In plain words
Everyone … was watching with one gaze to see who this great one was. Such people find their place in history. Hoping to win such a place, a great king was coming to the Buddha with wealth loaded on elephants. He was coming with the intention of giving the Buddha wealth and being called a great man. As he was coming along the way, an old woman asked, 'I am hungry; will you give me something?' The king gave the old woman the pomegranate from …. The old woman took the pomegranate and came to the Buddha. Meanwhile the king came to the Buddha and waited to see when He would beat the drum. However long it was, He did not sound the drum; … did not rise. Meanwhile the old woman came, worn out, and with trembling hands gave the pomegranate to the Buddha. At once the Buddha beat the drum. For all the money he had given, the Buddha had not beaten the drum. 'Beating the drum for giving so small a fruit? Is this sacrifice?' the king asked the Buddha. Then the Buddha said, 'Great king, in sacrifice quantity is not the important thing. Quality matters. For a king to give gold away is natural, but this hungry old woman offering her pomegranate to her … guru: what a sacrifice that is. That is, it is great that the old woman, so hungry, made the sacrifice without counting her own life. Sacrifice is not giving up what is of no use. Whatever is dear to us, whatever is chief for us, that we must sacrifice; that alone is true sacrifice. For us, Prema is as dear as life itself. So Prema is more precious than all things. Such precious Prema we must first of all sacrifice. We must give our parents their due worth. Not to be able to give Prema to those parents is not right, even for the great. In the world we make many sacrifices for the sake of name and fame; we have rest houses built, we have hospitals built. This is not true sacrifice. Satisfy your parents, and then do whatever you will. Mātṛdevo bhava, pitṛdevo bhava. You must hold these two as your aim. But on the other side we keep giving our parents hardship. We hold only our selfishness, our self-interest, as our aim. So we must sacrifice this selfishness. So long as there is selfishness, man cannot progress. So, students! Sacrificing our selfishness, we must dedicate our life on the path of satisfying the God we believe in. The whole world is God's. We must not think that God, who is all-powerful, all-pervading and all-knowing, is in one place and not in another. A small example. It has tape-recorded your songs and My words. But where are these songs and words? They are on the tape. … Can we see these on the tape? No. Even if we cut that tape into pieces, we neither see nor hear anything.