men carrying out great vows. Why should they utter lies? They would not speak falsehood even by a mistake. Then does it mean that my pupils have to go to hell ? Moreover who will go to heaven ? and who will go to hell ? Even this is not clear. If this was known clearly, it would have been good. But now I have to use my own methods and go to the roots of their statement and find out the truth.”
The Gurudev spent the whole night thinking of our future; and trying to solve the problem. He made a plan. Yet there was time for the sun-rise. Before dawn the Gurudev sent for us. We went to our teacher and politely bowed to his feet; but the Gurudev instead of bestowing his benedictions upon us as usual, was silent. At once, doubts and fears arose in our minds. Our teacher was silent for a moment or two; and then gave a cock to each of us; and said, “You must kill it; but take care that nobody sees you killing it."
Having received the orders of our Gurudev, we proceeded towards a dense forest, engaged in our own arguments and discussions. But we could not understand anything. Our minds and hearts had grown blunt and blank. The Prince Vasu and the teacher's son Parvat went far into the thick forest; and in a lonely place where nobody could see them, killed the cocks and returned to the Ashram.
But I went far into the darkest part of the forest where dense darkness prevailed even during the day. Cannot birds and animals see ? I stopped there and remembered the words of my teacher, and I began to contemplate on them; and to assimilate them. The Gurudev's orders were that the cock should be killed in such a place that no one should see its being killed. Of course, in the place where I was standing, no one could see my action
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