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| Sunday, 6 June 2004 |
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| News Business Features Editorial
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Searching and researching Sunday parable by Sunanda Mahendra In some parts of Africa there is a saying: "too much of searching disturb things that are lying still." The story woven around this is interesting. This is the story I got to know from Harold Courlander.
The rock that rolled down, bounded into a clump of bushes where an antelope was resting. The frightened antelope leaped to its feet and ran as fast as possible. It ran into another clump of bushes where a buffalo was resting. Believing that it was being attacked, the disturbed buffalo burst out of the bushes and looked for the enemy. Then the buffalo saw a hunter walking nearby, and it charged at the hunter and killed him with his sharp horns. Then the vultures came and hovered over the body of the hunter. In the village, people saw the hovering vultures, and they went out to see what was there. They found the body of the hunter. Then they asked one another. "What caused this man to die?" They saw the hoof prints of the buffalo and asked: "What caused the buffalo to come and kill this hunter??" Then they followed the hoof prints of the buffalo and came to the clump of bushes where it had been resting. There they discovered the hoof prints of the antelope. They said: "It is evident that, the buffalo was disturbed by the antelope. But what caused the antelope to come where the buffalo was lying?" Then they followed the prints of the antelope to the first clump of bushes, saying, "Yes, indeed, the antelope may have come from here! But what caused the antelope to do so?" They found the rock there, and saw the marks it had made rolling down from the high place. "It is clear, this rock had disturbed the antelope. But what caused the rock to come rolling down to the place where the antelope was resting?" Then they followed the trail of the rock, and came to where the tree had been cut. They said: "Why should a man cut a tree growing over here? He has obviously moved the rock in order to cut the tree!" They went home. They discussed everything in detail. Then they summarised their findings in the following manner, as researchers do. When the sun rose everything looked peaceful. The land was quiet and peaceful. Then the man went to cut wood. He searched for a particular tree, in the process he had come into this particular site. "Everything would have been peaceful if not for the moving of the rock on the part of the man. So he had disturbed things that were lying quietly. As a result what happened? One thing happened, then another, and the hunter died. "Though as the saying goes, as much searching disturbs things, that are lying still. Yet for us it is clear that much searching also helps us to know. Now we know the real situation, how the hunter died, and it is not a natural death". The old sayings and parables linked with them could be changed to fit the living condition of today in many parts of the world. |
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Once a man entered the forest to cut wood. As he passed along the way
he looked at one tree and then another, but he did not see the one he
wanted to cut. Gradually he came to a high rocky place, and above that he
saw a good tree growing. So he climbed the hill to cut it. But there was a
rock lying where he wanted to stand. He rolled the rock away and cut the
tree.
