Rumi
From The Art and Popular Culture Encyclopedia
|
Related e |
|
Featured: |
R. A. Nicholson’s ‘Dīvāni Shams Tabrīz’ (Cambridge, 1898).
Full text
SELECTED POEMS
PROM THE
DlVANI SHAMSI TABRIZ
EDITED AND TRANSLATED
WITH AN INTRODUCTION, NOTES, AND APPENDICES
BY
REYNOLD A. NICHOLSON, M.A.
former hf Sir Thomas Adams's Professor of Arabic in the I'nirersitif of Cambridge
kiTAb fetlAVAN
New Delhi-1 1 0002
Kitab Bhavan
Publishers, Distributors, Exporters & Importers 1784, Kalan Mahal, Darya Ganj New Delhi- 1 10002 (India)
Phone : (91-1 1)23277392/93,23274686
Web Site : www.kitabbhavan.com
E-Mail : nasri@vsnl.com
Fax : (91-11)23263383
ISBN 81-7151-1 97-X Book Code S00088
1st Published in India 1 898 4"' Edition 2004
Published in India By N us rat Ali Nasri for Kitab Bhavan 1784, kalan Mahal Drya Ganj New Delhi- 1 10002 (India)
V ffirovSrj ovk aftaprlas that, aXXA 6tbv that. Plotinus.
This is that mystic religion which, though it has nothing in it but that same spirit, that same truth, and that same life, which always was and always must be the religion of all God’s holy angels and saints in heaven, is by the wisdom of this world accounted to be madness. Law.
But I’ll pour floods of love and hide myself.
Browning.
Primed in India at:
Cahoot i Fine Art Press 1711, Sui Walan, Darya Ganj New Delhi- 1 10002 (India)
PREFACE.
ABOUT six years ago, when I consulted Professor A Robertson Smith, whose kindness and heroic un- selfishness none of his pupils can ever forget, as to what I should make the subject of the dissertation expected from candidates for a Trinity Fellowship, he suggested the Divani Shamsi Tabriz, in other words, the lyncal poetry of Jalalu’ddin Rumi. I was the more ready to follow his advice as the Sufi doctrines had even then begun to inspire me with the strange and irresistible fascination which a religion of love and beauty exercises over certain minds. Accordingly, Mr E. G. Browne having lent me his copy of the Tabriz Edition of the Divan, I worked through it page by page, selecting the poems that pleased me best and translating them in prose or verse. The present volume is an outcome of that experiment. It is not, however, mere y a rechauffe. My original dissertation was based upon a single text and left many difficulties unsolved. In 1894 I collated a splendid manuscript of the Divan preserved in the Vienna Hofbibliothek, and on my return I examined one of equal importance, which the authorities of the Leyden University Library generously placed at my disposal. The texts thus obtained I have corrected and
PREFACE.
PREFACE.
IX
viii
supplemented by reference to MSS. in the British Museum and elsewhere. As regards interpretation also much has been gained. In a wider knowledge of Sufi literature, and especially of the Masnavi, I found the key to passages which seemed hopelessly obscure. The comparative method may be abused ; its value is beyond dispute. Sufiism has few ideas, but an inexhaustible wealth and variety of illustration. Among a thousand fluttering masks the interpreter is required to identify each old familiar face. Now one mask reveals more than another, and when that has been penetrated, its neighbour can no longer dissemble the likeness which hitherto remained unrecognised. I do not, of course, pretend to have understood everything : Sufiism is neither an exact science nor a popular history of the Creation. This enigmatic and ambiguous style, of which the Divan is a masterpiece, will always leave ample room for conjecture, even though its chief characters are easily deciphered. I trust that my explanatory notes, if occasionally they prove to be beside the mark, may never- theless contribute to a better appreciation of the greatest mystical poet of any age.
