The Masnavi, Book One: Bk. 1 (Oxford World's Classics)
Page 37
To say he’s darkness while I’m radiant light.’
‘There shall be no more kinship then’* God said;
Struggle and piety earns grace instead—
Since it’s beyond the world that’s temporal,
Kinship can’t win you what is spiritual;
This heritage is from God’s messengers,
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Souls of the pure are sole inheritors,
Bu Jahl’s son found true faith a later day
While Noah’s son joined up with those astray:*
The earthling turns just like a moon, so bright,
You’re made of fire and dark with shame like night.
At night, by reasoning and by calculation
Scholars work out the qebla’s* right location,
But when by day the Kaaba is in sight
To make such calculations isn’t right—
Don’t claim you still can’t see, or turn away
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Due to your reasoning—God knows best the way!
If you should hear a message from God’s bird,*
As an example you would learn that word,
Then you’d apply to it your reasoning
To make from just one thought a concrete thing.
But those expressions God’s élite saints say
Are far beyond what language can convey:
Although you learn the bird’s tongue through one sound
And through analogies that can be found,
You injure saints’ hearts like that poor sick friend
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And, like the deaf man, think you comprehend.
The Prophet’s scribe, on hearing from that bird,
Thought he was that bird’s equal since he’d heard,
The bird then blinded him and flapped a wing
To shove him down death’s well of suffering.
By thoughts or what reflects from revelations
Don’t fall back down from heaven’s lofty stations,
Harut and Marut though you be, or more
Than those who stand in ranks* outside His door.
Have mercy on bad people’s wickedness,
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And curse instead your own self-centredness!
Beware lest God’s possessiveness should hit
And make you fall head-first inside earth’s pit!
Both said, ‘God, Yours is the command, for sure,
Without your care how can one feel secure?’
This pair of angels hadn’t understood:
‘How can our deeds be bad when we are good?’
The pair’s distracting itch would not subside
Until it sowed the seed of selfish pride.
They then said, ‘Foolish, base humanity
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Knows not of spiritual kings’ purity;
We’ll draw the curtains over all the sky
Then land on earth and raise a screen so high,
To grant all justice and bring worship’s light,
While flying home to heaven every night,
So that as wonders of the age we’ll be
Renowned for bringing earth security.’
This view of earth and heaven isn’t right,
There’s something missing here that’s kept from sight.
An explanation of why one must keep one’s own mystical state and intoxication hidden from the ignorant
Listen to what Hakim Sana’i said:
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‘Rest where you drank the wine your drunken head!’
For from the tavern if a drunk should stray
He’ll seem a clown with whom the children play:
He’ll tumble into puddles everywhere
And all the wretches will laugh, point, and stare;
They’ll follow him because he’s strange and new
Although of drunkenness they have no clue.
Except those drunk in God, men are just boys,
Mature men flee their passions and their toys:
God said, ‘The world is just a toy, and you
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Are merely children’*—what God says is true!
You keep on bringing toys down from the shelf—
You won’t gain wisdom till you slay your self!
Lust here’s like infants having sex, my friend,
Compared with what’s there at the other end:
What’s infant sex? Play-acting that brings laughter
Compared with sex by Rostam or a martyr;
The wars of men are like an infant’s fight
Meaningless, senseless, base, without real might:
They brandish wooden swords and then take aim,
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But there’s no point or meaning to their game:
They ride a length of wood just like at school,
Saying, ‘Here’s Boraq, and here’s the Prophet’s mule!’
They carry it themselves, but stupidly
They think they’re being borne majestically—
Wait till the day those borne by God should race
Beyond the nine-tiered heavens at great pace:
Spirits and angels to Him will ascend*—
And make the heavens shake from end to end.
Children, you ride your skirts and run the course,
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Clutching the hem to make it seem a horse,
Opinion does not free you from all need*—
You won’t reach heaven on your reasoning’s steed:
Relying on the stronger point of view
Don’t doubt the sun when it’s in front of you!
It’s time now to look down at your own steed—
You’ve made it from your own two feet, take heed!
Your every feeling, fancy, sense, and care
Is like the children’s wooden horse, beware!
Knowledge of mystics was the steed they rode,
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Knowledge of sensual men an extra load.
Heart knowledge helps you when it fills you there,
But other knowledge is a cross to bear:
‘Like asses carrying their books,’* God said,
Knowledge that’s not from Him wears down your head!
It has no meaning—shell without a core,
It doesn’t last, like make-up on a whore!
