Javid Nama PDF

JAVIDNAMA
Let its light illuminate the spirit
PRAYER and sounds become visible even as colours;
hidden things become manifest in its
Man, in this world of seven hues, splendour,
lute‐like is ever afire with lamentation; its watch is unending and intransient.
yearning for a kindred spirit burns him Grant me that Day, Lord, even for a single
inwardly day,
teaching him threnodies to soothe the heart, deliver me from this day that has no glow!
and yet this world, that is wrought of water Concerning whom was the Verse of
and clay— Subjection revealed?
how can it be said to possess a heart? For whose sake spins the azure sphere so
Sea, plain, mountain, grass —all are deaf and wildly?
dumb, Who was it knew the secret of He taught the
deaf and dumb heaven and sun and moon; names?
though the stars swarm in the selfsame sky Who was intoxicated with that saki and that
each star is more solitary than the other, wine?
each one is desperate just as we are, Whom didst Thou choose out of all the
a vagrant lost in an azure wilderness— world?
the caravan unprovisioned against the To whom didst Thou confide the innermost
journey, secret?
the heavens boundless, the nights O Thou whose arrow transpierced our breast,
interminable. who uttered the words Call upon me, and to
Is this world then some prey, and we the whom?
huntsmen, Thy countenance is my faith, and my Quran:
or are we prisoners utterly forgotten? dost Thou begrudge my soul one
Bitterly I wept, but echo answered never: manifestation?
where may Adam’s son find a kindred spirit? By the loss of a hundred of its rays
I have seen that the day of this dimensioned the sun’s capital is in no wise diminished.
world Reason is a chain fettering this present age:
whose light illuminates both palace and street where is a restless soul such as I possess?
came into being from the flight of a planet, For many ages Being must twist on itself
is nothing more, you might say, than a that one restless soul may come into being.
moment gone. Except you fret away at this brackish soil
How fair is the Day that is not of our days, it is not congenial to the seed of desire;
the Day whose dawn has neither noon nor count it for gain enough if a single heart
eve!
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grows from the bosom of this unproductive This world of mountain and plain, ocean and
clay! land—
Thou art a moon: pass within my dormitory, we yearn for vision, and it speaks of report.
glance but once on my unenlightened soul. Grant to this vagrant heart a resting‐place,
Why does the flame shrink away from the restore to the moon this fragment of the
stubble? moon.
Why is the lightning‐flash afraid to strike? Though from my soil nothing grows but
words,
So long as I have lived, I have lived in
the language of banishment never comes to an
separation:
end.
reveal what lies beyond yon azure canopy;
Under the heavens I feel myself a stranger:
open the doors that have been closed in my
from beyond the skies utter the words I am
face,
near,
let earth share the secrets of heaven’s holy
that these dimensions, this north and this
ones.
south,
Kindle now a fire within my breast—
like to the sun and moon in the end may set,
leave be the aloe, and consume the
I shall transcend the talisman of yesterday
brushwood,
and tomorrow, transcend the moon, sun,
then set my aloe again upon the fire
Pleiades.
and scatter my smoke through all the world.
Stir up the fire within my goblet, Thou art eternal splendour; we are like
mingle one glance with this inadvertency. sparks—
We seek Thee, and Thou art far from our a breath or two we possess, and that too
sight; borrowed.
no, I have erred—we are blind, and Thou art You who know naught of the battle of death
present. and life,
Either draw aside this veil of mysteries who is this slave who would emulate even
or seize to Thyself this sightless soul! God?
The date‐tree of my thought despairs of leaf This slave, impatient, conquering all horizons,
and fruit; finds pleasure neither in absence nor in
either despatch the axe, or the breeze of presence.
dawn. I am a momentary thing: make me eternal,
Thou gavest me reason, give me madness too, out of my earthiness make me celestial.
show me the way to inward ecstasy. Grant me precision both in speech and action:
Knowledge takes up residence in the thought, the ways are clear—give me the strength to
love’s lodge is the unsleeping heart; walk.
so long as knowledge has no portion of love What I have said comes from another world;
it is a mere picture‐gallery of thoughts. this book descends from another heaven.
This peep‐show is the Samiri’s conjuring‐ I am a sea; untumult in me is a fault;
trick; where is he who can plunge into my depths?
knowledge without the Holy Ghost is mere A whole world slumbered upon my shore
spellbinding. and saw from the strand naught but the surge
Without revelation no wise man ever found of a wave.
the way, I, who despair of the great sages of old,
he died buffetted by his own imaginings; have a word to say touching the day to come!
without revelation life is a mortal sickness, Render my speech easy unto the young,
reason is banishment, religion constraint. make my abyss for them attainable.
[Translated by A.J. Arberry]
284 Collected Poetical Works of Iqbal
Earth felt put to shame by heaven’s reproach,
PRELUDE IN HEAVEN desperate, heavy of heart, utterly annihilated,
fluttered before God in the agony of unlight.
ON THE FIRST DAY OF CREATION HEAVEN Suddenly a voice echoed from beyond the
skies:
REBUKES EARTH
‘O trusty one, as yet unaware of the trust,
Life out of the delight of absence and presence
be not sorrowful; look within thy own heart.
fashioned forth this world of near and far;
The days are bright of the tumult of life,
so snapped asunder the thread of the moment
not through the light thou seest spread in all
and mixed the hues of Time’s house of
quarters.
amazement.
Dawn’s light comes from the spotted sun,
On all sides, out of the joyous yearning for
the soul’s light is unsullied by the dust of
hábitude
time;
arose the cry: ‘I am one thing, you are
the soul’s light is upon a pathless journey,
another.’
roves farther than the rays of sun, and moon.
The moon and the stars learned the way to
Thou hast washed from the soul’s tablet the
walk,
image of hope,
a hundred lamps were kindled in the
yet the soul’s light manifests out of thy dust!
firmament.
Man’s reason is making assault on the world,
In the azure heavens the sun pitched
but his love makes assault on the Infinite;
its gold‐cloth tent with its silver ropes,
his thought knows the way without any
raised its head over the rim of the first dawn
guide,
and drew to its breast the new‐born world.
his sight is more wakeful than Gabriel.
Man’s realm was a heap of earth, no more,
Earthy, yet in flight he is like an angel;
an empty wilderness, without a caravan;
heaven is but an ancient inn upon his way;
not a river wrestled in any mountain,
he pricks into the very depths of the heavns
not a cloud sprinkled on any desert,
like the point of a needle into silk;
no chanting of birds among the branches,
he washes the stains from the skirt of Being,
no leaping of deer amidst the meadow.
and without his glance, the world is blank
Sea and land lacked the spirit’s
and blind.
manifestations,
Though few his magnificats, and much blood
a curling vapour was the mantle of earth’s
he sheds,
body;
yet he is as a spur in the flanks of doom.
the grasses, never having known the breeze of
His sight becomes keen through observing
March,
phenomena
still slumbered within the depths of earth.
so that he sees the Essence within the
The azure sky then chided the earth, saying:
attributes.
‘I never saw anyone pass so miserable a life!
Whoever falls in love with the beauty of
In all my breadth what creature is so blind as
Essence,
you?
he is the master of all existing things.’
What light is yours, save that drawn from my
lamp? SONG OF THE ANGELS
Be earth high as Alvand, yet it is only earth, The lustre of a handful of earth one day
it is not bright and eternal as the skies. shall outshine the creatures of light;
Either live with the apparatus of a earth through the star of his destiny one day
heart‐charmer, shall be transformed into heaven.
or die of the shame and misery of
worthlessness!’
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His imagination, which is nourished by the GHAZAL 1
torrent of vicissitudes, Open your lips, for abundant sugar‐candy is
one day shall soar out of the whirlpool of my desire;
the azure sky. show your cheek, for the garden and
Consider one moment the meaning of Man; rosebed are my desire.
what thing do you ask of us? In one hand a flask of wine, in the other the
Now he is pricking into nature, one day he beloved’s tress—
will be modulated perfectly, such a dance in the midst of the maidan is
so perfectly modulated will this precious my desire.
subject be You said, ‘Torment me no more with your
that even the heart of God will bleed one coquetry: begone!’
day at the impact of it! That saying of yours, ‘Torment me no more,
‘ is my desire.
O reason, become out of yearning a babbler
of words confused;
O love, distracted subtleties are my desire.
This bread and water of heaven are fickle as
a torrent;
PRELUDE ON EARTH I am a fish, , a leviathan‐Oman is my desire.
My soul has grown aweary of Pharaoh and
his tyranny;
THE SPIRIT OF RUMI APPEARS AND
that light in the breast of Moses, Imran’s
EXPLAINS THE MYSTERY OF THE
son, is my desire.
ASCENSION Last night the Elder wandered about the city
Tumulutous love, indifferent to the city— with a lantern
for in the city’s clangour its flame dies— saying, ‘I am weary of demon and monster:
seeks solitude in desert and mountain‐range man is my desire.’
or on the shore of an unbounded sea. My heart is sick of these feeble‐spirited
I, who saw among my friends none to confide fellow‐travellers;
in, the Lion of God and Rustam‐i Dastan, are
rested a moment on the shore of the sea: my desire.
the sea, and the hour of the setting sun— I said, ‘The thing we quested after is never
the blue water was a liquid ruby in the attained.’
gloaming. He said, ‘The unattainable—that thing is my
Sunset gives to the blind man the joy of sight, desire!’
sunset gives to evening the hue of dawn. The restless wave slept on the grey water,
I held conversation with my heart; the sun vanished, dark grew the horizon—
I had many desires, many requests— evening stole a portion of its capital
a thing of the moment, unsharing and a star stood like a witness above the roof.
immortality, The spirit of Rumi rent the veils asunder;
a thing living, unsharing life itself, from behind a mountain mass he became
thirsty, and yet far from the rim or the visible,
fountain, his face shining like the sun in splendour,
involuntarily I chanted this song. his white hairs radiant as the season of
youth—

1 This ghazal is from the Divan of Rumi.
a figure bright in a light immortal, then chisel anew the crumbled form;
robed from head to foot in everlasting joy. make proof of yourself; be a true being!
Upon his lips the hidden secret of Being Only such an existent is praiseworthy,
loosed from itself the chains of speech and otherwise the fire of life is mere smoke.’.
sound:
I asked again, ‘How shall one go before God?
his speech was as a suspended mirror,
How may one split the mountain of clay and
knowledge commingled with an inward fire.
water?
I asked him, ‘What is the existent, the
The Orderer and Creator is outside Order and
non‐existent?
Creation;
What is the meaning of praiseworthy and
we—our throats are strangled by the noose of
unpraiseworthy?’
Fate.’
He said, ‘The existent is that which wills to
He said, ‘If you obtain the Authority
appear:
you can break through the heavens easily.
manifestation is all the impulse of Being.
Wait till the day creation all is naked
Life means to adorn oneself in one’s self,
and has washed from its skirt the dust of
to desire to bear witness to one’s own being;
dimension;
the concourse on the day primordial arrayed
then you will see neither waxing nor waning
desired to bear witness to their own being.
in its being,
Whether you be alive, or dead, or dying—
you will see yourself as of it, and it of you.
for this seek witness from three witnesses.
Recall the subtlety Except with an authority
The first witness is self‐consciousness,
or die in the mire like an ant or a locust!
to behold oneself in one’s own light;
It was by way of birth, excellent man,
the second witness is the consciousness of
that you came into this dimensioned world;
another,
by birth it is possible also to escape,
to behold oneself in another’s light;
it is possible to loosen all fetters from oneself;
the third witness is the consciousness of God’s
but such a birth is not of clay and water—
essence,
that is known to the man who has a living
to behold oneself in the light of God’s essence.
heart.
If you remain fast before this light,
The first birth is by constraint, the second by
count yourself living and abiding as God!
choice;
Life is to attain one’s own station,
the first is hidden in veils, the second is
life is to see the Essence without a veil;
manifest;
the true believer will not make do with
the first happens with weeping, the second
Attributes—
with laughter,
the Prophet was not content save with the
for the first is a seeking, the second a finding;
Essence.
the first is to dwell and journey amidst
What is Ascension? The desire for a witness,
creation,
an examination face‐to‐face of a witness—
the second is utterly outside all dimensions;
a competent witness without whose
the first is in need of day and night,
confirmation
the second—day and night are but its vehicle.
life to us is like colour and scent to a rose.
A child is born through the rending of the
In that Presence no man remains firm,
womb,
or if he remains, he is of perfect assay.
a man is born through the rending of the
Give not away one particle of the glow you
world;
have,
the call to prayer signalizes both kinds of
knot tightly together the glow within you;
birth,
fairer it is to increase one’s glow,
fairer it is to test oneself before the sun;
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the first is uttered by the lips, the second of love conquered Khaibar on a loaf of barley,
the very soul. love clove asunder the body of the moon,
Whenever a watchful soul is born in a body broke Nimrod’s cranium without a blow,
this ancient inn, the world, trembles to its without a battle shattered Pharaoh’s hosts.
foundations!’ Love in the soul is like sight it in the eye,
be it within the house or without the door;
I said, ‘I know not what manner of birth this
love is at once both ashes and spark,
is.’
its work is loftier than religion and science.
He said, ‘It is one of the high estates of life.
Love is authority and manifest proof,
Life plays at vanishing and then
both worlds are subject to the seal‐ring of
reappearing—
love;
one role is constant, the other transitory;
timeless it is, and yesterday and tomorrow
now life dissolves itself in manifestation,
spring from it,
anon it concentrates itself in solitude.
placeless it is, and under and over spring
Its manifestation shines with the light of the
from it;
Attributes,
when it supplicates God for selfhood
its solitude is lit up by the light of the Essence.
all the world becomes a mount, itself the
Reason draws life towards manifestation,
rider.
love draws life towards solitude.
Through love, the heart’s status becomes
Reason likewise hurls itself against the world
clearer;
to shatter the talisman of water and clay;
through love, the draw of this ancient inn
every stone on the road becomes its preceptor,
becomes void.
lightning and cloud preach sermons to it.
Lovers yield themselves up to God,
Its eye is no stranger to the joy of seeing,
give interpretative reason as an offering.
but it possesses not the drunkard’s boldness;
Are you a lover? Proceed from direction to
therefore, fearing the road, it gropes like a
directionlessness;
blind man,
make death a thing prohibited to yourself.
softly, gently it creeps along, just like an ant.
You who are like a dead man in the grave’s
So long as reason is involved with colour and
coffer,
scent
resurrection is possible without the sound of
slowly it proceeds upon the path to the
the Trumpet!
Beloved;
You have in your throat melodies sweet and
its affairs achieve some order gradually—
delicate;
I do not know when they will ever be
how long will you croak like a frog in the
completed!
mud?
Love knows nothing of months and years,
Boldly ride upon space and time,
late and soon, near and far upon the road.
break free of the convolutions of this girdle;
Reason drives a fissure through a mountain,
sharpen your two eyes and your two ears—
or else makes a circuit around it;
whatever you see, digest by way of the
before love the mountain is like a straw,
understanding.
the heart darts as swiftly as a fish.
“The man who hears the voice of the ants
Love means, to make assault upon the
also hears from Time the secret of Fate.”
Infinite,
Take from me the glance that burns the veil,
without seeing the grave to flee the world.
the glance that becomes not the eye’s
Love’s strength is not of air and earth and
prisoner.
water,
“Man is but sight, the rest is mere skin;
its might derives not from toughness of
true sight signifies seeing the Beloved.
sinew;
Dissolve the whole body into sight—
go to gazing, go to gazing, go to gaze!” out of that cloud an angel descended
having two faces, one like fire, one like
Are you afraid of these nine heavens? Fear
smoke—
not;
one dark as night, the other bright as a
are you afraid of the world’s immensity? Fear
meteor,
not.
the eyes of one watchful, the other’s eyes
Open wide your eyes upon Time and Space,
asleep.
for these two are but a state of the soul.
The hues of his wings were of crimson and
Since first the gaze advanced on manifestation
gold,
the alternation of yesterday and tomorrow
emerald and silver, azure and lapis‐lazuli;
was born.
his temper had the fleetness even of a
The seed lying in the soil’s house of darkness
phantom,
a stranger to the vast expanse of the sky—
he sped from earth to the Milky Way in an
does it not know that in an ample space
instant;
it can display itself, branch by branch.
every moment he was seized by another
What is its substance? A delight in growing;
desire,
this substance is both its station and itself.
to spread his wings in yet another sky.
You who say that the body is the soul’s He said, ‘I am Zarvan, I am the
vehicle, world‐subduer,
consider the soul’s secret; tangle not with the alike hidden from sight and manifest am I.
body. Every plan is bound up with my determining;
It is not a vehicle, it is a state of the soul; voiced and voiceless—all alike are my prey.
to call it its vehicle is a confusion of terms. Through me the bud swells upon the branch,
What is the soul? Rapture, joy, burning and through me the birdie bewails in the nest;
anguish, through my flight the seed becomes a stalk,
delight in mastering the revolving sphere. through my effluence every parting turns to
What is the body? Habit of colour and scent, union.
habit of dwelling in the world’s dimensions. I pronounce both reproach and exhortation;
Your near and far spring out of the senses; I render athirst, that I may offer wine.
what is Ascension? A revolution in sense, I am life, I am death, I am resurrection,
a revolution in sense born of rapture and I am the Judgment, Hell, Heaven and Houri.
yearning; Man and angel are both in bondage to me,
rapture and yearning liberate from under and this transitory world is my own child;
over. I am every rose that you pluck from the
This body is not the associate of the soul; branch,
a handful of earth is no impediment to flight.’ I am the matrix of every thing that you see.
This world is a prisoner in my talisman,
ZARVAN, THE SPIRIT OF TIME AND
every moment it ages through my breath.
SPACE, CONDUCTS THE TRAVELLER ON But he who has in his heart I have a time with
HIS JOURNEY TO THE SUPERNAL WORLD God,
that doughty hero has broken my talisman;
My soul was convulsed by the words that he
if you wish that I should not be in the midst,
spoke,
recite from the depths of your soul I have a
every atom of my body trembled like
time with God.’
quicksilver.
Suddenly I saw, between the West and the I know not what it was that was in his glance,
East, it snatched away from my sight this ancient
heaven immersed in a single cloud of light; world;
Javidnama 289
either my sight opened on another world a naked sword is ample enough for the
or this same world took on another form. august pomp of kings.
I died in the universe of colour and scent, The drumming of the dervish, Alexander’s
I was born in a world without tumult and clamorous vanity—
clamour; the one is the rapture of Moses, the other the
my thread snapped from that ancient world, Samiri’s conjuring.
a whole new world came into my hands. The one slays with a glance, the other slays
My soul trembled at the loss of a world with an army;
until another world blossomed out of my the one is all peace and amity, the other is
dust; all war and wrangling.
my body became nimbler, my soul more Both were conquerors of the world, both
adventurous, sought immortality,
the eye of my heart was keener and more the one by the guidance of violence, the other
wakeful; guided by love.
veiled things became manifest uncurtained, Bring the hammer‐blow of the dervish,
the melody of the stars reached my ears. break the rampart of Alexander;
renew the ancient wont of Moses, break the
CHANT OF THE STARS glamour of wizardry!
Your reason is the fruit of life, your love is
creation’s mystery; [Translated by A.J. Arberry]
O form of dust, welcome to this side of the
world of dimensions!
Venus and Moon and Jupiter are rivals on
your account,
for one glance from you there’s a great jostle THE SPHERE OF THE
of manifestations.
On the road to the Beloved there are MOON
revelations ever fresh and new;
the man of true yearning and desire yields This earth and heaven are the Kingdom of
not his heart to the All. God,
Life is truth and purity, life is quickening this moon and Pleiades are our patrimony;
and surging; whatever thing meets your gaze upon this
gallop from eternity to eternity; life is the road,
Kingdom of God. regard it with the eye of intimacy.
Unto the passion of minstrelsy give leave to Go not about your own dwelling like a
clamour and riot, stranger—
give wine again to profligate and censor, you who are lost to yourself, be a little
wine pitcher on pitcher. fearless!
Syria and Iraq, India and Persia are This and that impose your command on their
accustomed to the sugar‐cane; hearts;
give to the sugar‐cane’s habituate the if you say ‘Don’t do this, do that,’ they obey.
bitterness of desire! The world is nothing but idols of eye and ear;
That it may enter upon battle with the its every morrow will die like yesterday.
high‐billowed ocean Plunge like a madman into the desert of the
give to the heart of the rivulet the joy of the Quest,
swift torrent. that is to say, be the Abraham of this
The poor man is a fire, rulership and power idol‐house!
imperial are straw;
When you have travelled all through earth no sign of life therein, neither of death,
and heaven, no root of the palm tree of life in its navel,
when you have traversed this world and the no events hidden in the thighs of its time;
other, though it is a member of the family of the sun
seek from God another seven heavens, its dawn and evening beget no revolution.
seek a hundred other times and spaces. Rumi said, ‘Rise, and take a step forward,
Self‐lost to sink on the bank of the river of do not let slip this wakeful fortune.
