Human being entering this world, this market place

A person without faith is like a man who arrives at the marketplace after dark. In the darkness, this man cannot tell what he is buying. There are all kinds of people among the sellers. He pays his money and stuffs whatever they give into his sack. He does not examine what he is getting.

That man has paid his money, but he has no idea what he bought. Back home, he empties his sack. He thought he had bought a rope, but finds he has a snake. The honey proves to be tar. The meat is a stinking carcass. All his money has been wasted, and he has brought himself a heap of trouble in the bargain.

The human being entering this world is like the man going to market in the dark.

Listen to the words of the sufi poet:

To market we came
From our mother's womb,
We brought a shroud,
Then back to the tomb.

- from Shems Friedlander's book, Rumi and the Whirling Dervishes