This request for creation has been reviewed. The reviewer comments appear below the article text.
If you want to make changes and try again, copy and paste your article into a new submission and make your changes there.
By: Marcellus Martyr
August 21, 2007
History or the Quatrain
A Rubaiyat is a collection of quatrains or four-line stanzas. It is the plural form of the Arabic Rubaiyah.
For most people, the word sound “Rubaiyat” is immediately associated with the name Omar Khayyam - (1050’s? – 1123) and tangentially or concomitantly with Edward Fitzgerald (1809 – 1883); but the poetic form predates both men.
Initially, Persian and Hindu quatrains were free of metre, but with the distinguishing feature that each line began and ended with a spondee – two consecutively stressed syllables.
The practice of expressing tender feelings, mystic experiences and philosophical ideas in a quatrain is as old as the Vedas. A series of such connected quatrains was called a Sukta
In Sanskrit, a collection of a hundred quatrains is called a Shataka. The most famous poet of that form was Bhartrihari . He wrote three shatakas: The Niti which deals with love-making, the Vairagya which addresses the philosophy of withdrawal from the world, and the Sringarm which deals primarily with ethics and ethical behaviour.
The Shatakas of Bhartrihari are famous examples of early rubaiyaats. Bhartrihari lived about 450 to 510 A.D His verses were as entertaining as they were reflective and philosophical. Bhartrihari was a grammarian and was able to exploit his facility with the language to good advantage spiced with pleasantly mocking humour.
The Arabic verse, the “bait” or "tent ", which primarily consisted of two parts like the flaps of a tent also employed the quatrains format.
'Al Murtuda, one of the most famous and early poet-saints of Islam expresses an aspect of his thought thus:
I'm born of Soul, in Culture chose a name, What -matters Mart or Mecca whence I came; For he is brave who says: "Lo! Here I am." Not he who prates about his father's fame!
My heart embraces all creation great and small, 'Tis pasture for the deer and Mystic Temple Hall; I chose the path of Love, and where my glances fall, Men welcome this creed and follow at my call!
About one hundred years before Omar Khayyam, a rhymed feature was introduced into what was then called Tarana (Songs.)
At first all four lines rhymed – Do Baiti; subsequently, around 1182 in the time of Rashid ud Din Watwat, the rhyme of the third line was dropped and called a Khasi (castrated.) From then it was called a Ruba i.
Khayyam’s Rubaiyat
Only about 25% of Omar’s collection is written in quatrains of four rhymes. The point is controversial. Some hold that succeeding schools not only contributed to Khayyam’s collection but also changed the rhyming sequence as was done to other poets before him.
Khayyam’s original manuscript is said to have been about 750 quatrains. These reflected his experiences, philosophic thought, moods and perceptions. The Rubaiyat is a most suitable form for doing this. It is something like the Japanese haiku. These Omeric quatrains were therefore not meant for publication. They were more or less spontaneous outpourings that emerged from the passion of the moment.
THE BIOGRAPHICAL RUBAIYAT
Khayyam’s life and the numerous stories told of him make fascinating reading, but are not all pertinent here to his Rubaiyat; and yet the Rubaiyat emerges out of his biography.
His father died when he Khayyam was about 16. He now had to secure a patron. He wrote a treatise on Algebra and came to the attention of one who, through introductions landed him a place in the observatory of Isphan. Omar also wrote on physics and astronomy, and was considered in his time, second only to the great Avicenna.
His duties as royal physician together with his other interests kept him so isolated that he had very few disciples in spite of his popularity and scholarly recognition.
His, poetical love began to emerge at around the age of thirty.
My evil fame has soared above the skies My joyless life above its thirty flies But if I could I’d drink a hundred toasts For life so safe and free from wedlock’s ties.
Political shifts brought about Omar’s fall from grace. The queen of the new power had no particular fondness for this unmarried, celibate Omar Khayyam. He records the circumstance as follows:
Unripes! Alas can taste the ripest fruit To rule the realm now comes the raw recruit The Turkish lady’s glance, a sport of hearts Is won by lackeys, slaves who follow suit.
And when even his friends deserted him he resorted to his rubaiyah. As is the case with many serious mystics, he gradually turned away from the world.
Friendship, the book proscribed, we should not hold, Affection Valour, Friend are myths of old; ‘Tis meet to keep aloof from the entire world, Adieu from far Miss Pearl and Mister Gold.
