"The Boy Who Cried Wolf"
The "Boy Who Cried Wolf" was written in 1673 by a slave known as Aesop but whose works have been admired from his time to the present for the moral lessons he had instilled in the minds of his readers---thought provoking stories.
For the Muslims, Aesop is the one being referred to as Lokman at the 31st Sura of the Holy Qu'ran.
The story centered on the protagonist, a shepherd boy who lied to kill his boredom and to entertain himself at the expense of the truth. So he yelled at the top of his voice one day, crying , "Help, help, the wolf is killing my sheeps!". The nearby villagers rushed to his rescue but only to be disappointed to find the lying boy laughed at them notwithstanding that they were so worried for the safety of the boy and his sheeps.
In other words, the boy learned that lying is a bad habit for in the process he loses self-respect and the respect of the people around him. But he learned about it too late.
He repeated the same lies again until the villagers stopped coming to help him. So when the true wolf came one day and ate all his sheeps, the boy could only watch helplessly and cried.
The moral is stated at the end of the fable as:
Even when liars tell the truth, they are never believed. The liar will lie once, twice, and then perish when he tells the truth.
This fable works well in educating childred to value and practice honesty at all times. This is the ideal medium to make children understand the importance of self-respect and honesty as a virtue that could speak well of a person's breeding wherever he is.
On the other hand, there is another question that arises from this fable which is applicable to the general setting of life. Honesty seems to be elusive and practiced only by the few who are principled in life.
More often than not, truthfulness is only spoken but not practiced; preached but not lived by example.
This is the irony of honesty in the lives of many people who are seemingly misled in believing that to lie is a convenient way to escape the ugly truth.
For the Muslims, Aesop is the one being referred to as Lokman at the 31st Sura of the Holy Qu'ran.
The story centered on the protagonist, a shepherd boy who lied to kill his boredom and to entertain himself at the expense of the truth. So he yelled at the top of his voice one day, crying , "Help, help, the wolf is killing my sheeps!". The nearby villagers rushed to his rescue but only to be disappointed to find the lying boy laughed at them notwithstanding that they were so worried for the safety of the boy and his sheeps.
In other words, the boy learned that lying is a bad habit for in the process he loses self-respect and the respect of the people around him. But he learned about it too late.
He repeated the same lies again until the villagers stopped coming to help him. So when the true wolf came one day and ate all his sheeps, the boy could only watch helplessly and cried.
The moral is stated at the end of the fable as:
Even when liars tell the truth, they are never believed. The liar will lie once, twice, and then perish when he tells the truth.
This fable works well in educating childred to value and practice honesty at all times. This is the ideal medium to make children understand the importance of self-respect and honesty as a virtue that could speak well of a person's breeding wherever he is.
On the other hand, there is another question that arises from this fable which is applicable to the general setting of life. Honesty seems to be elusive and practiced only by the few who are principled in life.
More often than not, truthfulness is only spoken but not practiced; preached but not lived by example.
This is the irony of honesty in the lives of many people who are seemingly misled in believing that to lie is a convenient way to escape the ugly truth.
2 comments:
Even though it has been written more than two millenia the moral of that story is still apllicable in these modern times.
That is true, Jing. :)
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