Paradise, Its interior is fairer than its exterior,
quit of the battle and buffetting of good and another world lurks hidden in its hollows.
evil— Whatever presents itself to you, man of sense,
if our salvation be the cessation of searching, seize it in the rings of the eye and the ear.
better the grave than a heaven of colours and If the eye has vision, everything is worth
scents. seeing,
Traveller! the soul dies of dwelling at rest, worthy to be weighed in the glance’s balance.
it becomes more alive by perpetual soaring. Wheresoever Rumi leads, there go;
be estranged a moment or two from all but
Delightful it is to travel along with the stars,
he.’
delightful not to rest one moment on the
Gently he drew my hand towards him,
journey.
then swiftly he sped to the mouth of a crater.
When I had tramped through the vastness of
space AN INDIAN ASCETIC, KNOWN TO THE
that which was once above now appeared PEOPLE OF INDIA AS JAHAN‐DOST, WHO
below me,
LIVES AS A HERMIT IN ONE OF THE
a dark earth loftier than the lamp of night,
my shadow (O marvel! ) flung above my CAVERNS OF THE MOON
head; Like a blind man, my hand on my
all the while nearer and nearer still companion’s shoulder,
until the mountains of the Moon became I placed my foot within a deep cavern;
visible. the moon’s heart was sore ravaged by its
Rumi said, ‘Cleanse yourself of all doubts, darkness,
grow used to the manners and ways of the within it even the sun would have needed a
spheres. lamp.
The moon is far from us, yet it is our familiar; Fancies and doubts made assault upon me,
this is the first stage upon our road; hung my reason and sense upon the gallows.
seen must be the late and soon of its time, I went along a road where highwaymen
seen must be the caverns of its mountains.’ lurked in ambush,
That silence, that fearful mountain‐range, my heart void of the joy of truth and
inwardly full of fire, outwardly riven and certainty;
ravined! presently manifestations met my gaze
A hundred peaks, such as Khaftin and unveiled,
Yildirim, a bright dawn without any rising of the sun—
smoke in their mouths and fire in their bellies; a valley, whereof each stone was an idolater,
out of its bosom not a blade of grass sprang, a demon’s haunt thick with lofty palm‐trees.
no bird fluttered in its empty spaces; Was this place truly compounded of earth
clouds without moisture, winds swift and and water,
sword‐sharp or was my sleeping fantasy painting pictures?
ever doing battle with a dead earth. The air was filled with the joy and gaiety of
A worn‐out world without colour and sound, wine,
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the shadows, kissing its dust, were light’s JAHAN‐DOST
own essence. The world is a thing of colour, and God is
No cerulean sky spanned its earth, without colour.
no twilight painted its margin crimson and What is the world? What is man? What is
gold; God?
there light was not in the chains of darkness,
there no mists enveloped dawn and eventide. RUMI
Under a palm‐tree an Indian sage, Man is a sword, and God is the swordsman;
the pupils of his eyes bright with collyrium, the world is the whetstone for this sword.
his hair knotted on his head, his body naked, The East saw God and did not see the
coiled about him a white snake writhing, world,
a man superior to water and clay, the West crept along the world and fled
the world a mere image in the cloister of his away from God.
fantasy, True servanthood is to open the eyes to
his time subject to no revolution of days, God;
he had no traffick with the azure‐tinted skies. true life is to see oneself without a veil.
He said to Rumi, ‘Who is your fellow‐ When a servant takes quittance of life
traveller? God Himself calls down blessings on that
In his glance there is a desire for life!’ servant.
Whatever man is unconscious of his destiny,
RUMI his dust travels not with the fire of the soul.
A man who is a wanderer on the quest,
a fixed star with the constitution of a planet. JAHAN‐DOST
His enterprise is more mature than his Tied up in the knot of being and not‐being
immaturities; the East has seen little into these secrets.
I am a martyr to his imperfections. The task of us celestials is only to see,
He has made of his glass the arch of heaven, and my soul does not despair of the East’s
his thought seeks to be boon‐companion of tomorrow.
Gabriel! Yesterday I saw on the summit of
He swoops like an eagle on the moon and Qashmarud
sun, his prey, an angel that had descended out of heaven;
hot‐foot he circumambulates the nine out of his glance the joy of sight distilled
spheres. as he gazed solely towards our mound of
A drunkard’s words he has spoken to the dust.
people of earth I said to him, ‘Hide not a secret from your
calling the houris idols, Paradise an confidants;
idol‐house. what is it that you see in this silent dust?
I have seen flames in the billow of his Do you melt for the beauty of some Venus?
smoke, Have you flung your heart into the well of
I have seen majestic pride in his prostration. Babylon?’
Ever he laments yearningly like a flute, He said, ‘It is the hour of the East’s arising;
separation and union alike slay him. the East has a new sun shining in its breast.
I do not know what is in his water and clay; Rubies come forth from the stones of the
I do not know what his rank and station road,
may be. its Josephs are issuing out of the well.
I have seen a resurrection happening in its
bloom,
I have seen its mountains trembling and so that another youth may thereby be
quaking; attained.
it is packing up to quit the station of Azar
3
at last to forswear forever idolatry.
Happy is the people whose soul has God is beyond death, He is the very essence
fluttered, of life;
that has created itself anew out of its own when His servant dies, He knows not what is
clay. happening.
For the Throne‐angels that hour is the dawn Though we are birds without wings or
of festival feathers,
when the eyes of a nation at last awake!’ we know more of the science of death than
God.
The Indian sage was silent for a little while;
then he looked at me again, somewhat 4
impatiently. Time? It is a sweet mingled with poison,
He asked, ‘Death of the reason?’ I said, Giving a general compassion mingled with
tip thought.’ vengeance;
He asked, ‘Death of the heart?’ I said, ‘Giving you see neither city nor plain free of its
up vengeance—
remembrance.’ its compassion is that you may say, ‘It has
He asked, ‘The body?’ I said, ‘Born of the dust passed.’
of the road.’
He asked, ‘The Soul?’ I said ‘The symbol of 5
One God.’ Unbelief is death, my enlightened friend;
He asked, ‘And Man?’ I said, ‘One of God’s how beseems it a hero to wage holy war on
secrets.’ the dead?
He asked, ‘The world?’ I said, ‘Itself stands The believer is living, and at war with
face to face.’ himself,
He asked, ‘This science and art?’ I said, ‘Mere he falls upon himself like a panther on a deer.
husk.’
‘He asked, ‘What is the proof?’ I said, ‘The 6
face of the Beloved.’ The infidel with a wakeful heart praying to an
He asked, ‘The commons’ religion?’ I said, idol
‘Just hearsay.’ is better than a religious man asleep in the
He asked, ‘The gnostics’ religion?’ I said, sanctuary.
‘True seeing.’
7
My words brought much pleasure to his soul,
and he disclosed to me delightful subtleties. Blind is the eye that sees sin and error;
never does the sun behold the night.
NINE SAYINGS OF THE INDIAN SAGE
8
1
Association with the mire makes the seed a
This world is not a veil over the Essence of tree;
God; man by association with the mire is brought
the image in the water is no barrier to to shame.
plunging in. The seed receives from the mire twisting and
2 turning
that it may make its prey the rays of the sun.
It is delightful to be born into another world,
Javidnama 293
9 impatiently, out of the joy of
self‐ manifestation,
I said to the rose, ‘Tell me, you with your torn
he came down into the dormitory of existence,
breast,
like ourselves a wanderer, exile his portion—
how do you take colour and scent from the
you are an exile, I am an exile, he is an exile.
wind and the dust?’
His rank is that of Gabriel, his name is Sarosh,
The rose said, ‘Intelligent man bereft of
he transports from sense, and restores to
intelligence,
sense.
how do you take a message from the silent
It was his dew that opened our bud,
electric ray?
the fire of his breath kindled the dead ember.
The soul is in our body through the attraction
The poet’s plectrum striking the chords of the
of this and that;
heart is of him,
your attraction is manifest, whereas ours is
and it is he who rends the veil shrouding the
hidden.’
Ka‘bah.
EPIPHANY OF SAROSH Within his melody I have glimpsed an entire
universe.
Thereupon the wise man ceased his discourse;
now take fire for a moment from his song.’
self‐intoxicated, he broke away from the
world— THE SONG OF SAROSH
ecstasy and yearning snatched him out of his I fear that you are steering the barque into a
own hands. mirage;
Then came into being, by the magic of divine born within a veil, you will die within a veil.
vision— When I washed the collyrium of Razi from
when it is present the motes become like my eyes
Mount Sinai, I saw the destinies of nations hidden in the
without its presence there is nor light nor Book.
manifestation— Twist over field and avenue, twist over
a delicate creature in the talisman of that mountain and desert—
night, the lightning that twists upon itself dies
a star shining upon that starless night. within the cloud.
The hyacinth‐curls of his two tresses reached I dwelt a while with the Westerners, sought
his waist, much and saw scarcely
mountains and foothills drew brilliance from the man whose musical modes turn not
his face. upon number.
Wholly drowned in a drunken epiphany, Without the anguish of battle that
drunken without wine, he chanted propinquity is not attainable;
melodiously. you who speak of ‘scent in rose‐water,’ go,
Before him the lantern of the imagination ravish the rose‐bush!
span around, Superficial ascetic, I concede that selfhood is
full of wiles as the ancient sphere of heaven; transient,
in that lantern appeared a form of many hues, but you do not see the whirlpool within the
hawk pouncing on sparrow, panther seizing bubble.
deer. This delightful music comes not from the
I said to Rumi, ‘You who know the secret, minstrel’s plucking,
reveal the secret to your companion of little a houri exiled from Paradise is weeping
vision.’ within the lute.
He said, ‘This form like unto flashing silver
was born in the thought of the holy God;
DEPARTURE FOR THE VALLEY OF He purifies the bones and fibres,
YARGHAMID, CALLED BY THE ANGELS gives to the thoughts the wings of Gabriel;
the mutterings within the hearts of creatures
THE VALLEY OF TAWASIN
upon his lip become Star, Light, and Pluckers.
Rumi, that guide to passion and love To his sun there is no setting, none;
whose words are as Salsabil to throats athirst, to his denier never shall come perfection.
said, ‘The poetry in which there is fire God’s compassion is the company of his
originates from the heat of “He is God!” freemen,
That chant transforms rubbish into a the wrath of God is his impetuous blow.
rose‐garden, Be you Universal Reason itself, flee not from
that chant throws into confusion the spheres, him,
that chant bears testimony to the Truth, for he beholds both body and soul together.
bestows on beggars the rank of kings. Stride then more nimbly on the road to
Through it the blood courses swifter in the Yarghamid
body, that you may see that which must be seen—
the heart grows more aware of the Trusty engraved upon a wall of moonstone
Spirit. behold the four Tasins of prophecy.’
Many a poet through the magic of his art
Yearning knows its own way without a guide,
is a highwayman of hearts, a devil of the
the yearning to fly with the wings of Gabriel;
glance.
for yearning the long road becomes two steps,
The poet of India—God help him,
such a traveller wearies of standing still.
and may his soul lack the joy of speech!—
As if drunk I strode out towards Yarghamid
has taught love to become a minstrel,
until at last its heights became visible.
taught the friends of God the art of Azar.
What shall I say of the splendour of that
His words are a sparrow’s chirp, no ardour or
station?
anguish;
Seven stars circle about it unceasingly;
the people of passion call him a corpse, not a
the Carpet‐angels are inly lit by its light,
man.
its dust’s collyrium brightens the eyes of the
Sweeter than that sweet chant which knows
Throne‐angels.
no mode
God gave to me sight, heart and speech,
are the words which you utter in a dream.
gave me the urge to search for the world of
The poet’s nature is all searching,
secrets;
creator and nourisher of desire;
now I will unveil the mysteries of the
the poet is like the heart in a people’s breast,
universe,
a people without a poet is a mere heap of clay.
I will tell you of the Tawasin of the Apostles.
Ardour and drunkenness embroider a world;
poetry without ardour and drunkenness is a TASIN OF GAUTAMA
dirge.
The Repentance of the coquettish
If the purpose of poetry is the fashioning of
Dancing‐Girl
men,
poetry is likewise the heir of prophecy.’ GAUTAMA
I said, ‘Speak again also of prophecy, Ancient wine and youthful beloved are—
speak again its secret to your confidant.’ nothing;
He said, ‘Peoples and nations are his signs, for men of true vision the houris of Paradise
our centuries are things of his creation. are— nothing.
His breath makes stones and bricks to speak; Whatever you know as firm and enduring
we all are as the harvest, he the sown field. passes away,
Javidnama 295
mountain and desert, land, sea and shore So that with carefree heart I may play a new
are—nothing. melody
The science of the Westerners, the give back again to the meadow the true bird
philosophy of the Easterners of the meadow.
are all idol‐houses, and the visiting of idols You have granted me a lofty nature; release
yields— nothing. the shackle from my foot
Think upon self, and pass not fearfully that I may bestow a prince’s robe upon your
through this desert, sackcloth.
for you are, while the substance of both If the axe struck against the stone, what
worlds is— nothing. cause of talk is that?
On the road which I hewed out with the Love can carry upon its back a whole
point of my eyelash mountain‐range!
station and caravan and shifting sands are—
nothing.
TASIN OF ZOROASTER
Ahriman Tempts Zoroaster
Transcend the unseen, for this doubt and
surmise are nothing; AHRIMAN
to be in the world and to escape from the Because of you my creatures complain like a
world—that is Something! reed‐pipe,
The Paradise that some God grants unto you because of you our April has become like
is nothing; December;
when Paradise is the reward of your you have made me humbled and
labours—that is something. dishonoured in the world,
Do you seek repose for your soul? The you have stained your image with my
soul’s repose is nothing; blood.
the tear shed in sorrow for your Truth lives through the epiphany of your
companions—that is something. Sinai,
The wine‐drenched eye, the temptress death for me dwells within your White
glance and the song Hand.
are all fair, but sweeter than these—there is It is folly to rely on a covenant with God,
something. to travel the road to His desire is to lose the
The cheek’s beauty lives for a moment, in a way;
moment is no more; poisons lurk within His rose‐tinted wine.
the beauty of action and fine ideals—that is saw, worm and cross—these are His gifts.
something. Noah had no other resource but prayer,
but the words of that hapless man were of
THE DANCING‐GIRL no avail.
Give not occasion for conturbation to this So abandon the city and hide yourself in a
restless heart; cave,
add one or two curls more to my twisted choose the company of the cavalcade of the
tress. creatures of light;
In my breast is such a lightning‐flash of with one glance make the dust a
revelation from you, philosopher’s stone,
I have yielded the bitterness of expectation set fire to the heavens with a single prayer;
to the moon and the sun. become a wanderer in the mountains like
The joy of God’s presence founded in this Moses,
world idolatry’s wont; be half‐consumed in the fire of vision;
love ever eludes the soul that is full of hope. but you must certainly give up prophecy,
you must give up all such mullah‐mongery. when love marches forth in display, that is
By associating with nobodies, a somebody to be a king!
becomes a nobody, Solitude and manifestation are the
though his nature be a flame, he becomes a perfection of ardour,
chip of wood. both alike are states and stations of
So long as prophethood is inferior to indigence.
sainthood What is the former? To desert cloister and
prophecy is a veritable vexation to love. church;
Now rise, and nestle in the nest of Unity, what is the latter? Not to walk alone in
abandon manifestation and sit in retirement! Paradise!
Though God dwells in solitude and
ZOROASTER manifestation,
Light is the ocean, darkness is but its shore; solitude is the beginning, manifestation the
no torrent like me was ever born in its heart. end.
My breast is swarming with restless waves; You have said that prophecy is a vexation:
what should the torrent do but devastate the when love becomes perfect, it fashions men.
shore? It is delightful to go on God’s road by
The colourless picture, which no man has caravan,
ever seen, it is delightful to go in the world free as the
cannot be painted save with the blood of soul.
Ahriman.
Self‐display—that is the very secret of life, TASIN OF CHRIST
life is to test out one’s own striking‐power. Vision of the sage Tolstoy
The self becomes more mature through In the midst of the mountain‐range of Seven
suffering Deaths
until the self rends the veils that cover God. is a valley where no bird stirs, no branches, no
The God‐seeing man sees himself only leaf;
through God; the smoke encircling it turns the moon’s light
crying ‘One God’, he quivers in his own to pitch,
blood. the sun in its broad heavens seems dying of
To quiver in blood is a great honour for thirst.
love, A river of quicksilver flows through that
saw, stave and halter—these are love’s valley
festival. meandering like the stream of the Milky Way.
Upon the road of love, whatever betides is Before it the hollows and heights of the road
good; are nothing,
then welcome to the unloving kindnesses of so swift its current, wave on wave, twist on
the Beloved! twist.
Not my eye only desired the manifestation A man stood, drowned up to his waist, in that
of God; quicksilver
it is a sin to behold beauty without a uttering a thousand ineffectual laments,
company. Rain, wind and water were not his portion—
What is solitude? Pain, burning and athirst he, and no water save the quicksilver.
yearning; On the bank I espied a slim‐bodied woman
company is vision, solitude is a search. whose eyes would have waylaid a hundred
Love in solitude is colloquy with God; caravans,
Javidnama 297
one that taught infidelity to the to you has given only thoughts of devastation.
Church‐elders, That man whose substance is true knows well
her glance turned ugly to beautiful, beautiful your crime is heavier than my crime.
to ugly. His breath restored the departed soul to the
I said to her, ‘Who are you? What is your body;
name? you make the body a mausoleum for the soul.
What is this utter lamentation and weeping?’ What we have done unto His humanity
She said, ‘In my eye is the spell of the Samiri; His community has done unto His divinity.
my name is Ifrangin, my profession is Your death is life for the people of the world:
wizardry.’ wait now, and see what your end shall be!’
All of a sudden that silvery stream froze,
TASIN OF MOHAMMED
the bones of that youth broke in his body.
He cried aloud, ‘Alas, alas for my destiny! The Spirit of Abu Jahl Laments in the
Alas for my ineffectual lamentation!’ Sanctuary of the Ka‘bah
Ifrangin said, ‘If you have eyes to see,
My breast is riven and anguished by this
look a little also at your own deeds.
Mohammed;
The Son of Mary, that Lamp of all creation
his breath has put out the burning lamp of the
whose light lit up the world dimensioned and
Ka‘bah.
undimensioned—
He has sung of the destruction of Caesar and
that Pilate, and that cross, that pallid face—
Chosroes,
what wrought you, what wrought he beneath
he has stolen away from us our young men.
the skies!
He is a wizard, and wizardry is in his speech:
You, to whose soul the joy of faith is
these two words ‘One God’ are very unbelief.
forbidden,
So he has rolled up the carpet of our fathers’
worshipper of idols fashioned of raw silver,
faith
you did not know the worth of the Holy
and has done with our Lord Gods what he
Spirit,
has done.
you bought the body, gambled away the
The blow of his fist has scattered Lat and
soul!’
Manat:
The reproach of that fair woman, drunken take vengeance upon him, you created beings!
with blandishment, He bound his heart to the invisible, broke
was a lancet that pierced the youth’s heart. with the visible,
He said, ‘You who display wheat and sell his incantation shattered the living, present
barley, image.
because of you Shaykh and Brahmin sell their It is wrong to attach the eye to the invisible;
own country. that which comes not into sight—wherever is
Your infidelities have debased reason and it?
religion, It is blindness to make prostration to the
your profit‐mongerings have cheapened love. invisible;
Your love is torment, and secret torment at the new religion is blindness, and blindness is
that; remoteness.
your hatred is death, and sudden death at To bend double before an undimensioned
that! God
You have associated with water and clay, such prayers bring no joy to the worshipper.
you have stolen away God’s servant from His creed cuts through the rulership and
Him. lineage
Wisdom, which loosened the knots of things,
of Koraish, denies the supremacy of the You who have forever a lodging in our eyes,
Arabs; tarry a little, if you intend to depart from me.
in his eyes lofty and lowly are the same thing
he has sat down at the same table with his
slave.
He has not recognized the worth of the noble
Arabs
but associated with uncouth Abyssinians;
redskins have been confounded with
THE SPHERE OF MERCURY
blackskins,
the honour of tribe and family has been VISITATION TO THE SPIRITS OF JAMAL
destroyed.
AL‐DIN AFGHANI AND SA‘ ID HALIM
This equality and fraternity are foreign
things— PASHA
I know very well that Salman is a Mazdakite; A handful of dust so carried forward its task
The son of Abdullah has been duped by him to the contemplation of its own
and he has brought disaster upon the Arab manifestations:
people. either I fell into the net of being and existence
Hashim’s progeny have become estranged or existence became a prisoner in my net!
one from another, Have I made a chink in yon azure curtains?
a couple of prayers have utterly blinded them. Am I of the skies, or are the skies of me?
