Read interesting stories. Read parables. Instructions for use, or How to read these parables to a child with maximum effect

02.11.2019

parables

Page 4

One day, an angel visited a man and told him about the great things that lie ahead of him: about the opportunity to get huge wealth, earn a worthy position in society and marry a beautiful woman. All his life this man waited for the promised miracles, but nothing happened, and, in the end, he died alone and in poverty. When he reached the gates of paradise, he saw the same angel who visited him many years ago, and said to him:
- You promised me great wealth, a worthy position in society and a wonderful wife. All my life I've been waiting for this, but nothing came true.
“I didn’t promise you that,” the angel replied. “I promised you the possibilities of wealth, high position in society and meeting a beautiful woman who could become your wife, and you missed them.
The man was puzzled.
“I have no idea what you're talking about,” he said.
– Do you remember once you had an interesting idea, but you were afraid of failure and did not take action? the angel asked.
The man nodded.
– You were afraid to even start putting your idea into practice, and a few years later a similar idea was realized by another person who did not let his fears stop him. And, if you remember, he became one of the richest people in your city.
The angel continued to speak:
“You must remember well the day when there was a great flood in the city, many houses were flooded, and thousands of people could not get to a safe place. You had the opportunity to save the survivors, but you were afraid that in your absence looters would break into your house and steal all your belongings, so you stayed at home.
The man nodded, remembering his shameful act.
“It was a great opportunity to save hundreds of human lives, to become a famous and revered citizen,” said the angel.
After a moment's pause, he continued:
– And finally, do you remember the beautiful red-haired woman that you really liked? She was unlike any other you've seen before or since, but you thought she'd never agree to marry someone like you, and fearing rejection, you never tried. to get to know her.
The man nodded again, but now there were tears in his eyes.
“Yes, my friend,” said the angel, “she would become your wife, with her you would be lucky to have many wonderful children, and with her you would be truly happy all your life.

Opportunities surround us all every day, but often, like the person in this story, we let fear and apprehension get in the way of realizing them.

Two angels traveled the earth: an old one and a young one. One evening, tired and exhausted, they asked for an overnight stay at a rich man's house. He let the wanderers in, but, being a stingy and inhospitable person, he provided them with lodging for the night in a shed. It was cold, dark, damp. Despite being tired, the young angel could not sleep for a long time. And when he did manage to fall asleep, he was suddenly awakened by some noise. Waking up, he saw that the old angel was diligently repairing the wall, closing up a hole in it. The young angel was surprised, several times he offered the old one to quit this business and try to rest before the upcoming road, but received a stubborn refusal. In the morning, the young angel, not hiding his curiosity, asked the old one:
“Why did you help this man when he treated us so badly?”
“Not everything is what it seems,” his companion replied.

The next evening, looking for lodging for the night, the travelers stopped at the poor man's house. The owner greeted them cordially, shared his dinner and even provided the only bed in the house, while he and his wife went to the barn. In the morning, the angels were awakened by the cry of the owner and the cry of his wife. It turned out that that night their cow died - the only breadwinner and hope for the family. The young angel, feeling extreme surprise, turned to the old one:
Why don't you help the poor man? - he said. “Last time you helped the one who treated us so badly, and this time you are inactive when it is in your power to save this family.
To which the old angel replied:
– Not everything is what it seems!

Continuing the journey, the young angel did not let up in any way, he reproached the old angel, accused him and could not come to terms with what had happened.
“Not everything is what it seems,” the old angel answered for the third time. “Last night, when we were at a rich man’s house, I saw a treasure through a crack in the wall, and I walled it up so that the owner of the house wouldn’t get it. And that night, death came for the poor man's wife, and I bought her back by giving away the cow.

One survivor of a shipwreck was tossed by a wave onto a small uninhabited island. He was the only one left alive and now prayed unceasingly that God would save him. Every day he peered at the horizon, hoping that a ship would sail to his aid. Finally exhausted, the man decided to build a small hut of floating logs in order to at least protect himself from rain and wild animals. But one day, returning from the jungle, where he went in search of food, he found his hut shrouded in flames and black smoke rose in a column to the sky. The most terrible thing was that all his supplies were destroyed along with the hut, and he was left with nothing at all. Now the man could not contain his despair.
"God, how could you do this to me?" - sobbing, he shouted.
Early the next morning he was awakened by a horn. A ship was approaching the shore to rescue the Robinson.
"But how did you know I was here?" the man asked the sailors.
“We saw a smoke signal,” they replied.

Any events that occur in our lives can be a signal sent by God for our salvation.

