"You wouldn't know it just by looking at me," said Nasruddin, "but I have truly miraculous powers."
Nasruddin's friend laughed. "So tell me," he said, "what is your most miraculous power?"
"I can see in the dark! In the darkest darkness, I can see as clearly as if it were broad daylight. I need no light of any kind."
"Surely you’re joking!" his friend objected. "I’ve seen you carrying a lantern in the dark, just like everybody else does."
"Of course!" said Nasruddin, smiling. "But I carry a lantern in the dark only so that others won't run into me."
Inspired by: 202 Jokes of Nasreddin Hodja by Her Hakki Mahfuzdur, story 23. The story also appears in The Sufis by Idries Shah, free to read online at the Idries Shah Foundation.
Notes: Compare the famous story of the wise fool carrying a lamp in broad daylight, a story that is told of Aesop and Diogenes in the Greek tradition, and which is also found in the Islamic tradition too: Lamp in Daylight.
I included this book in Tiny Tales of Nasruddin, where it is story 159.
(Pexels)
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