The Literature of Ecstasy Part 14

[180:A] _Zwei Abhandlungen uber d. Aristotleische Theorie d. Drama._

[182:A] This work has never been completely published. Dr. B. Halper, of Dropsie College, Philadelphia, has promised us a complete translation from the Arabic ma.n.u.script. There is a synopsis of it by Schreiner in the _Revue des Etudes, Juives XXI, XXII_.

[183:A] See Isaac Husik's _Medieval Jewish Philosophy_.

[184:A] F. C. Prescott's _Dreams and Poetry_ is a magnificent essay on the subject.

[187:A] I do not however agree with Bergson, who does not believe poetry can be composed in dreams at all.

[193:A] "Poetry is the most emphatical language that can be found for those creations of the mind 'which ecstasy is very cunning in.'" Hazlitt _On Poetry_. "The imaginative faculty (has) the capabilities of ecstasy and possession." Lowell, "The Imagination." _The Function of the Poet._

CHAPTER XI

LOVE ECSTASY IN ARABIAN POETRY

Oriental poetry, especially that of the Arabs and the Persians, is notable for its interpenetration with ecstasy couched in intricate conventional forms. The Oriental poems abound numerously in far-fetched figures of speech, and are written in metres following definite laws and are subject to difficult and uniform rhymes continued in every line in poems of great length. In fact the greatest historian of the Mohammedans, Ibn Khaldun (1332-1406), defined poetry as effective discourse based on metaphor and descriptions, divided into verses agreeing with one another in metre and rhyme, each verse having a separate idea, and the whole conforming to old Arab models. A poet was supposed to get many thousands of verses by heart before practicing his art. One of the chapters in Ibn Khaldun's famous _Prolegomena_[203:A] or introduction to his history, _Book of Examples_, has a t.i.tle stating that the art of composing is concerned with words and not ideas.

But in spite of slavish adherence to technique it was taken for granted that ecstasy was the main object of poetry. There is probably more ecstasy in the poetry of the Arabs and Persians than in that of most other nations, and it is an ecstasy that breaks through the molds of form. It is a matter of astonishment that the artificial forms did not utterly choke out the ecstasy. Professor Edgar G. Browne in his scholarly _Literary History of Persia_ has devoted the first chapter of the second volume to Persian metres and he calls attention to the conventional metaphors, bombast and inflation of the Arabic poets who were not without influence upon the Persians.

We today may accept the definition of poetry given in the _Four Discourses_[204:A] (1162) of Nidhami I Arudi, for though he also believed in the importance of the trappings of verse, he had ecstasy primarily in mind. He defined poetry thus:

Poetry is that art whereby the poet arranges imaginary propositions, and adopts the deductions, with the result that he can make a little thing appear great and a great thing small, or cause good to appear in the garb of evil and evil in the garb of good. By acting on the imagination, he excites the faculties of anger and concupiscence in such a way that by his suggestion men's temperaments become affected with exaltation or depression; whereby he conduces to the accomplishment of great things in the order of the world.

What more effective definition could there be of the utilitarian power of art to take man out of himself and exalt him into a state of beneficial ecstasy?

Ibn Khaldun said:

Poetry is, of all the forms of discourses, that which the Arabs regarded as the n.o.blest; they also made it the depository of their knowledge and their history, the testimony which would attest their virtues and faults, the store-house in which were found the greater part of their scientific views and their maxims of wisdom. The poetic faculty was as much deeply rooted in them as in all the other faculties they possessed.

He continues, that they have handled poetry so well, that one could deceive oneself and believe that this gift, which is really an acquired art, was with them an innate one.

These remarkable words of Ibn Khaldun will help us to understand the famous saying that poetry was the register of the Arabs. Never before nor since has poetry been so interwoven with a nation's life. The stories of the compet.i.tions for prizes for composing poetry, of the happiness when a poet was born, of the importance a.s.sumed by the discussion and recitation of poetry among all cla.s.ses, read to us like myths. Yet the fact that poetry should be part of the life of a pa.s.sionate people who lived in the desert, free and untrammeled, is not strange. The Arabs themselves attribute also their great superiority in poetry to the beauty of their language, especially as spoken by the Bedouins in the desert. The great Arabian poet Abu Nuwas completed his education by sojourning a year among the Bedouins.

Another factor enhancing their poetry and one not to be ignored is that after 622 A.D. in post-Islamic times, poetry was rewarded by gifts.

Hence the eulogy grew into prominence and the poets were fabulously rewarded for their poems. This, of course, led to fulsome and cringing eulogies. The caliph was the patron. When Mohammed appeared it seemed that poetry would die out, but it flourished more than ever. It was only after the Abbasid caliphate was exterminated by the Mongol invasion (1258 A.D.) that poetry declined in Arabia to such an extent that, as Ibn Khaldun says, no prominent man would deign to devote himself to it.

