The Shepherd Boy

I still find myself debating between summarizing each tale or posting it in original form. The main pros for telling it in my own words being that it shortens the length and makes it easier to read. Also, I like being able to interpret and highlight the parts of the tale I think are interesting or important, which I feel is more similar to the traditional oral way these tales were passed along. On the other hand, the polished up, beautifully written versions of the tale leave much more room for the reader to appreciate and think about the tale on their own rather than me doing it for them. I'm going to try posting the original tale this time. If you have any thoughts or preferences about how I should post the tales I'd love to hear about it in the comments or by email!

The Tale

There was once on a time a shepherd boy whose fame spread far and wide because of the wise answers which he gave to every question. The King of the country heard of it likewise, but did not believe it, and sent for the boy. Then he said to him: "If thou canst give me an answer to three questions which I will ask thee, I will look on thee as my own child, and thou shall dwell with me in my royal palace." The boy said: "What are the three questions?" The King said: "The first is, how many drops of water are there in the ocean?" The shepherd boy answered: "Lord King, if you will have all the rivers on earth dammed up so that not a single drop runs from them into the sea until I have counted it, I will tell you how many drops there are in the sea." The King said: "The next question is, how many stars are there in the sky?" The shepherd boy said: "Give me a great sheet of white paper," and then he made so many fine points on it with a pen that they could scarcely be seen, and it was all but impossible to count them; any one who looked at them would have lost his sight. Then he said: "There are as many stars in the sky as there are points on the paper; just count them." But no one was able to do it. The King said: "The third question is, how many seconds of time are there in eternity." Then said the shepherd boy: "In Lower Pomerania is the Diamond Mountain, which is two miles and a half high, two miles and a half wide, and two miles and a half in depth; every hundred years a little bird comes and sharpens its beak on it, and when the whole mountain is worn away by this, then the first second of eternity will be over."

The King said: "Thou hast answered the three questions like a wise man, and shalt henceforth dwell with me in my royal palace, and I will regard thee as my own child."

(From “Grimm Household Tales”)

Discussion points

These discussion points are going to have more of a philosophical aspect to them because of the nature of the questions and their answers. While the popular storyline of a poor boy using his wits to change his luck in life is still present, I think the questions and answers are the main meat of the story.

The questions and answers all share something in common. They have to do with counting something vast or never ending; drops of water, stars in the sky and seconds in eternity. In return, all the answers are “hidden” in an equally impossible question for the king. Each question is more complicated and sophisticated than the last.

The First Question: This question is completely nonsensical and has no logic to it, as the shepherd-boy points out with his answer. You can't count the drops in the sea, not because of the huge amount of them, but because they are constantly changing. You can't count something ever changing, no matter what the amount. The shepherd-boy uses his answer to politely tell this to the king without insulting the question and the one asking it. Notice he doesn't answer the actual question, because there physically isn't an answer. Instead he proves why there isn't an answer in an almost humorous fashion, by giving the king the impossible task of drying up all the rivers. The king shouldn't be asking such a question unless he was able to make the situation feasible.

The Second Question: The second question makes a bit more sense. While we might know today that stars are every moment dying and being born, an innocent gaze up at the night's sky does show what appears to be a pretty constant (moving) picture. So there are a set amount of stars to count, but it is physically impossible to do so because they are so far away and there are so many of them. Again, the shepherd-boy shows this rather than answering the question itself with his sheet of white paper and all the pen points. Again, the king is asked to take an active role by seeing for himself why the task he set cannot be done. The king can have his answer- as long as he can count the points on the paper. Everyone knows the amount of points on the page aren't the same amount as the stars in the sky, but as long as they cannot even count the pen points, they cannot prove that. They are both uncountable amounts.

The Third Question- This is by far the most sophisticate question of them all. Time is not a physical

matter, so there is nothing physical hindering the boy from answering. The concept of time, and of eternity is completely abstract, the only measurements come from the mind. The boy has no excuses anymore. He has to answer the question itself. And so he does. The question is complicated because eternity is never ending, but a second is a defined fragment of time. How can you fit a fragment of time into forever? How can you split forever up into equal units? The shepherd-boy does this in two ways. Firstly he turns a second into something subjective. A second in relation to eternity is not the same as a second in relation to a minute or an hour. He can do this because the way we mark time is subjective. Human beings were the ones who decided that time is split into millennium which are split into centuries which are split into decades which are split into years which are split into months, weeks, days, hours, minutes and seconds. Humankind, with their short lives and perspective on time decided how long a second was and how many fit into minutes and how many months fit into a year. We define time using the measurement of a second. So the shepherd-boy has every logical right to decide to define a second of eternity as something completely different. Secondly, he takes a measurable amount of time long enough to make it immeasurable, and so solves the problem of using something finite to define the infinite. Technically, the time for the bird sharpening its beak once every hundred years on a diamond mountain that size is a defined amount of time. But the calculations it would take to figure out how much time that is are probably higher than anyone can reach, thus making it impossible to calculate and so practically undefined. This undefined defined amount of time is the first second of the infinite, undefined eternity.

On a slightly unrelated point, I very much like the king character in this specific story. There's no double sided sword in his offer to the boy. He's willing to adopt him and give him a chance at a better life without any personal gain. Perhaps he has no children of his own or none he wishes to inherit the kingdom to. Either way, he appreciates wisdom and is willing to reward it, there's no hints to any malicious behavior as is often found in fairy tale kings that give poor boys the chance to improve their lot in life, and that ranks him pretty high in my books.

The interesting thing about all these questions is that they don't demand a great amount of knowledge in order to answer them. They are all purely logical and ask for innovative thinking rather than lots of information. Logic is where shepherd-boys can match minds with the king himself and come up on top. It's a story that shows that rank does not decide everything about a person. Everyone can answer great questions about life, the universe and everything if they aren't afraid to use their minds and take a chance.