In Attar's Elahi Nameh, 'The Tale of the Enamored Old Man and the Young Washerman' illustrates the overwhelming and irrational nature of earthly love as an allegory for the spiritual path. The old man becomes so completely infatuated with the beautiful youth that he loses his reason, and his intellect turns into madness ('junun'). In Sufi literature, this state of being rendered utterly helpless and devoid of conventional wisdom by love signifies the seeker's necessary surrender of the intellect and ego in the face of divine attraction.