What is alien stock, compared with the Either heaven has taken my heart into its
Adnani, breast
what betokens Sahbani speech to the or it is my heart that has seized heaven.
barbarian? Is this external then internal? What is it?
The eyes of the elect of the Arabs have been What manner of thing is it the eye sees? What
darkened; is it?
will you not rise up, Zuhair, from the dust of I beat my wings towards another heaven,
the tomb? I see another world rising before me,
You who are for us a guide through this a world of mountains and plains, seas and dry
desert, land,
shatter the spell of the chant of Gabriel! a world far more ancient than our earth,
Tell again, you Black Stone, now tell again, a world grown out of a little cloud
tell again what we have suffered through that has never known the conquest of man—
Mohammed! images as yet unlined on the tablet of
Hubal, thou who acceptest the excuses of thy existence
servants, where no critic of nature has yet been born.
seize back thy temple from the irreligious
I said to Rumi, ‘This wasteland is very fair,
ones;
very fair the tumult of the waters in the
expose their flock unto the ravening wolves,
mountains.
make their dates bitter upon the palm‐tree!
I find no sign here of any living thing,
Let loose a burning wind on the air of the
so whence comes the sound of the call to
desert
prayer?’
as if they were stumps of fallen‐down
Rumi said, ‘This is the station of the saints,
palm‐trees
this heap of earth is familiar with our dust.
O Manat, O Lat, go not forth from this abode,
When the father of mankind departed out of
or if you leave this abode, go not from our
Eden
hearts!
Javidnama 299
he dwelt in this world for one or two days; Only upon himself he has opened his eyes,
these expanses have felt the burning of his yielded his heart to no man, is utterly free;
sighs, swiftly he paces through the expanse of
heard his lamentations in the hour of dawn. Being—
The visitors to this honourable station jestingly, I call him Zinda‐Rud.’
are themselves pious men of lofty stations,
pious men such as Fudail and Bu Sa‘id, AFGHANI
true gnostics like Junaid and Ba Yazid. Zinda‐Rud, tell us of our terrestrial world,
Rise up now, and let us pray together, speak to us of our earth and sky.
devote a moment or two to burning and A thing of dust, you are clear‐eyed as the
melting.’ Holy Ones—
give us some tidings of the Muslims!
I went on, and saw two men engaged in
prayer, ZINDA‐RUD
the acolyte a Turk, the leader an Afghan. In the heart of a people that once shattered
The Sage of Rum, in rapture continually, the world
his face radiant with an ecstasy of joy, I have seen a conflict between religion and
said, ‘The East never gave birth to two better country.
sons— The spirit is dead in the body through
the plucking of their nails unravelled our weakness of faith,
knots: despairs of the strength of the manifest
Maulana Jamal, Sayyid of all Sayyids, religion;
whose eloquence gave life to stone and sherd, Turk, Persian, Arab intoxicated with Europe
and passionate Halim, commander of the and in the throat of each the fish‐hook of
Turks Europe;
whose thoughts matched the loftiness of his and East wasted by the West’s imperialism,
station. Communism taken the lustre from religion
To offer prayer with such men is true and community.
devotion,
a labour else whose hoped‐for wage is AFGHANI
Paradise.
Religion and Country
The recitation of that vigorous elder,
The Lord of the West, cunning from head to
the Chapter of the Star in that silent plain—
toe,
a recital that to move Abraham to ecstasy,
taught the people of religion the concept of
to enrapture the pure spirit of Gabriel;
Country.
the heedful heart becomes restless in the
He thinks of the centre, while you are at
breast,
discord—
the cry ‘No god but God’ rises from the
give up this talk of Syria, Palestine, Iraq!
tombs;
If you can discriminate between good and
it imparts to smoke the quivering of the flame,
evil
bestows on David ardour and intoxication;
you will not bind your hearts to clods,
at his recital every mystery was revealed,
stones, bricks.
the Heavenly Archetype appeared unveiled.
What is religion? To rise up from the face of
After prayer I rose up from my place the dust
and kissed his hand in all humility. so that the pure soul may become aware of
Rumi said, ‘A mote that travels the skies, itself!
in its heart a whole world of fire and passion!
He who has said ‘God is He’ is not Communism and Capitalism
contained
The author of Das Kapital came of the stock
within the confines of this dimensioned
of Abraham,
order.
that is to say, that prophet who knew not
A grass‐blade is of the earth, and yet rises
Gabriel;
from the earth;
since truth was implicit even within his
alas, if the pure soul should die in the dust!
error
Although man sprang out of water and clay,
his heart believed, though his brain was an
from water and clay rose‐like drew colour
infidel.
and sap,
The Westerners have lost the vision of
alas, if he wanders forever in water and
heaven,
clay,
they go hunting for the pure spirit in the
alas, if he soars not higher than this station!
belly.
The body says, ‘Go into the dust of the
The pure soul takes not colour and scent
roadway’;
from the body,
the soul says, ‘Look upon the expanse of the
and Communism has nothing to do save
world!’
with the body.
Man of reason, the soul is not contained in
The religion of that prophet who knew not
dimensions;
truth
the free man is a stranger to every fetter and
is founded upon equality of the belly;
chain,
the abode of fraternity being in the heart,
the free man rails against the dark earth
its roots are in the heart, not in water and
for it beseems not the falcon to act like a
clay.
mouse.
Capitalism too is a fattening of the body,
This handful of earth to which you give the
its unenlightened bosom houses no heart;
name ‘country’,
like the bee that pastures upon the flower
this so‐called Egypt, and Iran, and Yemen—
it overpasses the petal, and carries off the
there is a relationship between a country
honey,
and its people
yet stalk and leaf, colour and scent all make
in that it is out of its soil that a nation rises;
up the rose
but if you look carefully at this relationship
for whose selfsame beauty the nightingale
you will descry a subtlety finer than a hair.
laments.
Though it is out of the East that the sun rises
Surpass the talisman, the scent and colour,
showing itself bold and bright, without a
bid farewell to the form, gaze only upon the
veil,
meaning.
only then it burns and blazes with inward
Though it is difficult to descry the inward
fire
death,
when it escapes from the shackles of East
call not that a rose which in truth is clay.
and West;
drunk with splendour it springs up out of The soul of both is impatient and intolerant,
its East both of them know not God, and deceive
that it may subject all horizons to its mankind.
mastery; One lives by production, the other by
its nature is innocent of both East and West, taxation
though relationship‐wise, true, it is an and man is a glass caught between these
Easterner. two stones.
The one puts to rout science, religion, art,
Javidnama 301
the other robs body of soul, the hand of No, the Turks have no new melody in their
bread. lute,
I have perceived both drowned in water and what they call new is only the old tune of
clay, Europe;
both bodily burnished, but utterly dark of no fresh breath has entered into their breast,
heart. no design of a new world is in their mind.
Life means a passionate burning, an urge to Turkey perforce goes along with the existing
make, world,
to cast in the dead clay of the seed of a heart! melted like wax in the flame of the world we
know.
SA‘ID HALIM PASHA Originality is at the roots of all creation,
East and West never by imitation shall life be reformed;
The living heart, creator of ages and epochs,
For Westerners intelligence is the stuff of that soul is little enamoured of imitation:
life, if you possess the spirit of a true
for Easterners love is the mystery of all Mussulman
being. examine your own conscience, and the
Only through love intelligence gets to know Quran—
God, a hundred new worlds he within its verses,
love’s labours find firm grounding in whole centuries are involved in its
intelligence; moments;
when love is companioned by intelligence one world of it suffices for the present age—
it has the power to design another world. seize it, if the heart in your breast grasps
Then rise and draw the design of a new truth..
world, A believing servant himself is a sign of God,
mingle together love with intelligence. every world to his breast is as a garment;
The flame of the Europeans is damped and when one world grows old upon his
down, bosom,
their eyes are perceptive, but their hearts are The Quran gives him another world!
dead;
they have been sore smitten by their own ZINDA‐RUD
swords, The barque of us terrestrials has no
hunted down and slaughtered, themselves helmsman,
the hunters. no one knows where the Quran’s world lies.
Look not for fire and intoxication in their
vine; AFGHANI
not into their heavens shall rise a new age. It is a world lost now in our breast,
It is from your fire that the glow of life a world awaiting yet the command ‘Arise!’
comes, A world without distinction of race and
and it is your task to create the new world. colour,
Mustafa Kemal, who sang of a great its evening is brighter than Europe’s dawn;
renewal, a world cleansed of monarchs and of slaves,
said the old image must be cleansed and a world unbounded, like the believer’s
polished; heart,
yet the vitality of the Ka‘bah cannot be made a world so fair, that the effluence of one
new glance
if a new Lat and Manat from Europe enter planted the seed of it in Omar’s soul.
its shrine. Eternal it is, the impact of it ever new,
ever new the leaf and fruit of its sure Loftier than the heavens is the station of
foundations; man,
inwardly it is anxious not of change, and the beginning of education is respect for
outwardly, every moment is revolution. man.
Behold, that world lies within your own
Man alive in heart, do you know what thing
heart;
life is?
now I will tell you of its firm foundations.
One‐seeing love that is contemplating
The Foundations of the Quranic World duality:
man and woman are bound one to the other,
1. Man, God’s Vicegerent they are the fashioners of the creatures of
In both worlds, everywhere are the marks of desire.
love; Woman is the guardian of the fire of life,
man himself is a mystery of love. her nature is the tablet of life’s mysteries;
Love’s secret belongs not to the world of she strikes our fire against her own soul
wombs, and it is her substance that makes of the
not to Shem or Ham, Greece or Syria: dust a man.
a star without East and West, a star In her heart lurk life’s potentialities,
unsetting from her glow and flame life derives
in whose orbit is neither North nor South. stability;
The words I am setting tell his destiny, she is a fire from which the sparks break
their exegesis reaches from earth to heaven. forth,
Death, grave, uprising, judgment are his body and soul, lacking her glow, cannot
estates, take shape.
the light and fire of the other world are his What worth we possess derives from her
works; values
himself is Imam, prayer and sanctuary, for we are all images of her fashioning;
himself the Ink, himself the Book and the if God has bestowed on you a glance aflame
Pen. cleanse yourself, and behold her sanctity.
Little by little what is hidden in him You from whose faith the present age has
becomes visible; taken all fire,
it has no boundaries, its kingdom no now I will tell you openly the secrets of the
frontiers. veil.
His being gives value to contingent things, The joy of creation is a fire in the body
his equilibrium is the touchstone of and society is lightened by that light,
contingent things. and whosoever takes any portion of that fire
What shall I declare of his sea without a watches jealously over his private passion;
shore? all the time he fixes his gaze on his own
All ages and all times are drowned in his image
heart. lest his tablet should receive any other
That which is contained within man is the image.
world, Mohammed chose solitude upon Mount
that which is not contained within the world Hira
is man. and for a space saw no other beside himself;
Sun and moon are manifest through his our image was then poured into his heart
self‐display; and out of his solitude a nation arose.
even Gabriel cannot penetrate his privacy. Though you may be an unbeliever in God,
yet you cannot gainsay the Prophet’s glory.
Javidnama 303
Though you possess a soul illumined as His joining and parting are without fear and
Moses, favour;
yet without solitude your thoughts remain when other than God determines the aye
barren; and nay
by isolation the imagination becomes more then the strong man tyrannises over the
vivid, weak;
more vivid, more questing, more finding. in this world command is rooted in naked
power;
Science and passion are both stations of life
mastery drawn from other than God is pure
both take a share of the impact of events.
unbelief.
Science derives pleasure from verification,
love derives pleasure from creativeness. The tyrannical ruler who is well‐versed in
Display is very precious to the verifier, power
to the creator solitude is very precious. builds about himself a fortress made up of
The eye of Moses desired to behold Being— edicts;
that was all part of the pleasure of white falcon, sharp of claw and swift to
verification; seize,
thou shalt not see Me contains many he takes for his counsellor the silly sparrow
subtleties— giving to tyranny its constitution and laws,
lose yourself a little while in this sea a sightless man giving collyrium to the
profound. blind.
On all sides life’s traces appear unveiled, What results from the laws and
its fountain wells up in the heart of creation. constitutions of kings?
Consider the tumult that rages through all Fat lords of the manor, peasants lean as
horizons; spindles!
inflict not on the Creator the trouble of
Woe to the constitution of the democracy of
display—
Europe!
solitude is the protection of every artist,
The sound of that trumpet renders the dead
solitude is the bezel in the artist’s ring.
still deader;
2. Divine Government those tricksters, treacherous as the revolving
spheres,
The servant of God has no need of any
have played the nations by their own rules,
station,
and swept the board!
no man is his slave, and he is the slave of
Robbers they, this one wealthy, that one a
none;
toiler,
the servant of God is a free man, that is all,
all the time lurking in ambush one for
his kingdom and laws are given by God
another;
alone,
now is the hour to disclose the secret of
his customs, his way, his faith, his laws are
those charmers—
of God,
we are the merchandise, and they take all
of God his foul and fair, his bitter and sweet.
the profits.
The self‐seeking mind heeds not another’s
Their eyes are hard out of the love of silver
welfare,
and gold,
sees only its own benefit, not another’s;
their sons are a burden upon their mothers’
God’s revelation sees the benefit of all,
backs.
its regard is for the welfare and profit of all.
Woe to a people who, out of fear for the
Just alike in peace and in the ranks of war,
fruit,
carries off the very sap from the tree’s trunk
and, that the plectrum wins no melody from I do not say, desert utterly dwelling and
its strings, lane;
slays the infant yet unborn in its mother’s this world of colour and scent is your
womb. empery—
For all its repertory of varied charms grain by grain gather the jewels from its soil,
I will take nothing from Europe except—a falcon‐like seize your prey out of its skies,
warning! smite your axe against its mountain‐ranges,
You enchained to the imitation of Europe, take light from your self and set it all afire.
be free, Have nothing to do with the ancient ways of
clutch the skirt of the Quran, and be free! Azar
but hew out a new world to your own
3. The Earth is the Lord’s
desire!
The history of man throughout East and Yield not your heart to colour and scent,
West dwelling and lane;
is a tale of wars, battles, revolts, for ‘land’; the heart is His sanctuary, yield it only to
one bride there is, and we are all her Him.
husbands, Death without substance, without tomb and
that enchantress is without all and with all winding‐sheet
withal. is to lose oneself in riches, children, wife;
Her blandishments are nothing but guile but he who has the words ‘One God’ by
and trickery, heart
she belongs neither to you nor to me either. can lose within himself a world entire.
These stones and rocks have nothing in What is the poverty of hunger, dancing,
common with you; nakedness?
they are the stuff of stillness, you are on a Poverty is true kingship; what is monkery?
journey.
4. Wisdom is a Great Good
How can the sleeper and the wakeful mix
together? God has declared, Wisdom is a great good;
What has the planet to do with the fixed wherever you may see this good, seize it.
star? Science gives pinions to words and sounds,
God has called the earth simply our bestows purest substance on things without
‘enjoyment’, substance;
this valueless ‘enjoyment’ is gratis, gratis. science finds a way even to heaven’s zenith
You landowner, take a wise hint from me: to pluck the sight out of the sun’s own eye.
take from the land your food and grave, but Its transcript is the commentary of the
take it not. cosmos,
How long will its company last? You are, it the fate of the cosmos hangs upon its
is not; determining;
you are a living being, it is a lifeless show. it says to the desert, ‘Bubble up!’ and it
You are an eagle, therefore get you about bubbles,
the skies, to the sea, ‘Produce a mirage!’ and it
open your wings and pinions, rise clear of produces it.
the earth. Its eye beholds all the events in creation
‘The Earth is the Lord’s’: the inward that it may see the sure foundations of
meaning is plain, creation;
and he who sees not this plain is an infidel. if it attaches its heart to God, it is prophecy,
but if it is a stranger to God, it is unbelief.
Science without the heart’s glow is pure evil,
Javidnama 305
for then its light is darkness over sea and SA‘ID HALIM PASHA
land, The religion of God is more shameful than
its rouge renders the whole world black and unbelief,
blind, because the mullah is a believer trading in
its springtide scatters the leaves of all being, unfaith;
sea, plain and mountain, quiet garden and in our eyes this dew‐drop of ours is an
villa ocean,
are ravaged by the bombs of its aeroplanes. to his eyes our ocean is a dew‐drop.
It is its fire that burns the heart of Europe, At the elegant graces of that Quran‐vendor
from it springs the joy of raiding and I have seen the Trusty Spirit himself cry out!
robbing; His heart is a stranger to what lies beyond
it turns topsy‐turvy the course of the days, the sky,
despoils the peoples of their capital. for him the Archetype of the Book is but a
Its power becomes the faithful ally of Satan; fable;
light becomes fire by association with fire. having no share of the wisdom of the
To slay Satan is indeed a difficult task, Prophet’s religion,
since he is hidden within the depths of the his heaven is dark, being without any star.
heart; Short of vision, blind of taste, an idle gossip,
better is it to make him a true Mussulman, his hairsplitting arguments have fragmented
better to smite him dead with the sword of the Community.
the Quran. Seminary and mullah, before the secrets of
God save us from majesty that is without the Book,
beauty, are as one blind from birth before the light
God save us from separation without union! of the sun.
Science without love is a demonic thing, The infidel’s religion is the plotting and
science together with love is a thing divine; planning of Holy War;
science and wisdom without love are a the mullah’s religion is corruption in the
corpse, Way of God.
reason is an arrow that never pierced the The man of God is the soul of this
target. dimensionate world;
With the vision of God make the blind to say from me to him, who has gone into
see, solitude,
convert Abu Lahab into an impetuous ‘You whose thoughts are life itself to the
Hyder! believer,
whose breaths are confirmation to the
ZINDA‐RUD
Community,
You have displayed the foundations of the
having the sublime Quran by heart is your
Book of God,
rite,
yet is yonder world still veiled in a shroud.
your religion the publishing of the Word of
Why does it not strip off the veil from its
God.
face,
You with whom God speaks, how long will
why does it not issue yet out of our hearts?
you hang your head?
Before us lies a whole world wasting away,
Come, bring forth your hand out of your
a nation quietly reposing in its own dust;
sleeve!
the heart’s ardour of Tartar and Kurd is
Speak of the history of the ‘white’ people,
vanished—
speak to the gazelle of the vastness of the
either the Mussulman are dead, or the
desert.
Quran is dead.
Your nature is illumined by the Chosen One, speak one or two words from me to the
so declare now, where is our station? people.
The man of God takes not Colour and scent Afghani’s Message to the Russian People
from anyone,
One thing is the goal and aim of the Quran,
the man of God receives colour and scent
other the rite and ritual of the Muslim;
from God;
in his heart there is no burning fire,
every moment there is in his body a fresh
the Chosen One is not living in his breast.
soul,
The believer has not eaten the fruit of the
every moment he has, like God, a new
Quran,
labour.
in his cup I have seen neither wine nor beer.
Declare the secrets to the believer,
He broke the magic spell of Caesar and
declare the exposition of the mystery of
Chosroes
Every day.
and himself sat on the throne of empire;
The caravan has no halting‐place but the
when the young shoot of power gathered
Sanctuary,
strength,
the caravan has naught but God in its heart;
his religion took on the shape of empire,
I do not say that its road is different—
But empire changes the gaze entirely,
it is the caravan that is different, different its
reason, understanding, usage and way alike.
regard.
You who have laid down a new plan,
AFGHANI and disengaged your heart from the ancient
Have you any acquaintance with the system,
Traditions of the Chosen One? like us Muslims you have broken
‘God’s religion came a stranger into the the bone of imperial rule in this world.
world.’ So that you may light a lamp in your heart
I will tell you the meaning of this virgin take a warning from our past history;
saying. set your foot firm in the battle,
The ‘strangerhood’ of religion is not the circle no more about this Lat and Hubal.
poverty of God’s remembrancers; This aged world requires a nation
for the man who is truly a researcher that shall be both bearer of good tidings and
‘strangerhood’ of religion refers to the warner.
scarceness of its Return again to the peoples of the East;
verses. your ‘days’ are bound up with the ‘days’ of
The ‘strangerhood’ of religion every time is the East.
of a different kind; You have kindled a new flame in the soul,
ponder well this subtelty, if you have eyes your heart houses a new night and day.
to see. The rite and religion of the Franks have
Fasten your heart again to the perspicuous grown old;
Verses look no more towards that ancient cloister.
that you may seize a new age in your lasso. You have finished now with lords;
No man knows the inner secrets of the Book; pass on from ‘no’, march onwards to ‘but’—
Easterners and Westerners alike twist and pass on from ‘no’, if you are a true seeker,
turn this way and that. that you may take the road of living
The Russians have laid down a new design; affirmation.
they have taken bread and water, and You who desire a new world‐order,
jettisoned religion. have you sought for it a firm foundation?
Behold truth, speak truth, seek only truth;
Javidnama 307
You have expunged the ancient tale chapter this is man’s ‘enjoyment’, the property of
by chapter; God.
illumine your thoughts from the Archetype The believer is the trustee, God is the
of the Book. possessor;
Who gave the black man the White Hand? whatever you see other than God is
Who gave the good news of no Caesar, no perishing.
