Odilia Carmen Chirica

"One day the villagers thought they would play a joke on Nasrudin. As he was supposed to be a holy man of some indefinable sort, they went to him and asked him to preach a sermon in their mosque. He agreed. When the day came, Nasrudin mounted the pulpit and spoke: ‘O people! Do you know what I am going to tell you?’ ‘No, we do not know,’ they cried. ‘Until you know, I cannot say. You are too ignorant to make a start on,’ said the Mulla, overcome with indignation that such ignorant people should waste his time. He descended from the pulpit and went home. Slightly chagrined, a deputation went to his house again, and asked him to preach the following Friday, the day of prayer. Nasrudin started his sermon with the same question as before. This time the congregation answered, as one man: ‘Yes, we know.’ ‘In that case,’ said the Mulla, ‘there is no need for me to detain you longer. You may go.’ And he returned home. Having been prevailed upon to preach for the third Fridayin su...

"The philosophers, logicians and doctors of law were drawn up at Court to examine Nasrudin. This was a serious case, because he had admitted going from village to village saying: ‘The so-called wise men are ignorant, irresolute and confused.’ He was charged with undermining the security of the State. ‘You may speak first,’ said the King. ‘Have paper and pens brought,’ said the Mulla. Paper and pens were brought. ‘Give some to each of the first seven savants.’ They were distributed. ‘Have them separately write an answer to this question: “What is bread?”’ This was done. The papers were handed to the King, who read them out: The first said: ‘Bread is a food.’ The second: ‘It is flour and water.’ The third: ‘A gift of God.’ The fourth: ‘Baked dough.’ The fifth: ‘Changeable, according to how you mean “bread”.’ The sixth: ‘A nutritious substance.’ The seventh: ‘Nobody really knows.’ ‘When they decide what bread is,’ said Nasrudin, ‘it will be possible for them to decide other thi...

To the Sufi, perhaps the greatest absurdity in life is the way in which people strive for things – such as knowledge – without the basic equipment for acquiring them. They have assumed that all they need is ‘two eyes, a nose and a mouth’, as Nasrudin says. In Sufism, a person cannot learn until he is in a state in which he can perceive what he is learning, and what it means. Nasrudin went one day to a well, in order to teach this point to a disciple who wanted to know ‘the truth’. With him he took the disciple and a pitcher. The Mulla drew a bucket of water, and poured it into his pitcher. Then he drew another, and poured it in. As he was pouring in the third, the disciple could not contain himself any longer: ‘Mulla, the water is running out. There is no bottom in that pitcher.’ Nasrudin looked at him indignantly. ‘I am trying to fill the pitcher. In order to see when it is full, my eyes are fixed upon the neck, not the bottom. When I see the water rise to the neck, the pitcher will b...