Rumi’s ‘The Snake-Catcher’s Tale’

By Scott Horton

Sultan Murad II at Archery Practice: from Huner-nama (’Book of Skills’) (1584)

Listen to this, and hear the mystery inside:

A snake-catcher went into the mountains to find a snake.

He wanted a friendly pet, and one that would amaze

audiances, but he was looking for a reptile, something

that has no knowledge of friendship.

It was winter.

In the deep snow he saw a frighteningly huge dead snake.

He was afraid to touch it but he did.

In fact, he dragged the thing into Baghdad,

hoping people would pay to see it

This is how foolish

we’ve become! A human being is a mountain range!

Snakes are facinated by us! Yet we sell ourselves

to look at a dead snake.

We are like beautiful satin

used to patch burlap. “Come see the dragon I killed,

and hear the adventures!” That’s what he announced,

and a large crowd came,

but the dragon was not dead,

just dormant! He set up his show at a crossroads.

The ring of gawking rubes got thicker, everybody

on tiptoe, men and women, noble and peasant, all

packed together unconscious of their differences.

It was like the Resurrection!

He began to unwind the thick ropes and remove

the cloth covering he’d wrapped it so well in.

Some little movement.

The hot Iraqi sun had woken

the terrible life. The people nearest started screaming.

Panic! The dragon tore easily and hungrily

loose, killing many instantly.

The snake-catcher stood there,

frozen. “What have I brought out of the mountains?” The snake

braced against a post and crushed the man and consumed

him.

The snake is your animal-soul. When you bring it

into the hot air of your wanting-energy, warmed

by that and by the prospect of power and wealth,

it does massive damage.

Leave it in the snow mountains.

Don’t expect to oppose it with quietness

and sweetness and wishing.

The nafs don’t respond to those,

and they can’t be killed. It takes a Moses to deal

with such a beast, to lead it back, and make it lie down

in the snow. But there was no Moses then.

Hundreds of thousands died.

–Mawlānā Jalāl-ad-Dīn Muhammad Rūmī (Rumi) (مولانا جلال الدین محمد رومی), Masnavi-ye Manavi (مثنوی معنوی), bk iii (ca. 1265)(Coleman Barks transl.)