Chosroes? God’s banner has been beaten down by
Transcend the many‐coloured splendours, kings,
find yourself by abandoning Europe! their entry has reduced townships to misery.
If you are apprised by the Westerners’ Our bread and water are of one table;
cunning the progeny of Adam are as a single soul.
give up the wolf, take on the lion’s trade. When the Quran’s design descended into
What is wolfishness? The search for food this world
and means; it shattered the images of priest and pope;
the Lion of the Lord seeks freedom and I speak openly what is hidden in my heart—
death. this is not a book, it is something other!
Without the Quran, the lion is a wolf; When it has entered the soul, the soul is
the poverty of the Quran is the root of transformed;
empire. when the soul has been transformed, the
The poverty of the Quran is the mingling of world is changed.
meditation and reason— Like God, it is at once hidden and manifest,
I have never seen reason perfect without living and enduring, yes, and speaking.
meditation. In it are the destinies of East and West—
Meditation? To school pleasure and passion; realise then the lightning‐like swiftness of
this is the affair of the soul, not the affair of thought!
lip and palate. It told the Muslim, ‘Put Your life in your
From it arise the flames that burn the breast, hands;
it does not accord with your temperament give whatever you possess beyond your
yet. needs.’
Martyr of the delicate beauty of reason, You have created a new law and order;
I will tell you of the revelations of reason! consider it a little in the light of the Quran
and you will understand life’s heights and
What is the Quran? Sentence of death for the
depths,
master‐man,
you will comprehend the destiny of life.
succour for the slave without food and
destitute. Our assembly is without wine and
Look not for good from the money‐grubbing cupbearer,
manikin— yet the melodies of the Quran’s instrument
You will not attain piety, until you expend. are immortal;
What pray is born of usury? Tumults! if our plectrum now strikes without effect,
No one knows the pleasure of ‘a good loan’. Heaven houses thousands of excellent
Usury darkens the soul, hardens the heart strummers.
like a stone, God’s remembrance requires not nations,
makes man a ravening beast, without fangs it transcends the bounds of time and space.
and claws. God’s remembrance is apart from the
It is lawful to draw one’s sustenance from remembrance of every remembrancer—
the soil— what need has it of Greek or Syrian?
If God should remove it from us
He can if He will transfer it to another no, they are travellers all, like the waves of
people. the breeze.
I have seen the blind conformity and Where is the new truth which we seek, and
opinionatedness of Muslims do not find?
and every moment my soul trembles in my Mosque, school and tavern, all alike are
body; barren.
I fear for the day when it shall be denied to Learn a word from your own self, and in
them. that word burn,
and its fire shall be kindled in quite other for in this convent all lack Moses’ fire.
hearts. Speak not of the striving for purity of these
monastery‐ dwellers,
THE SAGE OF RUM BIDS ZINDA‐RUD they are all dishevelled of hair, blankets
INTONE A SONG unwashed.
The Sage of Rum, that man filled wholly with What temples they have fashioned within
ecstasy and passion, the Sanctuary,
I know what effect these words had on his these unitarians of one thought, but all split
soul; in two!
he drew from his breast a heart‐rending sigh, The problem is not that the hour of feasting
his tears ran redder than the blood of martyrs. has passed,
He, whose arrows pierced only the hearts of the problem is that they are all without
heroes, sweetmeats and boon‐companion!
turned his gaze upon Afghani, and spoke: [Translated by A.J. Arberry]
‘The heart must throb with blood like the
twilight,
the hand must be thrust into the saddle‐straps
of God;
hope moves the soul to flow like a running
river,
THE SPHERE OF VENUS
the abandonment of hope is eternal death.’
He looked at me again, and said: ‘O Between us and the light of the sun there
Zinda‐Rud, hang
with a couplet set all being afire. how many veils of space fold upon fold!
Our camel is weary and the load is heavy; A hundred curtains have been suspended
more bitter must be the song of the before us,
caravaneer. intertwisted firework displays,
The proving of holy men is through adversity, that the unardent heart may increase in
it is right to make the thirsty yet more athirst. ardour
Like Moses depart from the the River Nile, and become agreeable to branch, leaf and
stride out like Abraham towards the fire. fruit.
A melody of one who catches the scent of the Through its glow blood leaps in the tulip’s
Beloved veins,
bears a people onwards even to the Beloved’s its dance transmutes the stream to quicksilver.
street. Even so the pure spirit rises from the dust,
the pure spirit flees towards whither towards
THE SONG OF ZINDA‐RUD is not;
You say that these roses and tulips are on that road are but death and resurrection,
permanent here; resurrection and death,
Javidnama 309
no other provision save fever and glowing. with a glance that burns and rends all veils
Into that expanse of a hundred azure heavens pass within its clouds and mists
plunging continually, it surges out anew; and you will see therein the ancient gods;
itself its own sanctuary, its own Abraham, I know them all, one by one—
self‐offering, like him who was sacrificed to Baal, Marduk, Ya‘uq, Nasr, Fasr,
God. Ramkhan, Lat, Manat, Asr, Ghasr;
Before it the nine heavens are nine Khaibars, every one of them offers proof of its
its smiling is of the stature of Hyder. immortality
It is this incessant conflict that purifies the in the temper of this age that knows no
spirit, Abraham.’
makes it firm, speedy, nimble,
it spreads its wings in the broadness of light,
THE ASSEMBLY OF THE GODS OF THE
its talons seize Gabriel and the houris, ANCIENT PEOPLES
that it may take its share in the eye swerved not That tempestuous wind, those night black
and stand guardian in the ranks of God’s clouds—
servants. in their darkness the lightning itself had lost
I do not know where my own station is, its lustre;
I only know that it is apart from all friends. an ocean suspended in their air,
Deep within me rages a war without its skirt rent, few pearls pouring,
horsemen and armies; its shore invisible, its waves high‐surging,
he well descries it who has vision like me. high‐surging, powerless to battle with the
Men are ignorant of the conflict between winds.
unbelief and faith, Rumi and I in that sea of pitch
my soul is lonely, like Zain al‐Abidin; were as phantoms in the bedchamber of the
none is apprised of the station and the way, mind—
but for my song there is no lamp to light the he much‐travelled, I new to travel,
path. my eyes impatient to gaze abroad.
Infant, youth, old man—all are drowned in Continually I cried: ‘My sight is inadequate,
the sea, I do not see where the other world may be!’
only one poor soul has won his way to the Presently a mountain‐range appeared,
shore. a river, a broad meadow appeared,
I have drawn aside the curtains of this tent; mountain and plain embracing a hundred
I am fearful of union, and lament for springtides—
separation. fragrant with musk came the breeze from the
If union be the end of yearning, beware; hills.
how blessed the sighs and vain lamentations! Songs of birds conspiring together,
The wayfarer searches little for the high‐road fountains, and verdant herbs half‐grown.
if to be carefree is congenial to his soul. The body was fortified by the emanation of
My soul is such that, for the joy of gazing, that air,
it every moment desires a new world. the pure spirit in the flesh keener of vision.
Rumi, well aware of the states of my soul, I fixed my gaze on the top of a mountain;
said ‘Do you desire another world? Take it! joyful the mountain, the slope, the stretching
Love is cunning, and we are counters in his plain;
hand; a lovely valley, even, not sinking nor rising—
look ahead—we are in the land of Venus. the water of Khizr would have need of such a
This world too subsists on water and clay, land.
a sanctuary enveloped in purest musk, In this valley were the ancient gods,
there the God of Egypt, here the Lord of the Elder of the Sanctuary has tied the
Yemen, Magian girdle.
there a Lord of the Arabs, here of Iraq, Ancient gods, our time has come!
this one the god of union, that the god of
The days of joy have returned to the world,
separation,
religion has been routed by sovereignty and
here an offspring of the sun, and the moon’s
lineage.
son‐in‐law,
What thought is there now of the lamp of
another looking to the consort of Jupiter,
the Chosen One,
one holding a two‐edged sword in his hand,
seeing that a hundred Bu Lahabs blow it
another with a serpent wreathed about his
out?
throat.
Though the cry ‘There is no god’ rises up
Each one was trembling at the Beautiful
still
Name,
how should that remain on the lips which
each wounded by the smiting of Abraham.
has gone from the heart?
Mardukh said: ‘Man has fled from God,
The West’s enchantment has revived
fled from church and sanctuary, lamenting,
Ahriman;
and to augment his vision and perception
the day of God is pale‐cheeked, fearful of
turns his gaze backwards to the past age.
the night.
He takes delight in ancient relics,
Ancient gods, our time has come!
makes speeches about our theophanies.
Time has revealed a new legend; Religion’s chain must be loosed from his
a favourable wind is wafting from younder neck,
earth.’ our slave was ever a free slave;
Baal in excess of joy chanted sweetly since the ritual prayers are heavy for him,
unveiling our secrets to the gods. we seek only one prayer, and that without
prostration.
SONG OF BAAL Passions are elevated by songs,
Man has rent yonder azure veil so what pleasure is there in prayers without
and, beyond the sky, has seen no God. hymns?
What is there in man’s heart but thoughts, Better the demon that makes itself visible
like waves this upsurging and that fleeing? than a God to whom the Unseen is meet.
His soul takes repose in the sensible; Ancient gods, our time has come!
would that the past age might return! WE PLUNGE INTO THE SEA OF VENUS
Long live the European orientalist
AND BEHOLD THE SPIRITS OF PHARAOH
who has drawn us forth from the tomb!
Ancient gods, our time has come! AND KITCHENER
Behold, the ring of unity is broken, The Sage of Rum, that master of fair Report
Abraham’s people have lost the joy of Alast; whose blow has the power of Abraham’s fist,
its company is scattered, its cup in chanted this song in the world of intoxication
fragments, and all the ancient gods prostrate fell.
the cup which was drunken with the wine
of Gabriel.
Free man has fallen into the bonds of
directions,
joined up with fatherland and parted from
God;
his blood is cold of the glory of the ancients,
Javidnama 311
GHAZAL 2 Follow me closely and fear no one;
Again one must gaze on the past and the place your hand in mine and fear no one.
future; I will rend apart the sea like Moses;
ho, rise up, for one must think anew. I will guide you into its very breast.’
Love carries its load on the she‐camel of
The sea opened to us its breast—
Time;
or was it air, that appeared as a water?
are you a lover? You must make your
Its depths were a valley without colour and
mount of evening and morn.
scent,
Our elder said, ‘The world follows not a
a valley whose darkness was fold on fold.
constant way,
The Sage of Rum chanted the Sura of Taha;
one must close one’s eyes to its joys and
under the sea streamed down moonshine.
griefs.
Mountains washed, naked and cold,
If, having abandoned the world, you intend
and amid them two bewildered men
Him,
who first cast a glance on Rumi,
first you must pass away from your self.’
then gazed one upon the other.
I said to him, ‘In my heart are many Lats
Pharaoh cried, ‘What wizardry! What a river
and Manats.’
of light!
He said, ‘You must destroy this idol‐house
whence comes this dawn, this light, this
utterly.’
apparition?’
Again he said to me: ‘Rise up, boy,
cling only to my skirt, boy. RUMI
Yonder mountains, yonder heights without a All that is hidden through Him is manifest;
Moses, the origin of this Light is from the White
so covered with snow as to seem a heap of Hand.
silver,
beyond them stretches a diamond‐shining PHARAOH
ocean, Ah, I have gambled away the coin of reason
its depths even more translucent than its and religion;
surface; I saw, but did not recognize this light.
undisturbed by wave or torrent, World‐rulers, gaze all upon me;
in its nature an eternal quiet. world‐destroyers, gaze all upon me!
This is the place of power‐drunk arrogants Woe to a people blinded by avarice
denying the Unseen, worshipping the seen; who have robbed the tomb of rubies and
that one from the East, the other from the pearls!
West, A human shape dwells in a museum
both at war and blows with the men of God. with a legend upon its silent lips
One has had on his neck the staff of Moses, telling the history of imperialism
the other struck asunder by a dervish’s and giving visions to the blind.
sword, What is the grand design of imperialism?
both Pharaohs, one little, the other great, To seek security by contriving division.
both dying of thirst in the embrace of the sea; From such evil doctrine the fate of rulership
each is familiar with the bitterness of death— declines,
the death of tyrants is one of God’s signs. the contrivances of rulership become void
and confused.

If I could only see God’s interlocutor again
2 This appeared as Ghazal 21 in Part 2 of Persian
Psalms. Arberry’s translation of the same piece as I would beg from him a heart aware.
part of that book (also included in the present
volume) differs from this version.
RUMI like your forebears, be the creator of new
Government without spiritual light is raw, ages!
raw, Fouad, Feisal, Ibn Saoud,
imperial power without the White Hand is a how long will you twist like smoke on
sin. yourselves?
Rulership is strong through the weakness of Revive in the breast that fire which has
the subjects, departed,
its roots are firm through the deprivation of bring back to the world the day that has gone.
the deprived. Soil of Batha, give birth to another Khalid,
The crown derives from tribute and the chant once more the song of God’s Unity.
yielding of tribute; In your plains taller grow the palm‐trees;
if a man be a rock, he soon becomes glass. shall not a new Farouk arise from you?
Armies, prisons, chains are banditry; World of musky‐hued believers,
he is the true ruler who needs not such from you the scent of eternal life is coming to
apparatus. me.
How long will you live without the joy of
KITCHENER OF KHARTOUM journeying,
The goal of the people of Europe is lofty, how long with your destiny in alien hands?
they excavate not any grave for rubies and How long will you desert your true station?
pearls— My bones lament in the deep like a reed‐pipe;
the history of Egypt, Pharaoh and Moses are you afraid to suffer? The Chosen One
can be seen from ancient monuments. declared,
Science and wisdom is simply the unveiling “For man the day of suffering is the day of
of secrets; purification.”
wisdom without research is utterly
worthless. ‘Cameleer, our friends are in Yathrib, we in
Nejd;
PHARAOH sing that song which will stir the camel to
Science and wisdom uncovered my tomb; ecstasy.
but what was there to find in the Mahdi’s The cloud has rained, grasses have sprouted
grave? from the earth,
it may be that the camel’s pace grows languid.
THE SUDANESE DERVISH APPEARS My soul wails of the pain of separation;
A restless lightning flashed in the water, take the road where fewer grasses grow.
waves surged and rolled in the water; My camel is drunk with the grass, I for the
a sweet scent wafted from the rose‐garden of Beloved;
Paradise, the camel is in your hands, I in the hands of
the spirit of that dervish of Egypt appeared. the Beloved.
His fire melted the pearl in the oyster‐shell, They have made a way for waters into the
melted the stone in the breast of Kitchener. desert,
He cried, ‘Kitchener, if you have eyes to see, upon the mountains the palm fronds are
behold the avenging of a dervish’s dust! washed.
Heaven granted no grave for your dust, Yonder two gazelles one after the other—
gave no resting‐place but the salty ocean.’ see how they are descending from the hill,
Then the words broke in his throat; for a moment drink from the desert spring
from his lips a heart‐rending sigh was loosed. and then glance upon the traveller.
‘Spirit of the Arabs’, he cried, ‘arise; The dew has softened the sands of the plain
like silk,
Javidnama 313
the highway is not hard for the camel: like our world, it is a talisman of colours and
the clouds ring on ring like the wings of the scents,
partridge— having cities and habitations, palaces and
I fear the rain, for we are far from the goal. streets.
Cameleer, our friends are in Yathrib, we in Its dwellers are skilled in many arts, like the
Najd; Franks,
sing that song which will stir the camel to excelling us in physical and psychical
ecstasy.’ sciences.
They have greater dominion over time and
place
because they are cleverer at the science of
space;
they have so penetrated into its essence
that they have seen its every twist and turn.
THE SPHERE OF MARS
Earth’s dwellers—their hearts are bound to
water and clay;
THE MARTIANS in this world, body is in bondage to heart.
For an instant I closed my eyes in the waters, When a heart makes its lodging in water and
for a little in the depths I broke away from clay,
myself, with water and clay it makes what it wills;
bore my baggage towards another world, intoxication, joy, happiness are at the disposal
with another time, another space. of the soul,
Our sun reached its horizons, the soul determines the body’s absence and
creating a different kind of night and day. presence.
The body is a stranger to the spirit’s wont and In our world, existence is a duality,
way soul and body, the one invisible, the other
which dwells in time, yet is a stranger to time. visible;
Our soul accords with every fire there is, for terrestrials, soul and body are bird and
its time rejoices in every day there is; cage,
it grows not old with the flight of time, whereas the thought of Martians is unitive.
the days illumine the world through its light. When the day of separation arrives for any,
The ceaseless revolution of day and night he becomes livelier from the flame of
from it derives; separation;
make it your journey, for the very world a day or two before the day of death
springs from it. he proclaims his decease to his fellows.
Their soul is not nourished by the body,
A broad meadow with a tall observatory therefore it has not become habituated to the
whose telescope lassoed the Pleiades— body.
is this the nine‐domed retreat of Khizr, Death is to draw in the body,
or is it the dark territory of our earth? death is to flee from the world into one’s self.
Now I searched for the bounds of its This discourse is too high for your thought
immensity, because your soul is dominated by your body.
anon I gazed upon the expanse of heaven. You must wander here for a moment or two;
The Sage of Rum, that guide of the God gives not such an opportunity to
visionaries, everyone.’
spoke: ‘Behold, this world is Mars;
THE MARTIAN ASTRONOMER COMES OUT I have knowledge of earth’s nights and days,
OF THE OBSERVATORY
I have journeyed through its lands and seas.
The tumults of Adam’s sons are open before
An aged man, his beard white as snow, me,
having expended many years upon science though man is not intimate with our labours.’
and wisdom,
keen of eye like the Western sages, RUMI
his raiment like the robes of a Christian monk, I am of the skies, my companion is of the
far on in years, yet tall of stature as a cypress, earth,
his features glowing like a Turk of Merv, intoxicated, yet he has not tasted the veins
well‐versed in the wont and way of every of the vine;
road, a man intrepid, his name is Zinda‐Rud,
the deep thoughts evident in his eyes, his drunkenness derived from
seeing a man approaching, he opened like a contemplating existence.
flower We who have chanced thus upon your city
and spoke in the tongue of Tusi and are in the world, yet free from the world.
Khayyam. In our quest for ever new apparitions
‘A form of clay, prisoner to Quantity and be our companion on the road for a little
Quality, time.
has come forth from the abode of Under and
Over, THE MARTIAN SAGE
given flight to earth without aid of aircraft, These are the environs of Marghadin of
lent to the fixed stars the essence of the Barkhiya—
planet!’ Barkhiya is the name of our ancestor.
His speech and comprehension flowed like a Farzmarz, the tempter to all evil,
river; came up to Barkhiya once in Paradise;
I was lost in stupefaction at his words: ‘How can you remain here content?’ he
is this all a dream, or a trick of magic? cried.
Pure Persian proceeding from a Martian’s ‘For many ages you have been dominated
lips! by God.
He continued: ‘In the time of the Chosen One There is a world far better than your abode,
there was a Martian, a man pure of soul, compared with which Paradise itself is but a
who opened his world‐beholding eyes on moment’s springtide;
your world that world is loftier than all other worlds,
and set his heart on travelling the confines of that world is more sublime than
man. spacelessness.
He spread his wings in the vast expanses of God Himself knows nothing of that world;
being I have never seen a world more free.
until he alighted in the desert of Hejaz. God does not interfere in its ordering,
He wrote down all that he saw in East and it has no Book, no Prophet, no Gabriel,
West, no circumambulations, no prostrations
his picture more colourful than the Garden of there,
Paradise. no prayers, no thanksgivings.’
I too have been in Iran and Europe, Barkhiya replied, ‘Depart, you sorcerer,
I have travelled in the realms of Nile and pour your own image upon that world!’
Ganges, Since our ancestor did not succumb to his
I have seen America and Japan and China, guile
investigating the metals of the earth. God entrusted to us another world.
Javidnama 315
So enter this God‐given kingdom; ZINDA‐RUD
behold Marghadin and its laws and Mendicant and destitute are so by God’s
customs. decree,
by God’s decree ruler and ruled;
TOUR OF THE CITY OF MARGHADIN none but God is the creator of destiny
Marghadin and those lofty edifices— and against destiny human design is
what can I say of that noble city? powerless.
Its inhabitants sweet of speech as honey,
THE MARTIAN SAGE
comely their faces, gentle their manners,
If your heart bleeds on account of one
simple their apparel,
destiny,
their thoughts innocent of the burning fever
petition God to decree another destiny;
of gain,
if you pray for a new destiny, that is lawful,
they were intimate with the secrets of the
seeing that God’s destinies are infinite.
sun’s alchemy;
Earthlings have gambled away the coin of
who so of them desires silver or gold gathers
selfhood,
it from light,
not comprehending the subtle meaning of
even as we gather salt from the briny sea.
destiny;
The aim of science and art there is service,
its subtlety is contained in a single phrase—
no one weighs work done against gold;
‘If you transform yourself, it too will be
no one is even acquainted with dinars and
transformed.’
dirhams,
Be dust, and fate will give you the winds;
these idols may not enter the sanctuary.
be a stone, and it will hurl you against glass.
