The Man and the Brahmadaitya

The Haunted Tree and the Brahmadaitya

I once was a poor man growing up. I had no wife , no kids, and no friends. Everyone that I ever known or loved left me. I was alone and a helpless, homeless, man. Seven years ago my life changed forever. I was on the way to the new laird’s house and he was explaining to some of his servants that there was this supposedly haunted banyan-tree on the outskirts of our village was haunted by many ghosts. No one ever went to the tree at night and when they did the ghosts would come and kill anyone who disturbed the tree. The laird decided to make a challenge for anyone who wanted to attempt it. The challenge was that you were supposed to go to the tree and cut off one of his branches and bring it back in the laird. If you were to complete the take them we would reward you with 40 acres of land!

As a poor man, I saw that I needed to accept this challenge. I knew that it could have been potentially my last day to live, but what did I live for? I had nothing and I would have rather died tring to achieve a goal then die from starvation without doing anything.

I accepted the Laird’s challenge, and the other folks around laughed at me. They all doubted me, but I didn’t care. I made my trek the next night into the forest to find the haunted tree. Almost toward the tree I decided to take a break under a large vakula-tree. On my break, I began to have doubts. I was panicking and wanted to die. Little did I know, the vakula-tree was haunted as well by a Brahmadaitya who heard my worries.   He said he was there to help and I explained to him the situation and what I was trying to do. He offered his help and told me to go toward the tree. We reached the tree and I began to cut at the branch of it. Immediately a bunch of ghosts swarmed me and was about to kill be, but the Brahmadaitya stepped in to save me. He explained to them everything and they let me take a branch back home.

I was so excited that I raced back home to show the Laird what had been done and I asked for my part of the deal. He didn’t believe me at first, so he had to go to the tree and find the exact cut and see if it matched. It did, and the laird put together a contract and made it official. I had my 40 acres! It was rich with fruits and grain, but there was one problem. Since I was poor I had no tools to tend the land. I asked the Brahmadaitya if he could help me harvest all this food. He accepted and called out all the ghosts of the forest to tend the land at night. I woke up the next morning with the whole plot of land tended and a huge store house. I thanked the Brahmadaitya over and over again never fully expressing the joy and gratitude I felt. He said that it was time for him to go. He explained that befriending a good man like myself for a while enabled him to not be cursed as a ghost. It was time for him to go to heaven.

I lived happily for many years after that. I sold all the grain and corn from my land and became rich. I found a wife, had sons, and grandsons later. Together we got the tools and people needed to take care of our land, and this is where you see me today. 

Brahman and Brahmadaitya

Souce: Spirit of the Ages

Author's Note

This week I decided to base my story of off The Story of a Brahmadaitya in the Un-textbook. The reason why I chose to write about this story is because I liked that it had a good ending to it. Reading the story I thought that something bad was going to happen to the man, but nothing did. I also liked how the Brahmadaitya's spirit went to heaven after helping the man. It was his destiny  to help the man. I kept my story mostly the same the only differences were that I told it from the Brahman's point of view instead of a narrator. I wanted it to feel like he was talking to an audience asking him about his life.