In Attar's The Conference of the Birds, the tale of the Sheikh of Basra questioning Rabia al-Adawiyya illustrates the extreme Sufi stance on worldly detachment (Zuhd). When Rabia earns two silver coins from selling her spun yarn, she holds them in separate hands out of fear that if the coins 'pair up' (شُد سیم جفت), they will become a 'highwayman' (راهزن) to her soul. This allegory teaches that even the smallest accumulation of worldly wealth or material duality creates a distraction, laying traps for the heart and disrupting the seeker's single-minded focus on the Divine.