The demon of the machine has no power over
Are you a dew‐drop? Your destiny is to
nature,
perish;
the skies are not blackened by smoke;
are you an ocean? Your destiny is to endure.
the lamp of the hard‐toiling farmer is always
bright, Every moment you are fashioning new Lats
he is secure from the plundering of the and Manats;
landlords, inconstant one, do you look for constancy
his tillage is not a struggle for water, from idols?
his harvest is his own, no other shares in it. So long as your faith is to accord not with
In that world there are no armies, no your self
squadrons, the world of your thoughts is your prison;
none gains his livelihood by killing and toil without treasure—such is destiny;
murder; treasure without toil—such is destiny!
In Marghadin no pen wins lustre If this is the foundation of faith, ignorant
from inscribing and disseminating lies; fellow,
in the market‐places there is no clamour of the then the needy will become still more in
workless, need.
no whining of beggars afflicts the ear. Woe to that religion which lulls you to sleep
and still holds you in sleep profound!
THE MARTIAN SAGE Is this religion, or magic and enchantment?
No one here is a mendicant or destitute, Is this religion, or a grain of opium?
slave and master, ruler and ruled, here are Do you know whence comes the penetrating
none. nature,
whence came this houri into your tenement
of clay?
Do you know whence comes the sages’ Because you say what is the Lord’s belongs
power of thought, to you.
whence the potency of prayer in God’s The man who has not leaped forth from
interlocutors? water and clay
Do you know whence came this heart, and has shattered his own glass with his own
its visitations, stone.
whence these arts, these miracles? You who cannot tell goal from path,
Do you have fire of speech? That comes not the value of every thing is measured by the
from you; regard.
do you have flame of action? That comes not So long as the pearl is your property, it is a
from you. pearl,
All this is an overflow of the springtime of otherwise it is a pebble, worth less than a
nature, farthing.
nature which derives from nature’s Creator. View the world otherwise, and it will
What is life? A mine of gems; become other,
you are the trustee, its owner is Another. this earth and heaven will be transformed.
A radiant nature glorifies the man of God,
to serve all God’s creatures, that is his aim—
THE MARTIAN DAMSEL WHO CLAIMED
Service belongs to the wont and way of TO BE A PROPHETESS
prophethood; We passed by thousands of streets and
to seek a reward for service is mere mansions;
commerce. on the edge of the city was a broad square
Even so this wind, earth, cloud, field, and in that square a swarm of men and
orchard, meadow, palace, street, stones, women,
bricks— amidst them a woman with the stature of a
you who say, ‘Our property is of ourselves’, tall pomegranate‐tree.
ignorant one, all this belongs to God. Her face was radiant, but without the light of
If you regard God’s earth as your own, the soul,
then what means the verse, Work not as if its meaning were too hard to express;
corruption? her speech lacked fire, her eyes lacked tears,
Adam’s sons have given their hearts to Iblis, not intimate with the joy of desire:
and from Iblis I have seen only corruption. her breast was void of the ardour of youth,
None should convert a trust to his own use; blind and unreceptive to images her mirror;
blessed is he who renders God’s property she knew nothing of love and the laws of
up to God. love,
You have carried off what does not belong she was a sparrow spurned by the hawk of
to you; love.
my soul sorrows for so unworthy a deed. That sage who knew all subtleties spoke to us:
If you own a thing, that is meet and right, ‘This damsel is not of the Martians;
but if you do not, say yourself, how is that simple and free of guile, without artifice,
proper? Farzmarz kidnapped her from the Franks
Return to God the property of God and made her expert in the craft of
so that you may loose the knot of your prophethood,
involvement; then let her loose upon this world,
for why is there poverty and want under She declared, “I have come down from
heaven’s arch? heaven;
my message is the final message of time.”
Javidnama 317
She speaks of the status of man and woman, without the night of the womb it will find
she speaks more openly of the secrets of the the day.
body. Finally that being utterly demonic will die
The destiny of life in this end of time even as died the creatures of the ancient
I will now recount in the language of days.
earthlings.’ Tulips without scar, with skirt unstained,
not in need of dew, will rise from the earth.
ADMONITION OF THE MARTIAN PROPHETESS Of their own accord the secrets of life will
Women! Mothers! Sisters! emerge,
How long shall we live like fond darlings? life’s string will yield melodies without a
To be a darling here is to be a victim, plectrum.
to be a darling is to be dominated and Oyster dying of thirst under the sea,
deprived. do not accept the scatterings of April;
We idly comb out our tresses rise up and wage war with nature,
and think of men as our prey; that by your battling the maiden may be
but man is a hunter in the guise of a quarry freed.
and circles about you to lasso you. Woman’s unitarianism is to escape from the
His swooning ardours are but cunning and union of two bodies;
deceit, be guardian of yourself, and tangle not with
cunning and deceit his anguish and agony men!
and yearning.
Though that infidel makes a shrine of you, RUMI
he causes you to suffer much anguish and Regard the creed of this new‐fangled age,
grief. regard the harvest of irreligious education.
To be his consort is a torment of life, Love is the law and ritual of life,
union with him is poison, separation from religion the root of education; religion is
him sugar. love.
A twisting serpent he—flee from his coils, Love externally is ardent, fiery,
do not pour his poisons into your blood. inwardly it is the Light of the Lord of the
Maternity pales the cheeks of mothers; Worlds.
O happy, to be free and without husband! From its inward fever and glow, science and
art derive,
The divine revelation comes to me
science and art spring from its ingenious
continuously
madness;
augmenting the delight I have in faith.
religion does not mature without Love’s
The time has come when by a miracle of
schooling;
science
learn religion from the company of the
it is possible to see the foetus within the
Lords of Love.
body;
from life’s field you may gather a harvest [Translated by A.J. Arberry]
of sons and daughters exactly as you choose,
and if the foetus accords not with our desire
it is the essence of religion ruthlessly to slay
it.
After this age other ages will come
wherein new secrets shall be revealed;
the foetus will take nourishment of another
kind,
They were clad in robes of tulip hue,
THE SPHERE OF JUPITER their faces gleamed with an inner glow;
in fever and fervour since the moment of
THE NOBLE SPIRITS OF HALLAJ, GHALIB, Alast,
intoxicated with the wine of their own
AND QURRAT AL‐AIN TAHIRA WHO
melodies.
DISDAINED TO DWELL IN PARADISE, Rumi said, ‘Do not go out of yourself so,
PREFERRING TO WANDER FOR EVER be quickened by the breath of these songs of
fire.
Let me be a ransom for this demented heart
You have never seen intrepid passion; behold!
which every instant bestows on me another
You have never seen the power of this wine;
desert;
behold!
whenever I take up a lodging, it says,
Ghalib and Hallaj and the Lady of Persia
‘Rise ‐up!’
have flung tumult into the soul of the
The self‐strong man reckons the sea as but a
sanctuary.
pool.
These songs bestow stability on the spirit,
Seeing that the signs of God are infinite
their warmth springs from the inmost heart of
where, traveller, can the high‐road end?
creation.’
The task of science is to see and consume,
the work of gnosis is to see and augment;
THE SONG OF HALLAJ
science weighs in the balance of technology,
Seek from your own earth a fire as yet
gnosis weighs in the balance of intuition;
unseen,
science holds in its hand water and earth,
another’s apparition is unworthy of your
gnosis holds in its hand the pure spirit;
demand.
science casts its gaze upon phenomena,
I have so fastened on myself my gaze, that
gnosis absorbs phenomena into itself.
though the beauty of the Beloved
In quest of continuous manifestations fills all the world, I am left no time to
I travel through the skies, lamenting like a contemplate.
reed; I would not give for Jamshid’s realm that
all this is by the grace of a pure‐born saint verse of Naziri:
whose ardour fell upon my soul. ‘He who is yet unslain belongs not to our
The caravan of these two scanners of existence tribe.’
presently halted by the shores of Jupiter, Though reason whose trade is wizardry
that world, that earth not yet complete, mustered an army,
circling about it moons swift of pace; your heart will not be dismayed, for Love is
the glass of its vine was still empty of wine, not alone.
desire as yet had not sprouted from its soil. You know not the way and are uninformed
Midnight, a world half day in the moon’s of the stage;
gleam, what melody is there that is not in Sulaima’s
the air thereof neither chill nor torrid. lute?
As I lifted my gaze towards heaven Tell a tale of the hunting and fettering of
I saw a star closer to me; sharks:
the awful prospect robbed me of my senses— do not say, ‘Our skiff knows not the face of
near and far, late and soon became the sea.’
transformed. I am disciple of the zeal of that wayfarer
I saw before me three pure spirits who never set foot
the fire in whose breasts might melt the on any high‐road that ran over mountains,
world. deserts and seas.
Javidnama 319
Be partner with the ring of wine‐bibbing page by page, fold by fold, veil by veil,
dissolutes; curtain by curtain.
beware of allegiance to a Master who is not
The ardour and passion of these anguished
a man of tumult.
lovers
THE SONG OF GHALIB
cast fresh commotions into my soul;
Come, let us change the rule of heaven, ancient problems reared their heads
let us change fate by revolving a heavy and made assault upon my mind.
measure of wine; The ocean of my thought was wholly agitated;
though the police‐captain makes trouble, we its shore was devastated by the might of the
will not worry, tempest.
and if the king himself sends a present, we Rumi said, ‘Do not lose any time,
will reject it. you who desire the resolution of every knot;
Though Moses converse with us, we will not for long you have been a prisoner in your
say a word; own thoughts,
though Abraham be our host, we will now pour this tumult out of your breast!’
decline him. ZINDA‐RUD PROPOUNDS HIS PROBLEMS
Battling, the tribute‐snatchers of the grove
TO THE GREAT SPIRITS
we will turn away from our garden’s gate
with empty basket; Why do you keep far from the station of
peacefully, the birds that flutter their wings believers?
at dawn That is, why are you exiled from Paradise?
we will send back from the grove to their
nests. HALLAJ
You and I are of Hyder, so no wonder The free man who knows good and evil,
would it be his spirit cannot be contained in Paradise.
if we turn back the sun towards the East. The mullah’s Paradise is wine and houris
and page boys,
THE SONG OF TAHIRA the Paradise of free men is eternal voyaging;
If ever confronting face to face my glance the mullah’s Paradise is eating and sleeping
should alight on you and singing,
I will describe to you my sorrow for you in the lover’s Paradise is the contemplation of
minutest detail. Being.
That I may behold your cheek, like the The mullah’s Resurrection is the splitting of
zephyr I have visited the tomb and the trumpet’s blast,
house by house, door by door, lane by lane, tumult‐arousing Love is itself the Dawn of
street by street. Resurrection.
Through separation from you my heart’s Science is founded upon fear and hope,
blood is flowing from my eyes lovers are troubled by neither hope nor fear;
river by river, sea by sea, fountain by science is fearful of the grandeur of creation,
fountain, stream by stream. Love is immersed in the beauty of creation;
My sorrowful heart wove your love into the science gazes upon the past and the present,
fabric of my soul love cries, ‘Look upon what is coming!’
thread by thread, thrum by thrum, warp by Science has made compact with the canon of
warp, woof by woof. constraint
Tahira repaired to her own heart, and saw and has no other resource but constraint and
none but you resignation;
Love is free and proud and intolerant
and boldly investigates the whole of Being. ‘A fire‐worshipper there was in the
Our love is a stranger to complaining time of Ba Yazid;
even though it weeps the tears of a blessed Muslim said to him,
drunkenness. “Better were it if you accepted the
Our constrained heart is not truly Faith
constrained, so that salvation and the excellence
our arrow is not shot by any houri’s glance; would be yours.”
our fire augments out of separation, The other said, “Disciple, if this be
separation is congenial to our soul. faith
Life without prickings is no true life; that the Shaykh of the World Ba
one must live with a fire under one’s feet. Yazid possesses,
Such living is the destiny of the self I cannot endure its glowing heat
and through this destiny the self is built up. which is too great for the strivings of
A mote through infinite yearning becomes my soul.”’ 3
the envy of the sun,
Our concern is only with hope and fear;
in its breast the nine spheres cannot be
not every man has the zeal to surrender.
contained;
You who say, ‘This was to be, and so
when yearning makes assault upon a world
happened,
it transforms momentary beings into
all things were tethered to a divine decree,
immortals.
and so happened,’
ZINDA‐RUD
you have little understood the meaning of
The wheeling of destiny is death and life; destiny,
no man knows what the wheeling of destiny you have seen neither selfhood nor God.
is. The believer true thus petitions God:
‘We accord with you, so accord with us.’
HALLAJ His resolution is the creator of God’s
Whoever possesses the apparatus of destiny, determination
Iblis and death tremble before his might. and on the day of battle his arrow is God’s
Predestination is the religion of men of zeal, arrow.
predestination for heroes is the perfection of
power. ZINDA‐RUD
Ripe souls become yet riper through Men of short vision have stirred up
constraint commotions
which for raw men is the embrace of the and hung God’s true servant on the gibbet.
tomb. The hidden things of Being are manifest to
Khalid constrained turns a world upside you;
down; declare then, what was your crime?
for us, constraint tears us up by the roots.
HALLAJ
The business of true men is resignation and
The sound of the Last Trump was in my
submission;
breast;
this garment does not suit the weaklings.
I saw a people hastening to the tomb,
You who know the station of the Sage of
believers with the character and colour of
Rum,
infidels
do you not know the words of the Sage of
who cried ‘No god but God’ and denied the
Rum?
self.

3 The story is taken from the Mathnavi of Rumi.
Javidnama 321
‘God’s bidding’ they called a vain image explain to me the meaning of a verse of
because it was bound to water and clay. yours:
I kindled in my self the fire of life The dove is a handful of ashes, the
and spoke to the dead of the mysteries of nightingale a network of colour—
life. O lamentation, what is the true sign of a
The whole world has been founded on broken heart?
selfhood,
love therein has been compounded with GHALIB
violence; The lament that rises out of a broken heart—
selfhood is everywhere visible, yet invisible, I have seen its effect different in every place;
our gaze cannot endure to look on selfhood; the dove is consumed through its influence,
within its light many fires lurk hidden, the nightingale daubed with colours as its
from its Sinai creation’s epiphanies shine. result.
Every moment every heart in this ancient In it, death is in the embrace of life,
convent one moment here is life, there is death;
discourses, albeit secretly, of the self; such a colour as glowed in Mani’s abode,
whoever has not taken his share of its fire such a colour as begets colourlessness.
has died in the world, a stranger to himself. You know not, this is the station of colour
India and Iran alike are privy to its light, and scent;
but few there are who also know its fire. the portion of every heart is according to its
I have spoken of its light and its fire; ululation.
confidant of my secret, see now my crime. Either enter colour, or pass into
What I have done you too have done; colourlessness,
beware! that you may grasp a token of the broken
You have sought to resurrect the dead: heart.
beware!
ZINDA‐RUD
TAHIRA A hundred worlds are manifest in this azure
From the sin of a frenzied servant of God expanse;
new creatures come into being; are there saints and prophets in every
unbounded passion rends veils apart, world?
removes from the vision the old and stale,
GHALIB
and in the end meets its portion in rope and
Consider well this being and not‐being;
gallows
continuously worlds are coming into
neither turns back living from the Beloved’s
existence.
street.
Wherever the tumultuous clamour of a
Behold Love’s glory in city and fields,
world arises,
lest you suppose it has passed away from
there too is a Mercy unto all beings.
the world;
it lies concealed in the breast of its own
ZINDA‐RUD
time— Speak more plainly; my understanding
how could it be contained in such a closet as flags.
this?
GHALIB
ZINDA‐RUD
It were a sin to speak of these things more
You who have been given the agony of the plainly.
eternal quest,
ZINDA‐RUD HALLAJ
Then is the conversation of adepts Before him the whole world bows prostrate,
unprofitable? before him who called himself His servant.
‘His servant’ surpasses your understanding
GHALIB because he is man, and at the same time
It is difficult to give tongue to this subtlety. essence.
His essence is neither Arab nor non‐Arab;
ZINDA‐RUD
he is a man, yet more ancient than man.
You are wholly afire with the glow of the
‘His servant’ is the shaper of destinies,
quest,
in him are deserts and flourishing
yet how strange, you cannot master mere
cultivations;
words!
‘His servant’ both increases life and destroys
it,
GHALIB
‘Creation’, ‘Predestination’, ‘Guidance’ are ‘His servant’ is both glass and heavy stone.
the beginning; ‘Servant’ is one thing, ‘His servant’ is
a Mercy unto all beings is the end. another;
we are all expectancy, he is the expectation.
ZINDA‐RUD ‘His servant’ is time, and time is of ‘His
I have not yet glimpsed the face of the servant’;
meaning; we all are colour, he is without colour and
if you possess a fire, then burn me! scent.
‘His servant’ had beginning, but has no end;
GHALIB what have our morn and eve to do with ‘His
You who like me descry the secrets of servant’?
poetry, No man knows the secret of ‘His servant’,
these words overstretch the string of poetry; ‘His servant’ is naught but the secret of ‘save
the poets have adorned the banquet of God’.
words, ‘Save God’ is the sword whose edge is ‘His
but these Moses lack the White Hand. servant’;
What you demand of me is unbelief, do you want it plainer? Say, He is ‘His
an unbelief transcending poetry. servant’.
‘His servant’ is the how and why of creation,
HALLAJ ‘His servant’ is the inward mystery of
Wherever you see a world of colour and creation.
scent The true meaning of these two verses
out of whose soil springs the plant of desire becomes not clear
is either already illumined by the light of the until you behold from the station of Thou
Chosen One threwest not.
or is still seeking for the Chosen One. Zinda‐Rud, have done now with speaking
and listening,
ZINDA‐RUD
become drowned in the ocean of being,
I ask of you—though to ask is a sin—
Zinda‐Rud.
the secret of that essence whose name is the
Chosen One; ZINDA‐RUD
is it a man, or an essence in being I know so little—what is this business of
such as but rarely comes into existence? Love?
Is it the joy of beholding? Then what is
beholding?
Javidnama 323
HALLAJ I do not know how it has been implanted.
The meaning of beholding that Last of Time
is to make his rule binding on oneself. HALLAJ
Live in the world like the Apostle of men It has been implanted by force of love
and jinn or it has been implanted by force of
that like him you may be accepted by men violence;
and jinn because God is more manifest in love,
Then behold yourself—that is the same as love is a better way than violence.
beholding him;
his Sunna is a secret of his secrets. ZINDA‐RUD
Declare, master of the secrets of the East,
ZINDA‐RUD what difference is there between the ascetic
What is the beholding of the God of the nine and the lover?
spheres,
of Him without whose command moon and HALLAJ
sun do not revolve? The ascetic is a stranger in this present
world,
HALLAJ the lover is a stranger in the world to come.
First, to implant on one’s soul the image of
God, ZINDA‐RUD
then next to implant it on the world; The end of gnosis is not‐being
when the soul’s image is perfected in the what is life to repose in annihilation?
world,
HALLAJ
to behold the commons is to behold God.
The intoxication of lovers comes from
Blessed is the man whose single sigh
emptied cups;
causes the nine heavens to circle about his
not‐being is to be ignorant of gnosis.
dwelling;
You who seek your goal in annihilation,
woe to the dervish who, having uttered a
non‐existence can never discover existence.
sigh,
then closes his lips and draws back his ZINDA‐RUD
breath! He who counted himself better than Adam
Such a one never made God’s rule to run in in his jar and cup remains neither wine nor
the world; lees;
he ate barley‐bread, but never fought like our handful of dust is acquainted with the
Ali; skies
he sought a convent and fled from Khyber, where is the fire of that destitute one?
he practised monkhood and never saw royal
power. HALLAJ
Do you possess God’s image? The world is Speak little of that Leader of those in
your prey; separation,
destiny shares the same reins as your throat athirst, and eternally a blood‐filled
design. cup.
The present age seeks to war with you; We are ignorant, he knows being and
imprint God’s image on this infidel’s tablet! not‐being;
his infidelity revealed to us this mystery,
ZINDA‐RUD how that from falling comes the delight of
God’s image has been implanted on the rising,
world;
from the pain of waning springs the joy of his eyes scanning the soul within the body,
waxing. drunkard and mullah, philosopher and Sufi,
Love is to burn in his fire; in practice like a toiling ascetic,
without his fire, burning is no burning. his nature alien to the joy of union,
Because he is more ancient in love and his asceticism the abandonment of eternal
service, beauty;
Adam is not privy to his secrets. since it was not easy to break away from
Tear off the skirt of blind conformity beauty,
that you may learn God’s Unity from him. he made a beginning with spurning
adoration.
