What Left Prahlada

Bhishma told this one to Yudhishthira, and he had it from Dhritarashtra, who told it to Duryodhana on a day when the boy could not stop thinking about his cousin's wealth.

Prahlada, the son of the asuras, had taken the three worlds from Indra. He had not taken them with an army. He had taken them with his conduct, and Indra, sitting in his empty heaven, did not know what that meant.

He went to Brihaspati, the teacher of the gods.

"What is the highest source of happiness?"

"Knowledge," said Brihaspati. "But there is something above it. Ask Shukra."

Indra went to Shukra, the teacher of the asuras, and Shukra did not keep him long.

"Prahlada knows this better than I do," he said. "Ask Prahlada."

So Indra put on the look of a brahmin and went to the court of the one who had taken his throne.

"King," he said, "tell me what leads to happiness."

Prahlada did not look up from his work. "I have three worlds to run. I have no leisure to teach anyone anything."

"Then I will wait."

He waited. He did what a pupil does for a teacher: he carried water, he stood when the king stood, he asked the same question in a different way every day, and the days went into months. Prahlada began to like him, and then to talk to him, and one evening he answered.

"I feel no pride in the throne, that is all. I bear no grudge against brahmins. Shukra's counsel is given to me and I follow it. I serve my elders. I have no malice in me. I beat my anger a long time ago and I keep my senses on a short rope. What the teachers say goes into a man drop by drop, the way bees fill a comb. That is how I hold the three worlds."

The brahmin bowed, and Prahlada, who was pleased with him, said what kings say.

"You have served me well. Ask for anything."

"Give me your conduct."

Prahlada sat very still. Then he said, "It is yours," because he had promised, and the brahmin went out, and the king sat alone with a weight in his chest that he could not name. This was no ordinary pupil. He knew that much.

Something stood up out of his body. It was a shape of light, and it had a face.

"Who are you?" Prahlada asked.

"I am your Conduct. You gave me away. I am going to live in the brahmin who was your pupil." And it went.

A second shape rose and stood in the light the first had left.

"Who are you?"

"I am Righteousness. I live where Conduct lives." And it followed.

"And you?"

"Truth. I go where Righteousness goes."

"And you?"

"Good deeds. I live where Truth lives."

The next one came up crying aloud, and Prahlada knew it before it spoke, because the room felt smaller.

"I am Might," it said. "I stay where Good deeds are. I cannot stay here."

Then the last one rose, and she was a goddess, and she was the brightest thing he had ever seen.

"Who are you?" he asked, and his voice was not steady now.

"I am Shri," she said. "I have lived in you. You have let the others go, and I follow Might. I always have."

"Where are you going? Who was he?"

"The brahmin was Indra. He knew that you took his three worlds with conduct, so he asked you for it, and you gave it. Understand this before I go. Righteousness, Truth, Good deeds, Might and I have one root, and the root is conduct. Where that goes, we all go."

And she went after the others, and the room was dark.

Dhritarashtra ended his story the way a father does. Wealth that comes by crooked conduct, he told his son, comes, and then it goes, and it takes the house with it.

Indra found Bali alone in a far place, with no kinsman near him, and Indra laughed.

"Once you rode out with thousands of chariots behind you and the gods stood aside. Now look at this. Does it hurt?"

"No," said Bali. "Everything ends under Time. Body and breath come up together and go down together. Time takes the learned and the fool, the strong and the weak, and no one has seen its far shore. Time gives everything, and Time takes everything back. Do not boast of your strength to me. Thousands of Indras have gone before you, and you will go when your hour comes. As for Prosperity, she lived in all of them. She left me for you. She is restless, and she will leave you too."

While he was still speaking, something moved in him, and a goddess stepped out of his body and stood between them. She blazed. There were plumes on her head and gold on her upper arms, and the light came off her in every direction.

Indra stared. "Who is she?"

"I do not know," said Bali. "Ask her yourself."

"Lady, who are you?"

"Virochana never knew me," she said, "and his son does not know me. The learned call me Duhsaha, the one who is hard to bear. Some call me Vidhitsa, the wish to work, which is where plenty comes from. I am Bhuti. I am Lakshmi. I am Shri. And you do not know me either, Indra. No god does."

"Then why do you leave him, after living in him so long? Is the fault his, or mine?"

"Neither the Creator nor the Ordainer rules me. Time moves me from place to place. Do not look down on Bali."

"Tell me why."

"I live in truth," she said. "In gifts, in vows, in penance, in prowess, in virtue. He fell from all of them. He honoured brahmins once and then turned on them. He touched the ghee of the sacrifice with unwashed hands. He boasted in front of everyone that his worship of me never stopped. So I am leaving him, and I will live in you. Carry me carefully. Carry me with penance and with prowess."

"No one can carry you for ever," Indra said. "Not a god, not a man. How am I to keep you?"

"Divide me into four, as the Veda says."

He thought about it. "The earth bears everything. Let her have a quarter of you."

"She has it. Place the second."

"The waters, which serve every living thing."

"Done. The third?"

"Fire. The Vedas and the sacrifices and the gods themselves stand in fire."

"Yes. And the last?"

"Good men," said Indra. "The ones who honour brahmins and speak the truth. They can bear it."

"Then they have it. Guard my parts."

"Whoever offends you," he said, "answers to me."

Bali, without his Shri and without his pride, turned and walked south. Indra went north and rose into the sky.