"The story is told of how the Sultan decided to lead a military attack against neighboring India and Sanai, as a court poet, was summoned to join the expedition to record the Sultan’s exploits. As Sanai was making his way to the court, he passed an enclosed garden frequented by a notorious drunk named Lai Khur.
As Sanai was passing by, he heard Lai Khur loudly proclaim a toast to the blindness of the Sultan for greedily choosing to attack India, when there was so much beauty in Ghazna. Sanai was shocked and stopped. Lai Khur then proposed a toast to the blindness of the famous young poet Sanai who, with his gifts of insight and expression, couldn’t see the pointlessness of his existence as a poet praising such a foolish Sultan.
These words were like an earthquake to Hakim Sanai, because he knew they were true. He abandoned his life as a pampered court poet, even declining marriage to the Sultan’s own sister, and began to study with a Sufi master named Yusef Hamdani.
Sanai soon went on pilgrimage to Mecca. When he returned, he composed The Walled Garden of Truth. In Persian, the word for a ‘walled garden’ is the same word for ‘paradise,’ but it was also from within a walled garden that Lai Khur uttered the harsh truths that set Hakim Sanai on the path of wisdom."
"The seeing soul perceives the folly of praising other than the creator. The self is a servant in his cavalcade; reason a new boy in his school.
What is reason in this guesthouse, but a crooked scrawling of God’s handwriting? Had he not shown himself, how should we have known him? Unless he shows us the way, how can we know him?
We tried reasoning our way to Him: it did not work; but the moment we gave up, no obstacle remained.
He introduced himself to us out of kindness: how else could we have known him? Reason took us as far as the door; but it was his presence that let us in.
But how will you ever know him, as long as you are unable to know yourself?
Once one is one, no more, no less: error begins with duality; unity knows no error.
The road your self must journey on lies in polishing the heart.
It is not by rebellion and discord that the heart’s mirror is polished free of the rust of hypocrisy and unbelief: your mirror is polished by your certitude – by the unalloyed purity of your faith.
Break free from your chains you have forged about yourself; for you will be free when you are free of clay. The body is dark – the heart is shining bright;
the body is mere compost – the heart a blooming garden.
He doesn’t know his own self: how should he know the self of another?
He knows only his hands and feet, how should he know about God?
This is beyond the sage’s grasp: you must be a fool if you think that you know it. When you can expound on this, you will know the pure essence of faith; till then, what have faith and you in common? It is better to be silent then to talk nonsense like one of the learned; faith is not woven into every garment.
You were made for work: a robe of honor awaits you.
How is it that you are satisfied with mere rags?
How will you ever have riches if you are idle sixty days a month?
Knowing what you know, be serene also, like the mountain; and do not be distressed by misfortune. Knowledge without serenity is an unlit candle;
together they are honey-comb; honey without wax is a noble thing; wax without honey is only fit for burning.
Leave this abode of birth and decay; leave this pit, and make for your destined home. This heap of dust is mirage, where fire seems like water.
The pure man unites two in one; the lover unites three in one.
But I am frightened lest your ignorance and stupidity leave you stranded on the bridge.
He is the provider of both faith and worldly goods; he is none other than the disposer of our lives.
He is no tyrant: for everything he takes, he gives back seventy-fold; and if he closes one door he opens ten others for you.
He treasures you more than you do yourself. Rise, have done with fairy tales;
leave your base passions, and come to me.
You have to realize that it is his guidance that keeps you on the path and not your own strength
A Ruby there is just a piece of stone: and spiritual excellence the height of folly.
Silence is praise – have done with speech; your chatter will only bring you harm and sorrow – have done!
Belief and unbelief both have their origin in your hypocrite’s heart;
the way is long only because you delay to start on it;
one single step would bring you to him:
become a slave, and you will become a king.
The dumb find tongues, when the scent of life reaches them from his soul
Listen truly – and don’t be fooled – this is not for fools:
all these different shades become one color in the jar of unity;
the rope becomes slender when reduced to a single strand.
Your intellect is just hotchpotch of guesswork and thought,
limping over the face of the earth; wherever they are, he is not;
they are contained within his creation.
Man and his reason are just the latest ripening plants in his garden. Whatever you assert about his nature you are bound to be out of your depth, like a blind man trying to describe the appearance of his mother. While reason is still tracking down the secret, you end your quest on the open field of love.
The path consists in neither words nor deeds: only desolation can come from these, and never any lasting edifice. Sweetness and life are the words of the man who threads this path in silence; when he speaks it is not from ignorance,
and when he is silent it is not from sloth.
For the wise man evil and good are both exceeding good. No evil ever comes from God; whenever you think to see evil proceeding from him, you were better to look on it as good.
I’m afraid that on the way of faith, you are like a squinter seeing double, or a fool quarreling with the shape of a camel. If he gives you poison, deem it honey; and if he shows you anger, deem it mercy.
Be contented with your lot; but if you have any complaints, go and take them to the Cadi, and obtain satisfaction from him. That’s how the fool’s mind works!
Whatever befalls you, misfortune or fortune, is unalloyed blessing; the attendant evil a fleeing shadow.
‘Good’ and ‘evil’ have no meaning in the world of the Word:
they are names, coined in the world of ‘me’ and ‘you’.
Your life is just morsel in his mouth; his feast is both wedding and a wake. Why should darkness grieve the heart? – for night is pregnant with new day.
You say you’ve unrolled the carpet of time, step then beyond life itself and reason, till you arrive at God’s command.
You cannot see anything, being blind by night, and by day one-eyed with your foolish wisdom!"
~ Hakim Sanai, The Walled Garden Of Hakim
Photo ~ Fin garden, Kashan, Iran
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