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A king, out of his grace, had chosen a servant above all his retinue. His stipend was the allowance of forty emirs; a hundred viziers did not possess a tenth of his worth. Through the perfection of fortune, prosperity, and luck, he was an Ayaz, and the king was the Mahmud of the time. His soul, in its original essence, had been connected and akin to the king's soul before this bodily existence. What matters is that which was attained before the body; leave aside these things which have newly occurred. The work of the gnostic is straight because he is not squint-eyed; his eye is fixed upon the first sowings. Whether they sowed wheat or barley, his eye is mortgaged there day and night. Whatever the night is pregnant with, it gives birth to nothing but that; all tricks and stratagems are but wind. How should he whose heart is cheerful be pleased with ample stratagems, when he sees the stratagem of God over his head? He is within a snare and yet he sets a snare; your soul escapes neither from that nor from this. Whether a hundred plants grow or wither, in the end, that which was sown by God will sprout. They sow a new crop upon the first crop; this second is transient, while that first is sound. The first seed is perfect and choice; the second seed is corrupt and decayed. Cast this planning of yours before the Friend, although your planning is itself of His planning. What matters is that which God has raised up; in the end, that which was first sown will grow. Whatever you sow, sow it for His sake, since you are a captive of friendship, O lover! Do not hover around the thieving carnal soul and its business; whatever is not the work of God is nothing, absolutely nothing. Before the Day of Judgment becomes manifest, the night-thief is disgraced before the Owner. The goods stolen by his planning and art remain hanging on his neck on the Day of Judgment. A hundred thousand intellects spring up together to lay a snare other than His snare; They only find their own snare to be tighter; how can chaff show any strength against the wind? If you say, 'What was the benefit of existence?' there is benefit in your very question, O obstinate one! If this question of yours has no benefit, why should we listen to it as something vain and unprofitable? And if your question has many benefits, then why, after all, should the world be without benefit? And even if the world is without benefit from one aspect, it is full of profit from other aspects. If your benefit is of no benefit to me, since it is of benefit to you, do not cease from it. Joseph's beauty was a benefit to a whole world, although to his brothers it was vain and redundant. The melody of David was so beloved, yet to the deprived it was like the beating of a stick. The water of the Nile was greater than the Water of Life, yet to the deprived and denier it was blood. To the believer, martyrdom is life; to the hypocrite, it is death and decay. Tell me, what single blessing is there in the world from which some community is not excluded? What benefit is there to a cow or an ass in sugar? Every soul has a different nourishment. But if that food is accidental to it, then advising it is like training it. Like one who, due to disease, loved eating clay, although he thinks that is his very nourishment; He has forgotten the original nourishment and turned his face toward the nourishment of disease. He has left the sweet draught and swallowed poison; he has taken the nourishment of the malady as a delicacy. The original nourishment of mankind is the Light of God; animal nourishment is unbefitting for him. But because of disease, the heart fell into this, so that day and night it eats of this water and clay. With a yellow face, weak feet, and a faint heart, where is the nourishment of 'By the heaven that has paths'? That is the food of the favorites of spiritual fortune; the eating of it is without throat and instrument. The food of the sun came from the Light of the Throne, while the food of the envious and the devil is from the smoke of the earth. Concerning the martyrs, God said, 'They are provided with sustenance'; that food had neither mouth nor dish. The heart receives nourishment from every friend; the heart derives clarity from every knowledge. The form of every human being is like a cup; the eye is a sensitive organ for its meaning. From meeting anyone, you consume something; from the conjunction of every companion, you carry away something. When a star is conjoined with a star, an effect suited to both is surely produced. From the conjunction of man and woman, human beings are born; from the conjunction of stone and iron, sparks arise. From the conjunction of the earth with rains, fruits, greenery, and sweet basil grow. From the conjunction of greenery with man come delight of heart, freedom from grief, and cheerfulness. From the conjunction of cheerfulness with our soul are born our goodness and beneficence. Our bodies become fit to be consumed when our desire is attained through recreation. The ruddiness of the face comes from the conjunction of blood; blood becomes beautifully red from the sun. The best of colors is