34:12 And the wind was Solomon's, its morning course a month and its evening course a month.
Solomon had beautiful, faultless horses, like birds without wings. When the tale of missing the prayer took place, he drew his sword and cut their necks. It was said to him, "Now that you have done away with them, We will make the wind your mount."
"When someone belongs to God, God belongs to him." Whenever someone abandons his own gaze, it is replaced by God's gaze. No one has ever abandoned something for God without being given something better in return. Muṣ?afā sent Jaʿfar to battle and made him the head of the army, so the banner of Islam was in his hand. The unbelievers attacked and cut off his hand, so he took up the banner with the other hand. They struck him again and cut off his other hand, and after that he received seventy-some wounds. He left this world as a martyr. He was seen in a dream and asked, "What did God do with you?"
He said, "God gave me two wings in place of the hands and with them I fly in the Garden wherever I want with Gabriel and Michael."
AsmāÌ bint ʿAmīs said. God's Messenger was standing and suddenly said, "And upon you be peace."
I said, "To whom were you returning the greeting, O Messenger of God, for I do not see anyone with you."
He said, "That was Jaʿfar ibn Abī Ṭālib. He just passed by with Gabriel and Michael."
"O Jaʿfar, you gave your hands. Here are wings. O Solomon, you gave your horses. Here is the wind, your porter on land and sea."
"O truthful lover, if by virtue of your discipline you sacrifice your eyes and throw away your body, then here: Our gentleness is your eyes, Our bounty is your ears, Our generosity your lamp and candle. 'When I love him, I am his hearing and he hears through Me, his eyesight and he sees through Me, his hand and he grasps through Me.' First a man becomes a speaker, then a knower, then a traveler, then a flier.
O poor man, have you never wished that one day the bird of your heart would be delivered from the cage of your misfortune and fly in the air of the Real's approval? By the majesty of the Lord God! Nothing will welcome you but the caress of "I come near to him by a cubit."
Why do you stay in this low place like crows looking for carrion?
Break the cage and fly at once like peacocks to the heights. [DS 52]
The cage is the bodily frame, and the divine Trust is the bird's spirit. It is a bird whose wings are passion, whose flying is desire, whose horizon is the Unseen, and whose domicile is pain. Whenever the bird of the Trust flies from this cage of mortal nature to the horizon of the Unseen, the cherubim of the world of holiness put their hands over their eyes. Otherwise, the lightning of its beauty would burn their eyes.