If a strange happening keeps occurring, it is a bad omen.
Meaning: Certain behaviors are obvious signs of death or danger. Stubbornness leads to negative consequences in the end.
The word that loves you stays in the belly.
Meaning: Bad words should not be spoken.
One does not say everything as if he or she is dying.
Meaning: Not every truth is worthy to be said.
'A stranger does not hold the head of a coffin.'
(b) Explanation: In some villages people are not all buried in one common graveyard. Sometimes the type of death a person dies determines where the body should be buried and usually those who hold the head of the coffin know where the body will be sent for burial. A person who is new to a village community cannot know this, he needs time to learn it.
'It is because of shame that the harlot does not use the main street of a
village'.
(b) Explanation: Harlotry is one of the social evils in the traditional society and its practice produces a sense of guilt which is regarded as a punishment to those who indulge in it.
(c) Moral Teaching: Evil behaviour has its own punishment, i.e. it does not pay in the long run to misbehave and therefore people must refrain from doing evil and learn to do good.
'The person who steals mushrooms hears the evening announcement'.
(b) Explanation: In the villages people who have found their crops or any personal belongings stolen cause an announcement to be made in the evening about the stolen crops or articles. In the announcement they ask the thieves to return the stolen goods or else they will be handed over to the gods for punishment. Usually they mention the name of a powerful god who is believed to invariably kill all evildoers. Thieves therefore listen carefully to the evening announcement and they also dread
it. It may happen that someone has stolen some crops and his guilty conscience will cause him to behave as if he had heard an announcement about the crops he has stolen, even though there is no announcement. In other words, his conscience will be accusing him of his wrong deed.
(c) Moral Teaching: Guilty conscience is a form of punishment for wrong doing which any normal wrong-doer cannot escape and so it is better to stop doing wrong and do good.
'The person who has gone into a patch of giant-grass does not complain of
skin irritation.
(b) Explanation: This proverb comes from a farming experience and especially from farmers who work on the grassland. Sometimes they have to walk through the giant-grass to go to their farms and this produces a lot of skin irritation.
(c) Moral Teaching: The skin irritation caused by the giant-grass may be compared to minor distractions in the pursuance of one's objectives. The moral lesson of this proverb and of similar ones that will follow is that you must expect minor distractions in any effort that you put forth to realize certain objectives but do not let these minor distractions deter you from achieving your goals. You should not vacillate but be resolute and persistent in the pursuance of your goals.
'Once you make up your mind to cross a river by walking through, you do not
complain of getting your stomach wet'.
(b) Moral Teaching:Once you put your hand to the plough you do not look behind.
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