Shahrazad's story imparts us with the wisdom of Rationality.
Acting with out thinking first is never a wise thing to do as the young man learned in the story of the three apples. This story has many pertinent morals that can be learned. Over-reacting isn’t just the stuff that soap operas are made of, it occurs regularly in everyday life. Whether it is political or personal there are examples everywhere. As well, what we say to people, whether we mean for it to be cruel or not can cause damage.
In the story the young man reacted immediately to the words that a perfect stranger said over that of his wife who honestly didn’t know what had happened to the apple. Letting go of his logic and reason which composes one’s rationality he gave into his emotions and killed her. The sad thing about it is that it wasn’t until the deed was already done and there was no turning back did he learn that he murdered his wife for no reason because it was his own mischievous son that took the apple from her. She was good to her husband from beginning to end but was tragically punished for something that she didn’t do. How many times in our personal lives have we acted on information that we thought was correct before weighing out all of the facts?
It doesn’t always have to be with a lover or a spouse that we jump to conclusions. It can be with our friends or family, automatically thinking the worst and not giving them the benefit of the doubt especially when they have done nothing in the past to make us rationally think that they could hurt us in such a way.
The slave was given all of the blame for what happened in the story. If it wasn’t for him stealing the apple from the boy and lying about it to the young man the wife would still have been alive. There is a reason why there is the saying “the pen is mightier than the sword.” Words often cause more damage than physical blows. What someone says can bring about chaos, peace, used to justify a war or help someone feel better. It all depends on what we say and how we say it.
It’s in keeping our cool and being rational that we find the truth when things get to be too heated. Patience may be a virtue but rationality is a trait of wisdom and as Socrates said “True wisdom comes to each of us when we realize how little we understand about life, ourselves, and the world around us.”
