بخش 44 - رجوع به قصهٔ رنجور

Return (from the digression) and tell the story of the sick man and the wise physician whose nature was to palliate.

He felt his pulse and ascertained his state (of health): (he saw) that it was absurd to hope for his recovery.

He said, “Do whatever your heart desires, in order that this old malady may quit your body.

Do not withhold anything that your inclination craves, lest your self-restraint and abstinence turn to gripes.

Know that self-restraint and abstinence are injurious to this disease: proffer to your heart whatever it may desire.

O uncle, (it was) in reference to a sick man like this (that) God most High said, ‘Do what ye will.”

He (the sick man) said, “(Now) go; look you, my dear nephew, I am going for a walk on the bank of the river.”

He was strolling beside the water, as his heart desired, in order that he might find the door to health opened to him.

On the river-bank a Súfí was seated, washing his hands and face and cleansing himself more and more.

He saw the nape of his (the Súfí's) neck and, like a crazy man, felt a longing to give it a slap;

(So) he raised his hand to inflict a blow on the nape of the pottage-worshipping Súfí,

Saying (to himself), “The physician told me it would make me ill if I would not let my desire have its way.

I will give him a slap in quarrel, for (God hath said), ‘Do not cast yourselves with your own hands into destruction.’

O such-and-such, this self-restraint and abstinence is (thy) destruction: give him a good blow, do not keep quiet like the others.”

When he slapped him, there was the sound of a crack: the Súfí cried, “Hey, hey, O rascally pimp!”

The Súfí was about to give him two or three blows with his fist and tear out his moustache and beard piecemeal (but refrained from doing so).

Mankind are (like) sufferers from phthisis and without a remedy (for their disease), and through the Devil's deception they are passionately addicted to slapping (each other).

All (of them) are eager to injure the innocent and are seeking (to find) fault behind each others' backs.

O you who strike the napes of the guiltless, don't you see the retribution (that is coming) behind you?

O you who fancy that (indulgence of) desire is your (right) medicine and inflict slaps on the weak,

He who told you that this is the cure (for your disease) mocked at you: ’tis he that guided Adam to the wheat,

Saying, “O ye twain who implore help, eat this grain as a remedy that ye may abide (in Paradise) for ever.”

He caused him (Adam) to stumble and gave him a slap on the nape: that slap recoiled and became a (penal) retribution for him (the Devil).

He caused him (Adam) to stumble terribly in backsliding, but God was his (Adam's) support and helper.

Adam was (like) a mountain: (even) if he was filled with serpents (of sin), he is a mine of the antidote (to snake-poison) and was unhurt.

You, who do not possess an atom of the antidote, why are you deluded by your (hope of) deliverance?

Where, in your case, is trust in God like (the trust of) Khalíl (Abraham), and whence will you get the (Divine) grace like (that bestowed upon) Kalím (Moses),

So that your knife should not cut (the throat of) Ismá‘íl (Ishmael) and that you should make the depths of the Nile a (dry) highway?

If a blessed one fell from the minaret (and) was saved by the wind filling his raiment,

Why have you, O good man, committed yourself to the wind when you are not sure of that (same) fortune?

From this minaret hundreds of thousands (of peoples) like ‘Ád fell down and gave to the wind (lost) their lives and souls.

Behold those who have fallen headlong from this minaret, hundreds of thousands on thousands!

(If) you have no sure skill in rope-dancing, give thanks for your feet and walk on the ground.

Don't make wings of paper and fly from the (top of a) mountain, for many a head has gone (to destruction) in this craze.

Although the Súfí was afire with anger, yet he cast his eye on the consequence.

The highest success belongs permanently to him who does not take the bait and sees (the danger of) imprisonment in the trap.

How excellent are two noble end-discerning eyes that preserve the body from corruption!

That (foresight) was (derived) from the vision of the end that was seen by Ahmad (Mohammed), who even here (in the present life) saw Hell, hair by hair,

And saw the Throne (of God) and the Footstool and the Gardens (of Paradise), so that he rent the veil of (our) forgetfulnesses.

If you desire to be safe from harm, close your eye to the beginning and contemplate the end,

That you may regard all (apparent) nonentities as (really) existent and look upon (all) entities, (so far as they are) perceived by the senses, as of low degree.

At least consider this, that every one who possesses reason is daily and nightly in quest of the (relatively) non-existent.

In begging, he seeks a munificence that is not in being; in the shops he seeks a profit that is not in being.

In the cornfields he seeks an income (crop) that is not in being; in the plantations he seeks a date-palm that is not in being.

In the colleges he seeks a knowledge that is not in being; in the Christian monasteries he seeks a morality that is not in being.

They (the intelligent) have thrown the (actually) existent things behind them and are seekers of, and devoted to, the (relatively) non-existent things,

Because the mine and treasury of God's doing is not other than non-existence in (process of) being brought into manifestation.

We have previously given some indication of this (matter): regard this (present discourse) and that (former discourse) as one, not as two.

It was stated (formerly) that every craftsman who appeared (in the world) sought the abode of (relative) non-existence in (exercising) his craft.

The builder sought an unrepaired place that had become ruined and (where) the roofs (were) fallen in.

The water-carrier sought a pot with no water in it, and the carpenter a house with no door.

At the moment of pursuing (their object) they rushed into (relative) nonexistence; then (afterwards) they all are fleeing from non-existence.

Since your hope is (in) non-existence, why (this) avoidance of it? Why (this) strife with what is congenial to your desire?

Since that non-existence is congenial to your desire, why this avoidance of nonentity and non-existence?

O (dear) soul, if you are not inwardly congenial to non-existence, why are you waiting in ambush for non-existence?

You have torn your heart away from all that you own, you have cast the net of your heart into the sea of non-existence.

Wherefore, then, (this) flight from this sea of (heart's) desire that has put hundreds of thousands of prey into your net?

Wherefore have you given the name “death” to (what is really) provision (for the spirit)? Observe the sorcery that has caused the provision (barg) to seem to you death (marg).

The magic of His (God's) doing has bound both your eyes, so that desire for the (worldly) pit has come over your soul.

Through the contrivance of the Creator, in its (your soul's) fancy all the expanse above the pit is (full of) poison and snakes;

Consequently it has made the pit a refuge (for itself), so that (fear of) death has cast it into the pit.

(Having heard) what I have said concerning your misapprehensions, O dear friend, hear also the utterance of ‘Attár on this same (subject).