The Book of Rumi, page 14
The Moslem had his answer, thanked the mufti graciously, and left for the mosque.
Charity
In Zarvan, a beautiful and quiet village in Yemen, there lived a pious man who was a prosperous farmer. He was blessed with a most pleasant demeanor and a kind heart. He was also the fairest and most generous man in the village. Whatever he generated, whether a good crop or a profitable business transaction, he always contributed one-fifth of it to the poor, as Islam decreed. He never failed to remember, though, who was the ultimate provider of his wealth.
The farmer's home, because of his charity and benevolence, had become a safe house for many who were down on their luck. Penniless Sufi darvishes lived there from time to time, as well as travelers who had nowhere else to stay when they passed through Zarvan; additionally, the village's poorest residents would come and go regularly when they were in need.
The farmer was famous in the region; people knew that he always separated out what he intended to distribute to the poor from what he himself would take home for his personal needs. Out of every batch of wheat that he harvested, he put aside one-fifth of it for charity, and the bread he baked with it was always distributed among the needy. The farmer was sure that, come what may, he would maintain this altruistic routine until his dying day. However, he was not so sure about his children, whether they would follow his example. In fact, he was fairly certain that they wouldn't, seeing the way they looked at him whenever he distributed to the needy what they believed was their personal share of his wealth.
The farmer knew instinctively that what he gave away was not simply wealth flowing out the door but in fact a long-term investment. He believed that if one gave away the zakat, or one-fifth portion, of any gain, God would in turn guarantee a bountiful return. He was certain that sowing his seeds, tending to his fields and crops every year, and working hard at his livelihood were merely abilities that had been gifted to him, and that the true provider of life was only God.
He advised his children regularly to continue his ways, but he knew that they were against him and would never do as he wished. When it came to his children, he was merely sowing seeds in a salt field.
The farmer eventually passed away and, just as he had suspected, his children were uncharitable with the family's wealth and shut their door to the needy. Soon, their farms became unyielding and were left to rot, while the darvishes stopped passing through those parts entirely, keeping their blessed presence far from Zarvan and its people forever.
Majnoun
A great many love stories have been told through all time, but the story of Majnoun and his love for Laily is exceptionally renowned the world over. Majnoun had fallen ill, and he knew exactly why: he had been separated from his beloved Laily far too long. The torture of not being in her presence had demoralized Majnoun, weakening his already frail body. He coughed incessantly and breathed only with great difficulty, unable to eat or drink. His friends eventually called a physician, who promised to do what he could to restore Majnoun to health. After thoroughly examining him, the physician announced that diphtheria had struck the lonesome lover.
“So, what's the solution?” the friends inquired impatiently.
“I know of no other treatment but to bleed him!” decreed the doctor. “Unless we rid him of the infected blood, he won't even survive the night.” Immediately, the physician sent for the local bleeder, for this procedure needed an expert.
Majnoun, who had fallen into a semiconscious state, heard the physician's plan for treatment and made a great effort to sit up in his sickbed. The doctor tried to dissuade him from expending energy while attempting to lash down his arm with a strong piece of cloth, preparing him for the swift, razor-sharp cuts that would initiate the bleeding procedure, but Majnoun signaled that he wished to speak. “Leave me alone!” he yelled out as he shook his arm free.
“But my good man, you won't survive the night!” the physician tried to convince him.
“So be it! If my dilapidated body wishes to leave this earth, then that's what shall happen.”
The friends, the bleeder, and the physician, who all knew that Majnoun had shown genuine courage in several escapades he'd been party to in the past, wondered if he'd now lost his nerve and was afraid to be cut.
“Majnoun,” called out an old friend. “Since when are you afraid of a few tiny cuts? You, who I know has faced down wild beasts on several occasions in unknown lands, why be scared of this?”
“I'm not afraid of being cut; my entire body is in fact covered with love cuts,” he responded dreamily. “I no longer exist, for my whole being has been taken over by my love for Laily. I'm simply afraid that if you cut me, you might be cutting her at the same time! Only those who are particularly sensitive can tell that there's no difference between Laily and me, that we're one and the same!”
Having spoken his mind, Majnoun turned his back on those who sought to help him and refused to be touched, instinctively protecting the love of his life, Laily.
The Water Carrier's Donkey
In the past, cities did not generally have running water, and therefore a water carrier would go from house to house to provide people with their daily water needs. In the capital city, there was an old water carrier who owned a donkey who'd pulled the man's water cart faithfully all his life. The poor beast's back had been bent in two because of the weight he had to carry every day, and his body was covered with untreated scabs and cuts.
His owner, not a great animal lover, did not feed the poor animal properly, because he could only afford old hay. The minute he mounted the donkey to make him walk faster, he'd beat him heartlessly with his whip, inflicting yet more wounds on the poor animal. The donkey, blessed with patience, obedience, and good temperament, wished every single day for God to take his life and free him from his constant suffering.
One day as they were doing their rounds, they bumped into the water carrier's old friend, who tended the sultan's stables. When the man saw the sorry state of the donkey, he was quite taken aback: “What's the matter with him? Why does he look so spent?”
