Discourses of Rumi

150 V DISCOURSES OF RUMIthat charm us at first, but the longer you sit withthem thinking they are all there is, the colder youbecome. What is the form of the Koran comparedwith its meaning? Examine a man or woman:what is their form compared with their meaning?If the sense of that person departs, we wouldn’tlet them loose in our house for one moment.Our Master, Shams, once told this story: Agreat caravan was on its way to a distant city.Along the way they found a certain place with nosign of habitation or water. Suddenly they cameupon a well with no bucket. So they took a kettleand some rope and lowered this kettle into thewell. They drew up the rope, but the kettle brokeaway. They sent down another, but it broke awaytoo. After that they tied people from the caravanwith a rope and lowered them down into the well,but they disappeared as well.Now there was a man of great heart present.He said, “I will go down.” They lowered himdown. He was nearly to the bottom of the wellwhen a terrible black creature suddenly appeared.“I will never escape,” the man thought. “But atleast let me keep my wits about me and not lose mysenses, so that I can see what is going to happen.”