بِسۡمِ ٱللهِ ٱلرَّحۡمَـٰنِ ٱلرَّحِيمِ

"There is one thing in this world which you must never forget to do. If you forget everything else and not this, you've nothing to worry about. But if you remember everything else and forget this, then you will have done nothing in your life.

It's as if a King had sent you to some country to do a task and you perform a hundred other deeds but not the one he asked you to do. So human beings come to this world to do particular work. That work is the purpose and each is specific to the person.

If you don't do it, it's as if a priceless Indian sword were used to slice rotten meat. It's a golden bowl, being used to cook turnip when one filing from that bowl could buy a hundred suitable pots.

It's like a knife of the finest tempering nailed onto the wall to hang things on. You say, `But look, I'm using the dagger, it's not lying idle!' Do you hear how ludicrous that sounds? For a penny, an iron nail could be bought to serve for that. `But I spend my energies on lofty enterprises, I study jurisprudence, and philosophy and logic and astronomy and medicine and all the rest...' But consider why you do these things. They are all branches of your Self. The deep root of your being. The Presence of your Lord.

Give your life to the One who already owns your breath and your moments! If you don't, you will be exactly like the man who takes a precious dagger and hammers it into the kitchen wall for a peg to hold his dipper gourd. You'll be wasting valuable keenness and foolishly ignoring your dignity and your purpose. Give your life to the One who already owns your breath and your moments!"

- Jalal'uddin al-Rumi q.s. -


"Everyone knows the story of Noah, peace be upon him. He is one of the five greatest prophets of God. He called on his people day and night for years, asking them to leave their evildoing, to repent and return to love of God and His worship and to abstain from wrong. His people rejected him repeatedly and scoffed at him. As much as he preached they rejected his teachings.

However he was patient and continued to preach to them. They never let up in their mockery of him. So it continued for years and years, and Noah was persistent and patient. He did not tire of calling his people to truth and goodness, and they in turn did not tire of scoffing at him. This continued for decades, a century, two centuries, and Noah was patient and persistent. Three centuries, four, five...

After nine centuries of non-stop preaching accompanied by endless mockery and rejection, Noah reached his limit. Finally he asked God to punish his people and to send a flood upon them and not leave a single one of them alive. As he was a prophet of God, God was obliged to answer his prayer. We know what came to pass.

Once some time after having been saved from the flood, the Lord addressed Noah saying, "O my servant, I am asking you to go and with your utmost care make for Me forty clay jugs." As he was an obedient servant and a great prophet, Noah immediately went about complying with this order. He gathered the finest clay he could find and spent days and nights laboring with love to create 40 beautiful clay jugs.

After so much effort, the Lord then addressed Noah again saying: "O my servant, now that you have made these forty jugs, go outside and take each one and throw it down upon the rocks." Noah, an obedient servant, had no choice but to obey. He took the jugs which he had spent so much effort in making, and one-by-one smashed them against the rocks.

Then the Lord addressed Noah, saying: "Oh Noah, you made forty clay jugs, and it was odious to you to break them. Do you think that it was a pleasure for Me to kill all of My servants, even though they were unbelievers?" Then Noah began to cry and wail. So proverbial was his wailing that "Nuh" came to mean "wail" in Arabic."

- Excerpted from: Mercy Oceans: Oceans of Unity -

don't tell me i had enough
don't stop me from having more
my soul isn't yet satisfied

last night an intoxicated friend
handed me his wine jar
i broke the jar in spite of my desire

i'm not enslaved
by my craving body
i'll not pollute this endless longing

i've broken the barriers
of the past and the future
without being drunk

love's message came to me this morning
hiding itself as a healer
taking my pulse and declaring i'm weak

'don't drink wine
given by anyone
but your beloved'

if i can only find i said
the fountainhead named love
what use is any wine

- Jalal'uddin al-Rumi q.s. (Ghazal/Ode 1205) -

(Selected postings from Brother Az Cor)


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