“It's no fault of his,” the owner was quick to reply. “He looks like this because I can't afford to feed him.”
“Let me take him with me to the stables and tend to him. I'll feed him properly and let him revive a little,” offered the friend generously.
The water carrier couldn't be happier with the offer and parted with his companion, hoping to pick him up the following week all plumped up and ready to serve him again. The donkey soon found himself tied up in the sultan's stables surrounded by beautiful, robust Arabian studs. When he realized what a great difference there was between himself and his new stablemates, he became disheartened and turned to God:
“Even if I'm a lowly donkey, I'm still one of Your creations! Why should there be such a difference between me and these other four-legged relatives of mine? Why should I suffer hunger all the time? Why should I endure pain all night long, able to sleep only fitfully, wishing every day that I were dead? How is it fair that these horses should live in such luxury and I be demeaned to such misery?”
The donkey rambled on and on for quite some time, feeling utterly sorry for himself, when all of a sudden, he heard a loud trumpet blowing outside. A war had broken out, and the trumpet was announcing it. In the blink of an eye, soldiers amassed inside the stable and began saddling up the Arabians, who were in fact war horses. Soon, the donkey found himself all alone in the grand stable, wondering what had just happened.
The next morning, the horses stumbled back, covered with deep cuts and arrows still wedged in their flesh, their legs loosely bandaged. A team of veterinarians arrived on the scene; they tried their best to tend to the wounds, hoping not to cause more harm to the sultan's valuable steeds.
“Oh God, forgive me!” prayed the donkey, beside himself with embarrassment for his earlier self-pity. “I'm content with my poverty; at least I've got security! I'll gladly exchange the temporary comfort of these stables for my former despicable lifestyle any day!”
The donkey was relieved to be reunited the following week with his old, cruel owner, knowing now that nothing truly is as it seems.
Catching Donkeys
Pale as a sheet of thin paper, lips purple from fright, and shivering all over, a man hurled himself through the first unlocked gate he found in the alley. The owner of the house hurried into the yard when he heard the loud bang of the gate shutting and found his old acquaintance cowering in a corner.
“Greetings, my dear friend, what brings you here so early in the morning?”
The frightened man had not yet caught his breath and could hardly speak. The owner's curiosity was further aroused.
“What have you seen that has frightened you so?” he asked compassionately.
“The shameless king has ordered all donkeys in town to be confiscated!” replied the man.
“So? If they're catching donkeys, why are you running away? You're not an ass!”
“These men are very earnest and take their job seriously,” he rationalized. “However, they're not experts and tend to make mistakes. I wouldn't be surprised if they were to get confused and nab the owner of the ass instead of the ass!”
The owner of the house stared at his friend in disbelief, not knowing how best to reply to such a comment.
Fear of Hunger
Sufi shaykhs, as a teaching method, would travel and take their murids, or students, with them, believing that traveling provided the best possible education. On one such trip, a shaykh and his murid were approaching a town that had fallen on hard times, ravaged by famine. The murid was young and inexperienced and had never faced a day of hunger in his life; therefore, he was apprehensive and focused only on the hardship that awaited him.
The shaykh was an experienced Sufi who had many years of practice in abstinence, so hunger and deprivation were hardly issues for him. Long ago he had overcome sensual attractions, and he was not going to allow thoughts of food to pollute his mind at this point in his life. Having a clear and pure mind, the shaykh could easily read his murid's obsessive thoughts and feel his fear of hunger.
When the murid was completely overwhelmed by fear and could no longer walk in a straight line, the shaykh turned to him and said: “I understand that the worry for bread has extinguished all your patience. You have given up on God and no longer believe that He will look after you!” he lamented. “But you must realize, to be hungry is to be one of God's special servants! Hunger is exclusive to God's favorites, and only they can experience it. You, my dear, don't belong to that special group, so rest assured that you shall never suffer for lack of food. God will make sure that there's always plenty to feed those who love their own stomachs, so don't trouble yourself worrying about your next meal!”
Having said his piece, the shaykh looked with pity at his murid, shook his head sadly, and continued to walk toward the famine-stricken town, wondering all the while whether his words had made any sense to the young man.
Cow on a Green Island
There is a green island that never dries up, forever spreading lush and bountiful. On this island lives a cow who feeds sumptuously on the grasses and grows fatter and healthier each day. All day long, he roams the abundant meadows and feeds without a moment's respite until dusk. Once darkness descends and the green can no longer be seen, the cow begins to fret.
“What am I going to eat tomorrow?” he agonizes. “Will there ever be any food to eat again?”
He worries himself literally thin! Every night, he loses all the weight he had put on during the previous day as he worries about the next day's provisions. In the morning, he's a mere shell of the cow he was the night before, looking lanky and unkempt. He can hardly walk straight from lack of strength and feels that it's his last day alive.