Although the Arabs excelled in various kinds of poetry, we think of them primarily as love poets.

The Arabs, as we gather from _The Arabian Nights_, were a people especially devoted to tenderness in love. When the Arab was smitten with love he was a helpless weeping child. There was one tribe, that of Azra, wherein the victims were said to die of love. One poet said he knew of thirty young men whom love sickness carried off. In answer to a reproach for this weakness, one of the tribe replied: "You would not talk like that if you had seen the great black eyes of our women darting fire from beneath the veil of their long lashes, if you had seen them smile and their death gleaming between their brown lips." (Stendhal: _On Love_, p.

218.)

Arabic poetry in the period before Islam between 500 A.D. and 622 A.D.

did not consist of pure eroticism. Satire, eulogy, elegy, revenge, martial feeling, chiefly characterized it. Many poems were also devoted to the praise of animals and the description of nature. The odes or Qasidas, however, began with a love prelude, called nasib, in which the poet dwelt on his love sorrows merely to win the hearts of his hearers to his chief theme. One of the best of these is that in the ode of Imru'ul Qays the first and greatest of the seven poets of the _Muallaqat_.

Pure erotic poetry appeared after Islam with the luxury that spread with the growth of wealth, but the nasib continued to be used, especially in eulogies. The poets still wrote like the Pre-islamic poets instead of celebrating Islam. The Umayyad Dynasty, which extended from 661 to 749 A.D., saw the birth of pure love poetry celebrated not as introductory or episodic but purely for itself. The love story of one of the Arabian erotic poets of the period, Majnun, was celebrated by the great Persian poet, Nidhami, who flourished in the twelfth century. His _Laila_ and _Majnun_ has been translated into English by Mr. Atkinson. The story was retold by many Persian and Ottoman poets. Then there was Jamil, who was the lover of Buthaina. These love poems by Majnun and Jamil were of popular origin, and represented the spirit of the people. There were many other love poets, while some did not devote themselves exclusively to love.

The most celebrated, however, of the love poets was the handsome wealthy Omar ibn Abi Rabia (643-719 A.D.). He was of the tribe of Koraish, the same tribe to which Mohammed himself belonged. This tribe was famous for many things, but not for poetry until Omar took away the reproach. His poems were called a crime against G.o.d, yet a cousin of the prophet memorized some of them. The fullest account of him in English and of his love affairs, with translations from a few of his poems, appears in an essay by William G. Palgrave in _Essays on Eastern Questions_. Omar was united in marriage to his love Zeynab after a stormy courtship, opposed by her people, but he had several love affairs. The best idea of the sweetness and pathos of his love poetry is conveyed without further comment by giving two translations made by Mr. Palgrave.

Ah for the throes of a heart sorely wounded!

Ah for the eyes that have smit me with madness!

Gently she moved in the calmness of beauty, Moved as the bough to the light breeze of morning.

Dazzled my eyes as they gazed, till before me All was a mist and confusion of figures.

Ne'er had I sought her, and ne'er had she sought me; Fated the love, and the hour, and the meeting.

There I beheld her as she and her damsels Paced 'twixt the temple and outer enclosure; Damsels the fairest, the loveliest, the gentlest, Pa.s.sing like slow-wending heifers at evening; Ever surrounding with courtly observance Her whom they honor, the peerless of women.

Then to a handmaid, the youngest, she whispered, "Omar is near: let us mar his devotions.

Cross on his path that he needs may observe us; Give him a signal, my sister, demurely."

"Signals I gave, but he marked not or heeded,"

Answered the damsel, and hasted to meet me.

Ah for that night by the vale of the sand-hills!

Ah for the dawn when in silence we parted!

He who the morn may awake to her kisses Drinks from the cup of the blessed in heaven.

Ah! where have they made my dwelling? Far, how far, from her, the loved one, Since they drove me lone and parted to the sad sea-sh.o.r.e of Aden.

Thou art mid the distant mountains; and to each, the loved and lover, Nought is left but sad remembrance, and a share of aching sorrow.

Hadst thou seen thy lover weeping by the sand-hills of the ocean, Thou hadst deemed him struck by madness: was it madness? was it love?

I may forget all else, but never shall I forget her as she stood, As I stood, that hour of parting; heart to heart in speechless anguish; Then she turned her to Th.o.r.eyya, to her sister, sadly weeping; Coursed the tears down cheek and bosom, till her pa.s.sion found an utterance; "Tell him, sister, tell him; yet be not as one that chides or murmurs, Why so long thy distant tarrying on the unlovely sh.o.r.es of Yemen?