ZINDA‐RUD Gaze a little at his visitations,
You who hold the clime of the soul under gaze at his difficulties, his tenacity
your royal signet, still absorbed in the battle of good and evil,
keep company with me a moment more. he has seen a hundred prophets, and is an
infidel yet.’
HALLAJ
We do not tolerate confinement to one My soul in my body quivered for his agony;
station, a sigh of anguish broke from his lips.
we are wholly and singly a yearning to soar; With eyes half‐closed he turned to me and
every instant our occupation is to see and to said;
quiver, ‘Who besides me has so gloried in action?
our labour is to fly without feathers and I have become so involved in labour
wings. that even on the sabbath I am rarely at rest,
I have no angels, no servants attending me;
IBLIS, LEADER OF THE PEOPLE OF my revelation is without benefit of prophets.
SEPARATION, APPEARS I have brought neither Traditions nor Book;
I have robbed theologians of their sweet soul.
The company of the radiant of heart is for a
None ever spun finer than they the thread of
breath or two,
religion.
that breath or two is the substance of being
yet in the end they left the Ka‘bah a heap of
and not‐being;
bricks.
it made love more tumultuous, and then
My religion has no such foundation;
passed,
in the faith of Iblis there are no schisms and
endowed reason with vision, and then passed.
sects.
I closed my eyes to hold it still within me,
Ignorant one, I have given up prostration,
to transport it from my eyes to my heart.
I have turned the organ of good and evil.
Suddenly I saw the world had become dark,
Do not take me for one who denies God’s
become dark from space even to
existence;
spacelessness.
open your eyes on my inner self, overlook my
In that night a flame appeared
exterior.
from the midst of which an old man leaped
If I say, “He is not”, that would be
forth
foolishness,
wrapped in a cloak of antimony grey,
for when one has seen, one cannot say, “He is
his body immersed in wreathing smoke.
not”.
Rumi said, ‘The Leader of the People of
Under the veil of “No” I murmured “Yes”;
Separation!
what I have spoken is better than what I never
How all a‐fire, and what a cup of blood!
said.
Ancient, seldom smiling, of few words, To share in the pain and suffering of Adam
Javidnama 325
I did not forgo the fury of the Beloved. save me from the all too obedient servant!
Flames sprang forth from my sown field; Set me free from such a quarry;
man out of predestination achieved free‐will. remember my obedience of yesterday.
I displayed my own hideousness My lofty aspiration through him has been
and have given you the joy of leaving or abased;
choosing. alas for me, alas for me, alas for me!
Deliver me now from my fire; His nature is raw, his resolution weak,
resolve, O man, the knot of my toil. this opponent cannot withstand one blow
You who have fallen into my noose from me.
and given to Satan the leave to disobey, I need a servant of God possessed of vision,
live in the world with true manly zeal; I need a riper adversary!
as you pity me, live a stranger to me Take back this plaything of water and clay:
proudly disregarding my sting and my a child’s toy suits not a man of a certain age.
honey, What is man? A handful of straw;
so that my scroll may not become blacker still. one spark from me is enough for a handful of
In the world the huntsman lives on his prey; straw.
whilst you are my prey, I draw out my If nothing but straw existed in this world,
arrows. what profited it to endow me with so much
He who soars aloft is secure from falling: fire?
if the quarry is cunning, the huntsman will It were a shame to melt a piece of glass;
fail.’ to melt a rock—that is a proper task!
I have become so saddened by all my
‘Give up this cult of separation’, I said to him.
triumphs
‘The most hateful of things to God is divorce.’
that now I come to You for recompense;
He said, ‘The fire of separation is the stuff of
I seek from You one who dares to deny me—
life;
guide me, to such a man of God.
how sweet the intoxication of the day of
I need a man who will twist my neck,
separation!
whose glance will set my body quivering,
The very name of union comes not to my lips;
one who will say, ‘Depart from my presence’,
if I seek union, neither He remains nor I.’
one in whose eyes I am not worth two
The word ‘union’ made him out of himself;
barleycorns.
the burning agony was renewed in his heart.
Grant me, O God, one living man of faith;
He wallowed awhile in his own fumes,
haply I shall know delight at last in defeat.
he became lost again in his own fumes;
out of those fumes whirling a lament rose [Translated by A.J. Arberry]
high;
how blessed the soul that can feel anguish!
SATAN’S LAMENT
God of the righteous and the unrighteous, THE SPHERE OF SATURN
man’s company has devastated me.
Not once has he rebelled against my rule;
he has closed his eyes to himself, and has not THE VILE SPIRITS WHICH HAVE BETRAYED
found himself. THE NATION AND HAVE BEEN REJECTED
His dust is a stranger to the joy of BY HELL
disobedience,
a stranger to the spark of pride. The Sage of Rum, leader of the righteous,
The prey says to the huntsman, ‘Seize me’: familiar with all the stages of the righteous,
spoke: ‘Hard‐toiling traveller of the heavens, the air swarmed with snakes, as with sharks
do you see yonder world that wears a girdle? the sea,
That which it has twisted around its waist their hoods black as night, their pinions
it stole from the tail of a star. quicksilver;
So heavy of pace it is, its motion seems billows roaring and rending like panthers
stationary; so that the sharks in terror of them lay dead
under its rule, every good is turned to evil on the shore.
and base. The sea gave the shore not one moment’s
Though its form is fashioned of water and respite;
clay every instant mountain‐blocks fell crashing in
it is difficult to set foot on its soil. blood.
A myriad angels, thunder in hand, Bloody wave fought with wave of blood,
dispensing God’s wrath since the Day of whilst in their midst a skiff tossed up and
Alast, down;
continually castigate the planet in that skiff were two men pale of cheek,
and dislodge it from its pivot. pale of cheek, naked, with hair dishevelled.
A world rejected and repelled by heaven,
its morn is as evening, the sun is so grudging.
THE SPIRIT OF INDIA APPEARS
It is the lodging‐place of spirits that shall Heaven split in twain. A pure‐born houri
know no resurrection, lifted the veil from her countenance;
which Hell itself shrank from burning: on her brow shone eternal fire and light,
therein live two ancient demons her eyes were radiant with immortal joy.
who slew a people’s soul to save their skins, The robe covering her was lighter than a
Jaafar of Bengal and Sadiq of Deccan, cloud,
shame to mankind, religion and fatherland, its warp and woof of the veins of rose‐petals.
unaccepted, despairing, undesired, With all such loveliness, she was doomed to
a nation ruined by their handiwork. chains and fetters,
A nation, which had loosed the bonds of and from her lips sighs of agony broke.
every nation, Rumi said, ‘See, this is the Spirit of India;
thus lost its high sovereignty and its faith. the heart is broken by her lamentation.’
Do you not know that the land of India, THE SPIRIT OF INDIA LAMENTS
dear to the heart of every sensitive soul,
a land whose every manifestation lit up the The soul’s candle is quenched in the lamp of
world, India:
now grovels amid dust and blood? Indians are strangers to India’s fair repute,
Who sowed in its soil the seed of slavery? its manikins not intimate with their self’s
All this is the handiwork of those evil spirits. secrets,
Pause a moment in the azure expanse their plectrum plucks but rarely at their
that you may see the retribution for their strings.
deeds. They fasten their eyes upon the past,
their hearts would glow from an extinguished
THE SEA OF BLOOD fire.
What I beheld was indescribable; Because of them I am bound hand and foot,
body by terror was dissundered from soul. they are the reason for my unavailing
What met my eyes? A sea of blood I viewed laments;
tempest‐torn outwardly and inwardly; they have estranged themselves from their
selfhood,
they have made a prison of ancient customs.
Javidnama 327
Humanity is pained by their existence: alas, for the unkindness of being and
the new age is outraged by their ‘clean’ and not‐being!
‘unclean’. We passed through the world of East and
West
Have done with the poverty that bestows
and with pain and affliction reached the gates
nakedness;
of Hell,
blessed is the poverty which bestows true
but Hell shot not a single spark at Sadiq and
power.
Jaafar
Beware of constraint and of the habit of
nor even a handful of ashes hurled at our
patience;
heads,
constraint is poison to both constrainer and
saying, ‘Sticks and straws are better for Hell;
constrained—
my flame is better unsullied by these two
the latter becomes habituated to patience,
infidels.’
the former becomes habituated to constraint;
for both the pleasure of oppression increases We journeyed beyond the nine heavens
and I can only repeat, Ah, would that my seeking to come to sudden death
people knew! which spoke: ‘The soul is a secret among my
When shall India’s night give place to day? secrets;
Jaafar is dead, but his spirit is living still; it is my task to preserve the soul and destroy
as soon as it escapes from the chains of one the body.
body Though the wicked soul is not worth two
at once it makes its nest in another flesh. barleycorns,
Now it makes concord with the church, be gone, you who would have me destroy the
anon it turns entreating to the templars; soul!
its creed, its cult are nothing but commerce, Such a task cannot be performed by Death;
an Antar got up in the robes of Hyder. the traitor’s soul will not find rest in Death.’
As the world changes in scent and colour,
Swift winds! O sea of blood,
even so its customs and usages change;
O earth, O azure heaven,
In former times it bowed before other gods,
O stars, O shining moon, O sun!
in our days its idol is the fatherland.
O Pen, O Preserved Tablet, O Book!
Outwardly it is anguished for the Faith,
White idols! Lords of the West,
inwardly it wears the thread like the templars.
who hold a world in your grip without war
Jaafar, in whatever body, murders the nation;
and violence!
this ‘good old Muslim’ murders the nation.
This world without beginning is without end;
He is always smiling, and is friends with
where is the Lord Protector of traitors?
none;
let a snake smile, it is still a snake. Suddenly there came a terrible sound
His treachery divided the people’s unity; which split the breast of desert and ocean.
his nation is demeaned by the fact of his The whole realm of body disjointed fell apart;
being. moment by moment the mountain‐masses
Whenever a nation is devastated crumbled—
the root of its ruin is a Sadiq or a Jaafar. mountains like clouds in motion—
God save me from the spirit of Jaafar, a world’s destruction without the Blast of the
save me from the Jaafars of the present time! Trumpet.
Lightning and thunder, fired by an inward
THE LAMENT OF ONE OF THE fever,
SKIFF‐RIDERS OF THE SEA OF BLOOD sought a nest of refuge in the Sea of Blood.
“Neither not‐being nor being will accept us:
The billows boiled and broke out of ‘No Gabriel, no Paradise, no houri, no God,
themselves; only a handful of dust consumed by a
mountains and valleys were drowned in yearning soul.’
blood.
I said to Rumi, ‘Who is this madman?’
All that befell the visible and the invisible
He answered: ‘This is the German genius
the stars cavalcade beheld, and passed on
whose place is between these two worlds;
indifferently.
his reed‐pipe contains an ancient melody.
[Translated by A.J. Arberry] This Hallaj without gallows and rope
has spoken anew those ancient words;
his words are fearless, his thoughts sublime,
the Westerners are struck asunder by the
sword of his speech.
BEYOND THE SPHERES His colleagues have not comprehended his
ecstasy
and have reckoned the ecstatic mad.
THE STATION OF THE GERMAN Intellectuals have no share of love and
PHILOSOPHER NIETZSCHE intoxication;
they placed his pulse in the hand of the
The conflict of being and not‐being is
physician,
universal;
yet what have doctors but deceit and fraud?
no man knows the secret of yon azure sky.
Alas for the ecstatic born in Europe!
Everywhere death brings the message of
Avicenna puts his faith in textbooks
life—
and slits a vein, or prescribes a sleeping‐pill.
happy is the man who knows what death is.
He was a Hallaj who was a stranger in his
Everywhere life is as cheap as the wind,
own city;
unstable, and aspiring to stability.
he saved his life from the mullahs, and the
My eyes had beheld a hundred six‐day
physicians slew him.
worlds
and at last the borders of this universe ‘There was none in Europe who knew the
appeared; Way,
each world had a different moon, a different so his melody outstretched the strings of his
Pleiades, lute;
a different manner and mode of existence. none showed the wayfarer the road,
Time in each world flowed like the sea, and a hundred flaws vitiated his visitations.
here slowly, and there swiftly; He was true coin, but there was none to assay
our year was here a month, there a moment, him,
this world’s more was that world’s less. expert in theory, but none to prove him;
Our reason in one world was all‐cunning, a lover lost in the labyrinth of his sighs,
in another world it was mean and abased. a traveller gone astray in his own path.
His intoxication shattered every glass;
On the frontiers of this world of quality and
he broke from God, and was snapped too
quantity
from himself.
dwelt a man with a voice full of agony,
He desired to see, with his external eyes,
his vision keener than an eagle’s,
the intermingling of power with love;
his mien witness to a heart afire;
he yearned for these to come forth from water
every moment his inward glow increased.
and clay
On his lips was a verse he chanted a hundred
a cluster sprouting from the seed‐bud of the
times:
heart.
Javidnama 329
What he was seeking was the station of the heart is a world of spiritual states and
Omnipotence, thoughts.
which station transcends reason and Reason makes its way from fact to fact,
philosophy. it travels without highroad and tramping and
Life is a commentary on the hints of the self, transport;
“no” and “but” are of the stations of the self; a hundred images, each different from the
he remained fast in “no” and did not reach other,
“but” this one acquaint with heaven, that one
being a stranger to the station of “His unattaining.
servant”. No one says that this which is acquaint with
Revelation embraced him, yet he knew it not, heaven
being like fruit all the farther from the roots of is on the right hand of that unattaining image,
the tree. or that the joy which comes from beholding
His eyes desired no other vision but man; the beloved
fearlessly he shouted, “Where is man? “ is but half a pace from the air of His street.
and else he had despaired of earth’s creatures Your eyes may be wakeful or asleep;
and like Moses he was seeking the vision. the heart sees without the rays of the sun.
Would that he had lived in Ahmad’s time, Know that world by the world of the heart—
so that he might have attained eternal joy. yet what shall I say of what defies analogy?
His reason is in dialogue with itself;
In that universe was another world
take your own way, for one’s own way is
whose origin was from another Divine fiat,
good.
undecaying, and every moment transformed,
Stride onwards, for now that station has come
unimaginable, yet there clearly visible;
wherein speech sprouts without spoken
every moment clothed in a new perfection,
words.’
every moment clad in a new beauty.
DEPARTURE FOR THE GARDEN OF Its time had no need of moon and sun;
PARADISE in its expanse the nine spheres are contained.
Whatever is in the Unseen comes face to face
I passed beyond the bounds of this universe even before the desire for it issues from the
and set foot in the undimensioned world, heart.
a world without both right and left, How can I tell in my own tongue what it is,
a world devoid of night and day. this world? It is light, and presence, and life.
Before it the lantern of my perception Tulips repose amidst the mountains,
dimmed, rivers meander in the rose‐gardens;
my words died in awe of the meaning. buds crimson, white and blue
To speak of the spirit with the tongue of water blossom with the breath of the holy ones;
and clay— its waters silver, the air ambergris,
it is very hard to soar in a cage! palaces with domes of emerald,
Regard a little while the world of the heart tents of ruby with golden ropes,
that you may win clear vision by the light of beauties with countenances radiant as a
the self. mirror.
What is the heart? A world without colour Rumi said, ‘Prisoner of analogy,
and scent, pass beyond the credibility of the senses,
a world without colour and scent and without acts fair and foul derive out of manifestation,
dimensions. the latter turning to Hell, the former to
The heart is at rest, yet every moment in Heaven;
motion; these many‐coloured palaces you behold
are built of deeds, not of bricks and stones; only these two were your daughter’s
what you call Kauthar and page and houri intimates.
are the reflection of this world of ecstasy and Now that I take my leave I have this to say to
joy. you:
Here life is the Beatific Vision, naught else, do not remove the sword and the Quran from
the bliss of seeing and speaking with the me.
Beloved.’ Take to your heart these words I speak;
better my tomb without dome and lamp;
THE PALACE OF SHARAF AL‐NISA for believers, sword and Quran suffice—
I said, ‘Yonder mansion of pure ruby let this be the furniture of my grave.”
which gathers tribute from the sun, For long ages, beneath this golden dome,
yon station, yon abode, yon lofty palace the sword and the scriptures lay upon her
whose portico the houris throng shrine.
pilgrim‐robed— Her resting‐place, in this inconstant world,
tell me, you who inspired the travellers to spoke a message to the people of the Truth
search, until the Muslims did with themselves what
who is the owner of this habitation?’ they did
Rumi replied: ‘This is the mansion of Sharaf and time’s revolution rolled up their carpet.
al‐Nisa; The man of God was mindful of other than
the birds on its roof sing in the angels’ choir. God,
Our ocean gave not birth to such a pearl; the lion of the Lord took to the trade of the
no mother gave birth to such a daughter. fox;
By her grave the earth of Lahore vies with the quicksilver fire and fever departed from
heaven; his heart—
none in this world comprehends her secret. you know well what befell Panjab—
She was all ecstasy and yearning, anguish and the Khalsa snatched away sword and Quran
burning, and in that land Islam expired.’
eyes and lamp to the governor of Panjab;
radiance of the family of Abd al‐Samad, VISITATION TO HIS HIGHNESS SAYYID
her poverty is an image remaining eternally. ALI HAMADANI AND MULLA TAHIR
To cleanse her being wholly with the Quran, GHANI OF KASHMIR
not for one moment did she cease recitation;
at her side a double‐edged sword, the Quran Rumi’s words kindled a fire in my heart.
in her hand, Alas for Panjab, that precious land!
flesh, body, mind and soul drunken with Even in Paradise I burned with the fever
God; of my friends, and knew again my ancient
solitude with sword, Quran and prayer— griefs
O happy life, passed in supplication! until in that bower a sorrowful voice
When the last breath issued from her lips, rose up from the banks of the stream Kauthar:
looking upon her mother most yearningly ‘I gathered a handful of straw to set myself on
she spoke: “If you would have knowledge of fire;
my secret, the rose supposes that I would build a nest in
regard this sword and this Quran. the garden.’
These two forces preserve each the other Rumi said, ‘Observe what is now coming;
and are the axis of all life’s creation. give not your heart to what has passed, my
In this world, which dies every moment, son.
That poet of colourful song, Tahir Ghani,
Javidnama 331
whose poverty abounds in riches inward and ZINDA‐RUD
outward, Under the heavens man devours man,
drunk with eternal wine, is chanting a melody nation grazes upon another nation.
in the presence of the Sayyid sublime, My soul burns like rue for the people of the
noble of nobles, commander of Persia, Vale;
whose hand is the architect of the destiny of cries of anguish mount from my heart.
nations. They are a nation clever, perceptive,
Ghazali himself learned the lesson of God is handsome,
He their dexterity is proverbial,
and drew meditation and thought from his yet their cup rolls in their own blood;
stock. the lament in my flute is on their behalf.
Guide he of that emerald land, Since they have lost their share of selfhood
counsellor of prince and dervish and sultan; they have become strangers in their own
a king ocean‐munificent, to that vale land;
he gave science, crafts, education, religion. their wages are in the hands of others,
That man created a miniature Iran the fish of their river in other men’s nets.
with rare and heart‐ravishing arts; The caravans move step by step to the goal;
with one glance he unravels a hundred but still their work is ill‐done, unformed,
knots— immature.
rise, and let his arrow transfix your heart.’ Through servitude their aspirations have
died,
IN THE PRESENCE OF SHAH‐I HAMADAN the fire in the veins of their vine is
quenched.
ZINDA‐RUD
But do not think that they were always so,
I seek from you the key to the secret of God:
their brows ever lowered thus to the dust;
He sought from us obedience, and created
once upon a time they too were warlike folk,
Satan.
valiant, heroic, ardent in battle.
So to adorn the hideous and unlovely
Behold her mountains turbaned in white,
and to demand of us comeliness of works—
behold the fiery hands of her chenars;
I ask you, what is this magic‐mongering,
in springtime rubies leap down from the
what this dicing with an evil adversary?
rocks,
A handful of dust, against yon revolving
a flood of colour rises from her soil,
sphere—
stippled clouds cover mountain and valley
tell me now, did it beseem Him so to do?
like cotton‐flocks strewn from a carder’s
Our labour, our thoughts, our anguish
bow.
is but to bite our hands in despair.
Mountain and river, and the setting of the
SHAH‐I HAMADAN
sun:
The man who is fully aware of himself there I behold God without a veil.
creates advantage out of loss. I wandered with the zephyr in Nishat
To sup with the Devil brings disaster to a chanting as I roved, ‘Listen to the reed’.
man, A bird perched in the branches was singing:
to wrestle with the Devil brings him glory. ‘This springtide is not worth a penny.
