A certain villager had tied his ox in the barn. A lion came, ate the ox, and sat in its place. At night, the villager went to the barn and began searching for the ox by reaching into every corner and nook. He was touching the lion, stroking its back and sides up and down. The lion thought, “If there were light, he would die of fright, his heart would burst. But now he caresses and scratches me fearlessly, because in the darkness he thinks I am the ox.”
Likewise, God says, “O proud blind one, did not Mount Ṭūr shatter into pieces at My Name? If We had sent down Our Book upon a mountain, you would have seen it humbled and split asunder out of fear of Allah.” (Qur’an 59:21) “If Mount Uḥud had understood Me, rivers of blood would have flowed from that mountain.” He keeps saying this. You heard this Name from your father and mother, and that is why you cling heedlessly to this Name. If you understood this secret without imitation, by Allah’s grace you would reach a state without sign, you would become like a ḥatīf (a mysterious voice). Listen to the following story we will tell as a warning, and know the harm of imitation!
A dervish (sofi) came along the road and was a guest at a tekke (Sufi lodge). He took his donkey to the barn. With his own hand, he gave it water and feed. He did not act as in the previous story; he was cautious. But when fate arrives, what use is caution? The dervishes were poor, destitute people. Poverty nearly became a destructive kufr (disbelief).
O rich one, you are full—do not laugh at the strange behavior of that suffering poor man! Those dervishes, united in their helplessness, decided to sell the donkey. In necessity, even the impure becomes permissible. There are many bad things that, in necessity, become good and right. Immediately, they sold that little donkey and bought food. They lit candles. There was a commotion in the tekke: “Tonight there is food!” “How long will this patience last, how long this three-day fast, how long will we carry baskets and beg? We are people too, we have souls too. Tonight we have attained fortune, a guest has come,” they said.
Because they mistook what is not soul for soul, they sowed a false seed. The guest, too, had come from a distant road and was tired. He found that the dervishes were each honoring him, playing the game of hospitality in a beautiful manner, showing him affection and love. Seeing this, he said, “If I do not enjoy myself tonight, then when will I?”
They ate and began the samāʿ (spiritual audition). The tekke was filled with dust and smoke up to the ceiling. On one side, smoke from the kitchen; on another, dust from stamping feet; on another, the dervishes, in longing and ecstasy, were playing with their souls, turning the place upside down. Sometimes they clapped and stamped their feet, sometimes they swept the floor with their prostrations. In the world, a dervish without greed is rare. For this reason, the dervish is often despised and belittled.
But the dervish who is satisfied with the light of Allah and has been saved from the humiliation of begging is an exception. Yet one in a thousand dervishes is of this kind. The others live thanks to him. When the samāʿ reached its climax, the musician began to sing a Yörük semāʿi (nomad melody) in rhythm: “The donkey is gone, the donkey is gone.” All of them joined in this fervent rhythm, stamping their feet and clapping their hands with enthusiasm until dawn, saying, “O son, the donkey is gone, the donkey is gone.”
The guest dervish, too, imitated them and began to shout, “The donkey is gone!” That night of joy, that time of samāʿ and delight passed, and when morning came, all took their leave and departed. The tekke emptied, and the dervish remained. He began to dust off his belongings. He took everything he had out of his cell. He intended to load them onto his donkey and set out on the road.
In haste, he went to the barn to fetch his donkey so as to catch up with his companions, but he could not find his donkey. “The servant must have taken it to water, because it drank little last night,” he said. When the servant arrived, the dervish asked, “Where is the donkey?” The servant replied, “Feel your beard!” and a quarrel began. The dervish said, “I gave you the donkey, I entrusted it to you.
Speak properly, do not try to bring evidence. Bring me the donkey I entrusted to you. I ask from you what I gave you. Return it. The Prophet said: ‘What you take with your hand, you must return with your hand.’ If you act stubbornly and do not accept this, the court is right here, let us go.” The servant said, “All the dervishes attacked, I was defeated, left half-alive. You throw a piece of liver among cats, then go looking for it.
You throw a piece of bread before a hundred hungry people, you leave a poor cat among a hundred dogs!” The dervish said: “Suppose they took it from you by force and wronged me, a poor man like myself. But why did you not come and tell me, ‘Poor man, they are taking your donkey’? If you had told me, I would have taken it from whoever took it, or they would have shared its price among themselves and I would have accepted that.
They were all here at that time. A hundred solutions could have been found. But now each has gone his own way! Whom should I catch? To whom should I go? You started this trouble for me, let me take you to the judge and see! Why did you not come and say, ‘O stranger, you have suffered such a terrible injustice’?”
The servant said, “By Allah, I came many times and wanted to tell you about these things. But you kept saying, ‘O son, the donkey is gone.’ In fact, you were singing this tune more joyfully than all the others. So I thought, ‘He knows too, he is content with this, he is a wise man,’ and I went back.”
The dervish said: “They were all singing joyfully, and I was delighted by their words. I imitated them, and this imitation betrayed me. A hundred curses upon that imitation! Especially upon imitating such foolish people who beg for bread! Their joy reflected onto me, and because of this reflection my heart was delighted.”
The reflection that comes from friends is pleasant until you gain the power to draw water from the sea without need. Know that the first reflection is imitation. If it comes repeatedly and continuously, then know that it is real. Until you reach the true reflection, do not part from friends. Do not abandon the shell; that drop has not yet become a pearl. If you want your eye, mind, and ear to be pure, tear away the veils of greed.
For it is greed that leads the dervish astray. It leads him astray and his state becomes ruined, he remains in loss. Greed for food, pleasure, and samāʿ prevents him from comprehending the ḥaqīqa (inner reality). If the mirror had greed for something, it would become a hypocrite like us and would not show everything as it is. If the scale had greed for goods, how could it weigh accurately?
Every prophet openly said to his people, “I do not ask you for any reward for my prophethood. My proof and patron is Allah. Allah has granted my proclamation from both ends. My reward is to reach the Friend. Abū Bakr gave forty thousand dinars, but his forty thousand is not my reward. Can a bead ever resemble the pearl of Aden?” Let me tell a story; listen with the ear of your soul and understand how greed becomes a veil over a man’s ear! Whoever has greed, his tongue becomes tied. How can the eye and heart be illuminated by greed—is this possible? The illusion of rank and gold before the greedy man’s eyes is like a hair in the eye.
But the one intoxicated with God is an exception. Even if you give him treasures, he remains free. In the eyes of one who has attained union with the Beloved, this world is nothing but filth. But the dervish who is far from this intoxication, in the end, becomes without light and without a guide because of greed. The one attached to greed hears hundreds of stories, but they do not enter his greedy ear.