One day, two brothers who lived on neighboring farms had an argument. It was the first serious quarrel in many years between the brothers, whose households were very interconnected. And after a quarrel, their cooperation came to an end. It all started with a small misunderstanding, which grew into a verbal skirmish and a protracted silence, offensive to both. One morning, there was a knock on my younger brother's door. On the threshold stood a carpenter looking for a job. The younger brother said to him:
- There is a job for you. Look at this stream, it separates our farms. A week ago there was a meadow here, but my brother dug a ditch here and now a stream separates us. He did it to spite me. Now, you build a high fence between us and save me the trouble of seeing his face and his farm.
The carpenter agreed and set to work. He carefully measured everything, sawed wooden blocks - did not lose a minute. By sunset, when the younger brother returned from the field, the carpenter had already finished his work. The younger brother's eyes widened and his jaw dropped - instead of a fence, a bridge was erected across the stream! Imagine his surprise when he saw his older brother hurrying across the bridge towards him.
- Wow! You built a bridge for us after everything I've done! exclaimed the older brother.
The younger brother remained silent, only hugged his older brother, after which they shook hands and made up. To celebrate, they asked the carpenter to stay and work for them some more, but he answered them:
“I would love to stay, but I still have a lot of bridges to build.

One day, two friends were walking through the desert. And at some point it happened that they argued, and one of them slapped the other. The latter, feeling pain but saying nothing, wrote in the sand: "Today my best friend slapped me in the face." They continued on their way, and found an oasis in which they decided to swim. The one who received the slap almost drowned, but his friend saved him from death. When he came to, he wrote on a stone: "Today my best friend saved my life." The one who gave the slap and who saved the life of his friend asked him:
- When I offended you, you wrote about it in the sand, and today you wrote on the stone. Why?
The friend replied:
- When someone offends us, we must write about it in the sand so that even a light breeze can erase this inscription. But when someone does something good, we must engrave the inscription on the stone so that even the strongest wind cannot erase it.

An African medicine man leads a student through the jungle. Although he is very old, he walks quickly, while his young student falls many times. The novice rises, curses, spits on the treacherous earth and continues to follow his teacher. After a long journey, they reach a sacred place. Without stopping, the healer turns and walks back to the start of the journey.
“You didn’t teach me anything today,” the newcomer says after another fall.
“I taught you something, but you did not learn it,” says the medicine man. “I'm trying to teach you how to deal with life's mistakes.
And how should I deal with them?
“Just as you should have dealt with these falls,” the medicine man replied. “Instead of cursing where you fell, you should try to find out what made you fall in the first place.

05.07.2019 . PritchiAdmin

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One student asked his Sufi teacher:
Teacher, what would you say if you knew about my fall?
- Get up!
— And next time?
- Get up again!
- And how long can this go on - everything falls and rises?
"Fall and rise while you're alive!" After all, he who fell and did not rise is dead.

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23.06.2019 . PritchiAdmin

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A parable is one of the most ancient varieties of an edifying story. Instructive allegories make it possible to briefly and succinctly give some kind of moral attitude, without resorting to direct persuasion. That is why parables about life with morals - short and allegorical - have always been a very popular tool for education, touching on a variety of problems of human existence.

The ability to distinguish between good and evil distinguishes a person from an animal. It is not surprising that the folklore of all nations keeps many parables on this topic. They tried to give their own definitions of good and evil, explore their interaction and explain the nature of human dualism in the Ancient East, and in Africa, and in Europe, and in both Americas. A large corpus of parables on this topic shows that, despite the difference in cultures and traditions, different peoples have a common idea of these fundamental concepts.

two wolves

Once upon a time, an old Indian revealed to his grandson one vital truth:
- In every person there is a struggle, very similar to the struggle of two wolves. One wolf represents evil - envy, jealousy, regret, selfishness, ambition, lies ... The other wolf represents goodness - peace, love, hope, truth, kindness, loyalty ...
The little Indian, touched to the depths of his soul by his grandfather's words, thought for a few moments, and then asked:
Which wolf wins at the end?
The old Indian smiled almost imperceptibly and replied:
The wolf you feed always wins.

Know and don't

The young man came to the sage with a request to accept him as a student.
- Can you lie? the sage asked.
- Of course not!
- What about stealing?
- Not.
- What about killing?
- Not…
“So go and know all this,” exclaimed the sage, “and having known, do not do it!”

black dot

One day the sage gathered his disciples and showed them an ordinary sheet of paper, where he drew a small black dot. He asked them:
– What do you see?
Everyone answered in chorus that a black dot. The answer was not correct. The sage said:
“Don’t you see this white sheet of paper – it is so huge, bigger than this black dot!” This is how it is in life - we first see something bad in people, although there is much more good. And only a few see a "white sheet of paper" at once.

