"Mona Lisa And The Clown And The Cool Rain Of The Law" / Whirling Dervish

(42 years: a book of changes, pages 28 and 29)

Watch and listen.

After watching the video I found the following:

What is Sufism?

There is a traditional Sufi story about four travellers—a Persian, a Turk, an Arab, and a Greek, arguing as to how they should spend a single coin they possessed. The Persian suggested buying angur, the Turk wanted uzum, the Arab wanted inab, while the Greek suggested buying stafil. Another traveller, who was a linguist, asked them to give him the coin and promised to satisfy the desires of all of them. When he was given the coin, he bought grapes and gave them, seeing which the Persian recognized them to be his angur, the Turk his uzum, the Arab his inab, and the Greek said that in his language they were called stafil.

"The travellers are the ordinary people of the world. The linguist is the Sufi. People know that they want something, because there is an inner need existing in them. They may give it different names, but it is the same thing. Those who call it religion have different names for it, and even different ideas as to what it might be," explained a Sufi teacher (The Sufis by Idries Shah, p. 24). The author points out that the grape is the raw form of the wine, while wine is the real essence of that fruit. Since the travellers were ordinary people belonging to different religions, the Sufi shows them that the basis of all religions is the same. He does not impart the "wine" or essence, "which is the inner doctrine waiting to be produced and used in mysticism."

Robert Graves describes Sufism as the essence or secret teaching within all religions.

And from Wikipedia:

Sufism (Arabic: تصوّف‎) taṣawwuf,(Persian: صوفی گری) also spelled as tasavvuf and tasavvof according to the Persian pronunciation, is generally understood to be the inner, mystical dimension of Islam. A practitioner of this tradition is generally known as a ṣūfī (صُوفِيّ), though some adherents of the tradition reserve this term only for those practitioners who have attained the goals of the Sufi tradition. Another name used for the Sufi seeker is Dervish.

With the December the sun low in the Pacific Northwest sky, its light shown through a prism in my window onto my rocking chair and an owl carved by Mary A. Stapp from a piece of Fiddle Back Maple wood. She titled that piece "A Blooming Owl."

TWO MONKS AND A SCORPION

Unable to download pictures today, but here is a link to a story about two monks and a scorpion from Whiskey River.

I had just heard a story of a frog attempting to help a scorpion by carrying it across a river after the scorpion promised not to sting the frog. As they cross the river, the scorpion stings the frog and they both drown in the river. Before they go under, the frog asks the scorpion, "Why would you cause so much suffering? The scorpion says, "It is my nature."

Synchronicity.

"Take what you have gathered from coincidence" (Bob Dylan, 1965, from the song "It's All Over Now, Baby Blue")

And another version from an article by Doris Lessing with a Sufi story:

A tortoise carries a stranded scorpion across a river. The scorpion stings the tortoise who demands indignantly: "My nature is to be helpful. I have helped you and now you sting me." "My friend," says the scorpion, "your nature is to be helpful. Mine is to sting. Why do you seek to transform your nature into a virtue and mine into villainy?"