Original content

English translation

Book Three — Section 228 — The Lover Finding the Beloved, and Exposition That the Seeker Was the Finder, as in "Whoever does an atom's weight of good shall see it"

That youth had been in quest and seeking for seven years, Having become like a phantom from the phantom of union. The shadow of the Truth was over the servant's head; In the end, the seeker was the finder. The Prophet said: when you knock upon a door, In the end a head will emerge from that door. When you sit at the head of someone's lane, In the end you too will see that someone's face. When you dig earth from a well every day, In the end you will reach pure water. Everyone knows this, even if you do not believe: Whatever you sow, one day you shall reap. You struck stone against iron and no fire sprang — This does not happen; or if it does, it is a rarity. He whose fortune and salvation have deserted him — His mind looks nowhere but at rare exceptions: "That such-and-such a person sowed but reaped nothing, And that one carried off the shell, but the shell held no pearl. Bal'am Ba'ur and the accursed Iblis — Their acts of worship and religion availed them nothing." A hundred thousand prophets and wayfarers — These do not enter the mind of that ill-supposing one. He seizes upon these two, for they give darkness; What else but this would plant misfortune in his heart? Many a man has eaten bread with a glad heart, Yet it became his death, lodging in his throat. So you, O face of misfortune, do not eat bread either, Lest you fall like him into tumult and harm. A hundred thousand people are eating bread, Finding strength and nourishing their souls. Why have you fixed upon that rarity, Unless you are deprived and born a fool? This world is full of sunlight and moonlight — He has thrust his head down into a well, Saying, "If the Truth is, then where is the light?" Lift your head from the well and look, O base one! The entire world, east and west, has found that light — As long as you are in a well, it will not shine upon you. Why dally? Go toward the hall and the vineyards; Contend less here, knowing that contentiousness is ill-omened. Beware, do not say: "Look, so-and-so sowed, And in such-and-such a year locusts devoured his harvest. So why should I labor, when there is fear here? Why should I scatter this wheat from my hand?" And that one who did not abandon sowing and labor — He fills his granary, to your blindness. As he kept knocking at a door out of consolation, In the end he one day found a moment of solitude. Fleeing by night from fear of the night watchman, he leapt into the garden, And found his beloved like candle and lamp. In that moment he said to the Maker of causes: "O God, show mercy to the night watchman! O Unrecognized One, You have arranged the causes; From the gate of hell You have carried me to paradise. For this You arranged the cause of this affair: That I might not hold even a single thorn in contempt." In the breaking of the foot, the Truth bestows a wing; Even from the depths of a well He opens a door. Do not regard whether you are on a tree or in a well; Regard Me, for I am the key of the way. If you desire the remainder of this discourse, O brother, seek it in the Fourth Book.