The obedient student⁶

A Teacher, or Guru, was teaching religious as well as regular studies in ancient India. In India, even a school teacher is called a Guru. In the morning, about fifteen or twenty young boys used to go to their Teacher’s school to study and play, and in the late afternoon they used to come back home.

One day the Teacher asked a particular boy to do something. What was it? While the students were playing, the Teacher summoned the young boy and said to him, “Throw my child into the well.” The Teacher’s child was only five or six years old, but the student did not hesitate, even for a fleeting moment. He grabbed the child and threw him into the nearby well. The other students noticed it and came running. Two or three entered into the well and brought the child back out, and other students thrashed the particular student who had thrown the child into the well. The student did not say a word. Meanwhile, the Teacher was watching the whole situation. He also did not say anything.

A few months later, while the students were playing, the Teacher summoned the same boy and said to him, “Set fire to my house.” Again, the boy did not hesitate for a second. He immediately set fire to his Guru’s own house. The Guru’s wife was inside, and she was shouting and screaming. Then, as before, the rest of the students struck him mercilessly, saying, “How did you dare to set fire to our Guru’s house?” Again, the boy did not say a word. He did not say that his Guru had asked him to do this, and the Teacher also was silent, not saying anything. The other students could not fathom it: how could the Teacher be so indifferent?

As the days ran into weeks, the weeks into months, and the months into years, there came a time when the students grew up and entered into their own way of life. By this time, the Teacher had become very, very old, so he invited all his various students, past and present, to come and see him. They all came, and the Teacher started blessingfully giving them some material objects, such as plots of land and other things. Whatever he had, he wanted to give away to his students. They were all very happy. Then they noticed that for some reason, that particular student did not receive anything, perhaps because the Guru felt that he had not been a good student. The others were wondering why the Guru had not given him anything.

At long last, the Teacher said to the boy, “I have nothing to give you on the material plane that will equal your obedience. I have never seen, and I will never see, anybody who is so devoted to his Teacher. I have never seen anybody as obedient as you are, and whatever I give on the material plane will not be equal to your obedience.”

Then the Teacher said, “I am giving you a boon. The boon is this: in a few years, the Lord Himself will come to you as your student. Lord Krishna will come and be your student. This is the greatest gift that I can give you. I am the happiest person to tell you that the Lord Himself will come and study with you.” The name of this particular student was Sandip Muni. He became the Guru of Sri Krishna. He had this kind of obedience to fulfil his Teachers requests.