Isfahan Is Half the World: Memories of a Persian Boyhood [Course Book ed.] 9781400855520

Table of contents :
Contents
Introduction
VOLUME ONE: Reminiscings and Beginning
Map
PREFACE
PART I. Memories of Childhood Times
PART II. Wanderings of Youth
VOLUME TWO: Traveling on the Horizons and in the Mind
PART I. Roaming and Getting Acquainted
PART II. Return to the Original or Solving the Problems
Translator's Postscript Translator's Postscript
Glossary
Bibliography

Citation preview

I S F A H A N IS HALF THE W O R L D

PRINCETON LIBRARY OF ASIAN TRANSLATIONS ADVISORY COMMITTEE FOR THE MIDDLE EAST

Nina Garsoian Talat Halman William Hanaway, Jr. Jeanette Wakin

IS H A L F T H E

WORLD

Memories o f a Persian B o y h o o d Sayyed Mohammad Ali

Jamalzadeh

*

translated by W. L.

Heston

2 P R I N C E T O N

U N I V E R S I T Y

P R I N C E T O N

PRESS

U N I V E R S I T Y

Copyright © 1983 by Princeton University Press Published by Princeton University Press, 41 William Street, Princeton, New Jersey 08540 In the United Kingdom: Princeton University Press, Guildford, Surrey All Rights Reserved Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data will be found on the last printed page of this book Publication of this book has been aided by the Whitney Darrow Publication Reserve Fund of Princeton University Press This book has been composed in Linotron Bembo Designed by Barbara Werden Clothbound editions of Princeton University Press books are printed on acid-free paper, and binding materials are chosen for strength and durability. Paperbacks, while satisfactory for personal collections, are not usually suitable for library rebinding Printed in the United States of America by Princeton University Press, Princeton, New Jersey

Contents

Introduction

vii

VOLUME ONE: Reminiscings and Beginning PREFACE

5

PART I: Memories of Childhood Times PART II: Wanderings of Youth Chapter 1. The Flip of a Coin Chapter 2. The Greedy Eyes of the Wealthy Chapter 3. The Magi's Abbey and Their Pir Chapter 4. Heartache Chapter 5. Resurrection

10 66 66 72 86 111 125

VOLUME TWO: Traveling on the Horizons and in the Mind Part I: Roaming and Getting Acquainted Chapter 1. Extortion Chapter 2. People of Purity and Truth Chapter 3. The World of Chivalry and Manliness Chapter 4. Nightlife Chapter 5. The Hell of Fanaticism

135 135 151 170 200 209

PART II: Return to the Original or Solving the Problem Chapter 1. And They're Cut from the Same Cloth . . . Chapter 2. Without Rhyme or Reason Chapter 3. "Party's Over!" Chapter 4. The Absent Who's Present Conclusion

228 228 239 256 277 284

Translator's Postscript Glossary Bibliography

287 292 297

V

Introduction

The events in Iran beginning in late 1978 which ended in the overthrow of Pahlavi rule and the establishment of an Islamic republic came as a surprise to many westerners. For Americans, it is not difficult to sympathize with the desire to overthrow dictatorship, and even to applaud its fulfillment, but the Islamic republic, with its rejection of western values and its hostility toward the United States, has been hard to fathom, the more so because a number of the figures involved have been educated in the west and, indeed, in the United States. What could be the appeal of traditional Iranian life in the modern world? Finding answers, even with the benefit of hindsight, has not been easy. Social scientists have analyzed recent events, stressing the role of the clergy in Iranian society now and in the past, but with little concern for the daily life of ordinary individuals. Contemporary Persian literature portrays individuals, but its authors have generally shown little interest in Islam; their depiction of the clergy has been almost uniformly critical on the rare occasions when it is given any role at all. A major exception among Iranian writers is Jamalzadeh. The Persian original of this work is in two volumes. Its preface, written in 1955, expresses the author's concern about Iranians' blanket acceptance of foreign ways, largely French before World War II but mostly American thereafter. He calls for a reexamination of traditional life, a life portrayed in his boyhood memories in Volume I, Part I, and in the story of his friend's life in the remainder of this work. This is a way of life not usually seen by westerners but it survived to some extent even in the rapidly modernizing major Iranian cities through the Pahlavi period. Jamalzadeh's book is, then, about Iranians, and written for Iranians by an Iranian. It is, furthermore, about a life within Islam, as seen by a mullah's son who neither ignores nor rejects his religion, but presents its many facets, both good and bad.