Parables about happiness

Wherever a person is born, whoever he is, whatever he does, in fact, he does one thing - he is looking for happiness. This inner quest continues from birth to death, even if it is not always conscious. And along the way, a lot of questions lie in wait for a person. What is happiness? Is it possible to be happy without having anything? Is it possible to get happiness ready-made or do you have to create it yourself?
The concept of happiness is as individual as DNA or fingerprints. For some people and the whole world is not enough to feel at least satisfied. For others, a little is enough - a ray of sunshine, a friendly smile. It seems that there can be no agreement between people about this ethical category. And yet, in different parables of happiness, points of contact are found.

piece of clay

God molded man from clay. He blinded the earth, the house, animals and birds for man. And he had an unused piece of clay.
- What else to blind you? God asked.
“Blind me happiness,” the man asked.
God did not answer, thought and put the remaining piece of clay in the man's palm.

Money can not buy happiness

The student asked the Master:
- How true are the words that happiness is not in money?
The master replied that they were completely correct.
- It's easy to prove. For money can buy a bed, but not sleep; food - but not appetite; medicines - but not health; servants - but not friends; women - but not love; dwelling - but not the hearth; entertainment - but not joy; teachers - but not the mind. And what is mentioned does not exhaust the list.

Khoja Nasreddin and traveler

One day Nasreddin met a gloomy man walking along the road to the city.
- What happened to you? Khoja Nasreddin asked the traveler.
The man showed him a battered travel bag and said plaintively:
- Oh, I'm unhappy! Everything that I own in an infinitely vast world will hardly fill this miserable, worthless bag!
“Your deeds are bad,” Nasreddin sympathized, snatched the bag from the traveler’s hands and ran away.
And the traveler continued on his way, shedding tears. In the meantime, Nasreddin ran ahead and put the sack right in the middle of the road. The traveler saw his bag lying on the way, laughed with joy and exclaimed:
- Oh, what happiness! And I thought I had lost everything!
“It is easy to make a man happy by teaching him to appreciate what he has,” thought Khoja Nasreddin, watching the traveler from the bushes.

Wise parables about morality

The words "morality" and "morality" in Russian have different shades. Morality is more of a social attitude. Morality is internal, personal. However, the basic principles of morality and morality are largely the same.
Wise parables easily, but not superficially touch upon precisely these basic principles: the relationship of man to man, dignity and meanness, attitude towards the Motherland. Questions of the relationship between man and society are often embodied in a parable form.

Bucket of apples

A man bought himself a new house - a big, beautiful one - and a garden with fruit trees near the house. And nearby, in an old house, lived an envious neighbor who constantly tried to spoil his mood: either he would throw garbage under the gate, or he would do some other nasty things.
Once a man woke up in a good mood, went out onto the porch, and there was a bucket of slop. The man took a bucket, poured out the slop, cleaned the bucket to a shine, collected the largest, ripest and most delicious apples into it and went to a neighbor. The neighbor opens the door in the hope of a scandal, and the man handed him a bucket of apples and said:
- Whoever is rich, he shares it!

low and worthy

One padishah sent three identical bronze figurines to the sage and ordered him to convey:
“Let him decide which of the three people whose statues we are sending is worthy, who is so-so and who is low.
No one could find any difference between the three figurines. But the sage noticed holes in his ears. He took a thin flexible stick and stuck it in the ear of the first figurine. The wand came out through the mouth. The second figurine's wand came out through the other ear. The third figurine has a wand stuck somewhere inside.
“A person who divulges everything he hears is certainly low,” the sage reasoned. “The one whose secret enters in one ear and exits through the other is a so-so person. Truly noble is he who keeps all secrets within himself.
So the sage decided and made the appropriate inscriptions on all the figurines.

change your voice

Dovewing saw an owl in the grove and asked:
Where are you from, owl?
I used to live in the east, and now I'm flying west.
So the owl answered and began to hoot and laugh angrily. The dove asked again:
- Why did you leave your home and fly to foreign lands?
“Because in the East they don’t like me because I have a nasty voice.
- In vain you left your native land, - said the dove. – You need to change not the land, but the voice. In the west, just as in the east, they do not tolerate evil hooting.

About parents

Attitude towards parents is a moral task that has long been solved by mankind. Biblical legends about Hama, Gospel commandments, numerous proverbs, fairy tales fully reflect people's ideas about the relationship between fathers and children. And yet, so many contradictions arise between parents and children that it is useful for a modern person to recall this from time to time.
The constant relevance of the topic "Parents and children" gives rise to more and more parables. Modern authors, following in the footsteps of their predecessors, find new words and metaphors to touch upon this issue again.

feeder

There lived an old man. His eyes were blind, his hearing dulled, and his knees trembled. He almost could not hold a spoon in his hands, spilled soup, and sometimes food fell out of his mouth.
The son and his wife looked at him with disgust and began to put the old man in a corner behind the stove while eating, and the food was served to him in an old saucer. One day, the old man's hands were shaking so much that he could not hold a saucer of food. It fell to the floor and broke. Then the young daughter-in-law began to scold the old man, and the son made a wooden feeder for his father. Now the old man had to eat from it.
Once, when the parents were sitting at the table, their little son entered the room with a piece of wood in his hands.
- What do you want to do? the father asked.
“Wooden feeder,” answered the kid. - When I grow up, my father and mother will eat from it.