While the Masnatl is accessible in the scholarly abstract of Mr Whinfield and the laborious but amazingly unpoetical version of Bk. i. by Sir James Redhouse, the Divan, scarcely inferior in merit or fame, has been less fortunate. There is no English edition ; Austria has given us Rosenzweig’s Auswahl (1838), and the clumsy translations of Von Hammer in his Schone Redekunste Persiens. For a notice of both the reader is referred to the Introduction. I have included three odes which appear in the Auswahl ; the rest are now published in Europe for the first time. The task
of selection was not a simple one, and I have necessarily relied on my own taste and feeling. If my book were not addressed to students of Persian rather than to lovers of literature, I should have been tempted to imitate Abu Tarn in am, whose Hamcisa is a compilation of verses torn from their context. Such a plan is peculiarly favoured by the loose structure of the ghazal, where couplets complete in themselves are strung together in the slightest fashion. But as no writer can fairly be judged by fragments, however fine, I have endeavoured to make this anthology a true and sufficient reflexion of the whole Divan.
My translation seeks to reconcile the claims of accuracy and art : it is therefore in prose. Obviously English verse cannot convey the full verbal sense of oriental poetry without lapsing into grotesque doggerel ; the translator must either profess a general adherence to his author’s meaning (see Appendix II.) or, rising above the letter, he must catch the elusive spirit of his original and reproduce it in a worthy form. Of this, the highest and rarest kind of translation, Fitzgerald’s ‘Omar Khayyam is a classic example. I have done my best to avoid gratuitous ba- nalities, when no misapprehension was possible. Thus I have not rendered saffi. ni'dl by ‘ shoe-rack,’ nor have 1 described a burning heart as ‘ roast-meat.’ Although some Persian compounds can hardly be englished except by coining equivalent terms, I have taken warning from the sad fate of more than one inventor. ‘ Nubiquity ’ and ‘ nulliquity ’ are terrible epitaphs.
Finally, my warmest thanks are due to Professor Cowell, who lent me his two manuscripts of the Divan ; to Mr E. G. Browne, who since I began to study Persian has never
X
PREFACE.
grudged me the benefit of his unrivalled knowledge and experience ; to Mr G. Lowes Dickinson, who permitted me to make use of an unpublished dissertation on Plotinus ; and above all to Professor Bevan, who not only read the proof-sheets throughout but assisted me with many in- genious and important suggestions.
I would also declare my obligation to the staff of the Cambridge University Press for the admirable way in which they have printed a very troublesome text.
Trinity College,
July , 1898.
TABLE OF CONTENTS.
Preface
.
PAGES
vii — x
Introduction
xv — li
§ 1.
Authorship of the Divan
XV
§2.
Jalalu ’ddin RumI
xvi
§3.
Shamsi Tabriz ......
xviii
§4.
The Spiritual Director ....
XX
§5.
Jalalu ’ddin and Shamsi Tabriz
xxii
§6.
Sflfiism in Persian poetry. Development
of Sufiism
XXV
The doctrines of Jalalu ’ddin and Plotinus
XXX
§8-
Criticism of the Divan ....
xxxvi
§9.
Editions and Manuscripts of the Divan
xlvii
Addenda
and Corrigenda
liii — Iv
Selected
Poems
2—195
Notes
.
197—318
Additional Notes
319—330
Appendices
331—350
I.
Illustrative passages from the Divan with
a list of the historical and autobiogra-
phical allusions .....
331
II.
Translations in verse ....
342
III.
Table showing where the Selected Poems
occur in other editions of the Divan
347
IV.
Comparative Table of passages quoted
from the Masnavl ....
349
Indices
351—367
I.
Persian and Arabic
351
II.
English .
362
LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS.
J.R.A.S. = Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society.
Kor. = Kor’an.
Lakh. — Lakhnau Edition of the Dlvani Shamsi Tabriz.
R. = Roscnzweig’s Auswahl.
T. = Tabriz Edition of the Dlvani Shamsi Tabriz.
Z.D.M.G. = Zeitsckrift tier Deutschen morgenldndischen Gesell- schaft.
For the MSS. denoted by the letters BB 2 B ri CC 2 LV see the Introduction, § 9.
References to the Tabriz Edition of the Divan are by page and beyt ; those to the Preface of that Edition are by page and line. Small ‘a ’ affixed to a number denotes that the correspond- ing line or beyt belongs to the marginal text.
LIST OF AUTHORS AND EDITIONS REFERRED TO IN THE NOTES.
(This list includes only those editions which have not been specified.)
Alchldqi Jalall (Lucknow, 1889).
Ardd Vlrdf the Book of ed. and translated by M. Haug and E. W. West (Stuttgart, 1872).
‘Attar, Mantiqu ’ ttair , ed. and translated by Garcin de Tassy (Paris, 1864).
