The Sphere of Mercury - Visitation to the Spirits of Jamal al-Din Afghani and Sa'id Halim Pasha

A handful of dust so carried forward its task to the contemplation of its own manifestations:

either I fell into the net of being and existence or existence became a prisoner in my net!

Have I made a chink in yon azure curtains? Am I of the skies, or are the skies of me?

Either heaven has taken my heart into its breast or it is my heart that has seized heaven.

Is this external then internal? What is it? What manner of thing is it the eye sees? What is it?

I beat my wings towards another heaven, I see another world rising before me,

a world of mountains and plains, seas and dry land, a world far more ancient than our earth,

a world grown out of a little cloud that has never known the conquest of man—

images as yet unlined on the tablet of existence where no critic of nature has yet been born.

I said to Rumi, ‘This wasteland is very fair, very fair the tumult of the waters in the mountains.

I find no sign here of any living thing, so whence comes the sound of the call to prayer?’

Rumi said, ‘This is the station of the saints, this heap of earth is familiar with our dust.

When the father of mankind departed out of Eden he dwelt in this world for one or two days;

these expanses have felt the burning of his sighs, heard his lamentations in the hour of dawn.

The visitors to this honourable station are themselves pious men of lofty stations,

pious men such as Fudail and Bu Sa‘id, true gnostics like Junaid and Ba Yazid.

Rise up now, and let us pray together, devote a moment or two to burning and melting.’

I went on, and saw two men engaged in prayer, the acolyte a Turk, the leader an Afghan.

The Sage of Rum, in rapture continually, his face radiant with an ecstasy of joy,

said, ‘The East never gave birth to two better sons— the plucking of their nails unravelled our knots:

Maulana Jamal, Sayyid of all Sayyids, whose eloquence gave life to stone and sherd,

and passionate Halim, commander of the Turks whose thoughts matched the loftiness of his station.

To offer prayer with such men is true devotion, a labour else whose hoped for wage is Paradise.

The recitation of that vigorous elder, the Chapter of the Star in that silent plain—

a recital that to move Abraham to ecstasy, to enrapture the pure spirit of Gabriel;

the heedful heart becomes restless in the breast, the cry ‘No god but God’ rises from the tombs;

it imparts to smoke the quivering of the flame, bestows on David ardour and intoxication;

at his recital every mystery was revealed, the Heavenly Archetype appeared unveiled.

After prayer I rose up from my place and kissed his hand in all humility.

Rumi said, ‘A mote that travels the skies, in its heart a whole world of fire and passion!

Only upon himself he has opened his eyes, yielded his heart to no man, is utterly free;

swiftly he paces through the expanse of Being— jestingly, I call him Zinda‐Rud.’

Afghani

Zinda Rud, tell us of our terrestrial world, speak to us of our earth and sky.

A thing of dust, you are clear‐eyed as the Holy Ones— give us some tidings of the Muslims!

Zinda-Rud

In the heart of a people that once shattered the world I have seen a conflict between religion and country.

The spirit is dead in the body through weakness of faith, despairs of the strength of the manifest religion;

Turk, Persian, Arab intoxicated with Europe and in the throat of each the fish hook of Europe;

and East wasted by the West’s imperialism, Communism taken the lustre from religion and community.

Afghani - Religion and Country

The Lord of the West, cunning from head to toe, taught the people of religion the concept of Country.

He thinks of the centre, while you are at discord— give up this talk of Syria, Palestine, Iraq!

If you can discriminate between good and evil you will not bind your hearts to clods, stones, bricks.

What is religion? To rise up from the face of the dust so that the pure soul may become aware of itself!

He who has said ‘God is He’ is not contained within the confines of this dimensioned order.

A grass blade is of the earth, and yet rises from the earth; alas, if the pure soul should die in the dust!

Although man sprang out of water and clay, from water and clay rose like drew colour and sap,

alas, if he wanders forever in water and clay, alas, if he soars not higher than this station!

The body says, ‘Go into the dust of the roadway’; the soul says, ‘Look upon the expanse of the world!’

Man of reason, the soul is not contained in dimensions; the free man is a stranger to every fetter and chain

the free man rails against the dark earth for it beseems not the falcon to act like a mouse.

This handful of earth to which you give the name ‘country’, this so called Egypt, and Iran, and Yemen—

there is a relationship between a country and its people in that it is out of its soil that a nation rises;

but if you look carefully at this relationship you will descry a subtlety finer than a hair.

Though it is out of the East that the sun rises showing itself bold and bright, without a veil,

only then it burns and blazes with inward fire when it escapes from the shackles of East and West;

drunk with splendour it springs up out of its East that it may subject all horizons to its mastery;

its nature is innocent of both East and West, though relationship‐wise, true, it is an Easterner.