One must strike oneself against Ahriman; The tulip has blossomed, the dark‐eyed
you are a sword, he is the whetstone; narcissus is in bloom,
become sharper, that your stroke may be the breeze of Nauruz has torn their skirts;
hard, for many ages from this mountain and
else you will be unfortunate in both worlds. valley have sprung
daisies purer than the light of the moon,
for many ages the rose has packed and What does it mean to ‘give the soul away’?
unpacked her baggage, To give away the soul is to surrender it to
yet our earth has not begotten a second God,
Shihab al‐Din.’ it means melting the mountain with the
The passionate lament of that bird of dawn soul’s flame.
filled my heart with new fire and fever. ‘Drunk with vision’ means discovering
Presently I beheld a madman, whose one’s self,
threnody shining like a star in the night‐season:
robbed me of all endurance and reason. not to discover one’s self is not to exist,
‘Pass us by, and seek not an impassioned to discover is to bestow the self on the self.
lament, Whosoever has seen himself and has seen
pass from the rose‐twig, that talisman of naught else
colour and scent. has drawn forth the load from the self’s
You said that dew was dripping from the prison;
tulip’s petals; the ‘drunk with vision’ who beholds himself
nay, it is a feckless heart weeping beside the deems the sting sweeter than the honey—
river. in his eyes the soul is cheap as the air,
What have these few feathers to do with before him the walls of his prison tremble;
such a chant? his axe shivers the granite rock
It is the spirit of Ghani mourning the death so that he takes his share of the universe.
of desire. When he gives up the soul, his soul is truly
Zephyr, if you should pass over Geneva his,
speak a word from me to the League of otherwise his soul is his guest but for a
Nations: moment or two.
they have sold farmer and cornfield, river
and garden, ZINDA‐RUD
they have sold a people, and at a price how You have spoken of the wisdom of foul and
cheap.’ fair;
learned sage, expound a further subtlety.
SHAH‐I HAMADAN You were the guide of those who behold the
I will tell you a subtle mystery, my son: inner meanings
the body is all clay, the soul a precious pearl. you were the confidant of the secrets of
The body must be melted for the sake of the kings.
soul, We are poor men, and the ruler demands
the pure must be distinguished from the tribute;
clay. what is the origin of the sanction of throne
If you cut off a part of the body from the and crown?
body,
that slice of the body will be lost to you; SHAH‐I HAMADAN
but the soul which is drunk with vision— What is the origin of Kingship in East and
if you give it away, it will return to you. West?
The soul’s substance resembles nothing else; Either the consent of the peoples, or war and
it is in bonds, and yet not in bonds; violence.
if you watch over it, it dies in the body, Exalted sir, I will speak with you plainly;
and if you scatter it, it illuminates the it is forbidden to pay tribute save to two
gathering. persons:
What, noble sir, is the soul ‘drunk with either those in authority as being among
vision’? you,
Javidnama 333
whose proof and demonstration is the verse Rise up, let us break together against the
of God, shore.
or else a hero swift‐rising like a hurricane Our child, that is to say, yon ancient river
who seizes cities, and stakes himself in the fills with its roar valley and mountains and
battle, meadow;
on the day of war conquering the land by continually it smites the rocks on its path
force of arms, until it uproots the fabric of the mountains.
on the day of peace by the winning ways of That youth who seized cities, deserts and
love. plains
You might indeed purchase Iran and India, took his nurture from the milk of a hundred
but kingship cannot be bought from any mothers;
man; its majesty strikes terror into mortal hearts;
virtuous friend, the Cup of Jamshid all this is from us, not from any other.
none shall procure from the glassmaker’s To live in the bounds of the shore is a sin;
shop, our shore is but a stone in our path.
or if he procures aught, all he owns is glass, To accommodate oneself to the shore is
and glass has no other property but to eternal death,
break. even though you roll in the sea morning and
evening;
GHANI life is to leap amidst mountain and desert—
Who gave to India this yearning for happy is the wave that has transgressed the
freedom? shore!’
Who gave the quarry this passion to be the You who have read the lines on the brow of
hunter? Life,
Those scions of Brahmins, with vibrant you who have given to the East the tumult
hearts, of Life,
whose glowing cheeks put the red tulip to you who have a sigh that consumes the
shame— heart,
keen of eye, mature and strenuous in action stirring you to restlessness, and us still
whose very glance puts Europe into more,
commotion. from you the birds in the meadow learned
Their origin is from this protesting soil of their threnody,
ours, in your tears the grasses make ablution;
the rising‐place of these stars is our out of your genius the field of roses
Kashmir. blossomed,
If you suppose our earth is without a spark, out of your hope many souls are filled with
cast a glance for a moment within your hope.
heart; Your cry is a bell urging the caravans;
whence comes all this ardour you possess, why then do you despair of the dwellers in
whence comes this breath of the breeze of the Vale?
spring? Their hearts are not dead in their breasts,
It is from the selfsame wind’s influence their embers are not extinguished under the
that our mountains derive their colour and ice;
scent. wait till you see, without the sound of the
Do you not know what one day a wave Trumpet,
said to another wave in Lake Wular? a nation rising out of the dust of the tomb.
‘How long shall we strike at each other in Do not grieve then, visionary;
this sea?
breathe out that sigh consuming all, dry and MEETING WITH THE INDIAN POET
moist alike; BARTARI‐HARI
many cities beneath the turquoise heaven
have been consumed by the flame of a The houris in their palaces and pavilions
dervish heart. my lament provoked to supreme ardour;
Dominion is frailer than a bubble one here put forth her head from her tent,
and can be destroyed by a single breath. another there peeped out from her chamber
The destinies of nations have been shaped and gazed;
by a song, to every heart in eternal Paradise
by a song nations are destroyed and rebuilt. I gave of the pain and sorrow of yon
Though your lancet has pierced men’s terrestrial globe.
hearts, A smile played on the lips of my holy guide
none has perceived you as you truly are; and he said: ‘O magician of Indian stock,
your melody springs from a poet’s song, behold now that Indian minstrel
but what you utter transcends poesy. the grace of whose gaze converts the dew to
Stir up a new tumult in Paradise, pearls.
strike up an intoxicating air in Paradise! a broiderer of subtleties, his name is Bartari,
his nature generous as the clouds of Azar;
ZINDA‐RUD from the meadow he plucks only the
Habituate yourself to the dervish wine and new‐sprung buds.
quaff it continuously; Your melody has drawn him towards us,
when you become riper, hurl yourself at the a king who, with a song sublime,
dominion of Jamshid. even in poverty dwells in lofty exaltation;
They said, ‘This world of ours—does it with his delicate thought he designs images of
agree with you?’ beauty,
I said, ‘It does not agree’. They said, ‘Then a whole world of meaning hidden in two
break it to words.
pieces’. He is intimate with the workshop of life,
In the taverns I have seen there is not one he is Jamshid, his poetry Jamshid’s Cup.’
worthy adversary; We rose in reverence for his art
grapple with Rustam‐i Dastan, have done and prepared suitably to engage with him.
with Magian boys!
Tulip of the wilderness, you cannot burn ZINDA‐RUD
alone; You who have uttered heart‐delighting
strike this heart—enflaming brand upon the subtleties,
breast of man; through whose discourse the East knows all
You are the ardour of his bosom, the heat of mysteries,
his blood— say, whence comes the fire into poetry?
do you not believe me? Then tear apart the Does it come from the self, or from God?
flesh of the world.
BARTARI‐HARI
Is reason your lamp? Set it on the path to
shine; None knows where the poet is in this world;
or is love your cup? Quaff it with the his melody springs from the high notes and
intimate. the low.
I pour forth from my eyes the bloody gouts That burning heart which he has in his
of my heart; breast
my ruby of Badakhshan—pick it up, and set finds not repose even before God.
it in your ring. Our soul’s delight is in questing;
Javidnama 335
poetry’s fire is of the station of desire. Nadir, who knew the secret of unity
You who are drunk with wine pressed from and conveyed to the Muslims the message of
the vine of words, love;
if you should ever attain to this rank. heroic Abdali, his whole being a sign,
with two verses in this world of stone and who gave the Afghans the foundation of
brick nationhood;
one can ravish the hearts of the houris of that leader of all the martyrs of love,
Paradise. “glory of India, China, Turkey and Syria”,
whose name is more resplendent than the sun
ZINDA‐RUD and the moon,
I have seen the Indians twisting this way the dust of whose grave is more living than I
and that; and you.
it is time you told the secret of God Love is a mystery, which he revealed in the
unveiled. open plain—
do you not know how yearningly he gave his
BARTARI‐HARI
life?
These frail gods are but of stone and brick;
By grace of the gaze of the victor of Badr and
there is One more lofty, far from temple and
Hunain
church.
the poverty of the king became heir to
Prostration without the joy of action is dry
Husain’s ecstasy;
and useless;
the King departed from this tavern of seven
life is all action, whether fair or foul.
days,
I will tell you plainly a word not known to
yet still to this day his trumpet sounds in
every one—
Deccan.’
happy is the man who has written it on his
heart’s tablet. My words and voice are immature, my
This world you behold is not the handiwork thought imperfect:
of God, how can I hope to describe that place?
the wheel is yours, and the thread spun on The beings of light from its reflected glory
your spindle. derive vision,
Prostrate yourself before the Law of action’s vitality, knowledge, speech, awareness;
reward, a palace whose walls and gates are of
for from action are born Hell, Purgatory and turquoise
Paradise. holding in its bosom the whole azure sky;
soaring beyond the bounds of quantity and
DEPARTURE TO THE PALACE OF THE quality,
KINGS OF THE EAST, NADIR, ABDALI, THE it reduces thought to mean impotence.
MARTYR ‐ KING The roses, the cypresses, the jasmines, the
flowering boughs
The voice of Bartari penetrated into my soul;
delicate as a picture painted by the hand of
I was intoxicated with Bartari’s song.
spring;
Rumi said: ‘It is better to open your eyes,
the petals of the flowers, the leaves of the
better to step outside the circle of your
trees every moment
thoughts.
put on new colours out of the joy of growth—
You have passed by the banquet of dervishes;
such a spellbinder the zephyr is
give one glance also at the palace of kings.
that as you wink, gold is turned to scarlet;
The sovereigns of the East are here assembled,
on every side pearl‐scattering fountains,
the might of Iran, Afghanistan and Deccan—
birds born of Paradise in clamant song.
Within that lofty palace was a chamber her cheeks were lack‐lustre, her blood was
whose motes held the sun in a lasso; cold,
the roof, walls and columns were of red agate, ancient her religion, her laws, her system,
the floor of jasper, enclosed in carnation. ancient the light and dark of her dawn and
To the right and left of that lodge eve;
houris with golden girdles stood in ranks, in her vine’s flask no wine foamed,
and in the midst, seated on thrones of gold, no spark glowed in her heap of dust,
sovereigns stately as Jamshid, splendid as till from the desert a resurrection came to
Bahram. her
Rumi, that mirror of perfect refinement, which endowed her with new life.
with utmost affection opened his lips Such a resurrection is a grace of God:
saying, ‘Here is a poet from the East— Persia lives on—where is Rome the mighty?
either a poet, or an eastern magician; He from whose body the pure spirit has
his thoughts are acute, his soul impassioned; departed
his verses have kindled a fire in all the East’. cannot rise from the dust without a
resurrection.
NADIR The desert‐dwellers breathed life into Iran
Welcome to you, eastern weaver of and then sped back to their sandy wastes;
subtleties they erased from our tablet all that was old,
whose lips the Persian speech so well and departed,
beseems! they brought the apparatus of a new age,
We are your intimate friends; tell us your and departed.
secret, Alas, Iran has not recognized the
reveal what you know of Iran. benefaction of the Arabs;
she has melted away in Europe’s fire.
ZINDA‐RUD
After long ages she opened her eyes on THE SPIRIT OF NASIR‐I KHUSRAU ALAVI
herself, APPEARS, SINGS AN IMPASSIONED
but then she fell into the snare of a trap,
GHAZAL, AND VANISHES
slain by the charm of bold and elegant idols,
creator of culture—and slavish imitation of Once you have taken the sword in your hand
Europe. and grasped the pen
Lost in the cult of ‘rulership’ and ‘race’, she do not grieve if your body’s steed be lame or
acclaims halt:
the glory of Shapur, and despises the Arabs; virtue is born of the edge of the sword, and
her day today being empty of new the point of the pen,
achievements my brother, as light from fire, and fire from
she seeks for life in ancient sepulchres. narvan‐tree.
Wedded to the ‘fatherland’, having Know, that to the faithless, both sword and
abandoned her self pen are without virtue;
she has given her heart to Rustam, and when faith is not, reed and steel have no
turned from Hyder. worth.
She is accepting a false image from Europe, Faith is precious to the wise, and to the
she takes the version of her history from ignorant it is contemptible;
Europe. before the ignorant, faith is like jasmine before
Iran was aged already in the time of a cow.
Yazdajird, Faith is like fine linen, of which one half
makes a shirt
Javidnama 337
for Elias, and the other half a shroud for a The body is nothing, nothing, when the
Jew. heart is corrupt;
so fix your eyes on the heart, and be
ABDALI attached to naught else.
That youth who created dominions, Asia is a form cast of water and clay;
then fled back to his mountains and deserts, in that form the Afghan nation is the heart;
kindled a fire on his mountain‐peaks— if it is corrupt, all Asia is corrupt,
did he emerge of fine assay, or was he if it is dilated, all Asia is dilated.
utterly consumed? So long as the heart is free, the body is free,
else, the body is a straw in the path of the
ZINDA‐RUD
wind.
Whilst other nations are eager in
Like the body, the heart too is bound by
brotherhood,
laws—
with him brother is at war against brother.
the heart dies of hatred, lives of faith.
From his life the life of the whole East
The power of faith derives from unity;
derives;
when unity becomes visible, it is a nation.
his ten‐year‐old child is a leader of armies.
Imitation of the West seduces the East from
Yet ignorantly he has broken himself from
itself;
himself,
these peoples have need to criticize the
not recognizing his own potentialities.
West.
He possesses a heart, and is unaware of that
The power of the West comes not from lute
heart;
and rebeck,
body is parted from body, heart from heart;
not from the dancing of unveiled girls,
a traveller, he has lost the road to the good,
not from the magic of tulip‐cheeked
his soul is unconscious of its true purposes.
enchantresses,
Finely sang that poet familiar with Afghan,
not from naked legs and bobbed hair;
who proclaimed fearlessly what he saw,
its solidity springs not from irreligion,
that sage of the Afghan nation,
its glory derives not from the Latin script.
that physician of the sickness of the
The power of the West comes from science
Afghans;
and technology,
he saw the people’s secret, and boldly
and with that selfsame flame its lamp is
uttered
bright.
the word of truth with a drunkard’s
Wisdom derives not from the cut and trim
recklessness:
of clothes;
‘If a free Afghan should find a camel
the turban is no impediment to science and
richly caparisoned and loaded with pearls,
technology.
his mean spirit, with all that load of pearls,
For science and technology, elegant young
is only delighted with the camel‐bell.’
sprig,
brains are necessary, not European clothes;
ABDALI
In our nature, fever and ardour spring from on this road only keen sight is required,
the heart; what is needed is not this or that kind of hat.
waking and slumber possess the body from If you have a nimble intellect, that is
the heart. sufficient;
When the heart dies, the body is if you have a perceptive mind, that is
transformed: sufficient.
when the heart vies for glory, the sweat If anyone burns the midnight oil
turns to blood. he will find the track of science and
technology.
None has fixed the bounds of the realm of who has given order to the Afghan nation.
meaning Distressed on account of the Faith and
which is not attained without incessant Fatherland
effort. his armies came forth from the mountains:
The Turks have departed from their own at once soldier, officer and Emir
selves, drunk with Europe, steel with his enemies, silk with his
having quaffed honeyed poison from the friends—
hand of Europe; let me be ransom for him who has seen his
of those who have abandoned the antidote self
of Iraq and has weighed well the present age!
what shall I say, except ‘God help them’? The Westerners can have their magic tricks;
The slave of Europe, eager to show off, to rely on other than oneself is infidelity.
borrows from the Westerners their music
and dances; THE MARTYR‐KING
he gambles away his precious soul for Speak again of the Indians and of India—
frivolity— one blade of her grass no garden can
science is a hard quest, so he makes do with outmatch;
fun. speak of her in whose mosques the tumult
Being slothful, he takes the easy way; has died,
his nature readily accepts the easy of her in whose temples the fire is quenched,
alternative. of her for whose sake I gave my blood,
To seek for ease in this ancient convent whose memory I have nursed in my soul.
proves that the soul has gone out of the From my grief you may guess at her grief;
body. alas, for the beloved who knows no more
the lover!
ZINDA‐RUD
Do you know what European culture is? ZINDA‐RUD
In its world are two hundred paradises of The Indians reject the statutes of Europe,
colour; they are immune to Europe’s magic charms;
its dazzling shows have burned down alien laws are a heavy burden on the soul
abodes, even though they descend from heaven
consumed with fire branch, leaf and nest. itself.
Its exterior is shining and captivating
THE MARTYR‐KING
but its heart is weak, a slave to the gaze;
How man grows from a handful of dust
the eye beholds, the heart staggers within
with a heart, and with desire in that heart!
and falls headlong before this idol‐temple.
His concern is to taste the delight of
No man knows what the East’s destiny may
rebellion,
be;
not to behold anything but himself;
what is to be done with the heart bound to
for without rebellion the self is unattainable,
the exterior?
and while the self is not attained, defeat is
ABDALI inevitable.
What is able to control the East’s destiny You have visited my city and my land,
is the unbending resolve of Pahlavi and you have rubbed your eyes upon my tomb;
Nadir: you who know the limits of all creation,
Pahlavi, that heir to the throne of Qubad in Deccan have you seen any trace of life?
whose nail has resolved the knot of Iran,
and Nadir, that sum‐capital of the Durranis
Javidnama 339
ZINDA‐RUD to Deccan your water is the Water of Life.
I scattered the seeds of my tears in Deccan; Alas, for the city which lay in your embrace,
tulips are growing from the soil of that whose sweet beauty was a reflection of your
garden; sweetness!
the river Cauvery unceasing on its You have grown old, yet you are ever young,
journey— ever the same your surge, your ardour, your
in its soul I have beheld a new commotion. lustre;
your waves have begotten only the purest
THE MARTYR‐KING pearls—
You who have been endowed with may your tresses flow freely till all eternity!
heart‐illumining words, You whose music is the very fire of life,
I burn still with the fever of your tears. do you know from whom this message
The incessant digging of the nails of the comes?
initiates From him whose mighty power you once
has opened a river of blood from the veins encircled,
of the lute. whose empire you reflected in your mirror,
That melody which issues out of your soul by whose contriving deserts were turned to
imparts to every breast an inward fire. Paradise,
I was in the presence of the Lord of All, who wrought his image with his own blood,
without whom no path can be traversed; whose dust is the goal of a hundred
though there none may dare to speak, yearnings,
and the spirit’s only occupation is to behold, and with whose blood your waves surge still;
I was afire with the ardour of your verses the man whose words were all action,
and some of your thoughts came on my the one man awake, whilst the East slept.
tongue.
He said, ‘Whose is this verse which you You and I are waves of life’s river;
recited? every moment this universe changes,
In it pulses the true vibration of life’. for life is a perpetual revolution
With the same ardour, congenial to the soul, since it is ever searching for a new world.
convey from me one or two words to the This flux is the warp and woof of life,
Cauvery. this flux the source of the joy of manifestation;
You, Zinda‐Rud, ‘living stream’, he too a the highways like travellers are on a journey;
living stream— apparently at rest, secretly everywhere in
sweeter sounds melody interwoven with motion—
melody. the caravan, the camels, the desert, the
palm‐trees,
MESSAGE OF THE MARTYR‐KING TO THE whatever you see, weeps for the pain of
RIVER CAUVERY parting.
(THE REALITY OF LIFE, DEATH AND In the garden the rose is a guest of but a
moment,
MARTYRDOM)
its hue and lustre a moment’s experiment.
River Cauvery, flow gently for a while; The season of the rose? Funeral and festival
perchance you are wearied by continual together,
wandering. buds in the breast, the rose’s bier on the back.
For many years you have wept in the I said to the tulip, ‘Burn once again’;
mountains, the tulip answered, ‘You know not yet my
carving out your path with your eyelashes. secret,
Sweeter to me than Oxus and Euphrates, Existence is constructed of sticks and straws;
what is the guerdon of manifestation, but the believer’s warfare is the Sunna of the
regret? Prophet.
What is the believer’s warfare? Flight to the
Do you enter the inn of existence? Do not;
Beloved;
do you come from not‐being to being? Do not,
quitting the world, choosing the Beloved’s
or if you do, go not out of your self like a
street,
spark,
He who proclaimed to the peoples the word
but become a wanderer searching for a stack
of love
to fire.
said of warfare that it was ‘the monasticism of
If you have fever and flame like the sun,
Islam’.
step forth into the vastness of the sky;
None but the martyr knows this subtlety,
burn up mountain and bird, garden and
for he has purchased this subtlety with his
desert,
blood.
burn even the fishes in the depths of the sea.