redness, and that is from the sun and comes from it. Any land that becomes conjoined with Saturn becomes brackish, and there is no place for sowing in it. Potentiality comes into action from conjunction, like the conjunction of the devil with hypocrites. These meanings belong to the Ninth Heaven, without all this pomp and circumstance. Pomp and circumstance is borrowed for creatures; for the Divine Command, pomp and circumstance is the very essence. For the sake of pomp and circumstance, they endure humiliation; in the hope of glory, they are happy in humiliation. In the hope of a ten-day glory of being a ruler, they have made their necks thin as a spindle from grief. Why do they not come here where I am, where in this glory I am a shining sun? The rising-place of the sun is a pitch-black tower; our Sun is outside of all rising-places. Its rising-place is in relation to its particles; its Essence has neither risen nor set. We, who are the remaining particles of it, are in both worlds a sun without shadow. Wonderfully, I revolve around the Sun; this cause itself is from the glory of the Sun. The Sun is cognizant of all causes, and by it the cord of causes is cut. A hundred thousand times have I cut off hope—from whom? From the Sun? Do you believe this? Do not believe me that I can have patience without the Sun, or a fish without water. And if I become hopeless, my hopelessness is the very handiwork of the Sun, O Hasan! How can the very handiwork sever itself from the Maker? How can anything that exists graze on non-existence? All existences graze in this meadow, whether they be the celestial steed Buraq, swift Arab horses, or asses. And he who has not seen the turnings of that sea, turns his face to a new altar at every moment. He drank salty water from the sweet sea, until the salty water made him blind. The Sea says, 'Drink with the right hand from my water, O blind man, so that you may gain sight.' The 'right hand' here is the right opinion, which knows where good and evil come from. There is a spear-turner, O spear, that makes you turn straight sometimes and sometimes bent. We are nail-less from the love of Shams-i Din, otherwise we would make that blind man see. Behold, O Ziya-ul-Haqq Husam-ul-Din, quickly cure the blindness of the envious one's eye! The collyrium of majesty, swift in action, the medicine that destroys darkness and is hostile to contention; That which, if applied to the eye of a blind man, would eradicate a hundred years of darkness from him. Cure all the blind except the envious one, who out of envy brings denial against you. To your envious one, even if that be I, do not give life, so that I may continue to gasp and struggle for life. He who is envious of the Sun, and he who is vexed by the existence of the Sun— What an incurable pain is his, for which he sighs! What a one fallen forever into the bottom of the well! His desire is the negation of the Eternal Sun; tell me, how shall this desire of his ever be fulfilled? The falcon is that which returns to the King; but blind is the falcon that has lost the way. It lost the way and fell into a ruin; the falcon fell among owls in the ruin. It is all light from the light of divine pleasure, but the officer of Destiny made it blind. Destiny threw dust in its eyes, led it astray, and delivered it to the ruin and the owls. The owls strike it on the head from above, and pluck its delicate wings and feathers. A clamor arose among the owls: 'Behold, a falcon has come to take our place!' Like angry and dreadful street dogs, they fell upon the stranger's tattered cloak. The falcon says: 'What have I to do with owls? I have sacrificed a hundred such ruins to the owls.' 'I will not remain here, I am going; I am returning to the King of kings.' 'Do not trouble yourselves, O owls, for I am not a resident; I am going back to my homeland.' 'This ruined place is a thriving city in your eyes, but for me, the forearm of the King is the place of pride.' The owl said: 'The falcon is practicing deceit, so that he may uproot you from your home and hearth.' 'He will seize our homes by cunning and drive us out of our nests by hypocrisy.' 'This trickster affects satisfaction and fullness, but by God, he is greedier than all the greedy!' 'Out of greed, he eats clay like syrup; O friends, do not entrust the fat tail to the bear!' 'He boasts of the King and of the King's hand, so that he may lead us, the Solomons of the ruin, astray.' 'What kinship is there between a tiny bird and the King? Do not listen to him if you have a little intellect.' 'Is he of the same kind as the King or the vizier? Is garlic ever fit for a walnut-pastry?' 'That which he says out of deceit, trickery, and art: The King with his retinue is seeking me—' 'What an unacceptable melancholy is this! What a raw boast and a snare to catch fools!' 'Whoever believes this does so out of foolishness; how is a thin little bird fit for royalty?' 'If the least of the owls strikes him on his brain, where is any helper for him from the King?' The falcon said: 'If a single feather of mine is broken, the King of kings will uproot the land of owls.' 'What is an owl? If even another falcon of the King grieves my heart...'