The Ideas of the Prudent Man
From Rumi’s Masnavi (مثنوی معنوی), Book 3, section 95 of 185: The ideas of the prudent man (تصورات مرد حازم). Below, each of its 6 couplets is given in Persian, followed by R. A. Nicholson’s English translation.
The ideas of the prudent man. تصورات مرد حازم
آنچنانک ناگهان شیری رسید مرد را بربود و در بیشه کشید
’Tis as when a lion has suddenly come up and seized a man and dragged him into the jungle.
او چه اندیشد در آن بردن ببین تو همان اندیش ای استاد دین
At (the moment of) that carrying off, what will he think of? Consider (this), and think of the same thing, O thou who art learned in the (Mohammedan) Religion.
می‌کشد شیر قضا در بیشه‌ها جان ما مشغول کار و پیشه‌ها
The lion, Destiny, is dragging into the jungles (of death) our souls which are preoccupied with (worldly) business and trades.
آنچنانک از فقر می‌ترسند خلق زیر آب شور رفته تا به حلق
That (case) is like (the fact) that the people (of this world) have fear of poverty, plunged (as they are) up to their throats in the briny water.
گر بترسندی از آن فقرآفرین گنجهاشان کشف گشتی در زمین
If they should fear the Creator of poverty, treasures would be opened to them on the earth.
جمله‌شان از خوف غم در عین غم در پی هستی فتاده در عدم
Through fear of affliction they all are in the very essence of affliction: in their quest for (material) existence they have fallen into non-existence.
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by: Reza about (category: Masnavi, Persian Poetry)
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