138 – Hamzah narrated to me; ‘Abdān, ‘Abd Allāh, and ‘Abd al-Ḥamīd ibn Bahrām likewise transmitted from Shahr ibn Ḥawshab, from Abū Hurayrah, who said:

While the Messiah was walking with a company of disciples between a flowing river and a putrid carcass, a bird of striking colors appeared, its plumage shimmering as though it were gold. It alighted nearby, shook itself, and shed its feathers; once stripped of its plumage it was nothing but a bald, scrawny little creature.

It crept over to the foul carcass, wallowed in it, and was smeared with its stench, becoming even uglier and filthier than before. Then it waddled on until it reached a clear, shallow stretch of the river, where it bathed until it looked as white as a peeled egg. After that it returned, took up its discarded feathers, and clothed itself in them exactly as at first.

Such is the likeness of a person who commits sin while he is steeped in wrongdoing; and such is the likeness of repentance—it is like the bird’s washing away the stench in that shallow river. Yet he resumes his offence when he puts his plumage back on again.