Eventually, Omar gave up writing completely:
I see this world and all her wild affairs; And find all creatures full of useless cares; Alas! thro' ev'ry door I try to peep I find dejection, waits for me, and stares.
Looking back on his life he wrote:
A swan I was, I flew from regions deep, I sought to soar to summits with a sweep; But found no mate who could my secrets keep, So, through the door I entered, out I leap.
And so Khayyam becomes reclusive. He did as was advised in the antinomian philosophy of Bhatrihare’s Vairagya.
Seclusion is the only friend I find, To good or bad of folk my eyes are blind; First I must see how I shall fare at last, Then think of others, if I'm so inclined.
That Khayyam was a mystic and did have a transforming mystical experience is well established in several verses
I traverse through the world to even seven spheres, I reach the Plane Supreme thus when my heart expands. I fast from acts unchaste, refrain from evil thought And end my fast in peace on purest holy fare. Many are lost in World, some few are saved by Faith, Who in the "Path are guided by ever helping Grace. So by this Royal Road I march to reach my Goal, I pass over this Bridge through Darkest Wilderness.
But, following the mystic rule of “Those who know don’t say,” he kept it a secret.
I never advertise the truths in veil, In spinning longest yarns my flax may fail; I live in planes where words are never found, His sacred trust I never could retail.
He accurately predicted and described the place where he would be buried: a quiet place where roses drop their petals. Fitzgerald’s grave is also adorned by roses taken from Khayyam’s grave in Naishapur.
Fitzgerald’s Rubaiyat
Fitzgerald worked from a collection of 158 quatrains found in the Cowell collection in London. This collection, written in purple ink on yellow paper and powdered with gold, was written about 1460 -1461 nearly 338 years after Khayyam’s death. From these Fitzgerald selected and wrote 75 quatrains for the first edition of his Rubaiyat.
Only about half of them reflect a paraphrase of the original.
Fitzgerald borrowed ideas from other Sufi sources, primarily Hafiz from whom he plundered fine turns of phrases and from Attar’s The Discourse of the Birds which he partially put into rhyming couplets.
His liberties with and lack of fidelity to the original was a source of annoyance to academically respectable Sufis. Idries Shah (1924 – 1996) for instance has this to say of Fitzgerald:
“Fitzgerald was guilty of far more however than poor thinking capacity. His interpolation of anti-Sufi propaganda into his rendering of Khayyam cannot be excused even by his most ardent supporters. As a result, they tend to ignore this amazing dishonesty and shout about other subjects instead.” [The Way of the Sufi p 64]
Certain it is that Fitzgerald was creative, but the charge of outright dishonest, somewhat fables the facts. Fitzgerald forthrightly acknowledged his project. In a letter to Cowell he writes:
“My translation will interest you from its form, and also in many respect in its detail, very unliteral as it is. My quatrains are mashed together, and something lost, I doubt, of Omar’s simplicity, which is such a virtue in him.” The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam by G.F Maine
Examples of Fitzgerald’s Project
In a philosophic exchange with Abu Sa'id Abil Khair, Khayyam sent him this quatrain:
As Keeper mixed our natures, all the same Why call this bad and that as worse by name? If good the mixture, why the pot would’st break? If bad the form, on whom ye lay the blame?
Fitzgerald extrapolates, and extends this idea of Potter and clay in four quatrains in which a dialogue of pots takes place in the Potter’s shop. The last two stanzas of which were as follows:
Another said – “Why, n’eer but a peevish boy Would break the bowl from which he drank in joy; Shall He that made the vessel in pure Love And Fancy, in an after Rage destroy?
None answered this; but after silence spake A Vessel of a more ungainly Make: “They sneer at me for being all awry; What! Did the hand then of the Potter shake?”
What Fitzgerald did and did admirably, was to give a unity to his representation of the Rubaiyat by selecting a theme from what was originally alphabetically recorded. Often, as in the above, he captures and plays creatively with an idea.
There is a story that Khayyam’s face was blackened because of some offense against God. He beseeched and was granted forgiveness. Khayyam recorded:
Is there a sinless man on earth below? And how can we live here and sinless go? I sin and fail, but can Thy kindness fail? I'm evil… could Thy Grace be even so?
Fitzgerald represented this in two consecutive verses.
