Charity begins at home ‘Charity begins at home’ – meaning and explanation

Our Parents are Our First Teachers
It is rightly said that our parents are our first teachers. We learn a lot from them. Children observe their parents and begin to inculcate their habits subconsciously. After a certain period of time, most of them begin to behave and react in a similar manner as their parents. It thus becomes the duty of the parents to behave responsibly. ‘Charity begins at home’ has two interpretations. One of these is that if the parents are involved in charity, the kids shall learn and inculcate this habit too.
As explained above, children imbibe the gestures and mannerisms of their parents knowingly or unknowingly and begin to behave in a similar way. The phrase, charity begins at home’ implies the same. However, here the writer is specifically talking about indulging in charitable acts. If the parents and grandparents are involved in charitable tasks, the children will carry forward the legacy.
However, people must first ensure that their close relations are intact and that they have fulfilled all their responsibilities at home. Only when they have ensured this should they go ahead and indulge in charitable tasks.
Fables Related to ‘Charity Begins at Home’
There are many moral stories that explain this phrase. One such story with a deep moral lesson is as follows:
Once upon a time, a king decided to visit distant areas of his kingdom to see how the people of his kingdom were doing. He spent hours walking on foot to meet people and understand their needs. As he came back to his palace, he was extremely tired and his feet hurt badly as he had to walk on stony paths which he wasn’t used to. Since he wanted to visit the place regularly to connect better with his people and serve them, he ordered his men to cover the entire land with leather so that he wouldn’t have to face similar pain again.
Now, this meant slaughtering thousands of animals in order to get leather from their skin. Though the idea did not seem great, his servants nodded in affirmation just when one of them gathered the courage to give him an alternate idea. He said that instead of slaughtering so many animals to cover the entire land, why doesn’t he just get his feet covered by leather to avoid them from hurting. The king liked the idea and went for it.
Thereafter, he went to distant areas within his kingdom and worked upon improving his kingdom and the life of the people living there. This was only possible with a pair of shoes. Without them he would not have been able to visit these areas so often and would not have been able to connect well with his people and work for their betterment.
The story gives a meaningful message. In order to help others, we must first help ourselves. The phrase, ‘charity begins at home’ suggests the same. We should first help ourselves and those close to us only then we shall be able to do good to the society.