Eagle and eagle

The old eagle flew over the abyss. He carried his son on his back. The eaglet was still too small and could not master this path. Flying over the abyss, the chick said:
- Father! Now you are carrying me across the abyss on your back, and when I become big and strong, I will carry you.
“No, son,” the old eagle answered sadly. “When you grow up, you will carry your son.

Suspension bridge

There was a deep gorge on the way between two high mountain villages. The inhabitants of these villages built a suspension bridge over it. People walked on its wooden boards, and two cables served as a railing. People were so accustomed to walking on this bridge that they could not hold on to this railing, and even children fearlessly ran across the gorge on the planks.
But one day the ropes-railings disappeared somewhere. Early in the morning people approached the bridge, but no one could take a step across it. While the cables were, it was possible not to hold on to them, but without them the bridge turned out to be impregnable.
It's the same with our parents. While they are alive, we think that we can do without them, but as soon as we lose them, life immediately begins to seem very difficult.

Worldly parables

Everyday parables are a special category of texts. In a person's life every moment there is a situation of choice. What role can seemingly insignificant trifles, inconspicuous little meanness, stupid provocations, ridiculous doubts play in fate? Parables answer this question unequivocally: huge.
For a parable, there is nothing insignificant and unimportant. She remembers strongly that "the flutter of a butterfly's wing echoes like thunder in the distant worlds." But the parable does not leave a person alone with the inexorable law of retribution. She always leaves the opportunity for the fallen to rise and continue on their way.

All in your hands

A sage lived in a Chinese village. From everywhere people came to him with their problems and illnesses, and no one left without receiving help. For this he was loved and respected.
Only one person said: “People! Who do you worship? After all, this is a charlatan and a swindler! One day he gathered a crowd around him and said:
Today I will prove to you that I was right. Let's go to your sage, I'll catch a butterfly, and when he comes out on the porch of his house, I'll ask: "Guess what I have in my hand?" He will say: “Butterfly”, because anyway one of you will let it slip. And then I will ask: “Is it alive or dead?” If he says that he is alive, I will squeeze his hand, and if he is dead, then I will release the butterfly to freedom. In any case, your sage will be fooled!
When they came to the house of the wise man, and he came out to meet them, the envious man asked his first question:
“Butterfly,” answered the sage.
- Is it alive or dead?
The old man, smiling through his beard, said:
Everything is in your hands, man.

Bat

A long time ago, a war broke out between the beast and the birds. The hardest thing was the old Bat. After all, she was both an animal and a bird at the same time. That is why she could not decide for herself who it would be more profitable for her to join. But then she decided to cheat. If the birds prevail over the beasts, then she will support the birds. Otherwise, she will quickly go over to the beasts. And so she did.
But when everyone noticed how she was behaving, they immediately suggested that she not run from one to the other, but once and for all choose one side. Then the old Bat said:
- Not! I will stay in the middle.
- Good! both sides said.
The battle began and the old Bat, caught in the middle of the battle, was crushed and died.
That is why he who tries to sit between two chairs will always end up on the rottenest part of the rope that hangs over the mouth of death.

The fall

One student asked his Sufi teacher:
“Master, what would you say if you knew about my fall?”
- Get up!
– And next time?
- Get up again!
- And how long can it go on - all fall and rise?
- Fall and get up while you're alive! After all, those who fell and did not rise are dead.

Orthodox parables about life

Another academician D.S. Likhachev noted that in Russia the parable as a genre "grew" from the Bible. The Bible itself is littered with parables. It was this form of preaching to the people that Solomon and Christ chose. Therefore, there is nothing surprising in the fact that with the advent of Christianity in Russia, the parable genre took root deeply in our land.
Folk faith has always been far from formalism and "bookish" complexity. Therefore, the best Orthodox preachers constantly turned to allegory, where they generally transformed the key ideas of Christianity into a fabulous form. Sometimes Orthodox parables about life could be concentrated into one phrase-aphorism. In other cases - in a short story.

Humility is a feat

Once, a woman came to Optina hieroschemamonk Anatoly (Zertsalov) and asked him for blessings for a spiritual feat: to live alone and fast, pray and sleep on bare boards without interference. The old man said to her:
- You know, the evil one does not eat, does not drink and does not sleep, but everything lives in the abyss, because he does not have humility. Submit in all the will of God - here is your feat; humble yourself before everyone, reproach yourself for everything, bear illness and sorrow with gratitude - this is beyond all feats!

your cross

One person seemed to have a very hard life. And one day he went to God, told about his misfortunes and asked Him:
– May I choose another cross for myself?
God looked at the man with a smile, led him into the vault, where there were crosses, and said:
- Choose.
A man walked around the store for a long time, looking for the smallest and lightest cross, and finally found a small, small, light, light cross, went up to God and said:
“God, can I have this one?”
“Yes, you can,” God replied. - This is your own.

