Baháʼu'lláh's Mathnaví

[Ahanu]

A recent provisional translation of Baháʼu'lláh's Mathnaví uses the powerful image of two "Springs" to contrast the material and spiritual realms. The lines, "Our Beloved! — When She flings away the niqáb, / This Spring will get all fired up — without the hijáb!" resonate strongly with current struggles for freedom and self-expression, especially in the context of the Women, Life, Freedom movement in Iran. Here are lines 39-55:

O Beloved! — From Your Face, The Spring has come!
And, from This Spring, unnumbered Truths have come!
Every flower of Him — a book of His Story!
Every heart of Him — a fount of His Glory!
This Spring won’t be followed by fall, ever!
All its flowers will circle Him forever!
This kind of spring the soul can’t understand.
This kind of spring harrows the soul of man.
Those springs bring the strong desire for lovely mates,
and These Springs bring The Love of God that He creates.
Those springs end, because of their mortality,
and These Springs have the title: “Eternity”.
That Spring rises in the world from seasons taking place,
and This Spring from the Light of His Heart-Capturing Face!
That Spring brings lots of tulips coming out,
and This Spring has a lot of groaning now!
This Eternal Spring from The King’s Great Light
has raised His Tent to Heaven’s Greatest Height!
All the world’s people have entered His Tent!
(If you have eyes to see, behold This Event!)
Our King! — When He flings the veil away from His Face,
This Spring will pitch His Tent up over the stars in space!
Our Beloved! — When She flings away the niqáb,
This Spring will get all fired up — without the hijáb!
We will be within This Spring, then, looking at her face.
We will not be in a garden, searching for her face.
We will, in His Praise, be free from any other one.
We will, in this world, become enlightened from His Sun.
If a Breeze from This Beautiful Spring comes to you,
hundreds of Josephs you will see come into view.
If a Breeze wafts to you from This Fragrance-Garden,
you’ll see the spiritual Josephs in the world then —
you’ll see their bodies become like spirits, and these
will achieve — each moment — manifold victories!

 

[Ahanu]

The translator notes that, although a previous English translation has been done before, he wanted to create a translation that rhymed like Baháʼu'lláh's original work: "In Spring of 2017, I noticed that Frank Lewis’s provisional translation of The Blessed Mathnaví on bahai-library.com was unrhymed. Knowing how musical and lyrical the Persian language is, I wanted to see if this poem could be rendered in English in rhyming couplets, like the original." We can see his attempt to render rhyming couplets in the passages cited in this thread.

Baháʼu'lláh emphasizes the importance of wisdom and gentleness in sharing spiritual truths in lines 92-96:

From The Garden of Truth, open a gate!
For God’s sake, don’t make a wall of this gate! —
so I’ll come and explain, with evidence,
the Mystery of Your Benevolence!
He said: “O God! O God! — No, O Good Man!
Don’t explain this to the ignorant man!
God, no! — O Tongue of God’s Mystery! — Be wise.
Softly, nicely talk — and so, form loving ties,
for, if You take them gently by the hand,
they won’t fear 'this and that', do understand."

Baháʼu'lláh guides us to patiently guide people ("taking them gently by the hand") so they don't become fearful or resistant due to comparisons and contrasts ("this and that").

 

[Ahanu]

133** When you dwell in the shadow of The King of the Soul,
you’ll uproot your heart from the world’s pomp and show

Here we are presented with two paths: "the shadow of the King of the Soul" and "the world's pomp and show." The former is the path of spiritual wisdom and guidance, and the latter is the path of worldly pursuit and attachment to superficial things.

The author's notes read:

"Dwelling 'in the shadow of The King of the Soul' implies living under the influence and rule of The Messenger of God, i.e., adhering and 'sticking to,' or following, His Wise Counsel, i.e., residing in His Domain, under His Laws. See Lines 131, 91, 110, 192, 193, and 270 and footnotes."

"Regarding 'the world’s pomp and show,' it is worth remembering, here, the story of Bahá’u’lláh seeing a puppet show when He was a child. It was a show about war and intrigues in the court of a king, and the lavish lifestyle of the privileged and the powerful. It depicted their pomp and glory, and feasting and finery, as well as their jealousy and scheming and vying for the top positions in the king’s court, in order to prop up the appearance of their grandiosity. After the performance, Bahá’u’lláh saw the puppet master leaving the tent, carrying a box, and asked the man what was in the box. The man answered, in essence: 'These elaborate action figures and devices — the king, the princes, and the ministers, and the pomp and glory, the might and power — everything you saw — is all now contained within this box.' Years later, Bahá’u’lláh wrote about this event: 'Ever since that day, all the trappings of the world have seemed in the eyes of this Youth akin to that same spectacle. They have never been, nor will they ever be, of any weight and consequence, be it to the extent of a grain of mustard seed… Erelong these outward trappings, these visible treasures, these earthly vanities, these arrayed armies, these adorned vestures, these proud and overweening souls, all shall pass into the confines of the grave, as though into that box. In the eyes of those possessed of insight, all this conflict, contention and vainglory hath ever been, and will ever be, like unto the play and pastimes of children.'”

This story is also recounted here.