Holy Ma'navi, The (Masnavi) Paragraph English Edition

Excerpt

HEARKEN to the reed flute, how it complains, lamenting its banishment from its home: "Ever since they tore me from my osier bed, my plaintive notes have moved men and women to tears. I burst my breast, striving to give vent to sighs, and to express the pangs of my yearning for my home. He who abides far away from his home is ever longing for the day he shall return.

My wailing is heard in every throng, in concert with them that rejoice and them that weep. Each interprets my notes in harmony with his own feelings, but not one fathoms the secrets of my heart. My secrets are not alien from my plaintive notes, yet they are not manifest to the sensual eye and ear. Body is not veiled from soul, neither soul from body, yet no man hath ever seen a soul." This plaint of the flute is fire, not mere air. Let him who lacks this fire be accounted dead!

'Tis the fire of love that inspires the flute, 'tis the ferment of love that possesses the wine. The flute is the confidant of all unhappy lovers; yes, its strains lay bare my inmost secrets. Who hath seen a poison and an antidote like the flute? Who hath seen a sympathetic consoler like the flute? The flute tells the tale of love's bloodstained path, it recounts the story of Majnun's love toils. None is privy to these feelings save one distracted, as ear inclines to the whispers of the tongue. Through grief my days are as labour and sorrow, my days move on, hand in hand with anguish. Yet, though my days vanish thus, 'tis no matter, do thou abide, O incomparable pure one!

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But all who are not fishes are soon tired of water; and they who lack daily bread find the day very long; so the "Raw" comprehend not the state of the "Ripe;" Therefore it behoves me to shorten my discourse. Arise, O son! burst thy bonds and be free! How long wilt thou be captive to silver and gold? Though thou pour the ocean into thy pitcher, it can hold no more than one day's store. The pitcher of the desire of the covetous never fills, the oyster shell fills not with pearls till it is content; only he whose garment is rent by the violence of love Is wholly pure from covetousness and sin.

Hail to thee, then, O love, sweet madness! Thou who healest all our infirmities! Who art the physician of our pride and self conceit! Who art our Plato and our Galen! Love exalts our earthly bodies to heaven, and makes the very hills to dance with joy! O Lover, 'twas love that gave life to Mount Sinai, when "it quaked, and Moses fell down in a swoon." Did my Beloved only touch me with his lips, I too, like the flute, would burst out in melody. But he who is parted from them that speak his tongue, though he possess a hundred voices, is perforce dumb.

When the rose has faded and the garden is withered, The song of the nightingale is no longer to be heard. The beloved is all in all, the lover only veils Him; the beloved is all that lives, the lover a dead thing. When the lover feels no longer love's quickening, he becomes like a bird who has lost its wings. Alas! How can I retain my senses about me, when the beloved shows not the light of His countenance? Love desires that this secret should be revealed, for if a mirror reflects not, of what use is it?

Knowest thou why thy mirror reflects not? Because the rust has not been scoured from its face. If it were purified from all rust and defilement, it would reflect the shining of the sun of God. O friends, ye have now heard this tale, which sets forth the very essence of my case.

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A certain Jewish king used to persecute the Christians, desiring to exterminate their faith. His Vizier persuaded him to try a stratagem, namely, to mutilate the Vizier himself, and expel him from his court, with the intent that he might take refuge with the Christians, and stir up mutual dissension amongst them. The Vizier's suggestion was adopted. He fled to the Christians, and found no difficulty in persuading them that he had been treated in that barbarous way on account of his attachment to the Christian faith.

He soon gained complete influence over them, and was accepted as a saintly martyr and a divine teacher. Only a few discerning men divined his treachery ; the majority were all deluded by him. The Christians were divided into twelve legions, and at the head of each was a captain. To each of these captains the Vazir gave secretly a volume of religious directions, taking care to make the directions in each volume different from and contradictory to those in the others.

One volume enjoined fasting, another charity, another faith, another works, and so on. Afterwards the Vazir withdrew into a cave, and refused to come out to instruct his disciples, in spite of all their entreaties. Calling the captains to him, he gave secret instructions to each to set himself up as his successor, and to be guided by the instructions in the volume secretly confided to him, and to slay all other claimants of the apostolic office.