Oh, Thou who Man of baser Earth didst make, And who with Eden didst devise the Snake; For all the Sin wherewith the Face of Man Is balcken’d, Man’s Forgiveness give – and take!
Oh Thou who dids’t with pitfall and with gin Beset the road I was to wander in. Thou wilt not with Predestination round Enmesh me and impute my fall in sin?
KHAYAAM’S PHILOSOPHY
Vital to an appreciation of Khayyam’s Rubaiyat is his philosophy. He held as tenet that the seekers after God fall into four groups:
1) The traditionalists (Mutakallams) who are content with dogma and remain quite satisfied with the reasons given by their various disciplines. 2) The Philosophers (Hakims) who seek God in reasons and arguments, but not in dogmas. They all fail to achieve their goals 3)Those who seek God through the path of finding the correct or authoritative sources of information (Ta’lmis) and 4)The Sufi. They seek god “not through meditation and contemplation, but through the purification of the heart and cleansing the faculty of perception from its natural impurities and engrossment with the body” Thus purified, the soul is best able to reflect the Divine effulgence. ( The Nectar of Grace )
Khayaam felt that the way of the Sufi was the superior path and advocated it. God, he said did not withhold anything from his children. The light of God was already in the individual. All that was necessary was for the veil to be removed.
Khayyam was not constrained only to the ruba - i A poet by nature, his philosophical thought was often expressed in other genres: rhyming dialogue is one such form.
Qita of 'Omar Khayyam on World and Life.
A talk I had with Wisdom once, and learnt some dainty metaphors. I said: “Thou store of all we know: I ask some questions tell, me terse." Ques. What’s it about …life on this world? Ans. A dream or phantom, fancy - worse! Ques. What do we gain or gather here? Ans. A Plague of sores with none to nurse! Ques. How does this nag of lust get tamed? Ans. When curbed by whip and constant spurs! Ques. And what of doctrines argued here? Ans. Some empty jargons they rehearse! Ques. And what’s your take of Tyrants here? Ans. As wolves or hounds Death’s friends of erst. ! Ques. And how are wealthy here engaged? Ans. They’re storing sewage in their purse! Ques. Does wedlock bring them bliss of life? Ans. A week of joy the rest? A curse! Ques. What of this world so fair and fine? Ans. A hag in rouge and trendy furs! Ques. So what is all Omar has asked? Ans. Precepts proper to some cases Sirs!
KHAYAMM’S METAPHYSICS
Omar believed in one Universal Essence which manifested itself as body and spirit. These two are antagonists. Both had ten parts; but whereas the body was severable, the spirit was inseparable.
In the Universal essence, Intellect was dominant. Intellect governed mind, which in turn moves the ether which governs the physical. Mind is the lover and Intellect is the beloved.
There is a descent from highest to lowest in both reason and corporeal from, as well as an ascent from lowest form to man and thence to God constituting a Descending and an Ascending Arch.
Omar believed that God did not mean man to live the life of a recluse. Rather He meant man to live together and work in cooperation guided by law given by enlightened lawgivers. The whole idea of life was to live the life of service to God and endeavor to love God as much as possible.
OPPOSITION TO KHAYAAM
Khayyam’s position on Sufi philosophy and metaphysics were not all palatable to his contemporaries and he was accused of contaminating his Sufism with Greek philosophy.
He turns meekly to his God in verse:
They call me Philsuf; foes will so opine But Lord! Thou knowest truly they malign For since I entered this Thy shrine of Love I know not what I am. But I am Thine
And vitriolically on his contemporaries:
You slander me, in spite of your assaults I call a spade a spade, I see my faults. I admit my faults but think awhile You seem to store your malice in your vaults.
And when he was threatened with being killed, he recorded:
The secrets which my book of love has bred, Cannot be told for fear of loss of head; Since none is fit to learn, or cares to know, 'Tis better all my thoughts remain unsaid.
The Biblical injunction of not “casting pearls before swine” has always been a caution to those who ‘know.’ The denizens of the cave react negatively to sudden light.
It could be seen from the above and what follows, that Khayyam’s quatrains were in response to his experiences.
APPRECIATION OF THE RUBAYAAT
The issue that most perplexes an appreciation of the Rubaiyat is the received ‘Carpe diem’ notion from Fitzgerald’s translation which can be paraphrased thus:
“Forget all mundane cares, and earthly learning. Eat drink and be merry for tomorrow you will be dead.”
