Hakim Iskander Zaramez and Abdulwahab El Hindi, walking past the corner of a large house in Samarkand, heard a wild scream.
“Some poor guy is being tortured,” El Hindi said, stopping and standing still as the screams intensified.
- Would you like to ease the suffering? asked Zaramez.
- Naturally. As Vali and as a saint, you can, of course, do this if it is God’s will.
“Very good,” said Hakim. “And I’ll show you something.”
Zaramez walked five steps away from the corner of the house. The screams stopped.
“You took a few steps, and the screams died down!” It’s not for nothing that I have always heard that proximity to the sufferer softens his pain,” said El Hindi.
Hakim grinned, but said nothing more, making a sign that among the Sufis means: “A question may not have an answer at a certain time due to the state of the questioner.”
Many years later, in Morocco, El Hindi heard a certain dervish telling a group of disciples about what he had once experienced.
Among other things, the dervish said:
“Many, many years ago, I was captured as a tramp because of my obvious poverty and pitiful appearance. I was left in a stone cell built in the outer wall of the judge's house in the northern part of Samarkand. I had completely resigned myself to my fate and sat silently in the corner, but suddenly I felt that there was a saint outside, not far from me. I began to scream and rush around because I felt his power on me and wanted to get closer to him, but I could not break free. Then I felt him move away, as if he was bothered by my screams. I tried to let him come closer again, forcing myself to become quiet and calm as the night.
Sheikh of the circle of dervishes said:
— Spiritual power has a particularly profound effect at the moment when it is beyond reach. The saint taught you this, despite the fact that you were in prison. And to outside observers it might seem that he was doing something completely opposite.
El Hindi reports: “Then I realized: it is not surprising if people have a “spiritual experience.” It's surprising that many people don't have it. What is most surprising is that instead of learning from this experience, they consider it to be something that it is not.”
Translated from Russian · original on wisdomlib.ru