Daily Parable: The Boy Who Cried Wolf

Kevin is a young boy living in a village with his family. He has no siblings. He is known as a shepherd boy in his village and works for a master tending his sheep.

He takes care of the sheep not far from the village in the forest. Seeing that it was his daily task, he began finding life in the pasture very dull.

All he did was amuse himself and talk to his dogs or play on the shepherd’s pipe. One day when Kevin was sitting by himself watching the sheep in the quiet forest, he thought about what he could do should he spot a wolf.

He finally came up with a plan to amuse himself not to get bored. However, his master had cautioned him to call for help should he stumble upon a wolf, and the villagers would arrive right away.

Days went by, and he still had not seen any wolf. The following day, though he still had not seen anything that even looks a wolf, he ran toward the village shouting at the top of his voice, "Wolf! Wolf!"

As expected, the villagers heard his cry and dropped everything running in excitement to the pasture. But when they got there, they found Kevin laughing at the trick he played on them.

A few days later, he did the same thing and cried, “Wolf! Wolf!" Once again, the villagers dropped their work and ran to help him, only to find him laughing again.

The villagers had had enough of Kevin's stunts and told his master. The master reprimanded Kevin and said that he would let him go if he tries to trick the villagers again.

Kevin understood and stopped tricking the villagers. He felt terrible about playing people older than him and was worried he would not be a shepherd boy anymore and would be even more bored at home.

Therefore, he did not take the warning too lightly and behaved until one day during the evening, as the sun was setting behind the forest, a wolf appeared from the bush and attacked the sheep.

In terror, Kevin ran toward the village, shouting, "Wolf! Wolf!" But because he had fooled the village not once but twice, they ignored him.

"He cannot fool us again," they said. Kevin continued shouting and became sad because no one believed him. The wolf killed many of Kevin's sheep and then disappeared into the forest.

The moral of this story is that people who lie pretty often are not believed even despite their attempt to speak the truth.

If you enjoyed this parable, read up about another whereby a young boy who went to a drugstore impressed the store owner.