Accepting Compassion

How do we purify the world? - asked a disciple.

Ibn al-Husayn replied:

There was once a sheik in Damascus called Abu Musa al-Qumasi. Everyone honored him for his great wisdom, but no one knew whether he was a good man.

One afternoon, a construction fault caused the house where the sheik lived with his wife, to collapse. The desperate neighbors began to dig the ruins; eventually, they managed to locate the sheik’s wife.

She said:"Don’t worry about me. First save my husband, who was sitting somewhere over there."

The neighbors removed the rubble from the area she indicated, and found the sheik. He said:"Don’t worry about me. First save my wife, who was lying somewhere over there."

When someone acts as this couple did, he is purifying the whole world.