The Rose-Garden of Mystery

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Why the book was composed

🎙Listen on Ganjoor ↗ · read by رضا · vv. 34–70

Seven and ten past seven hundred years from the Hijra [i.e. A.H. 717], suddenly, in the month of Shawwāl,

a messenger with a thousand kindnesses and favours arrived from the service of the people of Khurasan,

from a great man who is famous there, like a fountain of light in every kind of excellence;

all the people of Khurasan, small and great, said of him that in this age he was the best of all.

He had written a letter on the subject of meaning (maʿnā) and sent it to the masters of meaning.

Whinfield's margin. Omitted by Hammer-Purgstall (1838).

In it he had put into verse some difficulties of expression, from the problems of the masters of allusion,

and asked them one by one: a world of meaning in few words.

When the messenger suddenly read out that letter, its contents at once passed from mouth to mouth.

In that gathering all the dear ones were present, and every one of them turned to look at this dervish.

One who was a man of experience, who had heard these ideas from me a hundred times,

said to me: "Give an answer at once, so that the people of the world may profit from it."

I said to him: "What need? For I have written of these questions many times in treatises."

"Yes," he said, "but in keeping with what is asked we hope for [an answer] in verse from you."

After their urging I began the answer to the letter in concise words.

In a single moment, in the gathering of the free, I spoke these words without forethought or repetition.

Whinfield's margin. The Midnapore MS reads بسیار for احرار.

Now, out of the kindness and goodwill they have, may they pass over these faults of mine.

Whinfield's margin. The Midnapore MS reads خرده گیری for خردگیها.

All know that this person in all his life never once set out to compose poetry.

Though my nature was capable of it, speaking [in verse] happened only rarely.

Though he wrote many books in prose, he never once applied himself to the mathnavī in verse.

Prosody and rhyme do not weigh meaning; the pearl of meaning does not fit in every vessel.

Meanings never come into letters, for the sea of Qulzum does not come into a vessel.

Since we are in a strait on our own side, why should we add something more to ourselves?

Whinfield's margin. The Midnapore MS reads حرف for طرف; the Midnapore MS reads وی for خود.

This is no boast; these words are by way of thanks, and before the people of the heart they are the preface to an excuse.

For my part I feel no shame in being a poet, for in a hundred ages there comes none like ʿAṭṭār.

Though in this manner a hundred worlds of secrets are but one whiff from the shop of ʿAṭṭār,

Still, this is a coincidence [with ʿAṭṭār], not something stolen by eavesdropping, as the demon steals from the angel [cf. Q 15:18, 37:10].

In short, I wrote the answer to the letter at once, point by point, neither more nor less.

Whinfield's margin. The Midnapore MS reads بگفتم for نوشتم.

The messenger took the letter with honour and went back by the road he had come.

Again a dear one, a man of authority, said to me: "Add something to it.

Set forth in plain words the meaning you have spoken; bring it from the essence of knowledge to the essence of seeing."

Whinfield's margin. The Midnapore MS reads در for باعین.

In those days I saw no possibility of taking it up out of the taste of [spiritual] state,

for describing that in talk is impossible: only the man of state knows what state is.

But in keeping with the word of the speaker of religion [the Prophet], I did not turn away the question of one who asks about religion [cf. Q 93:10].

But so that the secrets might become clearer, the parrot of my speech began to talk.

Whinfield's margin. The Midnapore MS reads پی ان تاشود for ولی تا خود شود.

With the help of the grace and success of the Lord, I said it all in a few hours.

When the heart asked the Presence for a name for the book, the answer came to the heart: "It is Our rose-garden (gulshan)."

Since the Presence named the book Gulshan, by it the eyes of all souls will be brightened.

Whinfield's margin. The Midnapore MS reads دلها for جانها.