God protects those who do not harm others

In a forest near a town there lived many big and small animals. In a small house in the middle of forest there also lived a magician. The animals were afraid of human beings living in the town. As soon as they saw a man coming closer, they would run away for their safety. There was a rat living in a small hole dug at the base of a tree in the forest. The rat too was afraid of human beings. 

The rat moved out of its house only during the night. When people fell asleep inside their homes, he would come out of his hole and eat the leftover food thrown by people in the garbage outside. The rat often wondered about the good food taken by human beings. He desired to eat the variety of fresh food prepared by them. 

One night, when everyone was asleep, the rat entered a house and stole food kept in the kitchen. He found the food very delicious. He thought that it was easier to get food in the kitchen of people than search for it in the garbage. He began to go into the houses of people and have a stomach full from the food kept in their kitchen. Soon, the residents of a house found out about the mischief of the rat. They set up a trap and the rat was caught. They released it in a far away forest. The rat had to walk a great distance to return to his residence. It made the rat very unhappy. He envied the cats, which could easily enter the homes of people and eat everything without being caught.

The rat went to the magician and said, “Sometimes I do not get anything to eat in the forest. I have to enter the houses of human beings for my food. People do not let me enter their houses. On the other hand, the cats  move in the houses of people without any fear of being caught. Could you change me into a cat?” The magician agreed to the request of the cat. He waved his magic wand and changed the rat into a cat. For a few days this cat felt very safe and happy. Now she could go anywhere without fearing man. It could climb up the trees, walk on the walls and fences and eat whatever it found. 

One day, this cat spotted a small cub of a bear in the jungle. The mother of the cub had gone away to drink water, leaving the cub alone. The cub was very small. At the time of birth, the baby-bears hardly weigh a kilogram but when they grow up as adults, their weight increases to more than a quintal. Finding the cub without its mother, the cat caught the cub by the neck and climbed up a tree to eat it. In the meantime the mother bear returned. Bears have a strong sense of smell. Sniffing all the way, the mother bear followed the trail of the cat and reached the tree. Since the trail of smell came to an end at the base of the tree, the bear stood up to look up at the tree in search of her missing cub. While standing erect on its hind legs, a bear appears very frightful. The height of a bear standing erect can be up to three metres. The body of the bear was as large as a big car. The sight of the large bear frightened the cat. With the cub of the bear in her mouth, she climbed further up on the tree. The mother bear hugged the thick trunk of the tree with its long limbs and powerful paws, and began to climb up behind the cat. To escape the bear, the cat kept going up and up till it reached the top of the tree.

Looking down from the top of the tree, the cat saw the big bear slowly coming up towards it. However, having reached the top, the cat could go no further to save herself from the bear. The cat saw a branch of the tree extending at right angles to the trunk of the tree. She crawled on this branch and went to its furthest end. In the meantime, climbing the tree the bear also reached where the branch came out of the trunk of the tree. However, the bear could not move on the branch. The branch was not sufficiently strong to support the heavy body of the bear. Holding the trunk of the tree with both front legs, the bear stopped climbing and looking angrily towards the cat began to growl angrily.

The angry grunts of the bear and its bloodshot eyes terrified the cat. The tree was about twenty feet tall. From this great height, the cat could not jump down without getting hurt. On the other hand, with the bear at the other end of the branch it could neither climb down. For a long time, both animals waited for the other to move. For the cat, there was no place to go and the bear had no intention of going away without its cub.

In this way several hours passed. The cat had not eaten anything for a long time. It was also feeling sleepy and thirsty. Trembling with fright, it dropped the cub held in her mouth. It fell down with a thud on a big heap of leaves at the base of the tree. The cushion of leaves saved the cub from getting hurt. God had so nicely saved it!

Falling on the ground, the cub cried for his mother. The sound of the cub drew the attention of the mother bear. It looked down and found his cub there, climbing down the tree. On reaching the ground, the bear sniffed the cub. Finding it unhurt, it picked the baby softly in its mouth and walked away, forgetting the cat on the tree.  The cat had learnt a lesson. As a rat, it had been punished earlier for stealing food. It had to face a problem again because of the habit of stealing. The cat wondered if it could eat fruits like monkeys, it did not have to steal for food. There were many trees with fruits on them. If it were a monkey it could eat fruits and would not require stealing meat or food from other animals and human beings. The cat also thought that by becoming a monkey it would grow very strong by eating fruits and vegetables. It had been observed that the vegetarian elephant was the strongest animal in the forest and had a long life. 

Eating only fruits and vegetables, the monkeys too were very active. Throughout the day they jumped up and down the trees without getting tired. On the other hand, sometimes the non-vegetarian animal food often spoiled its stomach. Hence the cat decided to request the magician to change itself into a monkey. The cat told the magician, “Sir! Please change me into a monkey, so that I may eat fruits and vegetables to become strong and active.” The magician again moved his magic stick and the cat became a monkey. As a monkey the cat felt very happy. It jumped from one branch of the tree to another, eating all types of delicious fruits and vegetables. 

However, by eating fruits and vegetables of a variety of tastes throughout the day, the monkey became greedy. Now it desires to eat even when the stomach was full. It would enter the houses of people and steal the food kept in their homes. One, who troubles others, is not tolerated for long. People complained to the officers of the civil administration. One day, people from the local civil administration came with a van to catch the monkeys of the area. In order to escape being caught, the monkey fled and hid in a dry well. It again went to the magician and requested him to change itself back into the rat. By now it had realised that whenever it stole food, it had to face problems.  The magician said: “I hope with your experience as a rat, cat and monkey, you have learnt that whoever you are, and wherever you live, you have nothing to fear unless you do something to trouble others”.

Moral 

God protects the helpless innocents. Those who speak or act to harm others have to face problems.

Source: Pragya Tales Part 2