Is it sated ease detains thee, or the quest of wealth that lures thee?

Tell me what the price they paid thee, that from Mecca bought thy absence?"

I give three other examples of Arabic love poetry by different translators, prose renderings by McGuckin de Slane in Ibn Khallikan's _Biographical Dictionary_ and by Terrick Hamilton in the _Romance of Antar_, respectively, and a verse translation by Lyall.

The following poem (Ibn Khallikan, V. 2, p. 330) is attributed to Ibn Alaamidi of the eleventh century:

Admire that pa.s.sionate lover! he recalls to mind the well protected park and sighs aloud; he hears the call of love and stops bewildered. The nightingales awaken the trouble of his heart, and his pains, now redoubled, drive all prudence from his mind. An ardent pa.s.sion excites his complaints; sadness moves him to tears; his old affections awake, but these were never dormant. His friends say that his fort.i.tude has failed; but the very mountain of Yalamlan would groan, or sink oppressed, under such a weight of love. Think not that compulsion will lead him to forget her; willingly he accepted the burden of love; how then could he cast it off against his will?

--O Otba, faultless in thy charms! be indulgent, be kind, for thy lover's sickness has reached its height. By thee the willow of the hill was taught to wave its branches with grace, when thy form, robed in beauty, first appeared before it. Thou hast lent thy tender glances to the gazelles of the desert, and therefore the fairest object to be seen is the eye of the antelope. Sick with the pains of love, bereft of sleep and confounded, I should never have outlived my nights, unless revived by the appearance of thy favor, deceitful as it was.

These four shall witness the sincerity of my attachment: tears, melancholy, a mind deranged, and care, my constant visitor; could Yazbul feel this last; it would become like as--Suha. Some reproach me for loving thee, but I am not to be reclaimed; others bid me forbear, but I heed them not. They tell thee that I desire thee for thy beauty; how very strange!

and where is the beauty which is not an object of desire? For thee I am the most loving of lovers; none, I know, are like me (_in sincerity_) or like thee in beauty.

The next poem represents one of the many outbursts of Antar:

O bird of the tamarisk! thou hast rendered my sorrows more poignant, thou hast redoubled my griefs. O bird of the tamarisk! if thou invokest an absent friend for whom thou art mourning, even then, O bird, is thy affliction like the distress I also feel? Augment my sorrows and my lamentations; aid me to weep till thou seest wonders from the discharge of my eyelids. Weep, too, from the excesses that I endure. Fear not--only guard the trees from the breath of my burning sighs.

Quit me not till I die of love, the victim of pa.s.sion of absence, and separation. Fly, perhaps in the Hijaz thou mayest see some one riding from Aalij to Nomani, wandering with a damsel, she traversing wilds, and drowned in tears, anxious for her native land. May G.o.d inspire thee, O dove! when thou truly sees her loaded camels. Announce my death. Say, thou hast left him stretched on the earth, and that his tears are exhausted, but that he weeps in blood. Should the breeze ask thee whence thou art, say, he is deprived of his heart and stupefied; he is in a strange land, weeping for our departure, for the G.o.d of heaven has struck him with affliction on account of his beloved; he is lying down like a tender bird, that vultures and eagles have bereft of its young, that grieves in unceasing plaints whilst its offspring are scattered over the plain and the desert!

This poem by an unknown author is tenderness unexcelled:

_One Unnamed_

Nay, ask on the sandy hill the ben-tree with spreading boughs that stands mid her sisters, if I greeted thy dwelling-place; And whether their shade looked down upon me at eventide as there in my grief I stood, and that for my portion chose: And whether, at dawn still there, mine eyelids a burthen bore of tears falling one by one, as pearls from a broken string.

Yea, men long and yearn for Spring, the gladsome: but as for me--my longing and Spring art thou, my yearning to gain thy grace; And men dread the deadly Drought that slays them: but as for me--my Drought is to know thee gone, my life but a barren land!

And sooth, if I suffer when thou greet'st me with words unkind, yet somewhat of joy it brings thou thinkest on me at all.

So take thy delight that I stand serving with aching heart and eyes bathed in tears lest thou shouldst sunder thyself from me.

Arabic poetry may lack the light of intellectual outlook that we find in our greatest English poets; it may be deficient in the intensity of religious fervor characteristic of the medieval Hebrew poets; it may fall short of the high mystic strain attained by the Persians, but in the fervor depicting love of pa.s.sion they have not been surpa.s.sed. The greatest Persian lyric love poet, Hafiz, and the greatest Turkish lyric love poet, Baqui, clearly were under their influence.