The Story of the Greengrocer and the Parrot

There was a greengrocer who owned a parrot, a sweet-voiced, green, and eloquent parrot.

It perched on the bench, keeping watch over the shop in the owner’s absence, and exchanged fine and witty remarks with all the traders.

When addressing human beings, it would speak like them, and it was also skilled at the song of parrots.

Once it sprang from the bench, flew away, and spilled the bottles of rose oil.

Its master came from his house and sat at the shop at ease as a merchant does.

He saw the shop was full of oil and his clothes greasy, and in anger he struck the parrot on the head so hard that it became bald.

For a few days, the parrot refrained from speaking, and the greengrocer sighed deeply in remorse.

He was tearing his beard and saying, “Alas! The sun of my prosperity has gone behind the clouds.” (The parrot had lost its voice and become worthless.)

“Would that my hand had been broken at the moment when I struck that sweet-tongued one on the head.”

He gave gifts to every dervish, hoping to recover his bird’s speech.

After three days and three nights, he was seated at the shop, distraught and sorrowful, like a man in despair.

Showing the bird every sort of marvel, in the hope that maybe it would begin to speak.

Meanwhile, a bare-headed dervish clad in a coarse woollen frock passed by, with a head hairless as the back of a bowl or basin.

Thereupon, the parrot broke into speech, crying out to the dervish, “Hey, fellow!”

“O bald one, how were you mixed up with the bald? Did you, too, like me, spill oil from a bottle?”

The people burst out laughing at the parrot’s comparison, for it had taken the wearer of the frock (the dervish) to be just like itself.

Do not measure the actions of the pure by your own standard, even though shér (lion) and shir (milk) are written the same way (in Persian).

The whole world has gone astray for this very reason of measuring the pure against themselves, and few came to know the friends of God (the abdal or substitutes).

They presumed themselves equal to the prophets and assumed the friends of God were just like them.

They said, “We are human, and they are human; they and we are both bound by sleep and food.”

Yet in their spiritual blindness, they did not see the endless difference between themselves and the friends of God.

For instance, both species of zanbur fed in the same place, yet one (the hornet) gave a sting, and the other (the bee) gave honey.

Both deer species fed on the same grass and water, yet one produced dung and the other pure musk.

Both reeds drank from the same water source, yet one remained hollow while the other filled with sugar.

Look at hundreds of thousands of such outward resemblances, yet know that the difference between them is as great as seventy years of road apart.

One (the misguided and deniers) eats, and from it filth and impurity are discharged; the other (the prophets and the friends of God) eats, and his entire being becomes the Light of God.

One eats, and of him only envy and miserliness are born; the other eats, and of him only the light of the peerless One shines forth.

One is pure, fertile soil while the other is barren and corrupt; one is a pure angel while the other is a devil and a wild beast.

It is no wonder if they both appear alike in outward form, for bitter water and sweet water share the same clarity.

Who but a person of true taste can discern the difference? Find such a one, for only he can distinguish sweet water from the brine.

The ignorant one has measured magic against prophetic miracle, wrongly assuming that both are rooted in trickery and deceit.

The sorcerers in the time of Moses, out of defiance, took up their rods just as Moses had taken up his.

But between this rod and that rod lies a vast difference, and from this action (magic) to that action (miracle) is a wondrous distance.

God’s curse follows upon this action (magic), whereas God’s Mercy and blessing are granted in reward for that action (miracle).

In their stubborn defiance, disbelievers possess the nature of an ape, and an (evil) disposition has become a canker within their breasts.

Whatever a person does, the monkey imitates, for it watches and follows every move the human makes moment by moment.

He thinks, “I have acted like him”: how should that quarrelsome-looking one know the difference?

This one (the holy man) acts by divine Command, while the other (the apish imitator) acts out of sheer defiance; pour dust upon the heads of such stubborn defiers.

The hypocrite stands alongside the believer in prayer, yet comes not out of need and devotion but out of defiance and pretence.

