The Masnavi, Book Four
Page 17
The ears of some are deaf to ‘Come! ’, unable
To take heed, since all beasts have their own stable.
This call makes some run, very stimulated;2015
In stables horses’ stalls are separated.
This story makes some sad and desperate
Because each bird’s cage is kept separate.
The angels aren’t considered to be even—
That’s why they are of different ranks in heaven.
Though children may attend the same school class,
Some will excel, some fail, and some just pass.
All men across the world have sense perception,
But just the eye’s perception gives us vision:
Although a hundred ears line up to try,2020
They would still need help from a seeing eye.
The lined-up ears have their own special role
For hearing revelation and the soul.
A million eyes can’t do the same for you:
About the auditory, eyes have no clue.
If you go through the senses, you’ll discover
None can perform the function of another.
There are five outward senses, five inside.
They’re ranked * in ten ranks, standing classified.
Those who turn round from faith’s rank you will find2025
Falling down to a rank that lags behind.
Do not downplay the word ‘Come! ’* for this word
Is a supreme elixir that you’ve heard.
Though copper ones reject it when they’re told it,
Regardless you should not try to withhold it.
The sorcerer-like self has them now bound;
Your words will help them later. They’re profound.
Say ‘Come!’ Say ‘Come!’ ,* O young man, without cease
And be aware that God invites to peace .*
Come back, good man, from selfish leadership;2030
Seek out instead a leader—that’s my tip.
An objector protested to the Prophet about his appointment of the man from the Hozayl as commander.
The Prophet made that Hozayli commander
Of that brigade, with God as his supporter.
Sheer jealousy meant one wretch couldn’t take it,
So he objected and would not embrace it.
Look at how dark the people are today—
They’re self-effaced in objects that decay.
They live in separation due to pride;
Their souls are dead since all their life they’ve lied.
It’s strange the soul’s in gaol when you can seē2035
That in its hand it holds its own cell’s key.
That young man is immersed in dung now wholly,
Although a flowing river flows so closely.
He can’t keep still, but fidgets all the while,
Though there’s a couch where he can rest in style.
The light is hidden, but the search makes plain
The heart does not seek refuge out in vain.
If there were no way out from this world’s prison,
Hearts wouldn’t seek escape and feel aversion.
Aversion to this world drags you as guardian,2040
Saying, ‘Seek now the path of guidance, lost one!’
There is a way out, but it’s hidden deeply;
To find it you must clutch at straws initially.
All separation secretly seeks union;
Look at the seeker to see there the sought one.
Dead plants in gardens jump up straight away:
‘Understand the life-giver!’ they all say.
Prisoners watch the door that leads outside—
Why do that if there’s no news from that side?
Why would a million soiled ones seek clean water2045
If there weren’t a supply in the clean river?
The ground’s not comfortable now for your back;
At home you have the mattress you now lack—
Without a resting place, no restless roamer,
Without relief from headaches, no hangover.
That rebel said, ‘Prophet, I disagree;
A leader should have seniority:
Though this youth be a lion cub or bolder,
The army’s leader should be someone older.
And you have also clearly stated oncē2050
“The leader must be old.” That’s evidence.
Survey this army now, O Messenger—
Several are older and superior.’
Its leaves have yellowed, but the tree’s not dead;
Focus on its ripe apples now instead.
Yellow leaves aren’t a sign of imperfection;
This is a sign of ripeness and perfection.
Like yellow leaves, a white beard on the chin
Brings good news that some wisdom lies within.
However, green leaves of the newborn typē2055
Are a clear sign that fruit will be unripe.
The mystic’s sign is food from nothingness;
The flushing banker loves gold’s yellowness.
The beard’s first hair is on a flushed one’s cheek—
This one has only learned to write this week;
The handwriting of this one is still crooked;
His body moves fast, but his brain is crippled.
An old man’s legs might not run very fast,
But his brain has acquired wings and soars past.
Just look at Ja‘far if you doubt such things:2060
In place of limbs God gave His servant wings.*
Leave gold behind; this speech has been disturbed.
Like mercury my heart has been perturbed.
One hundred silent, sweet-breathed ones within me
Put fingers to their lips: ‘Enough!’ they tell me.
The sea is silence; rivers are palaver:
The sea pursues you; don’t seek out the river.
Don’t turn round from the sea’s signs. Make this end.
And God knows best what is correct , my friend.
But that irreverent one refused to drop it:2065
He droned on with vain words before the Prophet.
Speech gave a helping hand, but he was clueless;
Compared with sight that knowledge is so useless.
