This story tells about an old man and how he managed to discipline his five sons to work together. The moral of the story is if you stick together as a family, no one will ever be able to break through your strong bonds and ties.
In a small village far away from the town, there lived an old man and his five sons. His wife was no longer around so he did not have a lot of time to take care of his sons and discipline them. He had to work in the farm and gather enough food and sell to get money to buy food and clothes for his sons.
As a result, his sons grew up to become very mischievous and they were always fighting every single day. The old man was becoming older and he knew that he would soon be gone and will not be able to take care of his sons.
He was very worried about how they would survive without him as they would be fighting every day.
One day, the old man had an idea to teach his sons to stop fighting and work together. He told his sons to go out and gather wood for the fireplace. They did as they were told and they went out to gather wood. Some of them had more wood than the others and when they went back home, they were fighting among themselves to get more wood.
Then the old man came and asked his sons to take a stick of wood each and break them into half. It was very easy and they broke it easily.
Next the old man asked each of his sons to take two sticks of wood and break them into half. It was a little harder but they broke it as well.
Lastly, the old man took five sticks of wood and asked them to break it. One by one, his sons tried to break it but they could not.
The old man then told his sons, “This wood is like you. If you are alone, someone else can break you and attack you easily. But if the five of you stick together as one, then no one will ever be able to break you.”
From that day on, his sons were always united and they worked hard together and they lived happily ever after.