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رو بر آنها که هم جفت تواند ** عاشقان و تشنهی گفت تواند
- Go to them that are your mates, (them) that are enamoured of your discourse and thirsting for it.
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پاسبان بر خوابناکان بر فزود ** ماهیان را پاسبان حاجت نبود
- One who keeps watch is superior to those who slumber: the (spiritual) fish have no need of one who keeps watch.
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جامه پوشان را نظر بر گازر است ** جان عریان را تجلی زیور است
- Those who wear clothes look to the launderer, (but) the soul of the naked hath (Divine) illumination as its adornment.
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یا ز عریانان به یک سو باز رو ** یا چو ایشان فارغ از تن جامه شو
- Either withdraw (and turn) aside from the naked, or like them become free from body-garments.
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ور نمیتانی که کل عریان شوی ** جامه کم کن تا ره اوسط روی 3525
- And if you cannot become wholly naked, make your garments less, so that you may tread the middle path.
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عذر گفتن فقیر به شیخ
- How the dervish excused himself to the Shaykh.
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پس فقیر آن شیخ را احوال گفت ** عذر را با آن غرامت کرد جفت
- Then the dervish told the Shaykh how the case stood, and coupled excuses with the discharge of that obligation.
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مر سؤال شیخ را داد او جواب ** چون جوابات خضر خوب و صواب
- To the Shaykh's questions he gave answer good and right, like the answers of Khadir—
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آن جوابات سؤالات کلیم ** کش خضر بنمود از رب علیم
- (Namely) those answers to the questions of Moses which Khadir, (inspired) by the all-knowing Lord, set forth to him,
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گشت مشکلهاش حل و افزون زیاد ** از پی هر مشکلش مفتاح داد
- (So that) his difficulties became solved, and he (Khadir) gave to him (Moses) the key to every question (in a way) beyond telling.
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از خضر درویش هم میراث داشت ** در جواب شیخ همت بر گماشت 3530
- The dervish also had (a spiritual) inheritance from Khadir; (hence) he bent his will to answering the Shaykh.
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گفت راه اوسط ار چه حکمت است ** لیک اوسط نیز هم با نسبت است
- He said, “Although the middle path is (the way of) wisdom, yet the middle path too is relative.
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آب جو نسبت به اشتر هست کم ** لیک باشد موش را آن همچو یم
- Relatively to a camel, the water in the stream is little, but to a mouse it is like the ocean.
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هر که را باشد وظیفه چار نان ** دو خورد یا سه خورد هست اوسط آن
- If any one has an allowance of four loaves and eats two or three, that is the mean;
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ور خورد هر چار دور از اوسط است ** او اسیر حرص مانند بط است
- But if he eat all the four, it is far from the mean: he is in bondage to greed, like a duck.
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هر که او را اشتها ده نان بود ** شش خورد میدان که اوسط آن بود 3535
- If one has appetite for ten loaves and eats six, know that that is the mean.
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چون مرا پنجاه نان هست اشتهی ** مر ترا شش گرده هم دستیم نی
- When I have appetite for fifty loaves, and you for (no more than) six scones, we are not equivalent.
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تو به ده رکعت نماز آیی ملول ** من به پانصد در نیایم در نحول
- You may be tired by ten rak‘as (of prayer), I may not be worn thin by five hundred.
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آن یکی تا کعبه حافی میرود ** و آن یکی تا مسجد از خود میشود
- One goes bare-foot (all the way) to the Ka‘ba, and one becomes beside himself (with exhaustion in going) as far as the mosque.
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آن یکی در پاکبازی جان بداد ** وین یکی جان کند تا یک نان بداد
- One in utter self-devotion gives his life, one is agonised at giving a single loaf.
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این وسط در با نهایت میرود ** که مرا آن را اول و آخر بود 3540
- This mean belongs to (the realm of) the finite, for that (finite) has a beginning and end.
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اول و آخر بباید تا در آن ** در تصور گنجد اوسط یا میان
- A beginning and end are necessary in order that the mean or middle (point) between them may be conceived in imagination.
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بینهایت چون ندارد دو طرف ** کی بود او را میانه منصرف
- Inasmuch as the infinite has not (these) two limits, how should the mean be applicable to it?
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اول و آخر نشانش کس نداد ** گفت لو کان له البحر مداد
- No one has shown it to have beginning or end. He (God) said, ‘If the sea were to become ink for it (the Word of God)…’
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هفت دریا گر شود کلی مداد ** نیست مر پایان شدن را هیچ امید
- If the Seven Seas should become entirely ink, (still) there is no hope of coming to an end.
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باغ و بیشه گر بود یک سر قلم ** زین سخن هرگز نگردد هیچ کم 3545
- If orchards and forests should become pens altogether, there would never be any decrease in this Word.