Dwell thou and thy spouse in the Garden! It has been said that once Iblis met Adam and said, “Know that you have been given a white face and I a black face. Do not be deluded, for our likeness is that of an almond tree planted by a gar- dener. The tree bears fruit, and the fruit is taken to a grocery shop. Some of it is sold to a customer who is a happy man, and some to a customer who is afflicted. The afflicted man blackens the face of the almonds and scatters them on the casket of his dead one. The happy man mixes them with sugar and distributes them with their white faces in his happiness. O Adam! I am the black al- monds scattered over caskets, and the almonds distributed by happiness are the work of your good fortune. But you should know that the gardener is one, and we have drunk water from the same stream. If someone should fall to the work of roses, he will smell roses, and if someone should fall into the gardener's thorns, his eyes will be struck by them.” I said, “In my passion I will be like Your hair, always before Your face.” I thought wrongly and fell far away- I'll be the slaveboy of Your street's watchman. Dhu'l-Nūn Miṣrī said, “I was in the desert and saw Iblis, who had not lifted his head from prostra- tion in forty days. I said, 'Poor wretch, after disownment and the curse, what is all this worship?' “He said, 'O Dhu'l-Nūn, though I have been dismissed from servanthood, He has not been dismissed from lordhood.'” O lovely one, my times and yours are in turmoil, talk of us has filled my city and yours. Union was apportioned in the beginningless, and now separation has come and the talk is of you and me. Sahl ibn ʿAbdallāh Tustarī said, “One day I came across Iblis. I said, 'I seek refuge in God from you.' “He said, 'O Sahl, if you are seeking refuge in God from me, I am seeking refuge in God from God. O Sahl, if you say that you are seeking help against the hand of Iblis, I say that I am seeking help against the hand of the All-Merciful.
