Tales of the Dervishes: Teaching-Stories of the Sufi Masters over the Past Thousand Years

Author: Shah Idries

Brand: Penguin Books

Color: Multicolor

Number Of Pages: 221

Details: Review

“… a collection of diamonds … incredibly well-crafted, multifaceted … likely to endure in the manner of the Koran and the Bible.” — Professor Robert E. Ornstein, Ph.D., Psychology Today, July 1973

“… challenges our intellectual assumptions at almost every point.” — The Observer

“… equal, and sometimes surpass, in relevance, piquancy and humour, the best of the spiritual and ethical teachers of the West …” — Kirkus Review, November 5, 1969

“… some really cracking tales … full of wit, sophistication, irony and commonsense … completely absorbing.” — Northern Despatch, October 20, 1967

“… these teaching-tales could become a permanent part of the reader’s experience …” — Geoffrey Grigson, Country Life, October 26, 1967

“An astonishingly generous and liberating book … strikingly appropriate for our time and situation … a jewel flung in the market-place.” — Sunday Times

“Beautifully translated . . equips men and women to make good use of their lives.” — Professor James Kritzeck, The Nation

“For every decade we live, we will find another meaning in each story.” — Desmond Morris, BBC – The World of Books

Product Description

Dervish tales are more than fable, legend, or folklore. For centuries dervish masters have instructed their disciples by means of these teaching stories, which are said to increase perception and knowledge and provide a better understanding of man and the world. In wit, construction, and piquancy, they compare with the finest tales of any culture. Idries Shah spent many years traveling through three continents to collect and compare oral versions of these remarkable stories. This anthology, presented in the dervish manner, contains stories drawn from the repertories of dervish masters over a period of more than a thousand years.

About the Author

Idries Shah was an author and teacher in the Sufi tradition who wrote dozens of books on topics ranging from psychology to spiritualilty to travelogues to other anthropological studies. In his writings, Shah presented Sufism as a universal form of wisdom that predated Islam. Shah is known for The Sufis, The Commanding Self, The Subleties of the Inimitable Mulla Nasrudin, The Exploits of the Incomparable Mulla Nasrudin, Thinkers of the East, and Learning How to Learn.

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

THE IDIOT, THE WISE MAN AND THE JUG
An idiot may be the name given to the ordinary man, who consistently misinterprets what happens to him, what he does, or what is brought about by others. He does this so completely plausibly that – for himself and his peers – large areas of life and thought seem logical and true.
An idiot of this kind was sent one day with a pitcher to a wise man, to collect some wine.
On the way the idiot, through his own heedlessness, smashed the jar against a rock.
When he arrived at the house of the wise man, he presented him with the handle of the pitcher, and said:
“So-and-so sent you this pitcher, but a horrid stone stole it from me.”
Amused and wishing to test his coherence, the wise man asked:
“Since the pitcher is stolen, why do you offer me the handle?”
“I am not such a fool as people say,” the idiot told him, “and therefore I have brought the handle to prove my story.”

Release Date: 01-10-1993

Package Dimensions: 18x190x181