It’s secondary to vision: that is clear
For those who’re absent, not for those who’re here.
For one who has true vision as his gain
These kinds of knowledge are absurd and vain.
You’ve sat next to your sweetheart, so today
Push all the intermediaries away.
Those who have grown up are no longer keen2070
To read books or employ a go-between.
That one reads books just for the needs of teaching;
Helping men learn is his sole aim in speaking.
It’s wrong to speak before those who can see;
That’s negligence and a deficiency.
Silence is best near seers who understand:
‘Be silent! ’* came down as the Lord’s command.
Speak joyfully if he invites you to,
But don’t go on at length. Make your words few.
And if he should request that you speak longer,2075
Be modest still as you obey his order.
Just as I do with this most handsome youth,
Hosamoddin, who is the light of Truth.
When I cut short what I provide of guidance,
He lures me back there with some new contrivance.
Hosamoddin, you are God’s Glory’s Light—
Why do you ask for speech when you have sight?
Is love for the desired one causing this?
Give me some wine and tell me what it is.
His cup is on your lips, but your ears dare2080
To ask Him still, ‘Where then is the ear’s share?’
Your share’s the warmth—you’re warm and drunk in bliss.
They
answer, ‘Our desire is more than this.’
The Prophet Mohammad answers the objector.
While present with our own sweet-natured Prophet
When that man argued on beyond the limit,
That king of ‘By the star ’, ‘His favour’s ’ ruler,*
Bit his lip, said ‘Enough!’ to that vain babbler.
He blocked that man’s mouth with his hand to say:
‘How long before the Unseen’s knower this way
Will you continue? You have brought dried shit2085
And urged, “Instead of purest musk buy it!”
O stinking brain, you place it to your nose
And say, “How lovely!” though it’s not a rose.
Wretch, you’ve said, “Ah!” to a most noxious smell,
So that your rotten goods will quickly sell,
So you can trick the holy sense perception,
The one that grazes in the heavenly garden.’
That giant’s forbearance has misled the fickle,
But one must recognize oneself a little;
The pot was left uncovered through the night,2090
But cats should feel ashamed to eat in sight.
That glorious one pretends to sleep—beware:
Don’t try to snatch his turban. He’s aware.
O stubborn wretch, for how long will you say
Those bad spells to the Prophet of the day?
Such men have much forbearance, by the millions,
And each of these is like a hundred mountains.
Each one, too, makes fools of the watchful spies
And misleads even men with scores of eyes.
And this forbearance is like lovely winē2095
Reaching up to one’s brain in ways so fine.
Observe one drunk on marvellous wine—now he
Moves like a queen in chess, diagonally.
Through the fast-acting wine, that man has rolled
Onto the street as if he’s very old,
That wine especially from the vat of ‘Yes! ’,*
Not wine that gives just one night’s drunkenness.
That wine which to the seven sleepers gave
Three hundred and nine years inside the cave.*
Egyptian women drank one cup of it,2100
Then cut their hands with knives not meant for it.*
Sorcerers had Moses’s intoxication
And deemed the gallows their beloved station.
Flying Ja‘far* got drunk with that wine and
Selflessly pawned away both leg and hand.
Story about Abu Yazid’s saying ‘Glory be to me! How magnificent my rank is!’, the opposition of disciples, and his response to this through visions rather than through saying words.
The noble Sufi Bayazid once told
His own disciples, ‘I am God, behold!’
While drunk that master said explicitly:
‘There is no god but I, so worship me! ’
When that state left him on the following day,2105
They said, ‘You spoke in an improper way.’
He said, ‘The next time I act similarly
Then strike at me with knives immediately.
I am with body, that which God transcends.
When I speak that way you must kill me, friends.’
This sound advice from one so liberated
Meant each disciple fetched a knife and waited.
Again he got drunk from that awesome flagon
And he forgot all the advice he’d given.
Sweets came and intellect could not be traced;2110
Dawn came and then his candle was effaced.
Reasoning is the chief of police, so when
The sultan comes it creeps away again.
Reason’s shadow, God’s sunlight, and not one
Shadow has ever stood up to the sun.
If just one sprite controls a man, the cost
Is that his attributes are quickly lost.
What he says is in fact what that sprite said:
He speaks the absent one’s words here instead.
When a mere sprite can be a dominator,2115
Imagine then the power of the Creator:
His self has gone—that man’s become the sprite;
The Turk speaks Arabic without the light.
He doesn’t know a word when he comes to—
That sprite’s possessed his traits and essence too.
