Become of one hue with the community, that you may feel spiritual delight; enter the street of the tavern, that you may behold the dregs-drinkers.
Drain the cup of passion, let it be that you become a disgrace; close up the eyes of your head, that you may see the secret eye.
Open your two hands if you desire an embrace; break the idol of clay, that you may see the face of the idols.
How long for the sake of an old woman will you endure such a dowry? How long for the sake of three loaves will you face sword and spear?
Lo, the saki who is no tyrant, in his assembly there is a circle—enter and sit in that circle; how long will you gaze on the circling of fate?
Here is a good bargain—give a life and receive a hundred; cease to act the wolf and dog, that you may behold the shepherd’s love.
By night the Beloved goes about; do not take opium tonight, close your mouth against food, that you may feel the taste of the mouth.
You say, “The enemy took so-and-so away from me”; go, abandon so-and-so, that you may see twenty so-and-so’s.
Think of naught but the creator of thought; thought for the Beloved is better than thinking about bread.
With the breadth of God’s earth why have you clung to prison? Knot care less, that you may see the expanse of Paradise.
Silence this speech, that you may gain speech one day; pass away from the soul and the world, that you may behold the Soul of the world.
