In Book Four of Jalaluddin Rumi's Masnavi, the parable of the dog and the blind beggar serves as an allegory for human greed and spiritual blindness. In this story, a stray dog barks and attacks a blind beggar in a narrow street. The beggar reproaches the dog, noting that while its pack in the wilderness hunts wild game (gūr) alongside lions, this dog contentedly scavenges in ruins and targets the vulnerable.

Rumi uses this image to symbolize how humans, possessing noble spiritual lineages and the potential to seek divine proximity, instead diminish themselves by aggressively competing for meager worldly wealth. The blind beggar represents the temporary, limited nature of worldly pursuits, while the dog's wasted potential mirrors humanity's heedlessness of its high spiritual calling.