The Brothers and the Stolen Fruit

The sages told the Pandavas of Shankha and Likhita, two brothers who were sages, and of how the strict keeping of dharma even between loving brothers, and the willing acceptance of a just punishment, became a thing of purification and grace. It is a tale of how justice and love are not opposed, but are perfected together.

Shankha and Likhita were two brothers, both of them sages, who dwelt in hermitages near one another on the bank of a sacred river. Each had his own hermitage and his own grove of fruit trees, tended with care. They were devoted to one another as only brothers can be, and devoted alike to the path of righteousness, holding the keeping of dharma to be above all things. Shankha, the elder, was especially firm and exact in matters of right conduct, a keeper of the law to the last degree; and his younger brother Likhita honored him for it.