Compiled by London swaminathan
Date: 19 December 2015
Post No. 2406
Time uploaded in London: 11-18
( Thanks for the Pictures )
DON’T REBLOG IT AT LEAST FOR A WEEK! DON’T USE THE PICTURES; THEY ARE COPYRIGHTED BY SOMEONE.
In a certain town there were four Brahmins who lived in friendship. Three of them had reached the far shore of all scholarship, but lacked sense. The other found the scholarship distasteful. He had nothing but sense.
One day they met for consultation. “What is the use of attainments, said they, if one does not travel, win the favour of kings, and acquire money? Whatever we do, let us travel”.
But when they had gone a little way, the eldest of them said, “one of us, the fourth is a dullard, having nothing but sense .Now nobody gains the favourable attention of kings by simple sense without scholarship. Therefore we will not share our earnings with him. Let him turn back and go home”.
Then the second said, “My intelligent friend you lacked scholarship. Please go home”.
But the third said, “No, no, this is no way to behave for we have played together since we were little boys. Come along, my noble friend. You shall have the share of the money we earn.”
With this agreement they continued their journey, and in a forest they found the bones of a dead lion. There upon one of them said, “A good opportunity to test the ripeness of our scholarship. Here lies some kind of creature, dead. Let’s bring it to life by means of scholarship we have honestly won”.
Then the first said, “l know how to assemble the skeleton.”
The second said, “l can supply skin, flesh and blood”.
The third said, “I can give it life”.
So the first assembled the skeleton, the second provided the skin, flesh and blood. But while the third was intent on giving life, the man of sense advised against it remarking, “This is a lion. If you bring him to life, he will kill every one of us”.
“You simpleton, said the other, it is not I who will reduce scholarship to nullity. In that case, came the reply, wait a moment, while I climb this convenient tree”.
When this had been done, the lion was brought to life, rose up killed all the three. But the man of sense, after the lion had gone elsewhere, climbed down and went home.
And that is why I say,
“Scholarship is less than sense
Therefore seek intelligence
Senseless scholars in their pride
Made a lion, and they died”.
Xxxx
There is a similar story in the Tales and Parables of Sri Ramakrishna:
THE PANDIT WHO COULD NOT SWIM!
Once several men were crossing the Ganges in a boat. One of them, a pandit, was making a great display of his erudition, saying that he had studied various books – the Vedas, the Vedanta, and the six systems of philosophy. He asked a fellow passenger,
“Do you know the Vedanta?”
“No, revered sir.”
“The Sankhya and the Patanjala?”
“No, revered sir.”
“Have you read no philosophy whatsoever?”
“No, revered sir.”
The pandit was talking in this vain way and the passenger sitting in silence, when a great storm arose and the boat was about to sink.
The passenger said to the pandit,
“Sir, can you swim?”
“No”, replied the pandit.
The passenger said, “I don’t know Sankhya or the Patanjala, but I can swim”
What will a man gain by knowing many scriptures? The one thing needful is to know how to cross the river of the world. God alone is real, and all else is illusory.
–Subham–
Tamil and Vedas 
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