Examples are legion and concatenate throughout all five editions of what should properly be called Fitzgerald’s Rubaiyat, and not that of Khayyam’s.
23 “Ah make the most of what we yet may spend Before we to unto the dust descend Dust into dust and under dust to lie Sans Wine, sans Song, sans Singer and - sans End!
24 Alike for those who for Today prepare And those that after a Tomorrow stare, A Muezzin from the Tower of Darkness cries “Fools! Your reward is neither Here nor There!”
25 Why, all the Saints and Sages who discussed Of the Two Worlds so learnedly, are thrust Like foolish Prophets forth; their Words to Scorn Are scatter’d and their Mouths are stopt with Dust
26 Oh, come with old Khayyam and leave the Wise To talk; one thing is certain, that Life flies; One thing is certain and the Rest is Lies; The Flower that once has blown for ever dies.
The controversy that shadows Fitzgerald’s representation or misrepresentation hinges on whether or not he deliberately transmogrified Khayaam for artistic expression or whether he did not fully understand the Sufi symbolism which Khayaam intended.
When Khayaam talks of ‘wine’ he means ‘Divine Love’; the ‘Tavern’ (Khardbdt )is the ‘Mystic Circle’ (Maikhana) ; the ‘cup’ or ‘vessel’ which holds the ‘wine’ is the human ‘heart’; the ‘Potter’ is ‘God’ and the ‘clay’ is the unregenerated human personality; the marketplace (Khardbdt =open assembly )is the noisy pedestrian world that has not as yet turned to God etc. These symbols were not peculiar to Khayyam. They were the common stock of esoteric Sufism. Thus speaking of the ‘tavern,’ Hakim Sanai (1044? – 1150?) who turned down marriage to the Sultan’s sister to follow Sufism writes:
The man who directs me in Tavern way Removes my rusting Grief and Pangs of life. To him who admits me in Mystic Shrine The Lord will open gates of Paradise.
Thus whisper folk: " O fie upon Sanai! Has he no shame to wend in Tavern way?" I will to Tavern ever go because My heart expandeth there and there alone!
The Victorian perception that genius involves a touch of madness may well have influenced Fitzgerald’s appreciation of Khayaam; but when Khayaam talks of ‘madness’ he refers to those who are either “masts” (God-intoxicated – their minds have slowed down) or “God-consumed” – they cannot help remembering God. That understand is too recent to have benefited Fitzgerald. (See “The Wayfarers: Meher Baba with The God Intoxicated” by William Donkin 1969)
Idries Shah justifiably complains that Fitzgerald imagined that
“… because Khayyam was at times talking about widely conflicting points of view, he himself was a victim of some sort of alternation of mind.”
Lawrence Houseman of similar Victorian optic to Fitzgerald, is supportive of his efforts and perception, and characterizes the Rubaiyat as being:
“Too resigned to be poignant, too philosophical to be bitter, about it, it dismisses the dream, and accepts with appetite almost gratitude what is left. That at least seems to be the thesis of the original.”
Whatever criticisms are made of Fitzgerald, both his Rubaiyat, - with it smiling, facile acceptance – and that of Khayyam’s, endure on their own standards as inspiring pieces of literature.
A NEW RUBAIYAT
The silence on rubaiyats that followed Fitzgerald’s first publication of 1859 (fifth edition in 1889) remained unbroken for 145 when in 2004, the little known publication of “Bhauji’s Garden” came out.
“Bhauji’s Garden” is a collection of 179 quatrains. Perhaps more appropriately, it should have been called “The Rubaiyat of Bhau Kalchuri.”
Unlike the Khayyam / Fitzgerald rubaiyat, its single-minded focus is on Divine Love. It expresses the lacerations of spirit as the soul in its torments of separation, yearns for its Beloved.
The text profits advantageously from Fitzgerald’s efforts and stands as it were on “the head of the giant.’ All the relaxed, subtle lyricism and engaging grace is retained even amidst the fire of burning.
The similarities however end there. Whereas Khayyam’s Rubaiyat was philosophical, Bhauji’s Garden situates itself in the affective domain. Where Khayaam is epigrammatic of his varied experiences, Bhauji’s entire being is an unquenchable fire of unpitied and unrequited Love that still manages to be a paean.
