'Way back in 1973, Paul Simon released a song called One Man's Ceiling Is Another Man's Floor. The lyrics are classic Paul: a Dylanesque flow of images that makes sense on an intuitive level.
But as a many-time flat dweller, it's the title refrain that means most to me. For like the best of Sufic teachings, its significance changes as you turn it in the light.
At base, it seems to mean "walk mindfully, because your tromping will be amplified in other rooms."
Or it could be a social justice message about the people you – wittingly or un- – exploit for your own comfort and well-being.
Conversely, it may be telling us that those limits we allow to confine us, a more visionary person could use to launch him- or herself to the stars.
Or maybe it just refers to the fact that we all live within a vast complex of shared boundaries, where freedom, if it exists, is more a matter of accord than licence.
Whatever the case (bit of a deep-dive Zen pun, there), I like to sit with Paul's one-sentence koan from time to time; see where it lands in that moment.
(Photo courtesy of Rawpixel.com and a generous photographer.)
One day Nasrudin was walking down a country road when he saw a group of horsemen riding toward him at great speed. Fearing bandits, he quickly jumped over a nearby wall and found himself in a graveyard.
"Where to hide?" he cried. Looking desperately about, he spied an open grave.
Meanwhile, having seen his troubled behaviour, the riders dismounted and followed Nasrudin into the cemetery. At length they found him trembling with fear at the bottom of the hole.
"Ho, fellow traveller!" they called down. "We were riding this way and saw you flee something. Do you need any help? Why are you in this grave?"
"Well," said Nasrudin, "as to that, simple questions often have complex answers.
"About all I can tell you is, I am here because you are, and you are here because I am."
(Photo of Adolph Schreyer painting courtesy of Sotheby's and Wikimedia Commons.)
A traveller paused in a forest clearing beside a stream, where a dervish sat meditating.
Sipping from his waterskin, he saw the dervish rouse and scoop a wasp from the stream's surface. But as the holy man transferred the insect to the bank it stung him; flinching, he shook it back into the water.
Taking a breath, the dervish reached for the wasp again; again it stung him before he could get it to the bank.
The traveller watched this scenario repeat itself several times. At last, seeing the holy man reach into the stream another time, he could contain himself no longer.
"Baba!" he exclaimed. "Don't do that! It will only sting you again!"
The dervish raised an eyebrow.
"It's the wasp's nature to sting me," he said.
"And it's my nature to save it."
(Painting by unknown Indian artist, circa 1630, courtesy of the British Museum and Wikimedia Commons.)
Zen is famous for its koans, those quirky, inscrutable Chinese stories that make no sense but are somehow profoundly true. My own devotion to it is rooted in this classic literature: the thunderous wisdom encoded in The Blue Cliff Record, The Book of Equanimity, and The Gateless Gate.
But the Sufis (Zen Muslims, more or less) may have us beat; not only do they have a prolific koanic tradition of their own, theirs are funny. All while sacrificing none of the point.
These teaching stories, collectively known as The Tales of Nasrudin (نصر الدين خواج , خواجه نصرالدین , نصرالدین جحا ; Nasrudeen, Nasreddin, Nasruddin, Nasr ud-Din, Nasredin…), chronicle the continuing misadventures of an Islamic scholar of that name. Like all academics (to say nothing of religious leaders), Mullah Nasrudin can be long on theory and short on practice, but his gift for brilliant, backhanded insight always makes for a worthwhile visit.
Back in November 2012 I ran one of my favourite examples in Rusty Ring's Kyôsaku series of observations by noted teachers. Others include:
- The host of an elegant feast required all guests to wear fine clothes. When Nasrudin arrived, he began stuffing food into his shirt and trousers. The host confronted him angrily:
"What do you mean by this?"
"Since clothes are more important than people," Nasrudin answered, "they should eat first."
- Two children arguing over a bag of marbles came to the mullah to settle the matter. "Would you like Man's justice or Allah's?" asked Nasrudin.
"Why, Allah's, of course," replied the children.
"Very well," said Nasrudin, and gave three marbles to one and nine to the other.
- "Mullah," asked a townsman, "is your theology orthodox?"
"That depends," said Nasrudin. "Which heretics are in charge at the moment?"
- "Nasrudin," said another, "four years ago you told me you were forty. Today you still say you're forty. How do you explain this?"
"I am an honest man!" said Nasrudin. "Whenever you ask me a question, you shall always get the same answer."
- One day Nasrudin was walking along a river when a man cried out to him from the far bank:
"How can I get across?"
"You are across!" shouted the mullah.
(Note that there's a classic koan virtually identical to this, but not the least bit funny. The Sufis took the same wisdom, employed exactly the same imagery, and added a rimshot.)
In Sufi tradition, contemplators are frequently invited to offer commentary of their own, in the form of a suggested moral. In some fora, the list of these responses can be longer than the actual story, each one subtly spinning the punch-line into new – even conflicting – teachings. (Indeed, scholars as august as Idries Shah have even mined the humour of other cultures for that nugget of sanity that all comedy contains.) What a refreshing challenge to our own tradition, where only recognised scholars are permitted to comment.
My man Nasrudin has left his tracks all over the Internet – a medium made for him if ever there was one – and that's good news for his fans. Fertile starting points include The Inimitable Mulla Nasrudin, NewBuddhist.com, WrongPlanet.net, Godlike Productions, and WikiQuote. Load 'em up and laugh.
All the wisdom, half the pomposity.
(Photo of the Nasrudin statue in the Lab-i Hauz Complex, Bukhara, Uzbekistan, courtesy of Wikimedia Commons and a generous photographer.)
While on a trip to another village, Nasrudin lost his favourite copy of the Qur'an.
Several weeks later, a goat walked up to Nasrudin, carrying the Qur'an in its mouth.
Nasrudin couldn't believe his eyes. He took the precious book out of the goat's mouth, raised his eyes heavenward and exclaimed, "It's a miracle!"
"Not really," said the goat. "Your name is written inside the cover."
From the Tales of Nasrudin.
(Photo courtesy of George Chernilevsky and Wikimedia Commons.)