In prayer, fasting, pilgrimage, and almsgiving, the believers and hypocrites are engaged in a contest of victory and defeat.

In the end, victory belongs to the believers, and in the Hereafter, defeat and checkmate fall upon the hypocrites.

Although both seem to be engaged in the same game (acts of worship), they are as far apart from each other as a man of Merv and a man of Rayy.

Each goes to their own proper station and destination, and each travels according to their own name and disposition.

If the hypocrite is called a believer, his soul rejoices, but if he is called a hypocrite, he becomes fierce and filled with rage.

The believer’s name is beloved because of his pure essence, while the hypocrite’s name is loathed because of his inner flaws and corruption.

The letters mim and waw and mim and nun (that make up the word “believer”) carry no honour in themselves, and the word “believer” is nothing but a means of describing and pointing to that inner reality.

If you call the hypocrite a hypocrite, this vile name stings him inwardly like a scorpion.

If this name (the hypocrite) is not derived from Hell, then why does it carry the very taste and burning sense of Hell?

The ugliness of that ill name (the hypocrite) does not come from its letters, just as the bitterness of the seawater does not come from the container that holds it.

The letter is like a container, and the meaning within it is like water, but the boundless sea of meaning abides with God in the Mother of the Book (Ummu ’l-Kitab).

The bitter sea and the sweet sea flow in this world, and between them stands a barrier which neither overtakes the other.

And yet both of these seas flow from a single origin; so pass beyond both of them and journey on towards their origin.

Counterfeit gold and fine gold in weight and measure can never be told apart by outward appearance alone, without the touchstone to test them.

Anyone in whose soul God places the touchstone of discernment will distinguish every certainty from doubt.

If a piece of debris leaps into a living person’s mouth, they will find peace only after they spit it out.

If a little piece of debris enters among thousands of morsels of food, as soon as it enters, the living sense detects it at once.

The worldly sense is a ladder to this world, while the religious sense is a ladder to the heavens.

Seek the health of that worldly sense from the physician, and beg the health of that religious sense from the Beloved.

The health of that worldly sense comes from the flourishing of the body, while the health of that religious sense comes from the breaking down of the body.

The spiritual path first ruins the body, but after that ruin, it restores it to true flourishing.

Like the one who ruins the house for the sake of a treasure of gold, and then with that very treasure rebuilds it more splendid than before.

Or like the one who cuts off the water and cleanses the riverbed, and then lets the water flow again through it to drink.

Or like the one who cuts open the skin and draws out the arrowhead, and after that, fresh skin grows anew.

Or like the one who tears down the fortress and seizes it from the infidel, and after that raises upon it a hundred towers and ramparts.

Who shall describe the action of Him who has no like? This that I have said was only out of necessity.

At times, the action of God shows itself thus, and at other times, the very opposite; the work of religion is nothing but bewilderment.

Not the bewilderment of one who has turned his back on Him, but rather the bewilderment of one drowned in God and intoxicated with the Beloved.

The face of one is turned towards the Beloved, while the face of the other has itself become the Beloved’s face.

Look closely upon the face of each and keep watch, so that through devoted service to them you may come to know the face (of human devils from the friends of God).

Since there are many devils who have the face of Adam, one must not shake hands and pledge allegiance to just anyone.

Because the fowler mimics the bird’s own call and whistle, so that the bird-catcher may lure and trap the bird.

That bird hears the call of its own kind and descends from the sky, only to find a snare and a sting awaiting it.

The vile man steals the words of the dervishes so that he may chant those spells to deceive a naive and pure-hearted soul.

The work of holy men is as light and heat, while the work of vile men is deceit and shamelessness.

They fashion a woollen lion merely to beg and bestow the title of Ahmad (Prophet Muhammad) upon a false prophet like Bu Musaylim.

But to Bu Musaylim remained attached the title of Kadhdhab (Liar), while to Muhammad remained attached the title of Ulu ’l-albab (Endowed with wisdom).

The divine wine seals its end with pure musk, whereas the worldly wine ends in stench and torment.