Srila Gurudeva: Once, Gautama Buddha was in a city and he was there preaching, “Don’t tell lies, always be merciful, always be truthful, and don’t kill anyone. What to speak of humans, you should not even uselessly kill any animal, insect, tree or creeper. Otherwise, you will have to suffer. So don’t do this.” He was preaching and in that village a very young boy had died. His mother was weeping and weeping so much. Like this, she came to see Gautama Buddha. Weeping bitterly, she told him, “This is my son and he has died. This son was my everything, and now he is dead. I want that I should also give up my life.” She was holding the dead body of her son and she was weeping bitterly.
Then Gautama Buddha asked her, “Why are you weeping so bitterly?”
“Oh, my dear son is dead. You are seeing that he is lying down here.”
“Oh, don’t be worried for this. I will give him life. I will bring his soul back here at once. Don’t weep and don’t worry. Can you bring some salt from any neighbor? By that salt, I will give your son life again and he will at once stand up.” She became so happy and she was going, running towards the neighbor to bring some salt. But Gautama Buddha told her, “One more thing. You should bring salt from that house where anyone has never died. You should only bring some salt from a house like this.”
She thought, “It may be that in every house someone has died. But perhaps there is a house where someone has not died.” She went and asked her neighbor, “I want some salt. Can you give me salt?”
“Yes, I can give you some salt.”
“But first, has anyone ever died in your house or not?”
“Oh, what can I say? My husband has died here.”
“Oh.” She returned from there feeling hopeless. Then she again went to another house and asked them, “I want some salt, can you give me some salt?”
“Yes, I can give you salt.”
“Has anyone ever died in your house?”
“Oh, my son died here two years ago.” She thus went to a third house, fourth, fifth, sixth, and like this she walked throughout the entire village from morning to evening. But every house she went to the told her, “Yes, anyone has died here.” When it was sunset, she returned to Gautama Buddha and she told him, “I am satisfied. I don’t want my son back now because I am seeing that someone has died in every house. There is not a single house where anyone has not died. So why should I worry? My son has died and I will also die. You will also die. Everyone will die, so why should we repent and worry for this?”
Those who have taken birth, they must die one day, so we should not be worried for this. You should all know strongly that you will die one day.
[Spoken by Srila Gurudeva on December 19th, 1998, Bali, published as part of the Bhakta Bandhav Anthology, Volume 24]