About love with morals

Love moves the worlds and human souls. It would be strange if the parables ignored the problems of relations between a man and a woman. And here the authors of parables raise a great many questions. What is love? Can you define it? Where does it come from, and what destroys it? How to get it?
Parables also touch upon narrower aspects. Household relations between husband and wife - it would seem, what could be more banal? But here, too, the parable finds food for thought. After all, it is only in fairy tales that the wedding crown ends. And the parable knows: this is just the beginning. And keeping love is as important as finding it.

All or nothing

A man came to a wise man and asked, "What is love?" The wise man said: "Nothing."
The man was very surprised and began to tell him that he had read many books that describe that love can be different, sad and happy, eternal and fleeting.
Then the sage replied: "That's it."
The man again did not understand anything and asked: “How can I understand you? All or nothing?"
The sage smiled and said, “You yourself have just answered your own question: nothing or everything. There can be no middle ground!

Mind and heart

One person argued that the mind on the street of love is blind, and that the main thing in love is the heart. As evidence of this, he cited the story of a lover who many times swam across the Tigris River, bravely fighting the current to see his beloved.
But one day he suddenly noticed a speck on her face. After that, as he swam across the Tigris, he thought, "My beloved is not perfect." And at the same moment the love that kept him on the waves weakened, in the middle of the river his strength left him, and he drowned.

Repair, don't throw away

An elderly couple who had lived together for over 50 years was asked:
- Probably, you have never had a fight in half a century?
“They fought,” the husband and wife replied.
- Maybe you never had a need, there were ideal relatives and a house - a full bowl?
- No, it's like everyone else.
- But you never wanted to disperse?
– There were also such thoughts.
How did you manage to live together for so long?
– Apparently, we were born and raised in those times when it was customary to fix broken things, and not throw them away.

Don't demand

The teacher found out that one of his students was persistently seeking someone's love.
“Don’t ask for love, that way you won’t get it,” the teacher said.
- But why?
- Tell me, what do you do when uninvited guests are breaking at your door, when they knock, shout, demanding to open it, and tear their hair out because they are not opened?
“I lock her tighter.
- Do not break into the doors of other people's hearts, so they will close even more strongly in front of you. Become a welcome guest and any heart will open before you. Take an example from a flower that does not chase bees, but by giving them nectar, attracts them to itself.

Short parables about insult

The outside world is a harsh environment that constantly pushes people against each other, striking sparks. The situation of conflict, humiliation, insult received can permanently unsettle a person. The parable comes to the rescue here too, playing a psychotherapeutic role.
How to respond to an insult? Give vent to anger and respond to insolent? What to choose - the Old Testament "eye for an eye" or the gospel "turn the other cheek"? It is curious that of the entire corpus of parables about insults, Buddhist parables are the most popular today. The pre-Christian, but not the Old Testament, approach seems to be the most acceptable to our contemporary.

Go your own way

One of the disciples asked the Buddha:
- If someone insults me or hits me, what should I do?
- If a dry branch falls on you from a tree and hits you, what will you do? he asked in response:
- What will i do? It's a mere accident, a mere coincidence, that I was under a tree when a branch fell from it, - said the student.
Then the Buddha remarked:
- So do the same. Someone was mad, angry and hit you. It's like a branch from a tree has fallen on your head. Don't let it bother you, go your own way as if nothing happened.

Take it for yourself

One day, several people began to viciously insult the Buddha. He listened silently, very calmly. And so they became uncomfortable. One of these people addressed the Buddha:
“Are you not offended by our words?!
“It is up to you whether you insult me or not,” said the Buddha. “And it is mine to accept your insults or not. I refuse to accept them. You can take them for yourself.

Socrates and the insolent

When some insolent man kicked Socrates, he endured without saying a word. And when someone expressed surprise why Socrates ignored such a brazen insult, the philosopher remarked:
- If a donkey kicked me, would I really begin to bring him to court?

