In his rendition, three princes set forth with their father’s blessing to
discover the far corners of their future kingdom. The king promises
them protection, warning them to keep away from the fortress,
destroyer of self-restraint and robber of consciousness. Naturally, they
disobey.
They arrive at the fortress of images, which resembles a body with
external and internal senses.
Into the beautiful fortress adorned with pictures,
five gates to the sea andfive to the land–
Five of those, like the senses, facing towards color and perfume;
five of them, like the interior senses, seeking the mystery.^69
The space, likened to wine, makes the young men, likened to idolaters,
restless. Although the similes underscore the fortress as a place of sin, it
also serves as a necessary passage for the education of the soul.
By those thousands of pictures and designs and decorations
they were made mightily restless to and fro.
Do not be intoxicated with these cups, which are forms,
lest you become a carver of idols and an idolater.^70
The intoxication, and not form itself, renders the princes idolaters. In the
palace of images, like a gallery or museum, their desire intoxicates them,
not the images. Although form enables the passage of meaning much as the
cup enables the drinking of wine, the soul is expected to perceive beyond
materiality to apprehend what matter conveys.
Abandon the cups, namely, the forms: do not tarry!
There is wine in the cup, but it is not from the cup.^71
Like ibn Arabi’s observation of glass appearing green from the liquid
inside, the cup is not only a carrier for the wine, but the wine itself is a
carrier of intoxication (seeChapter 5.3). Yet intoxication comes not
through drinking the wine, but through a divine gift which makes the
true form of the intoxication sensible.
Open your mouth wide to the Giver of the wine:
when the wine comes, the cup will not be lacking.^72
(^69) Rumi,1934: 462 (3703–3706). (^70) Rumi,1934: 462 (3707). (^71) Rumi,1934: 462 (3708).
(^72) Rumi,1934: 462 (3709).
The Ambivalent Image 211