How can the Lord of Man and sprites then be
Inferior to the sprite? Please answer me.
If someone drunk should kill a lion, you’d say
‘The wine did it, not him!’ And if one day
He says words precious as rare gold, then you2120
Will say, ‘It is the drink that’s talking through.’
Some wine can cause a stunning transformation—
Is God’s light too weak for such domination
Which empties yourself from you totally,
So you’re brought low and He speaks loftily?
The Prophet’s mouth spoke the Qur’an as well—
Claim ‘They’re not God’s words,’ you’re an infidel.
When selflessness’s bird flew out of reach
Great Bayazid then started baffling speech.
Bewilderment’s flood stole away his reason;2125
He spoke more strongly than he had first spoken:
‘There’s nothing in my cloak but God,’ he said,
‘Why seek on earth and heaven now instead?’
All his disciples fell into a frenzy
And stuck their knives into his holy body.
Like the Assassins,* each one plunged his blade
Into his master and none felt afraid.
Whoever stabbed with his knife was reversely
In fact just splitting open his own body.
On that great master’s body wounds weren’t found2130
But on their bodies which in blood soon drowned.
Whoever had attacked his throat could witness
His own throat slit, and died abased and helpless,
While he who stabbed him in the chest instead
Saw his own chest split open and fell dead.
But he who was acquainted with that sultan
Did not feel right to strike him with his weapon:
His partial knowledge bound his hands—his life
Was saved and he was just cut by his knife.
Their numbers were depleted by the dawn2135
And in their houses men began to mourn.
Thousands of people came to Bayazid,
Saying: ‘Two worlds within one shirt indeed:
If yours were really just a human body
By daggers you’d have been destroyed now totally.’
A man with self fought someone who was selfless:
He stabbed with thorns his own eye in the process.
You who stab selfless ones with swords should know
You only stab yourself with every blow.
The selfless ones live in security;2140
Effaced they stay safe for eternity.
His form has gone and he’s become a mirror;
There’s naught there but the image of another.
If you spit at it, it falls on your head;
If you strike it, you strike yourself instead.
You see an ugly face there? That is you.
Jesus and Mary? That view is you, too:
He’s neither this nor that; He is transparent.
It is your own face that He makes apparent.
Lips sealed up when the speech reached this last part;2145
Once the pen reached these words, it split apart.
Close your lips, though fine eloquence today
Is at your service. God knows the best way.
You’re on the roof’s edge, drunkard, so take care.
Sit down or you will fall off from up there.
Regard each moment of success that’s sweet
<
br /> As being on the roof edge at some feet.
Fear losing that sweet moment and conceal it
Like precious treasure, and do not reveal it.
Go to that ambush hideout with much caution2150
So you don’t suffer there all of a sudden.
At joy’s time your soul’s fear of loss will mean
Escape then from the roof edge that’s unseen—
Though you don’t see the secret roof edge, friend,
Your soul sees and it fears it’s near the end.
Every chastisement that came suddenly
Has come at joy’s own roof edge purposefully.
The roof edge is the sole place where men fall.
From Noah and Lot’s people learn it all.
Explaining the cause of the eloquence and talkativeness in that interferer while with the Prophet.
The Prophet’s drunkenness sent out a ray2155
Which struck that wretch and made him drunk that day:
His talkativeness was due to euphoria;
He put aside decorum for hysteria.
Losing your wits does not cause badness always:
Wine makes ill-mannered ones much worse in their ways;
If one is wise it makes one lovelier,
But, if bad-tempered, one gets angrier.
They have made wine prohibited to all
Since most are bad and reprehensible.
The Prophet’s explanation of the reason for his preferring and choosing the Hozayli man as commander and chief of the army over the elders and veterans.
Rulings are based on numbers in these lands:2160
Most are bad, so the sword’s seized from thieves’ hands.
The Prophet said, ‘You just see his appearance;
Don’t judge him young and lacking in experience.
With beards still black, some men have wisdom’s light;
Others have black hearts, though their beards are white.
I’ve tested often his sagacity:
The youth’s work shows his seniority.’
Seniority in wisdom matters there,
Not a white beard or on one’s head white hair.
Who’s older than cursed Satan of you men?2165
Without intelligence one’s worthless then.
A child with Jesus’s breath would be free
From arrogance and craving totally.
Maturity is proven by white hair
Only to blinkered men who’re unaware.
Blind imitators trust such proof alone:
To them through outward signs the way is known.
We’ve said for that man’s sake, ‘When it’s some order