A soldier charged with keeping watch and fallen desperately in love was thus without sleep or rest, by night and by day. One of his friends said to him: “O thou who art deprived of sleep! at least, then, sleep one night.” — “Love,” he replied, “is suited to my duty as sentry; for can these two things permit one to sleep? Since sleep
Such a feeling ill beseems a soldier who keeps watch; it is to his advantage that he be in love. Since such a feeling, which consists in risking one’s life, has taken possession of me, it is identified with my duty, and my duty falls within its domain! How could I find the least sleep, since I can borrow it from nowhere? Every night love puts me to the test, and thus makes me keep watch.
Sometimes, indeed, this lover would go about striking with his mace; at other times, in his grief, he would strike his face and head. If, by chance, deprived as he was of sleep and food, he fell asleep for a moment, he would dream of his love. He let no one pass throughout the night without crying, “Who goes there?” unless he were asleep.
Such a feeling ill beseems a soldier who keeps watch; it is to his advantage that he be in love. Since such a feeling, which consists in risking one’s life, has taken possession of me, it is identified with my duty, and my duty falls within its domain! How could I find the least sleep, since I can borrow it from nowhere? Every night love puts me to the test, and thus makes me keep watch.
Sometimes, indeed, this lover would go about striking with his mace; at other times, in his grief, he would strike his face and head. If, by chance, deprived as he was of sleep and food, he fell asleep for a moment, he would dream of his love. He let no one pass throughout the night without crying, “Who goes there?” unless he were asleep.
A friend once said to him, “You, whom the zeal of your duties and the fervour of your love occupy! You have not a moment’s sleep during the night.” The watchman replied, “Sleep must be a stranger to the sentinel. Just as the lover’s face should have no water (honour) upon it but tears, so wakefulness befits the sentinel. He must be accustomed to keeping watch, as lovers are to disgrace. How can sleep come when one weeps instead of sleeping? When one is at once a sentinel and a lover, sleep at once departs from one’s eyes. Love is pleasant to the sentinel, for sleeplessness has entered into his very nature. Will he to whom sleeplessness is pleasant ever be fit for sleep?”
Sleep not, O man, if thou seekest spiritual things; but if thou art content merely to speak of them, then sleep becomes thee. Keep close watch over the path of thy heart, for there are thieves about. The road is beset by thieves of the heart; therefore protect the jewel of thy heart from these brigands.
Sleep not, O man, if thou seekest spiritual things; but if thou art content merely to speak of them, then sleep becomes thee. Keep close watch over the path of thy heart, for there are thieves about. The road is beset by thieves of the heart; therefore protect the jewel of thy heart from these brigands.
When thou shalt have acquired the virtue of keeping watch over thy heart, thy love for spiritual knowledge will swiftly reveal itself. Now this knowledge will assuredly come to man through wakefulness amid the ocean of his heart’s blood. He who has long endured wakefulness has had his heart awakened when he drew near to God. Since one must forgo sleep to have an awakened heart, sleep little, that thou mayest preserve the heart’s fidelity. I must repeat to thee, when thy being crumbles: “He who loses himself in the ocean of beings must utter no cry of lament. True lovers have gone forth to plunge into sleep, drunk with love. Beat thy head, for these excellent men have done what was needful.” He who has truly tasted spiritual love holds in his hand the key to both worlds. If one is a woman, one becomes an astonishing man, and if one is a man, one becomes a deep ocean.