Accursed Satan for millennia
Led faithful saints as their superior,
But then he fought with Adam out of pride
3310
And was disgraced like dung that’s thrown aside.
Bal‘am, son of Ba‘ur, prayed, ‘Make Moses and his people turn back from this town which they have besieged without achieving their goal!’ It was answered
To Bal‘am men were subject at one stage
For he was then the Jesus of his age,
To no one else would they bow down, his spell
Could make those terminally ill get well;
He fought with Moses out of self-conceit,
You’ve heard, I’m sure, the fate that he would meet,
For Bal‘am, Satan, and the others too,
Met such sad ends, unseen and in plain view.
God made these two notorious as a test,
3315
As an example to warn off the rest:
He hanged these two thieves in the public square,
So thieves who earn such wrath might then be rare.
He brought their banners back, victorious—
Those slaughtered by His wrath are numerous!
When you keep in your bounds, to God you’re dear;
Don’t overstep the mark! Is that quite clear!
For if you strike one whom God loves still more,
You’ll be sent to the earth’s most rotten core.
What have you learned from Thamud and from Aad*?
3320
Their tales show prophets are all loved by God:
Quakes, thunderbolts, and stones all played a role
To show the strength of the prophetic soul.
For men’s sake kill all animals, and then
For intellect’s come back and kill all men!
What’s intellect here? Wisdom’s perfect source,
Not wretched human intellect, of course;
All animals are thus inferior
To Man who is through this superior,
Thus for mankind to take their lives is lawful
3325
Since beasts lack intellect that’s universal.
Wild men were dealt a massive fall from grace
Because they dared oppose the human race.
What honour will remain for you my friend—
When you’re wild, frightened asses* in the end?
Don’t kill an ass if it’s of benefit
But if it’s wild you’re free to slaughter it:
Though ignorance is what the ass might plead
God won’t forgive its failure to take heed.
When someone shuns truth’s breath, don’t say he can
3330
Be still excused unlike the ass, good man:
It’s lawful to take unbelievers’ lives
Like beasts, with arrows, spears, and hunting knives!
The same goes for their families, you know,
For they lack wisdom and they’re mean and low—
From truth the ones who turn away and flee
Are soon reduced to animality.
The angels Harut and Marut relied on their own immaculateness and wanted to lead the people of the world, but they fell into temptation
Harut and Marut, angels up on high,
Pride’s poisoned arrow also caused to die,
Because they had become self-satisfied:
Two beasts defied a lion and then died—
Even if they had used their horns with skill,
He would have ripped them up in pieces still,
With horns all over, just like porcupines,
He would have killed them, still unharmed by spines.
Although strong winds uproot the tallest trees,
They beautify moist grass just like a breeze;
That fierce wind pities weak grass mercifully—
Don’t show off all your strength conceitedly!
An axe does not fear branches of the tree
3340
But chops them up in bits quite easily;
Still at a flimsy leaf it never swings—
The axe’s blade chops only solid things.
Do flames care that the firewood’s layered so deep?
Do butchers ever run away from sheep?
What’s form next to Reality? So small!
What makes the heavens hang above us all?
In water-wheels the answer can be found—
What is the force that makes them spin around?
Your shield-like bodies’ motions all begin
3345
Deep in the hidden spirit that’s within;
The motion of the wind when it should blow
Is like this wheel moved by the water’s flow:
Where is each breath, each ebb and flow, then from?
Straight from the soul full of desire they’ve come;
It makes the letters: J, I, H, A, D.
Now it makes peace, then war and enmity;
It drags things right, then pulls them left in tow,
Now rose bushes, then thorns, are made to grow.
In this way wind was once transformed by God
3350
Into a dragon to confront the Aad,
Then for believers wind was forced to be
Their peace, protection, and security.
‘Reality is God,’ said one who knew,
‘Lord of the worlds, sea of all meaning too.’
All levels up in heaven and on earth
Are flotsam on the sea—they have no worth;
The twigs there dance and jiggle with the tide
Whenever there is turbulence inside,
So then to make the twigs stay still once more
The sea will throw them all out on the shore,
Though when its surge absorbs them, in a flash
It does what fire does to turn wood to ash—
This topic’s endless so let’s now return,
Harut and Marut’s bitter fate to learn.
The remainder of the story of Harut and Marut; their punishment in this world inside the pit of Babylon
Since the depravity of people here
To both of them had started to be clear,
They waved their fists in anger at mankind
While to their own shortcomings they were blind;
One saw his ugly features in the mirror,
3360
Then turned away from it, enraged and bitter:
Conceited men see other people’s sin,
A fire from hell then flares up deep within.
‘Protection of the faith’ they call this pride,
Their infidel self-love dictates inside!
