هر پری بر عرض دریا کی پرد ** تا لدن علم لدنی می‌برد1125
How should every wing fly across the breadth of the Sea? (Only) the esoteric knowledge will bear (thee) to the Presence (of God).
پس چرا علمی بیاموزی به مرد ** کش بباید سینه را زان پاک کرد
Why, then, should you teach a man the knowledge of which it behoves him to purify his breast?
پس مجو پیشی ازین سر لنگ باش ** وقت وا گشتن تو پیش آهنگ باش
Therefore do not seek to be in front: be lame on this side, and be the leader at the moment of return.
آخرون السابقون باش ای ظریف ** بر شجر سابق بود میوه‌ی طریف
O clever one, be thou (according to the Prophet's saying, “We are) the hindmost and the foremost”: the fresh fruit is prior to the tree.
گرچه میوه آخر آید در وجود ** اولست او زانک او مقصود بود
Although the fruit comes last into being, it is the first, because it was the object.
چون ملایک گوی لا علم لنا ** تا بگیرد دست تو علمتنا1130
Say, like the angels, “We have no knowledge,” to the end that “Thou hast taught us” may take thy hand (come to thy aid).
گر درین مکتب ندانی تو هجا ** همچو احمد پری از نور حجی
If in this school thou dost not know the alphabet, (yet) thou art filled, like Ahmad (Mohammed), with the light of Reason.
گر نباشی نامدار اندر بلاد ** گم نه‌ای الله اعلم بالعباد
If thou art not famous in the world, (yet) thou art not lost: God knoweth best concerning His servants.
اندر آن ویران که آن معروف نیست ** از برای حفظ گنجینه‌ی زریست
A treasure of gold is (hidden), for safety's sake, in a desolate spot that is not well-known.
موضع معروف کی بنهند گنج ** زین قبل آمد فرج در زیر رنج
How should they deposit the treasure in a well-known place? On this account it is said, “Joy is (hidden) beneath sorrow.”
خاطر آرد بس شکال اینجا ولیک ** بسکلد اشکال را استور نیک1135
Here the mind may bring (suggest) many difficulties, but a good beast will break the tether.
هست عشقش آتشی اشکال‌سوز ** هر خیالی را بروبد نور روز
His (God's) love is a fire that consumes difficulties: the daylight sweeps away every phantom.
هم از آن سو جو جواب ای مرتضا ** کین سال آمد از آن سو مر ترا
O thou with whom He is pleased, seek the answer from the same quarter from which this question came to thee.
گوشه‌ی بی گوشه‌ی دل شه‌رهیست ** تاب لا شرقی و لا غرب از مهیست
The cornerless corner of the heart is a King's highway: the radiance that is neither of the east nor of the west is (derived) from a Moon.
تو ازین سو و از آن سو چون گدا ** ای که معنی چه می‌جویی صدا
Why on this side and on that, like a beggar, O mountain of Reality, art thou seeking the echo?
هم از آن سو جو که وقت درد تو ** می‌شوی در ذکر یا ربی دوتو1140
Seek (the answer) from the same quarter to which, in the hour of pain, thou bendest low, crying repeatedly, “O my Lord!”
وقت درد و مرگ آن سو می‌نمی ** چونک دردت رفت چونی اعجمی
In the hour of pain and death thou turnest in that direction: how, when thy pain is gone, art thou ignorant?
وقت محنت گشته‌ای الله گو ** چونک محنت رفت گویی راه کو
At the time of tribulation thou hast called unto God, (but) when the tribulation is gone, thou sayest, “Where is the way?”
این از آن آمد که حق را بی گمان ** هر که بشناسد بود دایم بر آن
This is because (thou dost not know God): every one that knows God without uncertainty is constantly engaged in that (commemoration of Him),
وانک در عقل و گمان هستش حجاب ** گاه پوشیدست و گه بدریده جیب
While he that is veiled in intellect and uncertainty is sometimes covered (inaccessible to spiritual emotion) and sometimes with his collar torn (in a state of rapture).
The particular (discursive) intellect is sometimes dominant, sometimes overthrown; the Universal Intellect is secure from the mischances of Time.
عقل بفروش و هنر حیرت بخر ** رو به خواری نه بخارا ای پسر
Sell intellect and talent and buy bewilderment (in God): betake thyself to lowliness, O son, not to Bukhárá!
ما چه خود را در سخن آغشته‌ایم ** کز حکایت ما حکایت گشته‌ایم
Why have I steeped myself in the discourse, so that from story-telling I have become a story?
من عدم و افسانه گردم در حنین ** تا تقلب یابم اندر ساجدین
I become naught and (unsubstantial as) a fable in making moan (to God), in order that I may gain influence over (the hearts of) them that prostrate themselves in prayer.
این حکایت نیست پیش مرد کار ** وصف حالست و حضور یار غار
This (story of Moses and Pharaoh) is not a story in the eyes of the man of experience: it is a description of an actual (spiritual) state, and it is (equivalent to) the presence of the Friend of the Cave.