The Company of Fool: Sufi Story from Mevlana Rumi’s Masnavi

Hazrat Isa A.S. [Jesus] was once walking briskly towards a mountain, as though he was afraid of something.

“Is there something that you are concerned about? I don’t see any enemy behind you”, a person asked him.

“I am running away from the company of fool”, the great Prophet replied.

The person was astonished at hearing such a reply.

“Are you not the prophet with many miracles? You are the one who can bring the dead back to life, who cure blinds of their disability and who creates birds of clay that then take flight?”

“Yes I the one whom Allah blessed with miracles. I invoked His name on the dead and blind and they were cured, but I have tried the same ‘Ism-e-Azam’ on the fool a million times, but nothing cures him!”

“Isn’t foolishness a disease?”, the person asked?

“Yes, but this disease is Allah’s wrath [hence, my miracle has no effect on the fool!]”