People respected a Sufi dervish for his virtue and religious devotion. They would ask, "How did you become so holy?" He would answer, "I know what is in the Koran."
One day, he had given this response to an enquirer in a coffee house, and another man asked: "Well, what is in the Koran?" "In the Koran," said the Sufi, "there are two pressed flowers and a letter from my friend."
* * *
Religious persons often invest a magical quality to their holy books, prophets, sages, mystics, etc. What if these sources of inspiration point us outside themselves? Could they point to two pressed flowers and a friend's letter as equal to themselves in revelation and inspiration?
I, raised on a strict belief that the Christian Scriptures is God - inspired and without error - which I no longer agree with in the manner in which I was taught - now find as much inspiration and revelation via heart-to-heart meetings with others - and, sometimes, non-human others - as in any holy book. People are a holy book to me; they are two pressed flowers and a friend's letter. All Nature is two pressed flowers and a friend's letter.
In your daily life, in what 'ordinary' ways do you encounter the Sacred?
*Brian K. Wilcox, An Ache for Union: Poems on Oneness with God through Love, can be ordered through major online booksellers or the publisher AuthorHouse.
