Abd-al-Rahman Jami
Haft Awrang
Mawlana Abd al-Rahman Jami (1414–1492), known as Jami after his home town of Jam (western Afghanistan), was a scholar, teacher and spiritual guide of the Naqshbandi tradition; a student of Khawaja Ubayd Allah Ahrar - one of the most influential spiritual leaders in Central Asia during the 15th Century. Mawlana Jami’s life and work had a profound impact on the Persian poetic tradition as well as the wider Islamic tradition of devotional poetry and mystical teaching. His poetry is distinguished and celebrated for its profound depth of beauty, complexity and deep spiritual meaning. One of his most famous poetic collections is 'Haft Awrang' (The Seven Thrones), comprising of seven Masnavi poems. These include several allegories which reflect the struggles of love and yearning in worldly love - as symbolic of the soul’s longing for God. It remains a masterpiece of classical Persian literature and an essential text; its lavishly illuminated manuscripts reflect the esteem in which it was held and the influence it had especially in Central Asian and Persian traditions.
Selected excerpts from the 'Haft Awrang' can be found below and a detailed discussion of Mawlana Jami's life and work can be heard here:
"Though a hundred arts to you be known
Freedom from self is gained through love alone!"
(Pendlebury Trans. 1980)
So it behvoes us, bundles of desires that we are, to clean our mirrors of the rust of desire - to forget our own existence, and kneel henceforth in silence.
...
Like that friend of God, knock at the door of certainity and say: 'I do not love those that set'. Banish illusion and doubt from your heart and turn your face towards the One. From every single atom a way leads to Him and is a proof of His existence. If there is one idea engraved in the heart of every reasonable being, it is that every painting must have a painter. From the work, deduce the author.
No one ever suffered on the path of faith who did not find the remedy for his pain. Let the remedy for Jami's pain be that pain itself: let his medicine be his own ever-sorrowing heart.
...
Every being adorned with the attributes of beauty and love is a bird that has flown from the nest of unity and alighted on the branch of appearances and multiplicity. Hence the majestic glory of the beloved; and hence too, the lover's woeful lamentations.
...
All the atoms of the universe became so many mirrors, each reflecting an aspect of the eternal splendour. A portion of that effulgence fell on the rose, which drove the nightingale mad with love. Its ardour inflamed the candle’s cheek and hundreds of moths cam from every side and burnt themselves on it…it set the sun ablaze and made the water lily loom up from the depths. Laila owned her charms to it, so that Majnun’s heart was roused by every hair on her head…and through Yusuf, that moon of Canan, it challenged and conquered Zulaikha’s soul.
Such is the beauty whose splendour is everywhere and because of which the loved ones of the world are veiled from view. Whenever you see a veil, that is what is being concealed: that is what causes each captive heart to tremble. It is love of this beauty which quickens the heart and fills the soul with rapture. Knowingly or unknowingly, each heart that loves is in love with it alone… it is both treasure and treasure house.
…
The heart which is free of lovesickness is not a heart at all; the body bereft of the pangs of love is nothing but clay and water. Turn from the world to the sorrows of love’s delightful domain: let not a heart escape those sweet torments!…
If you would be free, be a captive to love. If you wish for joy, open your breast to the suffering of love. From the wine of love come warmth and rapture; without it there is only melancholy and icy egoism…
You may try a hundred things but love alone will release you from yourself. So never flee from love - not even from love in its earthly guise - for it is a preparation for the Supreme Truth. How will you ever read the Qur’an without first learning the alphabet?
I have heard tell of a seeker who went to ask a sage for guidance on the Sufi way. The old man said to him: 'if you have never trodden the path of love, go away and fall in love; then come back and see us.' Unless you first quaff the cup of the wine of appearances, you will never taste a draught of the mystic liqour. But do not linger in the abode of appearances: cross that bridge quickly if you wish to arrive at the supreme goal.
....
She was beside herself with shock; but she stopped short of grasping the true significance of her experience. If only she had been aware of that deeper meaning, she would have numbered among those who have joined the path of Truth; but being captivated by the outward form, she was oblivious at first to the underlying reality. All of us are like her: slaves of opinion and victims of appearances. If reality did not pop out from behind appearances, how should the sincere of heart ever reach the fashioner of appearances?
...
