Sunday, December 16, 2007

In The Hearts Of Men


The moving and instructional epitaph on Mevlana Rumi's tomb reads:

'When we are dead, seek not our tomb in the earth, but find it in the hearts of men.’

And in one of his poems read this beautiful advice:

be like a river in generosity and help
be like the sun in tenderness and mercy
be like the night in covering the faults of others
be like the dead in anger and nervousness
be like the earth in modesty and humility
be like the sea in tolerance
be like your appearance (image), or appear like yourself.


3 comments:

Anonymous said...

salaam

nice advice, except that i don't quite understand the meaning of last line...

TheHoopoe said...

aya,

Perhaps it means to just be honest and be true to yourself - and that is fitrah.

Maybe it is to be the human (through our actions) that we appear to be.

You can take it at many levels.

Wallahu'alam

Anonymous said...

thank you :)