چون بود اکراه با چندان خوشی ** که تو در عصیان همی دامن کشی
How should there be compulsion when you are trailing your skirt (sweeping along) into sin with such complacence?
آن‌چنان خوش کس رود در مکرهی ** کس چنان رقصان دود در گم‌رهی
Does any one under compulsion walk so complacently? Does any one, having lost his way’, go dancing (gleefully) like that?
بیست مرده جنگ می‌کردی در آن ** کت همی‌دادند پند آن دیگران
You were fighting like twenty men (to prevail) in the matter concerning which those others were giving you good advice.
که صواب اینست و راه اینست و بس ** کی زند طعنه مرا جز هیچ‌کس
You said, “This is right and this is the only (approved) way: how should any one but a nobody (worthless person) rail at me?”
کی چنین گوید کسی کو مکر هست ** چون چنین جنگد کسی کو بی‌رهست1400
How should one who is compelled speak thus? How should one who has lost his way wrangle like this?
هر چه نفست خواست داری اختیار ** هر چه عقلت خواست آری اضطرار
Whatever your fleshly soul desires, you have free-will (in regard to that); whatever your reason desires, you plead necessity (as an excuse for rejecting it).
داند او کو نیک‌بخت و محرمست ** زیرکی ز ابلیس و عشق از آدمست
He that is blessed and familiar (with spiritual mysteries) knows that intelligence is of Iblís, while love is of Adam.
زیرکی سباحی آمد در بحار ** کم رهد غرقست او پایان کار
Intelligence is (like) swimming in the seas: he (the swimmer) is not saved: he is drowned at the end of the business.
هل سباحت را رها کن کبر و کین ** نیست جیحون نیست جو دریاست این
Leave off swimming, let pride and enmity go: this is not a Jayhun (Oxus) or a (lesser) river, it is an ocean;
وانگهان دریای ژرف بی‌پناه ** در رباید هفت دریا را چو کاه1405
And, moreover, (it is) the deep Ocean without refuge: it sweeps away the seven seas like straw.
عشق چون کشتی بود بهر خواص ** کم بود آفت بود اغلب خلاص
Love is as a ship for the elect: seldom is calamity (the result); for the most part it is deliverance.
زیرکی بفروش و حیرانی بخر ** زیرکی ظنست و حیرانی نظر
Sell intelligence and buy bewilderment: intelligence is opinion, while bewilderment is (immediate) vision.
عقل قربان کن به پیش مصطفی ** حسبی الله گو که الله‌ام کفی
Sacrifice your understanding in the presence of Mustafá (Mohammed) say, “hasbiya ‘lláh, for God sufficeth me.”
هم‌چو کنعان سر ز کشتی وا مکش ** که غرورش داد نفس زیرکش
Do not draw back your head from the ship (ark), like Kan‘án (Canaan), whom his intelligent soul deluded,
که برآیم بر سر کوه مشید ** منت نوحم چرا باید کشید1410
Saying, “I will go up to the top of the lofty mountain: why must I bear gratitude (be under an obligation) to Noah?”
چون رمى از منتش اى بىرشد ** كه خدا هم منت او مىكشد
How should you recoil from being grateful to him, O unrighteous one, when even God bears gratitude to him?
چون رمی از منتش بر جان ما ** چونک شکر و منتش گوید خدا
How should gratitude to him not be (as an obligation) on our souls, when God gives him words of thankful praise and gratitude?
تو چه دانی ای غراره‌ی پر حسد ** منت او را خدا هم می‌کشد
What do you know (about his exalted state), O sack full of envy? Even God bears gratitude to him.
کاشکی او آشنا ناموختی ** تا طمع در نوح و کشتی دوختی
Would that he (one like Kan‘án) had not learned to swim, so that he might have fixed his hope on Noah and the ark!
کاش چون طفل از حیل جاهل بدی ** تا چو طفلان چنگ در مادر زدی1415
Would that, like a child, he had been ignorant of devices, so that, like children, he might have clung to his mother,
یا به علم نقل کم بودی ملی ** علم وحی دل ربودی از ولی
Or that he had not been filled with traditional knowledge, (but) had carried away from a saint the knowledge divinely revealed to the heart!
با چنین نوری چو پیش آری کتاب ** جان وحی آسای تو آرد عتاب
When you bring forward a book (in rivalry) with such a light (of inspiration), your soul, that resembles inspiration (in its nature), reproaches (you).
چون تیمم با وجود آب دان ** علم نقلی با دم قطب زمان
Know that beside the breath (words) of the Qutb of the time traditional knowledge is like performing the ritual ablution with sand when there is water (available).
خویش ابله کن تبع می‌رو سپس ** رستگی زین ابلهی یابی و بس
Make yourself foolish (simple) and follow behind (him): only by means of this foolishness will you gain deliverance.
اکثر اهل الجنه البله ای پسر ** بهر این گفتست سلطان البشر1420
On this account, O father, the Sultan of mankind (Mohammed hath said, “Most of the people of Paradise are the foolish.”