A visiting sage demands silk carpets to ‘protect holy feet.’ Tenali offers sandals cut from the man’s own sermons.
The scholar arrived with luggage and ego. “My feet,” he said, “are accustomed to silk. Fetch carpets.” The quartermaster winced; the treasury sighed.
Next morning Tenali presented sandals crafted from stitched copies of the scholar’s lectures—inked praises of simplicity and renunciation. The court snorted; the scholar reddened.
“If your words cannot bear your weight,” Tenali said gently, “why must our silk?” He set the sandals down. The scholar stared a moment, then removed his shoes and stood barefoot on stone that had outlived many fashions.
For the remainder of his visit he walked without carpets and spoke better—shorter sentences, longer pauses. Servants reported he learned to thank water and sit lower than listeners. When he left, he took the paper sandals as penance and gift.
The emperor, amused, issued a quiet directive: visiting wisdom would be measured by footprints, not footmen. The palace rugs looked no worse; the conversations sounded much better.
A proverb stuck to the corridor like cool shade: “Test doctrine underfoot.”
