Strangers

The repentance of two thieves came about very strangely: these fellows, who had grown up picking pockets and grabbing other people’s property since childhood, threw themselves at the feet of the pir, Mulla Ghani, crying, “Mercy! We repent!” Mulla Ghani was used to people’s repentance and remorse. This man, who walked in the river of worship and remembrance, knew the grace that was in him. He accepted the remorse of sinners with dignity and guided them onto the spiritual path. Not only thieves, but harlots and effeminates too raised the cup of repentance in the pir’s presence. To pray for them and immerse himself in the remembrance of the Truth was the pir’s work. One of the two thieves was Qobil, the other Horun. Both rolled up their sleeves and set to serving: they left the pir in want of nothing in any respect. Qobil especially excelled: he became the pir’s seeing eye and hearing ear. Horun, meanwhile, was busy with other work. In Qobil not a trace of thievery remained: he took on wholly the appearance of an ascetic and a gnostic. There was no one who was not enchanted by his sermons and admonitions. Horun worked in the fields, but he was bewildered by a feeling that welled up from within him: for some reason he wanted to take other people’s property, yet he would repent and weep. Sometimes he would take someone’s property without asking, go around once and come back, and put it back in its place, and with that find comfort; and he was sure that one day he would surely be freed from this affliction too. Those who saw Horun’s behavior were puzzled: call him a thief — he is not a thief; but what he does is unnatural. The talk got tangled and reached the pir. The one who brought it to the pir was Qobil. “Can it be that he does not regret what he did? Can it be that he has broken his vow of repentance?” the pir asked Qobil. Qobil said: “The Horun I know has surely gone back to that old trade of his. He could not keep himself from it!” The pir sank into thought: “For some reason, every time I see Horun, my heart does not come to rest. But it is hard to call him a thief. The evidence is not established.” That night Qobil went to Horun’s hut. Heavy rain was falling. “You have got a name as a thief. For a year now my pir has known about it. They say that whenever he sees you, his heart does not come to rest for forty days,” he said. Horun fainted. When he came to, his eyes full of tears, he said, “If their heart suffers torment because of me, let them never see my cold face again!” — and, sobbing loudly, he left the village. Qobil reported Horun to the night watchman as a thief. That very night they seized Horun, and several people at once called him a thief. They cut off Horun’s hand. Unable to bear the pain, he cried “Ah!” and lost consciousness. The blood that spurted out struck the face of Qobil, who was among those watching. He wiped the blood away with the end of his turban. They thrust the condemned man’s remaining stump into boiling oil. With that his whole body learned that the hand had been cut off. The blood stopped too. People watched this spectacle with relish. Everyone called Horun a thief. After about half an hour Horun came to. He took his severed hand in his healthy hand and walked out from among the people without a word. Mulla Ghani knew of all of it. He was left in such doubt that he could not say whether his disciple was a thief or not. Horun left the city. He went wherever his feet took him. At one point he came to a ruin. He looked and saw that every person there was missing one hand. All the handless people looked at Horun for a moment in silence, holding their breath, and then suddenly, with a cry, threw themselves at Horun. Horun too could not bear it and cried out: the sobbing and torment that had filled him like embers burst from his throat. His wound, which had found no remedy anywhere, had burst open before those who shared his pain. Strangers had laughed at his pain and his suffering, but the maimed outcasts knew his torment very well. Here it was not tongues that spoke, but tears.

Akrom MALIK