“Next, thou wilt have to cross,” continued the hoopoe, “the Valley of Unity, the place where all things are stripped away and made one. All those who raise their heads in this desert draw them from one and the same collar. Though thou seest many individuals, in reality there are but a few; nay, what am I saying? there is but one. Like this multitude
ANSWER OF A SPIRITUAL MADMAN
A man of eminence said to a spiritual madman: “What is the world? Explain it to me!” — “This world,” said the madman, “which is full of honour and infamy, is like a palm tree made of wax imbued with a hundred colours. If anyone handles this tree, it becomes once more an amorphous mass of wax. Since wax alone matters, go, and be convinced that the colours Thou admiredst are not worth a farthing. Since there is unity, there can be no duality; there neither I nor thou can arise.”
ANSWER OF A SPIRITUAL MADMAN
A man of eminence said to a spiritual madman: “What is the world? Explain it to me!” — “This world,” said the madman, “which is full of honour and infamy, is like a palm tree made of wax imbued with a hundred colours. If anyone handles this tree, it becomes once more an amorphous mass of wax. Since wax alone matters, go, and be convinced that the colours Thou admiredst are not worth a farthing. Since there is unity, there can be no duality; there neither I nor thou can arise.”
An old woman once went to Bû Al and offered him a sheet of gold paper, saying, “Accept this from me.” The schaïkh said to her, “I have bound myself to accept nothing from anyone but God.” The old woman at once replied to Bû Al, “Where didst thou learn to see double? Thou art not a man able, on this path, to bind or to loose. Wouldst thou indeed see several objects, if thine eye were not askew? The eye of man perceives therein nothing accessible to the senses. There is neither caaba nor pagoda. Learn from my lips the true doctrine, namely, the eternal existence of the (infinite) Being. One must never see anyone other than Him, nor recognize as permanent anyone other than Him. We are in Him, through Him, and with Him; and we may also be outside these three states. Whoever has not lost himself in the ocean of unity, though he were Adam himself, is not worthy to belong to mankind. Whether one be among the good or the wicked, one always possesses a sun of grace in the bosom of the invisible world. At last, a day will come when this sun will take thee with Him and cast aside the veil that now covers Him. Know then for certain that good and evil are unveiled to him who has reached this sun. So long as thou livest as an individual, good and evil will exist for thee; but when thou art lost (in the sun of the divine essence), all will be love. If thou remain behind in thine own existence, thou wilt see much good and much evil along thy long path. Until thou arrivest from this nothingness at the heavenly vision, thou wilt be held back by thine individuality. Would to God that thou wert now as thou wast before existing as an individual! That is to say, in the nothingness of existence. Be wholly purified of evil qualities; then be like the earth, with wind in thy hand. Knowest thou not that there are impurities and filth in every body? The serpent and the scorpion are within thee, behind the veil; they are asleep and as though annihilated; but if thou touchest them ever so slightly, each will have the strength of a hundred dragons. Thus there is for each of us an inferno full of serpents. If thou dost not act, they act infernally. If thou keepest thyself from these unclean beasts, thou wilt sleep peacefully upon the earth; otherwise, these serpents and scorpions will bite thee fiercely beneath the very dust of the tomb, until the Day of Reckoning.
But, O hoopoe, cease thy metaphorical discourse and resume the description of the mysterious valley of unity. When the spiritual traveller has entered this valley, he disapp