Lesson 2: How it became manifest that the physicians were unable to cure the handmaiden, and how the king turned his face towards God and dreamed of a holy man.

Meaning: When the king saw the helplessness of those physicians, he ran barefoot toward the mosque.

Meaning: He entered the mosque and advanced to the altar, and wept so bitterly that the place of prostration was flooded with the king's tears.

Meaning: On coming to himself out of the flood of ecstasy before God, he opened his mouth in goodly praise and glorification.

Meaning: 'O You whose least gift is the kingdom of the world, what shall I say, since You already know the hidden secrets of all things?'

Meaning: 'O You who are ever the refuge of our needs, once again we have strayed and lost our way.'

Meaning: "Yet You Yourself have said, 'Though I know your secret, still declare it forthwith in your outward act.'"

Meaning: When he raised a cry from the depths of his soul, the sea of divine mercy began to surge.

Meaning: In the midst of his weeping, sleep overtook him, and in that sleep he saw an old man appear before him.

Meaning: He said: 'O King! Good tidings, your prayers are granted; if tomorrow a stranger comes to you, know that he is from us.'

Meaning: 'When he comes, he is a skilled physician; know him to be truthful, for he is trustworthy and honest.'

Meaning: 'In his treatment behold absolute magic, and in his nature behold the power of God.'

Meaning: When the promised hour arrived and day broke, the sun rose from the east and consumed the stars with its light.

Meaning: The king sat in his lookout, waiting to see what had been secretly shown to him in that dream.

Meaning: He saw a man of great learning and worth whose great soul shone like the sun amidst the shadow of his earthly body.

Meaning: He approached from afar, like the crescent moon in slenderness and radiance, appearing as though he were both there and not there (forming and dissolving before the eye like a figure of the imagination).

Meaning: Imagination within the soul is like something that both is and is not; yet behold, an entire world moves and rests upon that very imagination.

Meaning: Their peace and their war rest upon imagination, and from imagination alone spring their pride and their shame.

Meaning: Yet those imaginings that become the snare of the saints are in truth the reflection of the moon-faced beauties of the garden of God.

Meaning: That very image the king had seen in his dream now became manifest in the face of the guest.

Meaning: The king himself, in place of his chamberlains, stepped forward to welcome his guest from the unseen.

Meaning: Both were seafarers of the Sea of Truth, skilled in swimming, and the souls of both were knit together as one without any sewing.

Meaning: The king said: 'It was you who were my true beloved; yet in this world, one event leads to another.' (Outward love was merely a pretext to reach you.)

Meaning: 'O you who are to me like Prophet Muhammad, while I am like Umar; for your service I gird my loins in devotion.'