Seeing is believing

Gods were discussing the great qualities they had heard about King Shivi.

“He is the greatest, or one of the greatest living in the human world.” A god said.

“Why do you say so?” Asked another.

“It looks as if he will even sacrifice his own life for the sake of others. This, according to wise men in the kingdom, is an act of truth he had cultivated over the series of births down the centuries. He wants himself to purify himself by being pious. He would only do great things and never succumb to evil deeds.”

“Why don't we test him once and for all to see if what others say of him is true?”

“Yes, then we can measure his greatness,” the other god nodded.

“How are we going to do that?” Asked the first god.

“Let us disguise as two birds and go to his palace. You are a pigeon, and I a hawk.”

The king was walking in his royal park in a pensive mood.

All of a sudden, a pigeon entered the royal garden.

Right at that moment a fierce looking hawk swooped down from the sky and tried to make a prey of the pigeon. The king clapped his hands and called the pigeon.

“Come on you innocent pigeon to my hand,” the king was slightly disturbed by the scene, seeing the pigeon and the hawk. Then he disallowed the hawk to harm the pigeon.

“Why do you want to harm this innocent pigeon?”

“But O great king, he is my prey. The nature has allowed that.”

“But you cannot do that in my royal park right at this moment before my eyes, I hate the sight of killing.”

“But I am hungry. I must eat the pigeon!”

“You are a flesh eating bird, aren't you?”

“Yes great king this is what the nature has given me.”

“Then you may eat a portion of my flesh if you are so hungry.”

“Will you give me the same share of pigeon meat from your body?”

“Certainly you may do so. But for that you need a balance to weigh the pigeon as well as the portion of flesh cut off from my body. You got to put the pigeon on one side of the scale and the portion of my flesh to the other side of the scale, and see that the two scales become equal.”

The hawk agreed, and a royal courtier was summoned to come with a pair of scales. The pigeon was placed on one side of the scale. The king got the courtier to draw the sharp sword and cut the first portion of his own flesh from his body and placed on the other side of the scale. It so happened that the side of the scale where the pigeon was placed went down showing that the pigeon was heavier than the portion of flesh cut off from the body of the king. The king went on cutting his body in a painful state.

The blood smeared all over the place. But the hawk and the king and the courtier, who was watching, saw that the pigeon was heavier than the flesh of the king placed on the other side of the scale. The king was about to faint, as he was cutting his body flesh part by part, when the hawk had something to say to the king:

“Please stop this self torture of yours great king! We now realize the value of your act of truth. This is sufficient testimony to prove your noble act of greatness.”

“Oh great king, now we have realized how very great you are. We want you to recover into your actual form."

Then they transformed the blood smeared king into the real form of the king who was walking in the royal park.

“We only wanted to see how very noble you are. You have cut off so much of your flesh from your own body with your own hands, to the extent that we could not go on watching it further. This is going too far. We cannot afford to see this further, for you are indeed a great king”

The pigeon and the hawk, appeared in their true forms before the king Shivi and venerated him saying:

“Long live this great king Shivi! Seeing is believing. We have seen the image of a noble king. You are not only a king, but you are also the noblest king on earth, and that we have now seen to our own eyes.”

Then the two gods disappeared into their deva world, blessing him longevity.