راست گوی ای نفس کین حیلت‌گریست ** ورنه نفس شهوت از طاعت بریست
Tell the truth, O my soul! This is trickery. Else (why wouldst thou fight)?—the lustful soul is quit of obedience (to the Divine command).
گر نگویی راست حمله آرمت ** در ریاضت سخت‌تر افشارمت
Unless thou tell the truth, I will attack thee, I will squeeze (torment) thee more painfully (than before) in maceration.’
نفس بانگ آورد آن دم از درون ** با فصاحت بی‌دهان اندر فسون
Thereupon my soul, mutely eloquent, cried out in guile from within me,
که مرا هر روز اینجا می‌کشی ** جان من چون جان گبران می‌کشی
‘Here thou art killing me daily, thou art putting my (vital) spirit (on the rack), like the spirits of infidels.
هیچ کس را نیست از حالم خبر ** که مرا تو می‌کشی بی‌خواب و خور 3795
No one is aware of my plight—how thou art killing me (by keeping me) without sleep and food.
در غزا بجهم به یک زخم از بدن ** خلق بیند مردی و ایثار من
In war I should escape from the body at one stroke, and the people would see my manly valour and self-sacrifice.’
گفتم ای نفسک منافق زیستی ** هم منافق می‌مری تو چیستی
I replied, ‘O wretched soul, a hypocrite thou hast lived and a hypocrite thou wilt die: what (a pitiful thing) art thou!
در دو عالم تو مرایی بوده‌ای ** در دو عالم تو چنین بیهوده‌ای
In both worlds thou hast been a hypocrite, in both worlds thou art such a worthless creature.’
نذر کردم که ز خلوت هیچ من ** سر برون نارم چو زنده‌ست این بدن
I vowed that I would never put my head outside of (come out of) seclusion, seeing that this body is alive,
زانک در خلوت هر آنچ تن کند ** نه از برای روی مرد و زن کند 3800
Because everything that this body does in seclusion it does with no regard to man or woman.
جنبش و آرامش اندر خلوتش ** جز برای حق نباشد نیتش
During seclusion the intention of (all) its movement and rest is for God's sake only.”
این جهاد اکبرست آن اصغرست ** هر دو کار رستمست و حیدرست
This is the Greater Warfare, and that (other) is the Lesser Warfare: both are (fit) work for (men like) Rustam and Haydar (‘Alí).
کار آن کس نیست کو را عقل و هوش ** پرد از تن چون بجنبد دنب موش
They are not (fit) work for one whose reason and wits fly out of his body when a mouse's tail moves.
آن چنان کس را بباید چون زنان ** دور بودن از مصاف و از سنان
Such a one must stay, like women, far off from the battle-field and the spears.
صوفیی آن صوفیی این اینت حیف ** آن ز سوزن کشته این را طعمه سیف 3805
That one a Súfí and this one (too) a Súfí! Here's a pity! That one is killed by a needle, while the sword is this one's food.
نقش صوفی باشد او را نیست جان ** صوفیان بدنام هم زین صوفیان
He (the false Súfí) is (only) the figure of a Súfí: he has no soul (life); accordingly, the (true) Súfís get a bad name from Súfís such as these.
بر در و دیوار جسم گل‌سرشت ** حق ز غیرت نقش صد صوفی نبشت
Upon the door and wall of the body moulded of clay God, in His jealousy, traced the figures of a hundred Súfís (of this sort),
تا ز سحر آن نقشها جنبان شود ** تا عصای موسوی پنهان شود
To the end that by means of magic those figures should move and that Moses' rod should be hidden.
نقشها را میخورد صدق عصا ** چشم فرعونیست پر گرد و حصا
The truth of the rod swallows up the figures, (but) the Pharaoh-like eye is filled with dust and gravel (and cannot see).
صوفی دیگر میان صف حرب ** اندر آمد بیست بار از بهر ضرب 3810
Another Súfí entered the battle-line twenty times for the purpose of fighting
با مسلمانان به کافر وقت کر ** وانگشت او با مسلمانان به فر
Along with the Moslems when they attacked the infidels; he did not fall back with the Moslems in their retreat.
زخم خورد و بست زخمی را که خورد ** بار دیگر حمله آورد و نبرد
He was wounded, but he bandaged the wound which he had received, and once more advanced to the charge and combat,
تا نمیرد تن به یک زخم از گزاف ** تا خورد او بیست زخم اندر مصاف
In order that his body might not die cheaply at one blow and that he might receive twenty blows in the battle.
حیفش آمد که به زخمی جان دهد ** جان ز دست صدق او آسان رهد
To him it was anguish that he should give up his soul at one blow and that his soul should escape lightly from the hand of his fortitude.
حکایت آن مجاهد کی از همیان سیم هر روز یک درم در خندق انداختی به تفاریق از بهر ستیزه‌ی حرص و آرزوی نفس و وسوسه‌ی نفس کی چون می‌اندازی به خندق باری به یک‌بار بینداز تا خلاص یابم کی الیاس احدی الراحتین او گفته کی این راحت نیز ندهم
Story of the (spiritual) warrior who every day used to take one dirhem separately from a purse containing (pieces of) silver and throw it into a ditch (full of water) for the purpose of thwarting the greed and cupidity of his fleshly soul; and how his soul tempted him, saying, “Since you are going to throw (this money) into the ditch, at least throw it away all at once, so that I may gain deliverance, for despair is one of the two (possible) reliefs”; and how he replied, “I will not give thee this relief either.”
آن یکی بودش به کف در چل درم ** هر شب افکندی یکی در آب یم 3815
A certain man had forty dirhems in his hand: every night he would throw one (of them) into the sea-water,