THE ILLUSION OF REFLECTION ••• Once there was a king who had presented his daughter, the princess, with a beautiful diamond necklace. The necklace was stolen & his people in the kingdom searched everywhere but could not find it. Some said a bird might have stolen it. The king then asked them all to search for it & put a reward for I000 gold pieces for anyone who found it. One day a clerk was walking home along a river next to an industrial area. This river was completely polluted, filthy & smelly. As he was walking, the clerk saw something shimmering in the river & when he looked, he saw the diamond necklace. He decided to try & catch it so that he could get the reward. He put his hand in the filthy, dirty river & grabbed at the necklace, but some how missed it. He took his hand out & looked again and the necklace was still there. He tried again, this time he walked in the filthy river & dirtied his pants & then he put his whole arm in to catch the necklace. But strangely, he still missed the necklace! He came out and started walking away, feeling depressed. Then again he saw the necklace, right there. This time he was determined to get it, no matter what. He decided to plunge into the river, although it was a disgusting thing to do as the river was polluted, & his whole body would become filthy. He plunged in, & searched everywhere for the necklace and yet he failed. This time he was really bewildered & came out feeling very depressed that he could not get the necklace that would get him 1000 gold pieces. Just then a saint who was walking by, saw him, & asked him what was the matter. The clerk didnt want to share the secret with the saint, thinking the saint might take the necklace for himself, so he refused to tell the saint anything. But the saint could see this man was troubled & being compassionate, again asked the clerk to tell him the problem and promised that he would not tell anyone about it. The clerk mustered some courage & decided to trust the saint. He told the saint about the necklace & how he tried continuosly to catch it, but kept failing. The saint then told him that perhaps he should try looking upward, toward the branches of the tree, instead of in the filthy river. The clerk looked up & true enough, the necklace was dangling on the branch of a tree. He had been trying to capture a mere reflection of the real necklace all this time Moral ♥ : Material happiness is just like the filthy, polluted river; because it is a mere reflection of the TRUE happiness in the spiritual world. We can never achieve the happiness we are looking for no matter how hard we endeavor in the material life. Instead we should look upwards, toward اللَّهُ Subhana Taala, who is the source of real happiness, and stop chasing after the reflection of this happiness in the material world. This spiritual happiness is the only thing that can satisfy us completely.
Posted on: Fri, 22 Nov 2013 01:48:44 +0000
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