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6
2463-2512

  • The vulgar do not pay homage to a venerable Shaykh and leader without some mischievous idea associated (with their homage).
  • This is their good: what must their evil be? Distinguish their (inward) foulness from their (outward) fairness.”
  • Parable.
  • A king was going to the congregational mosque, and the marshals and mace-bearers were beating the people off. 2465
  • The wielder of the stick would break the head of one and tear to bits the shirt of another.
  • A poor wretch amidst the throng received ten blows with the stick without (having committed) any offence. “Begone,” they cried, “get out of the way!”
  • Dripping blood, he turned his face to the king and said, “Behold the manifest iniquity: why ask of that which is hidden?
  • This is thy good: (thou doest this whilst) thou art going to the mosque; what must thy evil and burden (of sin) be, O misguided one?”
  • The Pír (Elder) never hears a salaam from a base fellow without being exceedingly tormented by him in the end. 2470
  • (If) a wolf catch a saint, it is better than that the saint should be caught by the wicked carnal soul,
  • Because, though the wolf does great violence, yet it has not the same knowledge and craft and cunning;
  • Else how should it fall into the trap? Cunning is complete (attains to perfection) in man.
  • The ram said to the ox and the camel, “O comrades, since such a (lucky) chance has come to us,
  • Let each (of us) declare the date (antiquity) of his life: the oldest has the best right, let the others suffer (disappointment) in silence. 2475
  • In those times,” said the ram, “my pasturage was (shared) with the ram that was sacrificed for Ismá‘íl (Ishmael).”
  • The ox said, “I am the (most) advanced in years, (I was) coupled with the ox that Adam yoked.
  • I am the yoke-fellow of the ox with which Adam, the forefather of mankind, used to plough the earth in sowing.”
  • When the camel heard the ox and the ram (make these assertions) he was amazed: he lowered his head and picked up that (bunch of grass).
  • Promptly, without any palaver, the Bactrian camel raised the bunch of fresh barley in the air, 2480
  • Saying, “I, in sooth, need no (support from) chronology, since I have such a (stout) body and high neck.
  • Indeed every one knows, O father's darling, that I am not smaller than you.
  • Whoever is one of those possessed of intelligence knows this, that my nature is superior to yours.”
  • (The Christian said), “All know that this lofty heaven is a hundred times as great as this low earth.
  • How can the wide expanse of the celestial domains be compared with the (limited) character of the terrestrial regions?” 2485
  • How the Moslem in reply told his companions, the Jew and the Christian, what he had seen (in his dream), and how they were disappointed.
  • Then the Moslem said, “O my friends, to me came Mustafá (Mohammed), my sovereign,
  • And said to me, ‘That one (the Jew) has sped to Sinai with him (Moses) to whom God spake, and has played the game of love (with God);
  • And the other (the Christian) has been carried by Jesus, the Lord of happy star, to the zenith of the Fourth Heaven.
  • Arise, O thou who hast been left behind and hast suffered injury, at least eat up the sweetmeat and comfit!
  • Those (two) talented and accomplished men have pushed forward and have read the book of fortune and honour. 2490
  • Those two eminent men have attained to their (proper) eminence and because of their talents have mingled with the angels.
  • Hark, O foolish simpleton who hast been left behind, jump up and seat thyself beside the bowl of halwá!’”
  • Thereupon they said to him, “Then, you greedy fellow, have you made a meal of the halwá and khabís? Oh, (what) an astonishing thing!”
  • He replied, “When that sovereign who is obeyed (by all) gave the order, who was I that I should resist it?
  • Will you, Jew, rebel against the command of Moses if he summon you (either) in a fair cause or a foul? 2495
  • Can you, Christian, ever spurn the command of Christ (whether) for good or evil?
  • How, (then), should I rebel against the Glory of the prophets? I have eaten the halwá and now I am happy.”
  • Then they said to him, “By God, you have dreamed a true dream, and ’tis better than a hundred dreams of ours.
  • Your dreaming is waking, O gleeful one, for its effect (reality) is made evident by (your) waking (and eating the sweetmeat).”
  • Abandon eminence and (worldly) energy and skill: what matters is service (rendered to God) and a goodly disposition. 2500
  • For this (object) God brought us forth (from non-existence): “I did not create mankind except to serve Me.”
  • How did that knowledge (of his) profit Sámirí, whom the skill (shown in making the golden Calf) banished from God's door?
  • What did Qárún gain by his alchemy? See how the earth bore him down to its abyss.
  • What, after all, did Bu ’l-Hakam (Abú Jahl) get from (intellectual) knowledge? On account of his unbelief he went headlong into Hell.
  • Know that (true) knowledge consists in seeing fire plainly, not in prating that smoke is evidence of fire. 2505
  • O you whose evidence in the eyes of the Sage is really more stinking than the evidence of the physician,
  • Since you have no evidence but this, O son, eat dung and inspect urine!
  • O you whose evidence is like the staff in your hand (which) indicates that you suffer from blindness,
  • (All this) noise and pompous talk and assumption of authority (only means), “I cannot see: (kindly) excuse me.”
  • How the Sayyid, the King of Tirmid, proclaimed that he would give robes of honour and horses and slave-boys and slave-girls and a large sum in gold to any one who would go on urgent business to Samarcand (and complete the journey) in three or four days; and how Dalqak, having heard the news of this proclamation in the country (where he then was), came post-haste to the king, saying, “I, at all events, cannot go.”
  • The sagacious Dalqak was the buffoon (court-jester) of the Sayyid of Tirmid, who reigned in that place (city). 2510
  • He (the king) had an urgent affair in Samarcand, and wanted a courier in order that he might conclude it.
  • (Therefore) he proclaimed that he would bestow (his) treasures on any one who should bring him news from there in five days.