About the meaning of life

Reflections on the meaning and purpose of being belong to the category of so-called "damned questions", and no one has a clear answer. However, a deep existential fear - "Why am I living if I'm going to die anyway?" - torments every person. And of course, the genre of the parable also concerns this issue.
Every nation has parables about the meaning of life. Most often, it is defined as follows: the meaning of life is in life itself, in its endless reproduction and development through subsequent generations. The brevity of the existence of each individual person is considered philosophically. Perhaps the most allegorical and transparent parable of this category was invented by the American Indians.

stone and bamboo

It is said that once stone and bamboo had a strong argument. Each of them wanted a person's life to be similar to his own.
Stone said:
- A person's life should be the same as mine. Then he will live forever.
Bamboo replied:
- No, no, a person's life should be like mine. I die, but immediately I am born again.
Stone objected:
- No, let it be different. Let the person be better like me. I do not bow down to the wind or to the rain. Neither water nor heat nor cold can harm me. My life is endless. For me there is no pain, no worries. This is how a person's life should be.
Bamboo insisted:
- Not. A person's life should be like mine. I am dying, it is true, but I am reborn in my sons. Isn't it true? Look around me - my sons are everywhere. And they will also have their sons, and all will have smooth and white skin.
The stone failed to answer this. Bamboo won the argument. That is why human life is like the life of bamboo.

Parables have been created since ancient times and by various peoples. But the wisdom of life embedded in them has not lost its relevance over the years. Through short parables about life, we can understand the principles that are always and everywhere important.

We have selected short parables about life with morality, the meaning of which will answer some of your questions.

Parable about life lesson

Father and son were walking through the mountains. The boy stumbled on a stone, fell, hit hard and shouted:
- A-ah-ah!!!
And then he heard a voice from somewhere behind the mountain, which repeated after him:
- A-ah-ah!!!
Curiosity got the better of fear, and the boy shouted:
- Who is here?
And got the answer:
- Who is here?
Angry, he shouted:
- Coward!
And heard:
- Coward!
The boy looked at his father and asked:
- Dad, what is it?
The man, smiling, shouted:
Son, I love you!
And the voice answered:
Son, I love you!
The man shouted:
- You are the best!
And the voice answered:
- You are the best!
The child was surprised and did not understand anything. Then the father explained to him:
“People call it an echo, but in reality it is life. Gives back to you everything you say and do.
Morality:
Our life is just a reflection of our actions. If you want more love from the world, give more love to those around you. If you wish happiness, give happiness to those around you. If you want a smile from the heart, smile from the heart to those you know. This applies to all aspects of life: she returns to us everything that we gave her. Our life is not a coincidence, but a reflection of ourselves.

One well-known artist painted his next canvas. On the day of its presentation to the public, many journalists, photographers, famous people gathered. When the time came, the artist threw off the fabric that covered it from the picture. An explosion of applause followed.
The painting depicted the figure of Jesus lightly knocking on the door of a house. Jesus seemed alive. Leaning his ear against the door, he seemed to want to hear if someone inside the house answered him.
Everyone admired the beautiful work of art. One curious visitor found a mistake in the picture. The door had no lock or handle. He turned to the artist:
- But this door seems to be closed from the inside, it has no handle, how can one enter it?
“So it is,” replied the author of the canvas. “This is the door of the human heart. It can only open from within.
Morality:
We all expect that in our life there will be Love, Joy, Sympathy, Happiness, Success. But in order for them to appear in our lives, we cannot sit idly by. We need to take action. Even just open the door...

Parable about friendship

There were two neighbors. The first one bought a rabbit for his children. The children of another neighbor asked that some kind of pet be bought for them. Their father bought them a German Shepherd puppy.
Then the first said to the second:
“But he will eat my rabbit!”
- No, think about it, my shepherd is a puppy, and your rabbit is still a child. They will grow up together and become friends. There will be no problems.
And it looked like the owner of the dog was right. They grew up together and became friends. It was normal to see a rabbit in a dog's yard and vice versa. The children were happy.
Once the owner of the rabbit and his family left for the weekend, and the rabbit was left alone. It was Friday. On Sunday evening, the owner of the dog and his family were drinking tea on the veranda when their huge dog entered. In his teeth he held a rabbit: bruised, dirty with blood and earth, and, worst of all, dead. The owners attacked their dog and nearly killed the dog.
The neighbor was right. What now? We just didn't have enough. They will be back in a few hours. What to do?
Everyone looked at each other. The poor dog whined and cried, licking his wounds.
Do you have any idea what will happen to their children?
One of the kids came up with an idea:
“Let’s give him a good bath, dry him with a hair dryer and put him in his house in the yard.
Since the rabbit was not torn, they did so. The rabbit was placed in his house, his head was laid on his paws, it seemed that he was sleeping. And then they heard that the neighbors were returning. The owners of the dog rushed into their house and closed the doors. A few minutes later they heard children's cries. Found! A couple of minutes later they knocked on the door. On the threshold stood the pale and frightened owner of the rabbit. It seemed like he met a ghost.
- What happened? What happened to you? asked the owner of the dog.
“Rabbit… rabbit…”
- Died? And this afternoon he seemed so cheerful!
He died on Friday!
- On Friday?
“Before we left, the children buried him at the end of the garden!” And now he's back in his house!
The dog, who has been looking for his missing childhood friend since Friday, finally found him and dug him up to save him. And he carried it to his masters to help them.
Morality:
One should never judge in advance, without checking what actually happened.

