In Book Five, Section 35 of the Masnavi, Rumi introduces the concept of the 'consumer and the consumed' (آکل و ماکول) to illustrate the perilous nature of the material world. He uses the metaphor of a bird hunting a worm while remaining completely oblivious to the cat or falcon waiting to hunt it. This chain of predation signifies that everything in creation, with the sole exception of God, is simultaneously a predator and prey. The allegory serves as a spiritual warning to humanity against becoming entirely absorbed in worldly pursuits and remaining ignorant of one's own mortality and ultimate reckoning.