As the sun begins to shine and the greenery again becomes apparent, the cow cannot contain his joy. Without losing another moment, he pounces on the grasses, which have grown through the night until they now reach the underside of his belly, and eats as though he'd been famished for years. As he eats, he puts back on the weight that he'd lost during the night and soon becomes as fat and as strong as the day before. This cycle is repeated regularly; the cow frets all night and loses weight, and the next day, when he sees the grasses, he feeds on them and puts the weight back on.
“I spend my days grazing on this grass, but I lose all the goodness I gain from it in the nighttime, when I worry about not finding any grass to eat the next day,” the cow occasionally ponders. “But every day there's plenty of fresh grass again for me to consume, and I do so happily. The supply never vanishes, but I don't seem to have any faith in it. I wonder why I behave this way—what kind of diseased thinking is this? What I gain during the day, I myself destroy in the night! Why can't I change? This has become my ingrained behavior, and there's nothing I can do about it.”
While he's aware that he's taking the wrong approach to life, nevertheless the cow is unable to change. Habit has become so deeply implanted in his mind that there's no place for trust.
The Zoroastrian and the Moslem
Two men had been friends since childhood; one was a Moslem and the other a Zoroastrian. One day as they were drinking coffee, the Moslem turned to his friend and suggested: “My friend, how about you finally becoming a good Moslem?”
“If God wills it, I will convert,” said the Zoroastrian cunningly.
“Allah wants you to turn to Him so that He can save you from hell, but it's your menacing ego that pulls you back toward disbelief.”
“I know you as a fair man, my friend,” replied the Zoroastrian gravely. “When that which you call the ego has conquered and continues to rule me, I've no choice but to obey it, for it is far more powerful than me. I would never dare think that anything in the world can be done without the will of God; therefore, I conclude that if He truly wanted me not to be a Zoroastrian, He wouldn't have made me one!
“If your Allah holds absolute supremacy and dominates all realms but still can't pull me toward Him, then His will does not exceed all. So, what's the use of me converting? He has bestowed free will on us, and we're responsible for putting it to good use, which I hope I'm doing!”
Having spoken his mind, the Zoroastrian continued to sit beside the Moslem, both quietly sipping their coffee in peace.
True Servitude
A destitute man was standing by the side of the road one day, hoping to receive alms from passersby, when he saw a group of men walking toward him dressed in colorful silk livery with brilliant, bejeweled belts. He had never seen people like these before and asked a person standing nearby: “Who might they be? Which kings and notables are they?”
“They're not kings or dignitaries; they're the servants of Omid of Khorasan, one of the sultan's ministers.”
As soon as the poor man heard this, he turned to God in despair and let the words roll off his tongue: “God, why don't You, too, look after Your servants like Omid of Khorasan does?”
The poor man uttered these ungrateful words out of desperation, for he never had enough clothes to keep warm or enough food to stave off his chronic hunger. But not long after the incident, the sultan turned against Omid, accusing him of treachery, binding his arms and legs, and throwing him in prison. He ordered Omid's servants to be arrested, tortured, and interrogated until they divulged where Omid had hidden his treasure.
For an entire month, the innocent servants were tortured day and night. The frustrated tormentors threatened to cut out their tongues if they didn't reveal where the treasure was kept, but none of them spoke. In the end, the sultan became exasperated and ordered them to be killed. Their limbs were severed from their bodies, their tongues were cut out, and their corpses were thrown into a sewage-filled ditch outside town.
That very same night, when the poor man who had earlier cried out in despair at the wealth of Omid's servants was soundly asleep in the dark, damp entryway of a neighborhood mosque, he had a revealing dream. In his dream, a holy man approached him, saying: “This is a lesson for you! You must learn how to be a true servant, like Omid's men. Only then may you approach the door of God and be worthy of seeking His grace!”
Love Pulls the Ear
Majnoun and Laily's love affair was known to everyone, but some doubted its sincerity. One day, a group of suspecting men, whose vision was clearly constrained by their inferior intelligence, bumped into Majnoun as he wandered through the streets, his head filled with thoughts of Laily.
“Hello, Majnoun,” one of the men called out. “We've been wondering about it for some time and can't figure out why you're so madly in love with Laily. She's no beauty—what do you see in her?”
Majnoun was caught off guard; his mind was totally occupied with thoughts of his beloved and couldn't exactly catch the men's train of thought. He looked at them with bafflement.
“Majnoun, don't look so surprised; we're serious! If you come with us, we'll introduce you to lots of beautiful girls, and you'll never look at Laily again!” another of the men boasted, quite pleased with himself.
“Your eyes are blind,” Majnoun retorted. “You can never see her beauty! Not like I do! To only grasp what's on the surface is the reaction of an idiot!”
He turned to walk away but changed his mind and came back to the cluster of men.
“Let me tell you something,” he asserted, his voice rising with each new phrase. “To only perceive what's visible to the eye is like having a beautiful jug but being oblivious to the real beauty of the wine inside, because you can only see the container. I drink from a pitcher, and I taste the delectable wine; but if you drink from the same vessel, God will only allow you to taste vinegar. Laily's love will never enter your hearts. Love for her shall never pull your ear. I'll taste honey from a pot while you'll taste poison. Every person sees what he chooses to see.”
