How People Can Be Compared to Fruits
You would wonder what clarity of thought our acharyas had.
When they share a principle, a thought, they do that in such a way that we can easily understand.
They do this often by drawing comparison from the nature around us.
Things that go unnoticed by most of us — they take centre place in their expositions.
Jackfruit, mango, and rose.
What could be the connection between them?
How are they different from each other?
पनसाम्रपाटलसमाः स्युरिहोत्तममध्यमाधमाः पुरुषाः
फल पुष्पफलैः पुष्पैः कर्म वचःकर्म वाग्भिरिव
Panasa – jackfruit, amra – mango, patala – rose.
Good people are like jackfruit.
Bad people are like rose.
Those in between are like mango or mango tree.
Uttama, adhama, and madhyama kinds of people.
How is this?
A jackfruit may not look nice from outside. It is thorny, swollen here and there.
But it has sweet fruit inside, which can satisfy your hunger — which can nourish you.
It silently feeds birds, squirrels, ants, monkeys, humans.
Does it show off? No.
You won’t even notice the flowers on the jackfruit tree.
There is nothing on the jackfruit tree that would attract you towards it.
There is nothing on the jackfruit tree that is meant for marketing.
Except when the fragrance of the ripe fruits starts spreading, you won’t even notice that there is a tree around.
The jackfruit silently goes about doing its work — of feeding, nourishing.
Compare this to the rose plants.
Only show-off. Only display. No fruit. No real benefit.
If you get attracted by the flowers and go near, what is it that you are getting?
You get hurt by the thorns.
Bad people are like this. They show off. They market themselves a lot.
They do nothing, but talk a lot — as if they are the most charitable philanthropists in the world.
But — no real work. No tangible benefit. It is only talking. It is only marketing.
In marketing, at least there is a product. There is service.
Here, there is no product or service even.
It is just show-off. False promises. Lying about real intentions.
This is what English language also says — paint a rosy picture — about something.
Showing a quality that does not exist for real.
The third kind of people are compared to the mango tree.
It has flowers — even though not very attractive, still, flowers are there.
Mango tree also gives good, edible, sweet fruits — maybe not as big as a jackfruit, but still, they are very good.
But this kind of people — they have this weakness of also talking about, putting on display, what they are doing.
It is a human weakness, but there is no evil intention.
They do good work, and they also talk a little bit about it.
The appreciation that they get is the incentive for them — the motivation for them.
So they are called the madhyama kind of people — the category to which most people belong.
They may not be as good as the jackfruit kind of people who just go about doing their good work without bothering to talk about it.
At the same time, they are not evil like the rose kind of people who only talk, do nothing, and can even hurt you if you get close to them.
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