The Raven

A raven was thirsty. It came upon a glass bottle with water at the bottom. Try as it might, it could not push its beak far enough inside to drink the water. Short of pushing the bottle over and letting the water pour out, there seemed no way to get the water out.

Then the raven hit upon a plan. It took stones and tossed them into the bottle. As the stones increased, so did the water level rise, eventually allowing the raven to drink.

This story has several morals.

Many a time our situation might seem hopeless. Yet, if we trust in Allah and live our lives according to His law, He opens our intellect and allows us to find ingenious ways out of our seemingly impossible problems.

Another moral is that we might at times have to change the order of things to see results. The raven needed to add stones to the water. We sometimes need to break out of the conventional mode of living which in today’s terms involves interest and other harmful business practices in order to maintain a certain level of lifestyle. This might mean that we drop to a lower level in our lifestyle in order to rid ourselves of some interest-laden debt.

The third moral is that we should never look down on anybody no matter how seemingly insignificant. Just as the ‘useless’ stones were eventually used for a valuable purpose, so too does every person have the potential to make something of him/herself.