Mullah Nasrudin

Anecdotes of Mullah Nasrudin

These anecdotes of Mullah Nasruddin were sent by rose red
from Australia. The Mullah's stories are famous in Tajikistan
and Turkey, especially in Iran and our whole country.

Many stories and legends exist about Mullah Nasruddin and

his anecdotes, which play a very important part in the
traditional verbal literature and in the social and lingual
interaction. These anecdotes show the oriental sense of
humour. The person Mullah is probably a highly historical
figure, a figure of fun and a figure of wisdom and light
fiction. There are very different variant legends about him.

The figure of Mullah came maybe into dating back to the

Middle Ages. He is supposed to having lived between the
12th and the 13th century, so he lived in the time, when
Seljuken ruled in Khorasan. Khorasan (how the current
western territory of Afghanistan in the Middle Ages was
called) nowadays is a province of Iran with Meshed as its
capital. Many people believed, that Sultan Alauddin
Jahansuz (burner of the world) from the Seljuk-Dynasty has
been a nasty contemporary of Mullah.

In Europe Mullah can be compared with the german Till

Eulenspiegel. The oldest manuscript of Mullah was found in
1571. Here he was called Khoja or Efendi. The famous man
of humour lived in the fictions in many countries and he was
born and buried in many cities of Turkey. One of his graves
in Turkey is a place of pilgrimage. Everybody who came to
his grave bursted out laughing. In the door of his monument
a very big lock is installed, but the other sides around the
monument are open.

The anecdotes of him imply exactly many funny and serious

situations of life. They show the ambiguity of human social
interaction in history and the present time. Young and old
tell these anecdotes at their leisure. So they are transferred
from generation to generation among the people, therefore
many various versions of the stories are existing. Fact is, that

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somehow his stories give pleasure for today’s people and

information about the social-cultural aspects about the
people of that time. It’s interesting that the anecdotes of
Mullah have played the part of release like weeping and tears
did in classical tragedy. Remember Afghans say that laughter
is the salt of life.

The anecdotes of Mullah characterize the fragments

concerning faintness and weakness of persons. The stories
can be compared with Germany’s Till Eulenspiegel
concerning the description of comical situation of life and
can be compared with the Baron of M•nchhausen
concerning the exaggeration of human actions. The
Mullah in fact sometimes is the fool and sometimes is
crafty.

The burglar
A thief went to Nasrudin's house and carried away
almost all the possessions of the mullah to his own
home. While Nasrudin had been watching from the
street. After a few minutes Nasrudin took up a
blanket, followed him, went in to his house, lay
down and pretended to go to sleep. The thief asked
Mullah, "who are you? And what are you doing in
my house?" Mullah replied, "we were moving house,
weren't we?" .

Chair or egg
One day Mullah was sitting on chair in a crossway
and was enjoying his meal which was egg. A Man
was crossing the cross way saw Mullah that he is
sitting on chair and enjoying his meal he find it
really interesting and went to ask mullah. O Mullah
are you sitting on chair and eating egg? Mullah
looked at him and said why should I sit on egg and
eat the chair.

Not so difficult
The Mullah's neighbour wanted to borrow his cloth-
line. Nasrudin said "sorry, I am using it'. Drying

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flour!'
The neighbour said, 'how on earth can you dry flour
on a cloths-line?' Mullah replied, 'it is less difficult
than you think when you do not want to lend it'.

Thankful not to loose myself

One day there was news in every corner of the town
about the Mullah's donkey which he lost it. When his
neighbours heard the news they got sad and decided
to go to mullah's house and help him to find his
donkey. So they came to mullah's house and they
saw that mullah is very happy and very thankful
from god! They find it very interesting and asked
mullah: " Mullah aren't you sad about loses of your
donkey?" Mullah laughed and said I am happier
because god helped me that I was not riding it other
wise I was lost as well.

Old graves for new

"when I die' said Nasrudin, 'have me buried in an old
grave. 'why?' asked his relatives.
'Because when Munkir and Nakir, recording angels
of good and bad actions, come, I will be able to wave
them on, saying that this grave has been counted and
entered for punishment already.'

Anachronism
"why are you sitting at the crossroad mullah?" " one
day something will happen here, and a crowd will
gather. When that comes about , I may not be able to
get close enough- so I am putting my time now .

Why ask me/

Nasrudin was riding along one day when his donkey
took fright at something in its path and started to
bolt. As he sped past them at an unaccustomed pace
some countrymen called out: 'where are you going, o
Nasrudin, so fast?' 'Mullah shouted, don't ask me ask
my donkey!'

The reason

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The mullah went to see a rich man to earn some

money from him. He asked the man to give him
some money.
The man said why you need money?
Mullah said I want to buy an elephant so that is why
I need money!
The man said if you don't have enough money how
you are going to look after the elephant?
Mullah said I came here to get money not advice!

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