But when you bear the burden well, it will
Be taken off and you’ll feel such a thrill,
So don’t bear knowledge for your own sake, friend,
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And you’ll find inner knowledge in the end—
Then you may ride on knowledge’s fast steed
And watch the load fall off and your soul freed.
If you don’t chant ‘He’ how can you then flee
Your own desire? Transcend the mere name ‘He’!*
A thought’s produced by attribute and name,
This thought’s a guide with union as its aim;
A guide without an aim does not exist,
If there were no path, ghouls would not persist:
Do names not tell of a reality?
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Can roses grow from R, O, S, and E?
You’ve said the name, to find the named now try—
The moon’s not on the lake but in the sky!
Mere names and words if you wish to transcend
Then purify yourself of self, my friend!
Like iron give up your original colour,
Through discipline become the clearest mirror!
Thus purge yourself of attributes to view
Your own pure essence lying inside you!
Within your heart you’ll find the Prophet’s knowledge
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Without a book or teachers from the college:
The Prophet said, ‘There are some in my nation
Who share my essence and my aspiration;
The same as me; they see me by that light
With which I also see them day and n
ight,
Without hadiths and their transmitters too
Water of Life* they drink to know it’s true.’
So understand ‘Last night I was a Kurd,
Now I’m an Arab though’*—it’s not absurd!
A parable which shows the mysteries
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Is this about the Greeks and the Chinese:
The story about the competition between the Greeks and the Chinese in the art of painting and portraiture
Once the Chinese said, ‘At art we’re the best!’
The Greeks said, ‘With more talent we’ve been blessed!’
The sultan said, ‘I’ll set a test for you
To see which of your claims is really true.’
They all prepared to paint a room’s interior,
In knowledge though the Greeks were far superior.
‘Come, show us to a room,’ said the Chinese,
‘And give the Greeks one similar to it, please.’
They found adjoining rooms which formed a pair,
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One half for each group, thus completely fair;
Then the Chinese requested lots of paint,
The king supplied them, generous as a saint:
Each dawn from his own storehouse men would bring
More paint for them as gifts from this kind king.
The Greeks said, ‘Colourful paints will not prove
Successful—colour’s what we must remove!’
They closed their space off, polished every wall
Clear as the heavens up above us all;
Colour to colourlessness can change quite soon,
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Colour’s a cloud, colourlessness the moon;
If in the clouds some radiance should appear,
It’s from the sun and moon that it shines here.
Once the Chinese felt their work was complete
They banged their drums to celebrate this feat,
The king arrived and saw such paintings there
That stunned him, for their beauty was so rare;
Then he went to the Greeks, who quickly raised
The screen in front and left him more amazed:
The image of that work which was so fine
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Reflected on the walls that they’d made shine—
Whatever he’d seen there shone on each wall,
Out of their sockets eyes began to fall!
The Greeks stand for the Sufis clearly:
Without techniques from books of theory,
They’ve cleansed their breasts so well that they shine bright
Free from all stinginess, desire, and spite.
The heart’s a mirror with such purity
It can reflect forms from eternity:
Such a pure image, boundless, unlike art,
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Shone through the hand of Moses* from his heart;
These forms the heavens even can’t contain,
Nor throne, nor ocean, nor an open plain,
For they’re all numbered and delimited,
While hearts are one and they’re unlimited—
The brain falls silent here or goes astray:
The heart’s with God, or is God in some way.
No form’s reflection shines eternally
But through the heart, home of infinity,
For every image which should reach this place
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Appears without a veil across its face.
Polishers fled all colours, so they could
Each breath see what is beautiful and good:
Beyond the husk of knowledge they can see,
They’ve raised the banner of true certainty,
All thought has left them, for they’ve seen the light,
The sea’s depths and their breasts they keep in sight.
Of death all other men are running scared,
To mock and laugh at it these men have dared,
To conquer their hearts there’s no hope in hell—
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The pearl is not harmed, only its mere shell;
Transcending grammar, law, theology,
They’ve chosen self-effacement, poverty,
When images from heaven shone to earth
Their hearts received them, and they knew their worth;
Their place is loftier even than God’s Throne,
God’s Seat of Certainty* they’ve made their own.
The Prophet asks Zayd, ‘How are you today, how have you risen from bed?’ He answers, ‘I’ve woken up a believer, Messenger of God’*
One dawn the Prophet turned to Zayd to say,
‘My friend, how have you woken up today?’
‘Like a believing slave who knows what’s true.’
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‘Then where’s faith’s garden’s sign displayed on you?’
‘I thirst,’ said Zayd ‘And wander in the day,