English
Nachiketa and Yama
Source: Katha Upanishad (Krishna Yajurveda), Part 1, Vallis 1–3
A sage named Vajashravasa performed a great sacrifice in which one must give away everything one owns. But the cows he was giving away were old ones: they had drunk their last water, eaten their last grass, given their last milk.
His son Nachiketa was still only a boy, but his heart was full of faith. He thought, “Gifts like these will bring my father not merit, but sorrow.”
He went to his father and asked, “Father, to whom will you give me?” His father said nothing. He asked a second time, then a third. Irritated, the father snapped, “To Death I give you!”
Nachiketa took his father's words as truth. He said, “A mortal ripens like grain, and like grain springs up again. Let my father's word not be false.” And he set out for the realm of Yama, the lord of death.
Yama was away from home. For three nights Nachiketa waited at his door without food or water.
When Yama returned, he was deeply ashamed: a guest, a brahmin, had gone hungry for three nights in his house! He said, “For your three nights, ask me for three boons.”
For the first boon Nachiketa asked, “May my father's anger be calmed, and when I return may he recognise me and greet me with love.” Yama said, “So be it.” The second: the knowledge of the sacred fire that leads to heaven. Yama taught him that too and, pleased, named the fire after him: the Nachiketa fire.
Now the third boon. Nachiketa looked Yama in the eye and asked, “When a man dies, some say he still is, some say he is not. Teach me this secret.”
Yama grew serious. “Nachiketa, even the gods once had doubts about this. It is very subtle. Choose another boon; let this question go.”
Nachiketa said, “If even the gods were in doubt, and you say it is hard to know, where else will I find a teacher like you? No other boon is equal to this one.”
So Yama tested him. “Ask for sons and grandsons who will live a hundred years, for cattle, elephants, horses and gold. Ask for a kingdom over the wide earth, and live as many years as you like. Take lovely maidens, with chariots and music, such as mortals can never have. Only do not ask about death.”
Nachiketa answered calmly, “All these last only until tomorrow, and they wear out the vigour of the senses. Life is short anyway. Keep your horses, your dancing and singing. No one is ever satisfied by wealth. I want that boon alone.”
Yama was delighted. “Nachiketa, two paths come before every person: shreya, the good, and preya, the pleasant. The wise choose the good. You weighed every pleasure and let it go. May I always have a seeker like you.”
Then Yama taught him: “The Self is never born and never dies. The body is slain, the Self is not. The body is a chariot, the Self its master, the intellect the charioteer, the mind the reins and the senses the horses. Only one whose reins are steady reaches the goal.”
This is where the Upanishad's famous call rings out: “Arise, awake, and learn by approaching the wise.”
The Upanishad says that having received this knowledge from Yama, Nachiketa became free from impurity and from death, and so will anyone else who knows the Self in this way.
What this story teaches
Again and again in life we must choose between the good and the pleasant. Nachiketa shows that for what truly helps us, every tempting pleasure can be set aside.
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