How should there be compulsion when you are trailing your skirt (sweeping along) into sin with such complacence?
چون بود اکراه با چندان خوشی ** که تو در عصیان همی دامن کشی
Does any one under compulsion walk so complacently? Does any one, having lost his way’, go dancing (gleefully) like that?
آن‌چنان خوش کس رود در مکرهی ** کس چنان رقصان دود در گم‌رهی
You were fighting like twenty men (to prevail) in the matter concerning which those others were giving you good advice.
بیست مرده جنگ می‌کردی در آن ** کت همی‌دادند پند آن دیگران
You said, “This is right and this is the only (approved) way: how should any one but a nobody (worthless person) rail at me?”
که صواب اینست و راه اینست و بس ** کی زند طعنه مرا جز هیچ‌کس
How should one who is compelled speak thus? How should one who has lost his way wrangle like this?1400
کی چنین گوید کسی کو مکر هست ** چون چنین جنگد کسی کو بی‌رهست
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).
هر چه نفست خواست داری اختیار ** هر چه عقلت خواست آری اضطرار
He that is blessed and familiar (with spiritual mysteries) knows that intelligence is of Iblís, while love is of Adam.
داند او کو نیک‌بخت و محرمست ** زیرکی ز ابلیس و عشق از آدمست
Intelligence is (like) swimming in the seas: he (the swimmer) is not saved: he is drowned at the end of the business.
زیرکی سباحی آمد در بحار ** کم رهد غرقست او پایان کار
Leave off swimming, let pride and enmity go: this is not a Jayhun (Oxus) or a (lesser) river, it is an ocean;
هل سباحت را رها کن کبر و کین ** نیست جیحون نیست جو دریاست این
And, moreover, (it is) the deep Ocean without refuge: it sweeps away the seven seas like straw.1405
وانگهان دریای ژرف بی‌پناه ** در رباید هفت دریا را چو کاه
Love is as a ship for the elect: seldom is calamity (the result); for the most part it is deliverance.
عشق چون کشتی بود بهر خواص ** کم بود آفت بود اغلب خلاص
Sell intelligence and buy bewilderment: intelligence is opinion, while bewilderment is (immediate) vision.
زیرکی بفروش و حیرانی بخر ** زیرکی ظنست و حیرانی نظر
Sacrifice your understanding in the presence of Mustafá (Mohammed) say, “hasbiya ‘lláh, for God sufficeth me.”
عقل قربان کن به پیش مصطفی ** حسبی الله گو که الله‌ام کفی
Do not draw back your head from the ship (ark), like Kan‘án (Canaan), whom his intelligent soul deluded,
هم‌چو کنعان سر ز کشتی وا مکش ** که غرورش داد نفس زیرکش
Saying, “I will go up to the top of the lofty mountain: why must I bear gratitude (be under an obligation) to Noah?”1410
که برآیم بر سر کوه مشید ** منت نوحم چرا باید کشید
How should you recoil from being grateful to him, O unrighteous one, when even God bears gratitude to him?
چون رمى از منتش اى بىرشد ** كه خدا هم منت او مىكشد
How should gratitude to him not be (as an obligation) on our souls, when God gives him words of thankful praise and gratitude?
چون رمی از منتش بر جان ما ** چونک شکر و منتش گوید خدا
What do you know (about his exalted state), O sack full of envy? Even God bears gratitude to him.
تو چه دانی ای غراره‌ی پر حسد ** منت او را خدا هم می‌کشد
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!
کاشکی او آشنا ناموختی ** تا طمع در نوح و کشتی دوختی
Would that, like a child, he had been ignorant of devices, so that, like children, he might have clung to his mother,1415
کاش چون طفل از حیل جاهل بدی ** تا چو طفلان چنگ در مادر زدی
Or that he had not been filled with traditional knowledge, (but) had carried away from a saint the knowledge divinely revealed to the heart!
یا به علم نقل کم بودی ملی ** علم وحی دل ربودی از ولی
When you bring forward a book (in rivalry) with such a light (of inspiration), your soul, that resembles inspiration (in its nature), reproaches (you).
با چنین نوری چو پیش آری کتاب ** جان وحی آسای تو آرد عتاب
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).
چون تیمم با وجود آب دان ** علم نقلی با دم قطب زمان
Make yourself foolish (simple) and follow behind (him): only by means of this foolishness will you gain deliverance.
خویش ابله کن تبع می‌رو سپس ** رستگی زین ابلهی یابی و بس
On this account, O father, the Sultan of mankind (Mohammed hath said, “Most of the people of Paradise are the foolish.”1420
اکثر اهل الجنه البله ای پسر ** بهر این گفتست سلطان البشر