The true protector of the faith I’ve seen,
He’s different, he makes things fresh and green.
‘If you’re enlightened,’ God then told the pair,
‘At heedless evildoers’ deeds don’t stare!
Give thanks, my angel-servants, that you’re free
3365
From bonds of lust and sexuality—
If I had given you those kinds of states,
The heavens wouldn’t let you in their gates,
The chastity that your forms both possess
Shows my affection and immaculateness—
Consider me and not yourself the source,
Don’t you succumb to that cursed devil’s force!’
That one who for the Prophet used to write
Saw in himself God’s wisdom and His light,
He thought he must himself be God’s apostle,
3370
But was a fake just like a hunter’s whistle.
The songs of birds you cleverly can name,
But do you know the songbirds’ actual aim?
You’ve heard the singing of the nightingale,
Not knowing love, its form’s of no avail;
If you do know, it’s guesswork anyway—
The way the deaf must lip-read what me
n say.
A deaf man went to visit his sick neighbour
A partially deaf man heard someone say
That his own neighbour had got sick that day,
He thought, ‘I’m deaf—what will I comprehend
3375
Of sentiments expressed by my sick friend,
For he’s now ill and might have lost his voice?
But I’m obliged to go, I have no choice.
When I see this friend’s lips move, then I’ll guess
The sentiments he’s trying to express:
When I ask him, ‘How are you, dearest friend?’
He’ll say, ‘Alright’, or ‘I am on the mend.’
I’ll ask, ‘What have you had for lunch today?’
‘Some bean soup and some tonic,’ he will say,
‘To health!’ I’ll say. ‘To whom do you now go
3380
For treatment?’ He’ll say, ‘Doctor so-and-so’,
I’ll say, ‘He’s very talented and blessed
So everything will turn out for the best;
I’ve seen myself his power and skilfulness,
Whatever he’s tried he has met success.’
He thus rehearsed such comments in his head,
Then went to see his sick friend in his bed:
‘How are you?’—‘Almost dead!’—‘The Lord be praised!’
The sick friend grew offended and amazed,
Thinking, ‘Praise God? Does this man want a fight?’
3385
The deaf man’s guesses hadn’t turned out right!
He asked, ‘What have you had?’—‘A poisonous drink!’
He said, ‘To health!’—The sick man reached the brink.
The deaf man asked ‘Which doctor’s coming then
To treat you so that you’ll feel well again?’
‘The Angel of Death—so just go away!’
The deaf man said, ‘Rejoice! He’ll save the day!’
His visitor left, thinking this inside:
‘Thank God I came!’ He was self-satisfied.
The sick man thought, ‘He’s my worst enemy;
3390
I never knew he could act spitefully!’
He then thought of expletives in his mind
To write to him swear words of every kind!
When someone swallows soup that has turned bad,
He soon feels ill and vomits what he’s had:
Suppress your rage,* don’t spew it out like this!
You’ll be rewarded with the sweetest bliss.
He had no patience, so he grew irate,
Saying, ‘Where are you, bastard? You just wait!
I’ll ram your words back down your throat again,
3395
My lion-like consciousness was sleeping then.
Visiting sick men is to bring relief,
Not to antagonize and pile on grief;
You wanted just to see your foe distressed
So that your filthy mind could find some rest.’
In acts of worship many go astray
With thoughts of their rewards on Judgment Day.
Truly, their worship’s just sin in disguise
Although their vileness seems pure to your eyes.
The deaf man thought he’d done a righteous act
3400
But it led to the opposite in fact,
Content, he thought, ‘I did well, I feel thrilled!
My duty to my neighbour I’ve fulfilled.’
But as we’ve seen a fire was made to start—
He burnt himself thus in his sick friend’s heart:
Beware of ever kindling such a fire,
The sum of all your sins will just rise higher!
The Prophet told pretentious men one day,
‘Repeat your prayers—you didn’t truly pray!’
Our remedy for such pretentiousness
3405
Is begging Him in every prayer ‘Guide us!*
Dear God, don’t mix this prayer of ours today
With those of show-offs who have gone astray!’
Due to the reasoning this deaf man applied
His ten-year friendship with his neighbour died.
Your temporal reasoning’s powers are unfit
For revelation, which is infinite,
For if your ears still savour every word,
This means your inner ear has still not heard.
The first person to apply analogical reasoning to revelation was Satan
Analogy and logic was used first
3410
Before God’s light by Satan, who was cursed:
‘Mere clay’s not worth as much as fire,’ he’d say,
‘I’m made of fire while Man’s just made of clay;
And judging just by origins, it’s right
The Masnavi, Book One: Bk. 1 (Oxford World's Classics) Page 36