The Third Loaf of Bread

Once upon a time a prophet, who was on a pilgrimage, accompanied by fellow pilgrims, gave
some money to one of his companions and told him to go to get some food for everyone. The
man took the money and went to a close by town. Since he was given rather a small amount of
money, all he was able to buy were three loaves of bread. He was feeling very hungry and
decided to eat one loaf of bread himself.

When he rejoined the group, he handed the bread over to the prophet, who asked him, “Who ate
the third loaf of bread?!!” The man nervously said that there were only two loaves of bread. The
prophet did not say anything further and they continued on with their journey.

Later on, the companions succeeded in hunting down a deer. They killed the deer, cooked it, and
were eating it when the prophet stood up, raised his hands, and asked Allah to bring the deer
back to life. In less than a second, the deer came back to life, jumped up, and ran away. All the
pilgrims were amazed that the deer that they just killed, cooked, and were eating from its flesh,
all of a sudden came back to life. At this point the prophet looked at the man who had gone after
the bread and said, “I am asking you by the One who brought this deer back to life, who ate the
third loaf of bread?” The man retorted that there were only two loaves of bread. The prophet
again did not say anything and the group continued on with their journey.

As they were walking, they came across a river that was flooded up. The prophet asked everyone
to hold his hand. So everyone joined hands with him and thus they were able to walk on water
across the over-flooded river. When they reached the other side, people marveled at the miracle,
“How could this be?! We just walked on water!” At that time the prophet again turned to the man
who had been sent to buy bread and said, “I am asking you by the One who made us able to cross
the river by walking on water, who ate the third loaf of bread?” The man retorted, “There were
only two loaves.” The prophet did not say anything further and they continued the journey.

Next they came to a desert where the prophet took three big piles of sand and asked Allah to turn
it into gold. As the man who had been asked to buy bread was watching it, the piles of sand
became piles of gold. The prophet then said, “One pile is for me. One pile is for you. The third
pile is for the one who ate the third loaf of bread!” At this, the man said, “I was the one who ate
the third loaf of bread.” The prophet then told him, “Than all three piles of gold are for you, but
do not accompany us anymore.”

The man did not care to have lost the company of the prophet and other pilgrims. He was so
happy that he sat down in front of his new fortune and started to day-dream what he will do with
all the gold. He was smiling all alone, looking at his wealth when suddenly three thieves came
upon the scene. They saw this man sitting alone with a huge treasure of gold. The first thing they
did was kill him. They then divided the gold. Each one of them took one of the piles of gold.
Then one of the thieves was sent to go get some food so they could eat and then plan out their
future.

One of the thieves went to a nearby town to buy food. He didn’t take one of the loaves of bread
for himself like the other guy. Instead he decided to poison the food so that when he goes back,
the other two thieves would eat the food and die, thus leaving him with all of the gold. So he
poisoned the food and went back to rejoin the thieves.

His friends, who he left behind, were also plotting against him, thinking how to eliminate him in
order to keep all the gold to themselves. So when he came back, they killed him and sat down to
enjoy their meal. They ate the poisoned food and few minutes later they both died.

When the prophet came back with his companions, he saw their former companion lying dead
next to the three thieves and the three piles of gold. The prophet pointed to the scene and said,
“This is the life of this world and this is what it will do to those who seek after it.”