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Introduction

Sayyed Mohammad AIi Jamalzadeh, son of the liberal preacher and orator Sayyed Jamal-od-din, was born in 1895 in the city of Isfahan. After a stay in Tehran, he left the country prior to the death of his father, and went to study in Lebanon in 1908 and in France and Switzerland in 1910. He later went to Berlin where he was actively involved in various Persian-language publications while working at the Persian legation. His first book, The Worthy Treasure; or, The Economic Situation in Iran, a gazetteer of Iran with information about its geography, commerce, customs, and weights and measures, was published in Berlin in 1916. His next book, a collection of six short stories entitled Once Upon a Time (Yaki Bud, Yaki Na-bud), appeared in 1921, and was also published in Berlin. This short-story collection, now a landmark in Persian literature, raised a tremendous furor at the time, being admired by young in­ tellectuals and the more progressive elements in society and de­ nounced by conservative and religious circles. One story even led Iranian religious authorities to excommunicate the author and declare him a nonbeliever whose blood it is lawful to shed {mahdur al-dam). The book had a preface in which Jamalzadeh stressed the role of prose as a means of educating the public. The significance of this view for the development of Persian literature has been pointed out in an ar­ ticle by Daragahi (1974) which includes a translation of the preface. The only story so far translated into English from that collection is "Persian Is Sugar"; the story pokes fun at two people who embellish their native language—an Iranian student newly returned from Eu­ rope with his imported vocabulary and a Muslim divine with highflown Arabic phrases. The translation and an introductory note are included in the volume edited by Hillman (1976). In 1931, Jamalzadeh moved to Geneva to work for the Interna­ tional Labor Organization, where he continued to be employed until his retirement in 1956. He published no more fiction until 1942, when his first novel, Lunatic Asylum, came out. Three other novels fol­ lowed and after that in 1956 came the pair of volumes translated here under the title, Isfahan Is Half the World. The Persian text is titled Sar ο Tah-e Yak Karbds (lit., "The Beginning and End of One Canvas," but more idiomatically, "Cut From the Same Cloth") and subtitled Esfahan-ndmeh ("The Isfahan Story"). Jamalzadeh's short-story writing did not cease with Once Upon a Time, and a number of collections have since been published. One collection, There Was No One but God (Gheyr az Khodd Hich Kas Nabud), includes a play retelling the episode in "The Hell of Fanaticism"

Introduction

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(Vol. II, Pt. I, Chap. 5 of this translation). A 1964 collection, Of Cabbages and Kings (Asman ο Rismdn, lit., "Sky and Rope") includes not only short stories but also translations of works by Honore de Balzac, Maurice Le Blanc, Oscar Wilde, Rabindranath Tagore, and Friedrich Durrenmatt. Jamalzadeh has also compiled editions of the classical Persian authors, Rumi and Sa'di, and of biographies of tenthto nineteenth-century Shia ulama. His constant interest in the spoken language resulted in a dictionary of Persian idioms with the French title, Vocabulaire du persan populaire. Volumes of collected jottings also appear in the list of his published books. Jamalzadeh's contributions to newspapers and journals in both Iran and Europe are likewise impressive in both breadth of interest and sheer quantity. The subjects range from his work at the International Labor Organization to literary criticism. Introductions to the works of others plus contributions to Festschriften and conference volumes add further to his massive published writings. Studies of Jamalzadeh and his work are as yet few in number; no major critical study is yet available in English. General works on Persian literature, whether large or small, pay tribute to the impor­ tance of his contributions to twentieth-century Persian prose (Rypka 1968, pp. 389-91, and Levy 1969, pp. 167-71). Kamshad (1966) de­ votes a chapter to his work and a lengthy article by Mashiah (1971) examines the stories in Once Upon a Time. There have been scattered translations of Jamalzadeh's short stories into other European languages and one collection of eight pieces into French (Choix de nouvelles). No translations of his novels or short stories, with the exception of "Persian Is Sugar," have yet been pub­ lished in the United States or England, although his now classic Once Upon a Time, translated by Paul Strachman and Heshmat Moayyad, will be included in the Modern Persian Literature Series, Caravan Publishers. This translation will thus enable English-speaking readers to thoroughly acquaint themselves with "one of Iran's greatest writ­ ers who despite (or perhaps because of) long years of residence abroad is still the most absolutely Persian of writers today" (Kamshad 1966, p. 112).

