THERE was a king who used daily to hear the Bhagavata recited by a pandit. Every day, after explaining the sacred book, the pandit would say to the king, “O King, have you understood what I have said?” And every day the king would reply, “You had better understand it first yourself.” The pandit would return home and think; “Why does the king talk to me that way day after day? I explain the texts to him so clearly, and he says to me, “You had better understand it first yourself’. What doe she mean?” The pandit used to practise spiritual discipline. A few days later he came to realise that God alone is real and everything else – house, family, wealth, friends, name, and fame – illusory.
Convinced of the unreality of the world, he renounced it. As he left home he asked a man to take this message to the king: “O king, I now understand.” (114)