Today's Sermon #49

from Masnavi Book I, 599-607

We are as the flute, and the music in us is from thee;
we are as the mountain and the echo in us is from thee.

We are as pieces of chess engaged in victory and defeat:
our victory and defeat is from thee, O thou whose qualities are comely!

Who are we, O Thou soul of our souls,
that we should remain in being beside thee?

We and our existences are really non-existence;
thou art the absolute Being which manifests the perishable.

We all are lions, but lions on a banner:
because of the wind they are rushing onward from moment to moment.

Their onward rush is visible, and the wind is unseen:
may that which is unseen not fail from us!

Our wind whereby we are moved and our being are of thy gift;
our whole existence is from thy bringing into being.

Jelal ad-Din Muhammad Rumi, 1207 -1273
(جلال‌الدین محمد رومی)



[as an aside: After teaching a young man from Persia many years ago now, his parents visited me in the following autumn with a gift of a beautifully illustrated Masnavi Book I that they had purchased and brought back for me from their summer visit to Iran. I have taught the occasional Iranian student over the years from Kentucky to Maryland, and never have I met more gracious people anywhere on the planet.]