3-2094 Since God has called the infidel “impure”, that impurity is not on his outer

side.

3-2095 The infidel’s outer side is not defiled by this outer impurity; that impurity is in
his temperament and religion.

3-2096 The smell of this outer impurity extends to a distance of twenty paces; but the
smell of that inner impurity reaches from Rayy85 to Damascus.

4-2385 Wash your senses for a while with the water of clear-sightedness: know that the
garment-washing of the Ṣūfīs is like this.

4-2386 When you have become purified, the spirit of the pure ones will tear off the
veil and attach itself to you.

God’s Mercy is like an all-cleansing water. [1.2.1]

5-199 The water rained down from heaven, that it might cleanse the impure of their
defilement.

5-200 When the water86 had done battle during ablution, had been made dirty and had
become such that the senses rejected it,

5-201 God brought it back into the sea of Goodness, that the origin of the water might
generously wash it clean.

5-202 Next year it came sweeping proudly along. “Hey, where have you been?” “In
the sea of the pure,

5-204 Listen, come to me, o you polluted ones, for my nature has partaken of the
nature of God.

5-205 I will accept all your foulness: I will bestow purity like that of the angel on the
demon.

5-206 When I become defiled, I will return there: I will go to the Source of the source
of purities.

5-207 There I will pull the filthy cloak from my head: He will give me a clean robe
once more.

5-208 Such is His work, and my work is the same: the Lord of all created beings is
the beautifier of the world.”

5-212 Or, porter-like, it takes on its head the ship that is helplessly tossing in the
seas87.

85
Rayy: ancient Persian city to the southeast of Tehran. It was the regional capital in the 11th and 12th centuries
CE.
86
The water is a type of saintly water which, when it is soiled through contact with human sin, renews its purity
by Union with God (Nich.).

36