Once a butterfly chrysalis fell into the hands of a man. He picked her up and stared at her for hours, seeing her struggling to squeeze her body out of the little hole in the cocoon. Time passed, she kept trying to get out of the cocoon, but there was no progress. It seemed that she was completely exhausted and could no longer ... Then the man decided to help the butterfly. He took scissors and cut the cocoon to the end. The butterfly easily emerged from it, but its body was somewhat atrophied, small, and its wings were folded and squeezed. The man continued to watch her, he expected that at any moment she would open her wings and fly.
But that did not happen. Until the end of its days, the butterfly remained with a deformed body and glued wings. She has never been able to spread her wings and fly.
The man did not know that the rigid cocoon and the incredible efforts applied by the butterfly to get out of the small hole were necessary for the body to take the correct shape and for forces to enter the wings through a strong body and it was ready to fly as soon as it was freed from the cocoon.
Morality:
Do not help if you do not know how or are not sure that your help will really be useful. Don't interfere with the nature of things you didn't create. Otherwise, you can just do harm.

Parable about nail marks

One boy had a very bad temper. His father gave him a bag of nails and told him that every time he offended someone, he had to drive one nail into the fence.
On the first day, the boy hammered in thirty-seven nails. In the days that followed, as he began to learn to control his anger, he started hammering fewer and fewer nails. He made the discovery that it is easier to restrain oneself than to hammer a nail later. The day came when he was able to completely control his temper during that day. His father said that now for every day that he managed to restrain himself, let him pull one nail out of the fence.
Days passed, and then one day not a single nail was left in the door. The father took his son by the hand, led him to the fence and said: “It is clear, son, that you have worked hard, but look how many holes are left in the tree. It will never be the same as before.”
Morality:
Every time you offend someone, scars remain after that. You can say something bad to someone, then take back your words, but the scars will remain forever. Let's be careful what we say.

A good parable is like a melody that, once heard, is impossible to forget. She remains in memory for a long time, and maybe even forever. These creations of folklore or author's wisdom have such a strong influence on the human mind. The peculiarity of parables is that they leave few people indifferent. Parables are useful and interesting to people of different ages, because they keep and convey the wisdom of millennia.

What is a parable in literature. The meaning of the word "parable"

A parable is a small moralizing story in an allegorical form, where animals or representatives of the plant world can act as heroes. An important element of the parable is its subtext. As in a fable, a parable always has another side, which makes these two genres related, they also have one more unifying factor - this is a moralizing conclusion and morality. Prayerfulness is more akin to a fable, the subtext in it is usually clearly expressed and initially understood by everyone, while in a parable the reader cannot always find the conclusion presented by the author, he still has to search and think it up himself.

The parable opens up a lot of freedom for interpretation. It is more philosophical in its nature. It has less unambiguity compared to a fable. In terms of semantic orientation, it can be much more complicated, but in form it can be simpler; Also, there is not always a clearly defined plot in the parable. We can say that sometimes it is not at all. This distinguishes "minimalistic" parables. However, many short parables have a plot, but in a concise form, which allows the reader to concentrate as much as possible on the semantic subtext of the literary form, rather than on the filigree elaboration of the images of characters or situations.

What does parable mean

Παροιμία (translated from Greek as ‘passionate’) was a short saying that expressed the rule of life, wisdom in a concentrated form. Usually this Greek word was applied to biblical stories in the form of parables such as the parables of Solomon.

Another word Παραβολή already means a more voluminous work in form, where situations from everyday life are taken as a basis, but high spiritual concepts are expressed allegorically through them. Such works were primarily intended for ordinary people to make it easier for them to understand speculative concepts, and through a parable-parabola to make them accessible to perception. The parable to some extent "condescends" to the level of a reader unprepared for philosophical concepts.

Otherwise, the parable is also called a parabola, which means the second definition presented in Greek above. There are several hypotheses about the origin of the word. There are also associations with a figure, that is, a story as a “figure”. There are also direct indications that the structure of the literary genre of a parable or a parabola resembles the form of a mathematical parabola. It starts as if from nowhere, from afar, then the story quickly comes to a critical point, where the key moment of the parable takes place, and then there is a return to the motives with which it started.

The word "parabola" began to be used since the time of Aristotle, and in pre-Christian times, its meaning was close to allegory and riddle. Many of those literary terms that we now share were perceived as one concept. A parabola meant such concepts as a fable, a proverb, an aphorism, an epigram. What united these concepts with each other was the brevity of presentation or the inclusion of comparison in the internal structure of the composition.

