THE KINGDOM

by Sulocana dasa

May 20, 1986

Once upon a time there lived a very wise and saintly king who had thousands of sons and daughters. His kingdom spread throughout the world and he loved all of his children equally. He was the well-wisher of all. His children could live in any one of their father's many kingdoms and be happy in their service to the king, no matter what that service may be. The elder, managerially inclined sons, managed the kingdom for their father but they were not favored over the youngest sons just because of their managerial post. This was because the king saw the love of his sons and not their material qualifications. He wanted the best for all his sons but unfortunately not all of his sons loved the father equally. Many of the younger sons loved their father more than the eldest sons and this naturally created some jealousy amongst them. The wise old king of course tried to pacify all his sons but eventually he gave up and decided to leave this world.

But first, he requested that all his sons try and live together in love and trust. He practically begged his oldest sons to treat the youngsters as brothers and not as inferiors. But the moment the king died, some of the oldest sons held council and as a result, they grabbed as much territory, riches, women and children as they could. Each declared himself an independent sovereign king equal to their father. The thousands of younger, more simple and trusting brothers were baffled. Some of them, out of humility and in order to keep peace in the family, went along with the older brothers for awhile but it was wrong and everybody knew it. Eventually the older brothers took complete control of the kingdom.

Some of the younger brothers and sisters protested by reciting their father's last wishes. But to no avail. The older sons already had the taste of wealth, worship and power and would not give it up. So instead of listening to the humble advice of the younger brothers, they had them beaten, exiled, or killed. One after another, the young brothers came forward to protest and one after another, they failed until finally all gave up and left the kingdom for good, leaving behind their heritage, homes, and often even their wives and children since many of the women chose the security of the kingdom over the wandering, struggling life of their exiled husbands. Many wives were so young they never really knew the old kind and thus they thought the oldest brothers were as good as the king. So they chose to worship the new "kings" rather than follow their husbands into the cold, cruel world.

One of the younger sons, however, not willing to sacrifice his family and home to such a corrupt despot of a king decided to fight. Without wealth or many allies, and practically alone, he fought the older brothers who had stolen the kingdom for themselves. Aided with only a computer and the knowledge in his father's books and personal letters, he tried to awaken a revolt amongst the discouraged and exiled brothers. He knew that peaceful pleading and scriptural argument would fall on deaf ears as it had for many years. So instead, he spoke straightforward and truthfully, often using violent language when appropriate. He described the crimes that had been committed to the younger brothers, and their families, many of which were crimes the father had said were punishable by death. The older brothers were shocked by this violent verbal attack but they could say nothing in argument. Every word spoken by the younger brother was true and they all knew it. Since they could not defend themselves verbally, and since they were too blinded by power to give up their folly, they tried to kill the younger brother. But alas, they could not find him, for he lived in hiding, moving constantly from the house of one exiled brother to another.

Then one of the oldest, and most corrupt brothers went outside his father's kingdom and told the police of that town, who knew nothing of the king, his kingdom, or the teachings of the king, that a violent killer was stalking nearby. He convinced the police that this young brother should be arrested and thrown in jail. He showed the police a quote from one of the letters of the younger brother which stated that the older brother deserved to be executed. Not knowing, or caring to know where the real violence was, the outside world police found and arrested the defenseless younger brother.

Since the corrupt brother went outside the walls of his father's kingdom to stop the younger brother, the younger brother decided to try and fight in the outer world also. So he described all the crimes the older brothers had committed in terms that the citizens of the outside could understand. He tried to get them to understand that a horrible injustice had taken place and that as citizens of a free country, the younger brothers also had a right to protection under the laws of the land. The young brother showed the police exactly how the older brother had stolen his wife and family in exactly the same way they had stole hundreds of other families from the younger brothers. He showed how the women had been taken and used as whores, how the children had been tortured. How the young brothers had been beaten, robbed, and exiled. He showed how the older brothers had lost all sense of right and wrong in that they even justified selling heroin to amass wealth since they didn't have the purity to inspire honest contributions.

Some of the outer world people listened and agreed. Some even sympathized. But most didn't want to take the time and trouble to understand all the intricacies of the kingdom, which to them was too different, and was based on a different set of laws. And so no one helped. The younger son was sitting alone in a strange jail with no one. Almost all his fellow exiled brothers had given up on their father's kingdom and went back to living in the outer world, the way everyone else lived. But the younger brother could not stand to see his father's kingdom fester and rot to the point where self-confessed homosexuals, rapists, heroin pushers, and murderers were being worshipped as though they were as good as their father. He could not bear to see his father's name brought down to such a low level and thus he...(to be continued).

(Sulocana dasa was murdered May 22nd, 1986, 1:00 a.m., Los Angeles, two days after this story was written.)