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Katha Upanishad · Anchored at KaU 1.2.18, KaU 1.2.20.
Sent to Death by his father's careless word, a boy waits three days at Yama's door — then spends his last boon on the secret of dying.
Vajashravasa was giving away his possessions to gain merit, but the cattle he gave were old and barren — useless gifts. His young son Nachiketa, watching, felt the hollowness of it and asked, again and again, "Father, to whom will you give me?" In anger his father snapped, "To Death I give you!" A careless word — but a word once spoken must be kept. So the boy went to the house of Yama, the Lord of Death.
Yama was away. Nachiketa waited at his door three days and nights without food or welcome. Returning, Yama — ashamed that a guest, and a brahmin boy, had waited unhonoured — offered him three boons to make amends. With the first Nachiketa asked his father's peace; with the second, the fire-sacrifice that leads to heaven. With the third, he asked the question Yama did not want to answer: *when a person dies, do they still exist, or not?*
Yama tested him. "Choose sons and grandsons, cattle, horses, gold, a long life — choose any pleasure, but do not press me on death." Nachiketa answered that pleasures only wear out the senses, and even the longest life is short before Death. He would not be bought. Seeing the boy was ready, Yama taught him: the Self is not born and does not die; it is hidden in the heart, subtler than the subtle, greater than the great. The one who knows it grieves no more.
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