Storytelling has been an integral part of the sanātana dharma lifestyle. In this culture, stories are mostly orally narrated with or without the assistance of an instrument.
An ascetic wishes to have darśan of lord Narasiṃha. He puts this in his mind and begins his penance in a dense forest. A hunter who is passing by sees this and asks the ascetic as to what he is doing and whether he has enough food to eat or not. The acetic comes out of his penance and mentions with slight anger that he is meditating. The illiterate hunter says, ‘I do not know what meditation is, but, can you kindly tell me as to why you are closing your eyes and sitting here’ ? The ascetic decides to reply in the language of the hunter and mentions that he is looking for a creature that has the head of a lion and a body of a human being. Astonished to hear this, the hunter replies, ‘I have not seen such a creature in my 40 years of knowing this forest but within 3 days I assure you that I will find this creature and will be in front of you’. The ascetic smiles and continues his penance with a wavering mind of whether he can have darśan of the lord or not.
The hunter wanders in the whole forest in search of this creature by believing that it’s a strange animal and he must find it. His whole concentration is in search of this creature while wandering and not hunting anything else although he sees many other animals. He ignores hunger and thirst as his mind is only on this strange animal. On the third day the hunter decides to end his life as he understands that he has failed to capture this creature and is unable to keep up his promise to the ascetic. As the hunter tries to tie a rope to the tree to hang from, lord Narasiṃha upon observing the hunter’s faith and strong conviction to find the animal, the lord appears right in front of him. By seeing Narasiṃha the hunter feels overwhelmed and ties the animal with a rope that he is using to hang himself (lord also accepts himself to be tied for the hunter’s immense faith and belief). He takes the creature with him to the ascetic’s place and tells him to open his eyes to see the creature. But to the eyes of the ascetic only a long rope is visible. The ascetic replies to the hunter, ‘I can only see the rope but not the creature’. The hunter elaborately starts giving detailed explanation of the looks of the creature which the ascetic upon listening realizes that the hunter is able to see lord Narasiṃha but not him!
Śraddhā is extremely important no matter what task one takes up !