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Sufi sampler

D. Murali

SOME stupidity is unavoidable. But lots of people deliberately make themselves stupid, and thus prevent themselves from understanding things that would be of value to them, says Idries Shah in Knowing how to know: A pra ctical philosophy in the Sufi Tradition. People who appear to be intelligent are often quite obtuse in the methods that they use in assessing something and because of their repute or ebullient manner, however, they are not regarded as stupid. ``T his is one reason why stupidities of thought are so easily propagated: they are passed on by those whom the public takes as being all-round intelligent people,'' says Shah. Here are a few excerpts from the book:

* First, man had no words. Then he learned to use words instead of physical violence. Now he uses words to lead him into violence.

* ``Don't try to convince a student if you see him looking unconvinced during one of your lessons.'' ``But why not?'' ``Because he may be the only student who is listening to you.''

* Mulla Nasrudin was seen one day trudging towards the town with his shoes slung from a string around his neck. The man who saw this said, as he passed: ``Hey, Mulla, why don't you put your shoes on?' ``What,'' said Mulla, ``and wear them out? '' A little later a nail went right into one of his feet. ``Thank goodness I've saved my shoes,'' said the Mulla to himself.

* Two citizens of the Land of Fools are walking together when one of them picks up a piece of mirror from the wayside. He looks into it and shudders, then turns away. The other Foolslander takes it from him and looks into it. ``What's the matte r? This is me inside!'' ``Thank goodness,'' says his companion, ``I thought it was me!''

* The Half-Blind King: Once upon the time there was a king who desired his portrait painted. He was blind in one eye. The King invited the three greatest royal portraitists in the world to paint his picture, saying: ``If you do a bad p ortrait, I shall punish you; but if you do a good one, I shall reward you beyond your dreams.'' The first painter produced a picture which showed the King's eye to be blind. The King had him executed for disrespect. The second painter showed the King's eyes as perfect. The King had him thrashed for falsification. The third painter, however, pictured the King in profile, showing only his good eye. This man was made the official portraitist, and heaped with gold and honour s. (Most auditors are no different from the third painter -- well, if only to survive.)

Wordsmith

SHAKESPEARE: A beginner's guide, by Roni Jay, introduces readers to the great bard. Talking about the Shakespeare's vocabulary, Jay writes that it was basically made up of words that were in common use at the time, but he did have a huge vocabulary by an y standards. ``He uses a total of over 17,000 different words in his plays and poems; an average well-educated person today generally has a vocabulary of around 4,000 words. The Oxford English Dictionary credits him with introducing almost 3,000 words in to the language, although this simply means that his was the first recorded use of them -- it doesn't mean he invented all of them.''

This breadth of language is all the more remarkable because Shakespeare's education stopped at the age of 14, and that there were no dictionaries in those days (the first ever was compiled in 1604).

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Tailpiece

``This time the crowd at the makeshift canteen is more than at the concert hall. Next year, we should organise better.''

``How?''

``By swapping the places.''

(Books courtesy: The British Council Library, Chennai. e-mail:

contact.chennai@in.britishcouncil.org)