Her lips were busy, chattering away with her chambermaids, while her heart languished in silent lamentation; her tongue prattled with them, while a thousand tongues of fire seared her passionate breast. Her eyes were on someone else's face, but all her feelings were fixed on the friend; the reins of her heart were in her hands- but her was her heart? It was wherever the heart-ravisher was. Every heart which is caught in the fangs of love is paralysed like this: its whole desire is concentrated on the friend; among others no peace is to be found. If any owrds are spoken it is to the loved one they are addressed. Whatever the apparent aim may be, it is the beloved who is sought.
(Griffith Trans. 1882)
Let us, mere handfuls of shifting dust
Purge our soul's mirrors from ambition's rust,
Low on the knee of wondering silence sink,
And on our brief existence cease to think.
...
Seek, like the Friend, truth's kingdom, nor forget
to cry with him, 'I love not gods who set.'
Cast doubt away, each idle fancy shun,
And turn thine eyes in constant faith to One.
One, only One, see, learn, and know, and seek:
Call on One alone, of One alone speak.
Each atom leads the soul to Him
And proves His being though our eyes be dim.
Deep lies the truth impressed on every heart -
the picture certifies the painter's art.
...
In every mirror then her face was shown,
Her praise in every place was heard and known.
Touched by her light, the hearts of angels burned,
And, like the circling spheres, their heads were turned
...
Rays of her splendour lit the rose’s breast
And stirred the bulbul’s heart with sweet unrest
Her loveliness made Laila’s face look fair
To Majnun fettered by her every hair
Through her his head the Moon of Canaan raised
And fond Zulaikha perished as she gazed
Yes, though she shrinks from earthly lovers' call,
Eternal Beauty is the queen of all;
In every curtained bower the screen she holds,
About each captured heart her bonds enfolds.
Through her sweet love the heart its life retains,
The soul through love of her its object gains.
The heart which maidens' gentle witcheries stir
Is, though unconscious, fired with love of her.
Refrain from idle speech; mistake no more:
She brings her chains and we, her slaves, adore.
Fair and approved o fLove, thou still must own
That gift of beauty comes from her alone.
Thou art concealed: she meets all lifted eyesl
Thou art the mirror which she beautifies.
She is that mirror, if we closely view
The truth -the treasure and the treasury too.
But thou and I - our serious work is naught;
We waste our days unmoved by earnest thought.
Then let us still the slaves of love remain,
For without love we live in vain, in vain.
No heart is that which love never wounded: they
Who know not lovers’ pangs are soulless clay.
Turn from the world, o turn thy wandering feet
Come to the world of love and find it sweet!
…
What though a hundred arts to thee be known
Freedom from self is gained through love alone
To worldly love though thy thoughts now incline
indeed earthly love will lead to love divine.
First with the alphabet thy task begin
Then take to the word of God and read therein
Once to his master a disciple cried : -
'To wisdom's pleasant path be thou my guide!'
'Hast thou ne'er loved?' the master answered; 'learn
the ways of love and then to me return.'
Drink deep of earthly love, that so thy lip.
may learn the wine of holier love to sip.
But let not form too long thy soul entrance:
Pass o'er the bridge: with rapid feed advance
If thou would rest, thine ordered journey sped,
Forbear to linger at the bridge's head.
...
Her soul's rein had slipped from the hand of her will
For wherever she might be, she was with him still.
'Tis vain for the poor heart to struggle while
Love holds it with the teeth of the crocodile.
No wish she had now, not a thought save for one
Save in him no rest and no comfort, none.
If she spoke, his image prompted the world;
if she wished, he only her bosom stirred.
Often her soul had near passed away
Ere the sweet night ended her every day
....
"Thou art wise and prudent," she said, "strive,
the thought of the dream from thy breast to drive."
"Had I the strength," replied she, "the thought to control
this crushing weight never would hace pressed on my soul.
But counsel is feeble the load to withstand,
and the reins of my purpose fall loose from my hand."
Original Persian Text
همان بهتر که ما مشتی هوسناک کنیم آیینه از زنگ هوس پاک
ز بود خود فراموشی گزینیم. پس زانوی خاموشی نشینیم
عنان تا کی به دست شک سپاری به هر یک روی «هذا ربی » آری
خلیل آسا در ملک یقین زن نوای «لا احب الآفلین » زن
کم هر وهم و ترک هر شکی کن رخ «وجهت وجهی » در یکی کن
یکی بین و یکی دان و یکی گوی یکی خواه و یکی خوان و یکی جوی
ز هر ذره بدو رویی و راهیست بر اثبات وجود او گواهیست
بود نقش دل هر هوشمندی که باید نقش ها را نقشبندی