The Eye of the Needle

And he took up the needle and held it against the light, that he might find the eye of it; and the eye was a small thing, and narrow, and hard to be seen, being made for the passage of one thread only, and no more.

And he took the thread, and behold, the end of it was frayed, and swollen, and split into many fibres, each going its own way; and he brought it up toward the eye, and it would not go. For the thread was fat with its own frayedness, and the ways of it were many, and the eye was single; and the many cannot pass where only the one may go.

Then said he within himself, It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for this thread, in the fatness thereof, to pass. And his hand shook, for the hour was late and the eye was small and the years were upon his sight; and the more he strove and stared, the more the eye swam, and the thread missed, and struck the side, and turned back.

And those looking on were troubled, and said, Who then can thread it? For if the frayed thread cannot pass, nor the trembling hand find the eye, who is sufficient?

But he wetted the end of the thread upon his tongue, and rolled it between finger and thumb; and the many fibres were gathered into one, and the fatness was made lean, and the split end was drawn to a point fine and smooth and single. For that which would pass the narrow eye must first be made small, and gathered, and humbled to a single thread; the laden do not pass, neither the many, neither the proud that stand out in every direction, but only the one made fine.

And he breathed, and was still; for the passing is not done by striving but in the stillness after it. He held the breath, and stayed the tremor, and brought the pointed thread up level and slow toward the light of the eye —

and it went through.

A hand’s breadth of thread stood out the far side, that a moment before could not find the way at all; and he drew it through, and the eye had given passage to the single thing it was made to pass. With striving it was impossible; but with the wetted point, and the gathered fibres, and the one still breath, all things were made possible, and the small gate was open.

And he pulled the thread even, and made the ends to meet, and set to the mending; for the eye of the needle openeth not to the great, nor to the frayed, nor to the many, but to the one thing made small enough to pass, and patient enough to wait for the tremor to cease.

It may be so. It may not.