‘Attar, Pendnameh, ed. and translated by Silvestre de Sacy (Paris, 1819).
Bahari ( Ajam, a Persian Dictionary (Lucknow, 1847 ; Delhi, 1853).
Burhani Qati\ a Dictionary of the Persian Language (Calcutta, 1818).
Dabistiin , translated by Shea and Troyer (Paris, 1843).
Deutsche Mystikei-, ed. by Franz Pfeiffer (Leipzig, 18(>7).
Firdausi, S/uihndma, ed. by Vullers (Lugduni Batavorum, 1877, etc.).
Freytag, G. W., Arabum Proverbia (Bonnae ad Rhenum, 1838, etc.).
Ghiyasu ’ llughdt , a Persian Dictionary (Lucknow, 1849).
Gulshani Raz, ed. and translated by E. H. Whinfield (London, 1880).
Hafiz, the Divan of, ed. and translated by Vincenz Ritter v. Rosenzweig-Sehwannau (Wien, 1858, etc.).
Hariri, les Seances de, publiees en Arabc avec un commentaiie choisi pur Silvestre de Sacy (Paris, 1847, etc.).
XIV
LIST OF AUTHORS REFERRED TO.
Ibnu '1 Farid, Td ’iyya, ed. and translated by Hammer-Purgstall (Wien, 1854).
Ibn Khallikan, Biographical Dictionary, translated by De Slane (Paris, 1842, etc.).
JamI, Bahdristdn , ed. and translated by Freiherr v. Schlechta- Wssehrd (Wien, 1846).
Jam!, Nafahdtu ’l Uns, with a biographical sketch of the author by W. Nassau Lees (Calcutta, 1859).
.Jam!, Yusuf u Zulaikhd, ed. and translated by Vincenz v. Rosenzweig (Wien, 1824).
Juan de la Cruz, in the Biblioteca de autores Espaholes, Vol. 27 (Madrid, 1853).
JuijSnl, Kitdbu 'tta i rifdt, ed. by G. Fliigel (Lipsiae, 1845).
Lane, E. W., an Arabic- English Lexicon (London, 1863, etc.).
„ , the Thousand and One Nights (London, 1841).
„ , an Account of the Manners and Customs of the
Modem Egyptians (London, 1871).
Law, W., The Spirit of Love (London, 1893).
Masnam, by Jal&lu 'ddln Rami. See Appendix IV.
Nis&ml, Ishandar-ndma (Calcutta, 1812).
‘Omar Khayyam, ed. and translated by E. H. Whinfield (London, 1883).
Sa'di, Bnstdn , ed. by Ch. H. Graf (Vienna, 1858J.
„ , Oulistdn , ed. by Platts (London, 1874).
Tabari, ed. by M. J. De Goeje and others (Lugduni Batavorum, 1879, etc.).
Tholuck, F. A. D., Ssufismus (Berolini, 1821).
Vaughan, R. A., Hours vhth the Mystics (London, 1860).
Vullers, J. A., Lexicon Persico-Latinum (Bonnae ad Rhenum, 1855, etc.).
INTRODUCTION.
§ 1. The Dlvani Shamsi Tabriz acquaints us with a striking literary phenomenon 1 . It is true that books have been ascribed by ambition or malice to those who had no hand in producing them. It is true, again, that while the fashion of pseudonymous authorship is everywhere understood and practised, in Persia the poet k la mode cannot dispense with a takhallus, which instead of exciting curiosity and sparing modesty a blush serves to gratify the generous patron, to immortalise a place or event, to unfold some characteristic, and in fine to secure that its owner shall not for all time lie buried under one of those cumbrous family trees that betray alike the poverty and confusion of Mohammedan nomenclature. But here is no question of takhallus 3 , forgery, or composition holding up to ridicule the imagined author. The Divan was never attributed to Shamsi Tabriz, who probably died before it was complete. Why then does his name appear on the title-page and at the end ot most of the odes ? Who was he, and in what
1 The case of Plato and Socrates is similar in kind, not in degree.
2 In a certain mystical sense Shamsi Tabriz may be regarded as a takhallus. Jalalu ’ddin asserts the identity of subject and object : to him Shamsi Tabriz represents the divine Beloved, the one Being in whom all individual names are manifested and ultimately merged.
