The Seventh Heaven

A Warning from Afar

We had not thought that Hasabu, who warned us of danger, would ever amount to so much. He used to sell perfumes for a meager profit, though his wealth in human affection knew no bounds. His most prominent qualities were his soundness and reliability. In his leisure time he would dabble in song, loving to stay up late talking, though he didn’t partake of a water pipe except behind the neighborhood tombs.

One morning he came back from his late night out, his face white and his mind distracted. He told his friends in the coffeehouse that he had been summoned as he returned in the dark, finding himself surrounded by furious ghosts. He learned from their conversation that they were skeletons of the former residents of our quarter. They were agreed among themselves that what was now going on here was morally forbidden. They asked him to serve as their herald, warning the people of the hara that if they didn’t put right their affairs, and return to the straightened path, then the spirits would creep upon them as an army of walking bones, cleansing the quarter of both sin and sinners.

Some people laughed. Others cracked jokes. Yet they all fell speechless in view of his intense sadness, and his tearful, dejected looks.

“You’re serious, Hasabu!” said one.

“We’ve never known you to be a liar!” declared another.

“But what you’re saying is simply impossible!” opined a third.

So he answered in a quavering voice, “Sublime is His power…. He says of something, Be! — and it is….”

Amazingly, what Hasabu said greatly affected many souls. One group repeated what is said of the Holy Traditions, that there can be no altering them. Others clung to the word of the All Powerful, who knows no limits. The wise men, common folk, and fools alike became caught up in all this until it kindled civil strife. The shaykh of the alley finally felt compelled to intervene, calling out to them on market day, “What have you to do with these arcane affairs? Have you given up your daily concerns?”

He appealed for help from the prayer leader of the local Sufi order, but the disputation persisted and grew out of control. Insults were traded, and fistfights broke out.

During all this, they would refer to the warning of the Dead as if it were an undeniable fact. Yet this did nothing to diminish the deviations from the righteous way that took place every day, as though there was no relation between the two.

As for Hasabu, he withdrew from the life of his alley— and was drawn instead to the world of the Unseen with all its force. All connections between himself, people, and material things were cut, as he retired with his white robe, green turban, and cryptic speech. He spent most of his days at the cemetery’s edge, staring into the wasteland beyond, awaiting whatever Time would bring.