The two rubaiyats also differ significantly in other respects. Fitzgerald was separated from Khayaam by several centuries; consequently, he was not able to fraternize with him share his confidence and guidance, and exchange intimacies and correspondences. Except for a passing interest, Fitzgerald did not drink deeply of Sufism. The exact opposite is the case with the author of Bhau Kalchuri’s Rubaiyat.
The sources and genesis of the two rubaiyats are also different. Khayaam was an outstanding astrologer, philosopher, and mathematician. The source for Bhau Kalchuri’s rubaiyat was somewhat different. Bhau wrote ghazals – long lyrical poems on the theme of love - published as “Meher Sarod.” The nuggets on which these ghazals were written, were dictated to him on the death bed of one who is considered to be the avatar of the age – Meher Baba.
These nuggets and the ghazals themselves were together alembicated into quatrains and constitute the most recent Rubaiyat – “Bhauji’s Garden.”
Bhau’s Ghazal on Nugget No.1
PREVENTING ANYONE FROM SNATCHING YOU
Oh. Meher, allow the fire to sketch Your picture today. See how it tries while dancing to Your tune.
Your picture is infinite – it can never be measured, Yet this fire can draw it as it burns me to ashes.
I am weeping and crying day and night – I am helpless, But this fire saves me and keeps me on the Path.
Even my enemies weep at seeing my plight. How can I call You my Beloved when You have no mercy?
I am traveling far and wide telling of Your cruelty To frighten and prevent anyone from snatching You away.
Oh Bhau, what can I tell you about the Path of love? I cannot live without my Beloved, yet He kicks me and I feel pleased.
The Corresponding Ruba- i Nugget No. 1 - Bhauji’s Garden
Burn fire burn. Singe me from toe to hair And etch upon my soul His picture there I’ll drum Your cruelty that all May Hear To scare ‘way others while I hold You dear.
Bhau’s Ghazal on Nugget No. 2
BRING AN END TO YOUR GAME
I am searching for You oh Meher, but I cannot find Your address. Love’s lamp is weeping in my heart; I cannot bear its pain.
You are so close to me, yet remain so far And from Your distance You watch my constant burning.
How can I walk on a path full of fire? Only by becoming fire am I able to tread it.
Oh Beloved do not leave me after an embrace Bring on end to Your game of hide and seek!
I am grateful to You for giving me this song of fire – I know that singing it is not in vain.
Oh Bhau, tell me, what should I do in this path of fire? I am treading it day and night as if not treading it at all.
The Corresponding Ruba- i No. 2 - Bhauji’s Garden
You kissed and slipped to your remote retreat My tearful eyes can’t find the haunts you keep. Ah Love come quickly to your skills one And end this dizzy game of hide and seek.
BibliographyBhau Kalchuri Meher Sarod, Manifestation Inc. Myrtle Beach S.C (1984)
William DonkinThe Wayfarers: Meher Baba and the God-intoxicated Sufism Reoriented: San Francisco 1969
Edward Fitzgerald The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam Collins Clear Type Press: London 1963 Ed. George F. Maine
Idries Shah The Way of the Sufi, Arkana Penguin: London (1990)
Marcellus Martyr Bhauji’s Garden Café Press: San Leandro CA (2004)
Swami Govinda Tirtha The Nectar of Grace Omar Khayyam's Life and Works Government Press Hyderabad: 1941
[edit] Sources
Bibliography
Bhau Kalchuri Meher Sarod, Manifestation Inc. Myrtle Beach S.C (1984)
William Donkin The Wayfarers: Meher Baba and the God-intoxicated Sufism Reoriented: San Francisco 1969 Edward Fitzgerald The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam Collins Clear Type Press: London 1963 Ed. George F. Maine Idries Shah The Way of the Sufi, Arkana Penguin: London (1990)
Marcellus Martyr Bhauji’s Garden Café Press: San Leandro CA (2004)
Swami Govinda Tirtha The Nectar of Grace Omar Khayyam's Life and Works Government Press Hyderabad: 1941
74.113.66.32 22:49, 22 August 2007 (UTC)
Declined. This article already exists in Wikipedia. See Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam. Also please be aware information copied and pasted from another site, a book, or a periodical violates Wikipedia copyright policies Ariel♥Gold 00:22, 23 August 2007 (UTC)