Comments on: Parable: Watermelons and Walnuts http://simerg.com With a particular focus on the cultural, intellectual and textual expressions of the Ismailis and related Muslim traditions. Weekly quote: “...This is a time of new freedoms, but it is also one in which new choices must be made wisely. In exercising freedom and making choices, our institutions must be guided by the teachings of the Prophet Muhammad (Peace of Allah be upon him), and the tradition of our tariqah, which is the tradition of Hazrat Ali: A thinking Islam and a spiritual Islam – an Islam that teaches compassion, tolerance and the dignity of man – Allah’s noblest creation.” Excerpts from His Highness the Aga Khan's message dated May 14, 1992, to mark the Aga Khan Foundation's 25th anniversary. Mon, 28 May 2012 09:56:03 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.com/ By: Shellina http://simerg.com/parables/parables-watermelons-and-walnuts/#comment-13159 Mon, 07 Mar 2011 21:01:13 +0000 http://simerg.com/?page_id=1464#comment-13159 Beautiful beautiful website…. keep the good work… this is the BEST way of communication, learning and sharing knowledge…. Mowla Bless all involved…. thanks a bunch and lots of dua to you all for such wonderful works, writing and information.

]]> By: Zarina Bhatia http://simerg.com/parables/parables-watermelons-and-walnuts/#comment-1485 Mon, 12 Oct 2009 08:20:19 +0000 http://simerg.com/?page_id=1464#comment-1485 Just as my comment on Hodja I made earlier. I remember a parable I heard about a lost Donkey of a Turkish villager, let us call him Yusuf. He ran ecstatically one morning saying ‘Listen, my friends, I lost my Donkey, thank Allah’. People gathered round him, ‘You foolish man, what are you so jubilant about? You lost your Donkey you never could do without, and instead of lamenting you are screaming and screeching with delight! You never were seen without him as if you were married to your Donkey.’ Yusuf replied, ‘My friends, you do not understand, I lost him sometime at night and just discovered it now, suppose I was riding on my Donkey when he was gone where would I be then?’

Sufism is a tool for an intellectual search and is based on an esoteric interpretation of Islam, not just based on conventional or external practice. This great religion of Islam today is practised by a quarter of the world population. It is a faith based on Reason.

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