A hunter, walking through some woods, came upon a notice. He read the words: Eat No Stones. His curiosity was stimulated, and he followed a track which led past the sign until he came to a cave at the entrance to which a Sufi was sitting. The Sufi said to him: The answer to your question is that you have never seen a notice prohibiting the eating of stones because there is no need for one. Not to eat stones may be called a common habit. Only when the human being is able similarly to avoid other habits, even more destructive than eating stones, will he be able to get beyond his present pitiful state.
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Why we need a teacher.
One day a bird flew into a temple and couldn’t get out. The bird flew from window to window, battering himself, in a vain effort to escape. Then, exhausted, the bird rested on the window sill of the only open window without realizing it was different from the others. A teacher, who had been watching the bird’s frantic efforts, immediately clapped his hands. The startled bird jumped through the window and was free.
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Intellectual copyright
I am a mimic of you. I am a pale copy and a counterfeit,though I never intended to steal stories from your mouth.
Those stories are no more my property than the clothes of my youth or the tables at which I ate. We kept company together awhile. When I died, God scattered those words like diamonds over the earth. Pick them up and set them in brilliant settings and you will have eulogized me and my teachers and will have given three fine gifts to the Lord of Glory, though no gift can ever befit Him.
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