If you have a breast worthy of an arrow, ZINDA‐RUD DEPARTS FROM PARADISE:
live like a falcon, and like a falcon die; THE HOURIS’ REQUEST
immortality is in the breadth of life—
I do not ask of God for length of days, The glass of my patience and quietude was
What is the law, the religion, the rite of life? shattered;
Better one instant a lion, than a century a The Sage of Rum spoke in my ear, ‘Rise up’.
sheep. Ah, those words of love, that ecstatic
certainty!
Life is fortified by cheerful resignation;
Ah that court, that sublime palace;
death is a magic talisman, a fantasy.
heart bleeding, I reached its gate
The man of God is a lion, and death a fawn;
and beheld there a throng of houris,
death is but one station for him of a hundred.
on their lips, ‘Zinda‐Rud, Zinda‐Rud,
The perfect man swoops upon death
Zinda‐Rud, master of fire and melody!’
even as a falcon swooping upon a dove,
Clamour and tumult rose from left and right:
The slave dies every moment in fear of death;
‘One or two moments sit with us. sit with us!’
the fear of death makes life for him a thing
forbidden; ZINDA‐RUD
the free servant has another dignity, The traveller who knows the secrets of the
death bestows upon him a new life. journey
He is anxious for the self, but not for death, fears the lodging‐place more than the
since to the free death is no more than an highwayman.
instant. Love reposes not in separation, nor in union,
Transcend the death that is content with the reposes not, without Eternal Beauty;
grave, first beginning, falling down before idols,
for that death is the death of brute beasts; final end, freedom from all heart‐ravishers.
the true believer prays to the Holy God Love recks for nothing, and is ever on the
for that other death which raises up from the move,
dust. a wayfarer in space and spacelessness.
That other death—the goal of the road of love, Our creed, like the swift‐paced wave:
the final Allahu Akbar in love’s battlefield. abandon the halting‐place, choose the
Though to the believer every death is sweet, highway.
the death of Murtada’s son is something
other. THE HOURIS OF PARADISE
The warfare of worldly kings is for rapine, Your blandishments are like those of Time;
grudge us not now one sweet song.
Javidnama 341
GHAZAL OF ZINDA‐RUD From the science of the interpretation of the
You have not reached Man, so why do you world of colour and scent
seek God? your eyes and your heart derive nourishment;
You have fled from your self; why do you it brings you to the stage of ecstasy and
seek a friend? yearning
Hang again on the rose‐twig and suck in the and then suffers you like Gabriel to stand.
sap and the dew; How shall love bring any soul to the Solitude,
faded blossom, what are you seeking from seeing love is jealous of its own eyes?
the zephyr? Its beginning is the road and the companion,
What they call musk is two drops of the its end, travelling the road without
heart’s blood; companion.
gazelle of the Sanctuary, what are you
I passed on from all the houris and places
seeking in Cathay?
and hazarded the soul’s skiff on the sea of
Poverty’s assay is by sovereignty and
light.
world‐dominion;
I was drowned in the contemplation of
seek Jamshid’s throne—why do you seek a
Beauty,
reed‐mat?
which is constantly in eternal revolution;
Men track it out from the garden of tulips;
I became lost in the heart of creation
why do you seek from me the song
till life appeared to me like a rebeck
drenched with blood?
whose every string was another lute,
The vision augments through the company
each melody more blood‐drenched than the
of the
other.
enlightened of heart;
We are all one family of fire and light,
why do you seek collyrium from the sorrow
man, sun and moon, Gabriel and houri.
of the short—sighted?
Before the soul a mirror has been hung,
We are calenders, and our miracle is
bewilderment mingled with certainty;
world‐vision;
today’s dawn, whose light is manifest,
seek vision from us—why seek the
in His Presence is yesterday and tomorrow
philosopher’s stone?
ever present.
THE DIVINE PRESENCE God revealed in all His mysteries,
with my eyes makes vision of Himself.
Though Paradise is a manifestation of Him
To see Him is to wax ever without waning,
the soul reposes not, save in the vision of
to see Him is to rise from the body’s tomb;
Him.
servant and Master lying in wait on one
We are veiled from our Origin;
another,
we are as birds who have lost our nest.
each impatiently yearning to behold the other.
If knowledge is perverse and evil of substance
Life, wherever it may be, is a restless search;
it is the greatest curtain before our eyes;
unresolved is this riddle—am I the quarry, or
but if the object of knowledge is
is He?
contemplation
it becomes at once the highway and the guide, Love gave my soul the delight of beholding,
laying bare before you the shell of being gave my tongue the boldness to speak:
that you may ask, ‘What is the secret of this ‘Thou who givest light and vision to both
display?’ worlds,
Thus it is that knowledge smoothes the road, look a little while on yonder ball of clay.
thus it is that it awakens desire; Uncongenial to the free servitor,
it gives you pain and anguish, fire and fever, from its hyacinths springs the sting of thorns.
it gives you mid‐night lamentations.
The victors are drowned in pleasure and ZINDA‐RUD
enjoyment, What law governs the world of colour and
the vanquished have only to count the days scent,
and nights. but that water once flowed returns not to
Thy world has been wasted by imperialism, the stream?
dark night ravelled in the sleeve of the sun. Life has no desire for repetition,
The science of Westerners is spoliation; its nature is not habituated to repetition;
the temples have turned to Khaibar, without a beneath the sky, reversion is unlawful to life
Hyder. once a people has fallen, it rises not again.
He who proclaims ‘No god but God’ is When a nation dies, it rarely rises from the
helpless; grave;
his thought, having no centre, wanders astray, what recourse has it, but the tomb and
slowly dying, pursued by four deaths— resignation?.
the usurer, the governor, the mullah, the
shaykh. THE VOICE OF BEAUTY
How is such a world worthy of Thee? Life is not a mere repetition of the breath,
Water and clay are a stain upon Thy skirt.’ its origin is from the Living, Eternal God.
The soul near to Him who said ‘Lo, I am
THE VOICE OF BEAUTY nigh’—
The Pen of God such images fair and foul that is to take one’s share of everlasting life.
wrote exactly as became each one of Us. The individual through the Unity becomes
Noble sir, do you know what it is, to be? Divine,
It is to take one’s share of the beauty of the nation through the Unity becomes
God’s Essence. Omnipotent;
Creating? It is to search for a beloved, Unity produced Ba Yazid, Shibli, Bu Dharr,
to display one’s self to another being. Unity produced, for the nations, Tughril and
All these tumultuous riots of being Sanjar.
without our beauty could not come to exist. Without the Divine Epiphany man has no
Life is both transient and everlasting; permanence;
all this is creativity and vehement desire. Our Manifestation is life to individual and
Are you alive? Be vehement, be creative; nation;
like Us, embrace all horizons; both attain their perfection through the
break whatsoever is uncongenial, Unity,
out of your heart’s heart produce a new life being for the latter Majesty, for the
world— former Beauty.
it is irksome to the free servitor The one is of Solomon, the other of Salman,
to live in a world belonging to others. the one perfect poverty, the other all power:
Whoever possesses not the power to create the one sees there is One, the other becomes
in Our sight is naught but an infidel, a one—
heathen; while in the world, sit with the former, live
such a one has not taken his share of Our with the latter!
Beauty, What is the nation, you who declare ‘No
has not tasted the fruit of the Tree of Life. god but God’?
Man of God, be trenchant as a sword, With thousands of eyes, to be one in vision
be yourself your own world’s destiny! The proof and claim of God’s people are
always One:
‘Our tents are apart, our hearts are one.’
Javidnama 343
Oneness of vision converts the motes to the present the destinies of West and East.
sun;
be one of vision, that God may be seen
EPIPHANY OF THE DIVINE MAJESTY
unveiled. Suddenly I beheld my world,
Do not look slightingly on oneness of vision; that earth and heaven of mine,
this is a true epiphany of the Unity. I saw it drowned in a light of dawn;
When a nation becomes drunk with the I saw it crimson as a jujube‐tree:
Unity out of the epiphanies which broke in my soul
power, yea, omnipotence lies in its grasp. I fell drunk with ecstasy, like Moses.
A nation’s spirit exists through association; That light revealed every secret veiled
a nation’s spirit has no need of a body. and snatched the power of speech from my
Since its being manifests out of tongue.
companionship, Out of the deep heart of the inscrutable world
it dies when the bands of companionship an ardent, flaming melody broke forth.
are broken. ‘Abandon the East, be not spellbound by the
Are you dead? Become living through West, 4
oneness of vision; for all this ancient and new is not worth one
cease to be centreless, become stable. barleycorn.
Create unity of thought and action, That signet‐ring which you gambled away
that you may possess authority in the world. to Ahriman
should not be pledged even to trusty
ZINDA‐RUD Gabriel.
Who am I? Who art Thou? Where is the Life, that ornament of society, is guardian of
world? itself;
Why is there a distance between me and you who are of the caravan, travel alone, yet
Thee? go with all!
Say, why am I in the bonds of destiny? You have come forth brighter than the
Why dost Thou die not, whilst I die? all‐illumining sun;
so live, that you may irradiate every mote.
THE VOICE OF BEAUTY
Alexander, Darius, Qubad and Khusrau
You have been in the world dimensionate,
have departed
and any contained therein, therein dies.
like a blade of grass fallen in the path of the
If you seek life, advance your selfhood,
wind.
drown the world’s dimensions in your self.
So slender is your cup that the tavern has
You shall then behold who I am and who
been put to shame;
you are
seize a tumbler, and drink wisely, and so be
how you died in the world, and how you
gone!’
lived.
ZINDA‐RUD
Accept the excuses of this ignorant man;
remove the veil from the face of destiny.
I have seen the revolution of Russia and
Germany,
I have seen the tumult raging in
Muslimdom, 4 This appeared as Ghazal 62 in Part 2 of Persian
I have seen the contrivings of West and Psalms. Arberry’s translation of the same piece as
East— part of that book (also included in the present
volume) differs from this version.
His submission [to God] had once a grace of
ADDRESS TO JAVID its own.
His prayer and fasting have lost all [spiritual]
This charming array of words is useless, light;
What is in the recesses of the heart hardly No longer is there any [divine] manifestation
comes to the lips. in his universe.
Although I have expressed several points He whose source of strength was only God,
without any difficulty, Has fallen prey to love of money and fear of
I have something which cannot be expressed death.
in words. He has lost that ecstasy, ardour and zest that
If I say it, it becomes all the more knotty, once characterised him;
Words and sounds make it more mysterious. His religion is in the Book and he is in the
Catch its warmth from my look, grave.
Or from my morning lamentation. The modern age has adversely affected him;
He learnt his religion from two prophets:
You got your first instruction from your
The one was from Iran, the other from India;
mother;
The former disapproved of hajj (pilgrimage),
It was her breeze which helped open your
the latter, of jihad (holy war)
bud.
When hajj and jihad are no longer religious
It was her breath that made you what you are;
duties,
O dear one, your worth is all due to her.
Prayers and fasting lose their inner essence.
You gained immortal riches (of the spirit)
When prayers and fasting are deprived of
through her,
their soul,
And learnt la ilah through her lips.
Individual loses his balance and society
O son, have from me the joy of vision
becomes disorganised.
And burning in [the fire of] la ilah.
When the hearts lack warmth of the Quran,
If you say la ilah, speak it from the depth of
There can be no hope of good from such
your heart
people.
So that your body may smell of soul.
The Muslim lost his khudi;
The sun and the moon revolve through
O Khidr! help us, for the situation has gone
burning in la ilah;
beyond our control.
I have seen this ʺburningʺ in mountains and
grass; Prostration which causes tremors to the earth,
These two words la ilah are not mere words; And to whose bidding the sun and the moon
La ilah is nothing but a sword from which revolve,
there is no escape. If it casts its imprint on the stone
To live with its burning is to attain power; That stone would melt into thin air like
La ilah is a stroke very telling and effective smoke;
That prostration these days is nothing but
A believer and to pay obeisance to others!
bending down of the head,
A believer and to be disloyal, beggarly and
And is nothing but old ageʹs weakness.
hypocrite!
It no longer has the grandeur of ʹGod is Highʹ,
He sold away his religion and community for
Is it [due to] our fault or any defect in it?
a trifle
Everybody is moving fast on his own path,
And burnt away the household goods as well
Like a bridleless dromedary and without any
as the house.
goal.
His prayers were once inspired by la ilah
The upholder of the Qurʹan, with no zest for
though not now;
search,
Javidnama 345
How strange it is! As the demands of the present age are
different
If God grants you insight,
I laid the foundation of a different
Look at the times in which you live.
phenomenon.
Reasons are impudent and hearts impervious
to compassion, The young of today are thirsty and yet have
Eyes lack modesty and are immersed only in an empty cup,
appearances. Charming to look at, with a clever mind but
Art and science, religion and politics, reason with dark soul;
and heart— Lacking in insight and conviction and
Each concerned only with water and clay. hopeless of future,
Asia, that land of the rising sun, Their eye didnʹt see any thing in the world.
Looks towards others and is hidden from Poor in spirit, lacking faith in themselves,
herself. dependent on others,
Her heart has ceased to have new experiences, The architect of the temple uses bricks made
Her [intellectual] products are not worth a of their earth.
farthing; The school is unaware of its objective,
Her life in this ancient world Hence it does not appeal to their innermost
Is stationary, frozen and without any urge for heart.
movement. It robbed their souls of the light of nature;
She has fallen prey to Mullas and Kings; Not a single graceful rose grew on its branch.
Her thought, being lame and cripple, canʹt Our architect lays the foundation stone awry:
soar high. He cultivates the habits of a duck in the
Her reason, faith, wisdom and honour young one of a falcon.
Are all tied to the apron‐strings of the lords of Unless knowledge gets warmth of burning
the West. from life
I made an assault on her world of thought Heart remains devoid of new experiences.
And tore the veils from over her secrets. Knowledge is nothing but exposition of your
My heart has bled within my breast stations
Thus have I been able to revolutionise her And commentary of your manifestations.
world. One must burn oneself in the fire of sense‐
impressions
I have said a few words for the people of the
So that one can distinguish between oneʹs
age;
silver and copper.
Two oceans have been condensed in two
Knowledge of truth starts with sense‐
cups.
impressions and ends in vision,
I have expressed my ideas in a technical
Its end canʹt be comprehended by reason.
language,
That I may win applause from the people; A hundred books have you learnt through
It is in the difficult language, using the efficient teachers,
terminology of the West. Far better is the lesson that you receive
Ecstatic songs from the strings of a harp. through sight.
The origin of one is contemplation, the origin From that wine that flows from sight,
of other is thought, everybody
May you be the inheritor of them both! Gets intoxicated in his own way;
I am a rivulet, my water comes from both The morning breeze puts out the lamp
these sources; But it fills the tulipʹs cup with wine.
My separation is both separation and union. Eat little, sleep little, talk little:
Move round yourself like a pair of compasses.
He who denies God is an unbeliever in the And relate to you an episode from the life of
eyes of a theologian, Sultan Muzaffar.
To me, he who denies himself is a greater He was unique in his acts of sincerity,
unbeliever. A king enjoying the states of Bayazid.
The one is called ʺhastyʺ because of denial of He had a horse whom he loved as a dear son;
Being; Like his master, the horse was hard hitting in
The other is ʺhastyʺ as well as ʺunjustʺ and war;
ʺignorantʺ. A black steed of pure Arab breed,
Be steadfast in the way of sincerity Faithful, faultless and of pure stock.
And free yourself from fear of kings and O man of intelligence! for a believer, there is
landlords. nothing more dear
Donʹt swerve from the path of justice whether Than the Qurʹan, a sword and a horse.
in anger or in peace, What can I say about that horse of noble
Stick to the golden mean in affluence or in stock?
poverty. He was like a mountain and moved over
The Law may be difficult; donʹt seek escape rivers like a wind.
from it; On the day of battle, he was swifter than
Let none but your own heart be your guide. eyesight:
Soulʹs welfare: limitless remembrance [of A stormy wind encircling mountains and
God] and rational reflection; rocks.
Bodyʹs welfare: self control in youth. Several tumults of Resurrection were in his
Position of authority in the world below and swift running;
above Stones would break into pieces under his
Cannot be attained except through bodyʹs and hoofs.
soulʹs welfare. One day, the horse, as noble as man,
The object of journey is to enjoy moving Suffered from acute pain in his stomach.
about, A veterinary doctor treated him with wine
If your object is to return to the nest, then And thus the horse was relieved of pain.
donʹt start flying. The righteous king no longer used that horse;
The moon revolves that it may become The ways of taqwa are different from our
stationary; ways.
For manʹs journey, staying at any place is May God grant you true heart,
disallowed. See the submission of a true Muslim!
Life is nothing but enjoyment of flight;
Religion is to burn from head to foot in
Nest is incompatible with its nature.
search,
The food of vultures and crows is in the earth
Its end is love and its beginning is correct
of the grave,
behaviour.
The food of hawks is in the neighbourhood of
The beauty of the rose lies in its colour and
the moon and the sun.
smell;
The essence of religion is: truthful speech and One who is disrespectful is without honour.
lawful food; When I see a young man, lacking in correct
To look at Beauty in solitude and in company. behaviour,
Live as hard as diamond in the path of My days become dark as night.
religion, It increases pain in my heart
Be in constant touch with God and live And the testament of Mustafa comes to my
without anxiety. mind.
I tell you of the essence of religion I feel ashamed of my own deeds
Javidnama 347
And hide myself in days gone by. . Scholars have set aside the teaching of the
A womanʹs protection is her husband or the Qurʹan,
grave, Sufis are predatory wolves with long hair.
A manʹs protection is security from bad Although there is much activity in the
company. monasteries,
It is wrong to speak ill of others; There is hardly a person who has wine in his
Believer and unbeliever—all are Godʹs cup.
creatures. On the other hand, the West‐oriented
Manliness is to respect man; Muslims
Be aware of the true position of man. Are seeking sweet water from mirage.
Man prospers by maintaining proper All are ignorant of the essence of religion,
relationship with others, They are men of deceit and malice.
Set your foot on the path of friendship. Good and virtue are hardly to be found in the
Man of love tries to follow in the Ways of elite;
God, Sincerity and truth are found only among the
Is kind to all, believer and unbeliever alike. masses.
Let belief and unbelief find room in the Distinguish people of religion from the people
expanse of your heart; of malice;
If your heart feels ill at ease, then God protect See the man of God and sit in his company.
you! The vultures have their own laws and
Although heart is confined within water and customs;
clay, The grandeur of the flight of the hawk is a
This whole world is the world of heart. different thing.
Even if you are a lord of the land, Man of truth comes down from the heaven
Donʹt give up the attitude of faqr. like lightning;
The ardour [of this faqr] lies hidden in your His fuel is cities and towns of east and west.
soul We are still [wrapped] in the darkness of the
This old wine is an inheritance from your universe;
ancestors. He partakes in its management.
In this world seek nothing but pangs of the He is like Kalim, Messiah, Khalil;
heart, He is Muhammad, the Book and Gabriel
Ask blessings from God and not from kings. He is like the sun for the universe of the
It so often happens that a man of insight and people of the heart,
God‐oriented His rays impart life to the people of the heart.
Becomes blind through affluence. First he burns you in his own fire
Abundance of wealth deprives man of Then teaches you kingship.
compassion, We are all people of the heart through his
Produces pride and uproots submissiveness. ardour,
I have moved round the world for years, Without him, we would be unreal image of
I have never seen tears in the eyes of the rich. water and clay.
I love him who lives like a dervish; I fear, the time in which you were born
Woe to the man who lives forgetful of God! Is immersed in body and is hardly aware of
the soul.
Donʹt expect to find in Muslims that rapture
When through dearth of soul, body is every
and ecstasy
where,
That faith, conviction and power [which were
The man of truth hides himself within
once their characteristics].
himself.
Search does not bring such a man to your From soulʹs dance comes knowledge and
view judgment,
Although you see him face to face. Earth as well as heaven is caught in our net.
Still you donʹt give up your search, The individual through it achieves Mosesʹ
Although you have to face a hundred ecstasy,
difficulties. Society becomes inheritor of a great kingdom.
If, however, you donʹt find company of a wise To learn soulʹs dance is a difficult task;
man, To burn other than God is not a child’s play.
Get from me what I have from my forefathers. So long as the heart does not burn in the fire
Make Rumi your guide on the path, of avarice and sorrow,
That God may grant you ardour and O son, the soul does not dance till then.
compassion. Sorrow is the sign of weak faith and affliction,
For Rumi knows kernel from shell, O young man! sorrow is half old age.
He is steadfast in the way of the Beloved. Do you know that avarice is modern faqr,
People have written commentaries on his I am slave of him who controls himself.
works but none saw him, You will be a source of comfort to my
His real intent missed our grasp like a deer. impatient soul,
People learnt from him bodily dance; If you chance to learn soulʹs dance.
Dance of the soul was neglected absolutely. I tell you the essence of Mustafaʹs religion,
Bodily dance leads to the revolving of the And shall pray for you in the grave too!
earth,
[Translated by Bashir Ahmad Dar]
Soulʹs dance upsets the skies.

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