Gratitude in folklore can demand the ultimate sacrifice of life itself

Evidence

Lying dead beneath the bell were two magpies — the very parent magpies whose chicks he had saved that afternoon. The two birds had followed him. And in the night, understanding that their rescuer’s life depended on the ringing of the bell, the two magpies had flung themselves, again and again, with all their strength, headfirst against the great bronze bell — beating their own small bodies against it until it rang. Three times they had struck it, ringing it to save his life — and the effort had killed them both. … The lesson, Korean grandmothers say, is this: a kindness, however small, is never forgotten by a grateful heart — and gratitude, true gratitude, will give everything, even life itself, to repay a debt of love. — , A Year of World Stories, 8823

Categorization

• FICTION: Small creatures repaying a debt by self-destruction is a wrenching image — the magpies’ suicide-bell is a story beat with strong emotional torque for fiction.
• XREF: connects to: Selfless kindness directed even at inanimate objects is held up as an ideal — , A Year of World Stories, 8454; The kindness-rewarded, greed-punished tale recur in nearly every human culture independently — , A Year of World Stories, 9258; Aztec human sacrifice was rooted in repaying the gods’ original self-sacrifice — , A Year of World Stories, 10294 (+5 more)

Related

• Gratitude is the only feeling that can always be morally demanded (similarity 0.90)

Broader Connections

• Aztec human sacrifice was rooted in repaying the gods’ original self-sacrifice #exemplifies (0.85) — , A Year of World Stories, 10294
• Extreme acts of self-sacrifice can function as argument rather than abandonment of it #complicates (0.60) — Jamal Awil, The Whispering Archive, 569
• The kindness-rewarded, greed-punished tale recur in nearly every human culture independently #exemplifies (0.50) — , A Year of World Stories, 9258