Interesting parables, or parabolas, in literature

Parabola, or in Russian - “parable”, was popular in the 19th century, but stood out as a separate genre a little later, in the 20th century, largely thanks to the works of F. Kafka and B. Brecht. From a short work, which was considered a parabola, it began to look more like a large literary form. Golding's "Lord of the Flies", Hemingway's "The Old Man and the Sea", Orwell's "Animal Farm" and other works of the last century have replenished the treasury of parable novels, in other words, parabolic novels.

However, interesting folklore parables are still the most popular. Folk wisdom, carried through the centuries, will leave few people indifferent, and taking into account the fact that the parabola is multilayered, there are several levels in the subtext, which, moreover, can be interpreted in different ways. Sometimes you have to think for a long time on the question posed in the parabola, because everything is not as simple as it seems, and it can be very interesting to look and reread the same parable after some time in order to understand the hidden meaning that it carries.

If we turn to the folklore tradition, then we will see a huge selection of parables of the peoples of the world: Western and Eastern, Greek, Indian, Christian and Sufi, ancient and modern. There aren't any! This genre really did not go unnoticed, perhaps, by any people who had developed literary creativity.

What parables teach: short parables, wise parables

Short and wise parables are a concentrate of wisdom. What they teach can often be fully understood only after a long time devoted to rethinking them. But, even after reading it for the first time, we always derive great benefit for ourselves, because a parable is a teacher of life that you cannot meet face to face, but he is always there, on the pages of a book of parables. Sometimes, over the years, we look at the work in a completely different way: what we understood in our youth in one way is rethought in the middle of life, and our views change radically, and after some time even what has already been overestimated, viewed again from a different angle. This process of reassessment of values tells us only that even a person's views on being cannot be unchanged throughout his life.

One of the wise men once said that he who does not change his mind is either dead or a fool. A person grows, and his worldview does not stand still. Views are becoming wider, in many ways he is becoming more tolerant, because life experience opens the eyes to what was previously perceived only from the point of view of maximalism, as black or white. The more a person learns in life, the more people he meets, the more his horizons expand. He accepts and understands the different lifestyles of others without judgment, because he begins to really understand that the person on Earth is part of the overall mosaic. But in order for this mosaic to turn out to be multicolored and varied, all colors are needed, that is, dark shades cannot be dispensed with.

When we look at a pattern up close, we evaluate it differently. We are too keen on details to capture the whole image, and it is visible only from the side. What seems unsightly and absurdly located to a person next to the fragment, from a distance will look like it takes its place, only intended for it.

It's the same as admiring the meter-long paintings by Titian or Rembrandt, standing at arm's length from them. To appreciate the beauty of creation, you need to take a step back and then the integrity and alignment of the composition will be revealed to your eyes, because you stopped looking at only a small fragment, moving away physically, you approached mentally and spiritually. This is in many ways similar to the comprehension of works of an allegorical nature, such as fables and parables.

In order to perceive them in their entirety, you need to move away from them, put off reading them for a while, but then return to them again. Someone comes back by chance through the years, someone purposefully makes a second and third attempt after a certain time and finds for himself completely new aspects of a work that seemed to be understood long ago.

How to understand instructive parables

In how to understand instructive parables, much depends on perception. Our psychology is the key, although not to all things in the world (because there are higher concepts that are not controlled by mental processes), but to most of them, and perception is one of them. Depending on what stage of psycho-spiritual development you are at, from that position you will approach the understanding of the parable, you will see such a meaning in it. The unusual and uniqueness of the parable lies in the fact that it is submissive to all ages, and you, being in a new segment of your life, each time turning to your favorite parables, will discover something new in them. However, this will not happen because you did not read carefully last time. The parable is attractive because it is not a couple of volumes of great Russian classics that can be mastered only for some time, it’s just that its capacious form contains so much that this semantic load would be enough for a larger literary form.

The parable does not require a large time investment from the reader. It is a kind of useful "fast food", but in the sense that you do not need to spend a lot of time on its development, but its "utility ratio" for the mind and soul will be higher than the best vitamin-mineral complex. Parable - concentrated food. It will not be possible to use a lot at a time, and if it does, then you need to assimilate it all, think it over and realize it. This is where it takes time. I read one, and there is food for thought for the whole day, and maybe longer. I reread it - and again I found something new, because I looked from the other side, or maybe under the influence of other circumstances. Although the parable is simple, it is also multifaceted, but its facets are hidden from view. They cannot be seen with the naked eye. It takes skill. You need to learn to see the value of a diamond when it has not yet been cut, because when it is already in the setting, everyone can admire, but only a true connoisseur and connoisseur can consider and understand what kind of nugget you are holding in your hands.

So the parable reveals its true essence and meaning only to an inquisitive and intelligent reader who will reflect and fully realize the hidden meaning that lurked behind the simple plot of the story, but in fact turned out to be gems of wisdom, sometimes scattered on just one printed page.