It is told that a poor man named Shaban lived in a village bordering a mountain. Every day the man went out to search for salt among rocks, caves, and valleys. Whenever he found an amount of salt, he carried it in a sack on his shoulders and sold it to the villagers. He had no children to spend on except himself and his wife. One day he returned carrying a sack of salt to his house and placed it in a corner of the room where he lived with his wife.
His wife started preparing food but discovered that the salt in the house had run out. She said to her husband, “The salt is finished, I’ll fill the salt container from the sack.” As she was filling the container, she saw something sparkling among the salt grains in the sack. She took it and hurried to her husband saying, “Look, Shaban, it looks like a diamond!” The husband looked at the shining stone and said, “If this is a real diamond, it will be a precious treasure God has blessed us with, and we will become rich.”
At that moment someone knocked on the door. Shaban hesitated, then hid the diamond in his pocket and opened the door. He found an elderly woman who appeared sick and tired. The old woman said, “Give me from what God has given you.” Shaban quickly said, “I have nothing,” but he didn’t finish and his wife interrupted him, grabbing his arm. The kind wife remembered that God had blessed them with a treasure moments earlier. Shaban was confused about how to give her from the diamond that couldn’t be divided, but his wife saved him from his confusion and said to the old woman, “Welcome, aunt. God has given us good, but we don’t know how to give you from it now.”
Suddenly the old woman’s back straightened, many wrinkles vanished from her face, she smiled and said, “I am the one who placed the precious stone in the sack of salt. Since you have shown willingness to share with others what God has given you, God will bless you with the child you long for.” Before Shaban and his wife could utter a word, the woman had disappeared!
The strange old woman’s words came true, and Shaban and his wife were blessed with a beautiful daughter whom they named Fayrouz. As she grew, her beauty and intelligence increased. Shaban continued his work collecting salt from the mountain as before, but he found great difficulty in finding salt.
Fayrouz, now a young woman of stunning beauty, said to him, “I would like to go out with you, Father, to search for salt.” Her father pitied her for the hardship and said to her, “You’ll get tired and the sun will burn you.” But she insisted, and so Fayrouz went out with him. On this day he found a crack filled with salt, unlike previous days when he hadn’t found much.
They began the journey back home with his daughter. As they were returning, he suddenly saw a man walking with a large dog beside him. The man shouted at Shaban, “Stop, you and the girl with you!” Shaban and his daughter stopped, and the stranger approached them, raising his sword, and said to Shaban, “You must choose either to marry your daughter to me or to marry her to this dog.” Shaban was astonished and said to him, “Is it reasonable to marry my daughter to a dog?!” The stranger said, “It’s not a dog, it’s a prince and I am his servant.”
Shaban said, “If I agree to her marriage to the dog, and then I want to see her, where and how can I see her?” No sooner had Shaban said these words than the dog transformed into a handsome, agile prince. The prince said to Shaban, “So then you don’t object to my marriage to your daughter.” Shaban said, “She is my only daughter, and her mother will be very sad if she leaves her.” The prince said, “If I don’t marry your daughter, I will become an animal again.”
Fayrouz stepped forward and stood between the prince and her father, saying with concern, “He speaks with gentleness and truth, Father. It would be wrong to let him return to the form we saw him in.” The father said, “So then you agree to marry him?” Fayrouz lowered her face shyly, and Shaban said, “And I also agree.”
At that moment the mountain split open and they entered it with the prince. Shaban and his daughter found themselves in a large city built of crystal. The wedding was held in a grand celebration. Shaban said to the prince, “How can I see my daughter when I want to visit her?” The prince gave him a palm branch and said to him, “When you want to see your daughter, strike the ground to your right with this branch.”
Shaban returned to his wife, and she asked him about his daughter and his delay. He told her the story and struck the ground with the branch as the prince had instructed him. He took his wife to their daughter the bride. Fayrouz and her mother rejoiced greatly. Fayrouz said to her mother, “What a wonderful husband he is!” After a while, the father went to visit his daughter. Fayrouz said to her father, “You must live with me in this wealth and bliss.” She said to her father, “Go to my husband and ask him to give you the small donkey.” Her father was surprised and said to her, “What would I do with a small donkey?” She said to him, “You won’t regret it.”
He went to the prince, and indeed he gave him the small donkey. The prince said to him, “This donkey, when you tell it ‘sing to us your beautiful voice,’ will drop pieces of gold from it.” Shaban had debts to the owner of the village inn, so he went to him.
He took the donkey with him, and the inn owner was surprised that Shaban wanted to keep the donkey with him in the room. He spied on him and discovered that the donkey was magical and produced gold. He brought a similar donkey and replaced it when Shaban was asleep.
When Shaban woke up, he went to his wife and told her about the magical donkey, but the donkey didn’t produce any gold, so he realized it had been stolen from him. He went again to his daughter Fayrouz and told her. She said to him, “Go to my husband the prince and tell him to give you the flour machine.”
Indeed, he took it from the prince. It was magical and produced whatever food he desired whenever he turned it. He went for the second time to the inn, and the inn owner did to him as he had the previous time—he stole it from him and left him with a similar one. Shaban never discovered the thief.
So he went to the prince, and this time he gave him a magical staff that reveals the thief. Shaban had suspected the inn owner, so he went to the inn and said to him, “You stole a magical donkey and a magical flour machine from me, but this time I possess in this box something greater and better than them.” At night, the inn owner tried to steal the box containing the staff, but Shaban ordered the staff to strike the thief.
The staff kept striking the inn owner, and Shaban said to him, “Tell me where the donkey and the flour machine are.” The inn owner told him, and Shaban took them to the house. He held a feast for all the villagers and gave them all gold. He didn’t keep the treasure for himself alone, for he and his wife always loved to share the good that God blessed them with with people. In this way, Shaban and his wife teach us the joy of giving.