The Skeptic of Khorasan

Late one summer afternoon, Mullah Nasreddin was wandering the outskirts of Bukhara when he stopped to rest beneath a walnut tree. In the field across the way, a patch of yellow-skinned Khorasan melons ripened in the sun.

The Mullah studied the plump gourds hanging from their thin, fragile vines, then looked up into the canopy of the mighty tree, dotted with tiny walnuts.

“Tell me, O Khuda,” the Mullah said, addressing God with the easy familiarity of a drunkard speaking to a friend.

“Without questioning Your Honor’s vast power and boundless wisdom,” he added, “why did You place these tiny little nuts on a dignified, thick-trunked tree like this, while pinning those magnificent melons to the dirt?”

At that exact moment, a single nut dropped from the treetop and struck the honorable Mullah’s forehead with a hollow thud.

“I see how it is,” the Mullah muttered. “For every question there is an answer, and for every doubter, a nut to the head.” *

*(Editorial note: Pecans do not grow near Bukhara; this was likely a Persian walnut, which suffers less from clumsy puns.)