Jamalzadeh, in telling his story, assumes as common ground with his fellow Iranians certain knowledge that will be unfamiliar to most western readers. Guided by the author's statement in his Preface about wanting to turn adventures of the past into story form and by other

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Introduction

remarks of his in correspondence and conversation, I have made cer­ tain changes from the Persian text, unsignaled by the symbols gen­ erally used in scholarly translations. First, most ofJamalzadeh's remarks in his text and footnotes which explain words, phrases, or pronunciations of the Isfahani and other regional dialects have been omitted. Biographical information in his footnotes has been shortened or omitted. Some descriptions of nonIranian persons and customs, especially in the Preface and the chap­ ter, "The Magi's Abbey and Their Pir," have been omitted. In the chapter "Nightlife," most of the material on the history of Isfahan and its relation to Iranian history has been omitted; the interested reader can largely repair this omission by consulting the entry on Isfahan in the Encyclopedia of Islam. Second, I have added an identifying phrase, such as "in the words of Hafez" or "as it says in the Qoran," to a number of quotations where the source is not stated in the Persian text. Similar identifying phrases have in some cases also been added for certain proper names and historical events. Some quoted material, identified or not, and the related portion of the text have been shortened or omitted in the translation when, for example, the passage is repeated elsewhere, when it merely amplifies or ornaments an already expressed idea, or when it would seem to require explanatory footnotes. The major omission of quoted material is some sections of the treatise by Jamalzadeh's father, which was entitled "The True Dream." It uses colloquial lan­ guage for its Isfahani characters, who are shown at the Last Judg­ ment. These characters are historical figures and two, Zell-os-soltan and Aqa Najafi, will be seen to play a role in the autobiographical section of this book. Jamalzadeh uses the same scene for more comic and less didactic satire in a 1947 novel, "The Plain of Resurrection" (Sahra-ye Mahsahr). Third, comments of Jamalzadeh in correspondence about particular words or passages have in some cases been incorporated directly into the translation, particularly where they clarify a passage and do not involve a digression. In other cases, these comments are included in the footnotes with the notation Jz-c; they may thus be distinguished from his footnotes in the Persian text, marked simply as Jz. Finally, some passages in the book have been compressed. Jamal­ zadeh is a virtuoso at piling adjective upon adjective and image upon image, giving a richness to his Persian prose that is difficult, for this translator at least, to transfer to English without being repetitious. Some of this compression has been specifically suggested by the au-

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thor and the remainder has tried to follow the pattern he used in translating one of his short stories into French. Beyond this, however, the overall plan of the translation follows the Persian original. Chapter divisions are unchanged, and most of the paragraphing is retained. The frequent long sentences reflect weakly the generally much longer sentences of the original. For convenience in consulting the Persian text, the volume and page number of the original appear in the margin of the translation at about the beginning of each page of Persian text; a skipped page number indicates that the first part or more of that page has been omitted. Sketch maps of Iran and Isfahan have been included to show the locations of some frequently mentioned places. The Glossary lists both Persian words appearing, but not defined, in the text and certain proper nouns; it begins with some comments on pronunciation. Fur­ ther information about poets and other writers infrequently men­ tioned in the translation can be found in Rypka 1968. I have tried to avoid diacritics in the spelling of Persian words in this book, while giving the English reader an idea of the approximate modern pronunciation. Words already likely to be familiar to the reader, such as Isfahan, Iman, and Islam, will appear in accepted Eng­ lish form. The resulting inconsistencies will be most obvious (and probably most irritating) to the specialist, who will also be most able to make appropriate adjustments. Books citing the author of this text will use the form Jamalzada when following a system common among Orientalists; the Library of Congress currently uses the form, Jamalzadah. Certain other libraries and some writers on modern Persian use the form, Jamalzadeh, which has been adopted here; the author, when writing in French, signs his name as Djamalzadeh.

* The first decade of this century, the period in which Jamalzadeh's autobiography is set, was a period of ferment. The Qajar monarchy was coming to an end; democratic reform was in the air, backed by western-educated intellectuals, some of the clergy, and the merchants of the bazaar. Jamalzadeh's father was among the clergy active in this reform. In December 1906, a constitution was drafted and signed by the Qajar shah, Mozaffar-od-din, and his son, Mohammad AIi, who succeeded him in 1907. The latter, however, then tried to overthrow the constitution, declaring martial law in Tehran and dissolving the Parliament in June 1908. He was backed in this action by various conservative groups, including both the clergy who had remained loyal to the Qajars during the constitution's reform movement and

xii

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Introduction

some other clergy who had originally been in favor of reform but were dissatisfied with the secular provisions of the proposed constitution. It is this conservative faction of clergy who are seen in conflict with Jamalzadeh's father in this book. A number of liberal leaders were killed in the events of June 1908; Jamalzadeh's father managed to escape from Tehran, but was later captured and put in prison, where he died, probably of poison. Jamalzadeh was by then out of the country and learned only later by mail of his father's death. The political events of this period were described soon afterward by Browne (1910), who takes cognizance of the role of Jamalzadeh's father and includes his picture (facing p. 204) as one of the victims of the June 1908 coup d'etat. Theoretically, church and state have never been separate in Islam and law has always been religious law, the Shari'a. The current Islamic republic in Iran is the most recent attempt to put this theory into practice. The modern universities from which many of the young Iranian militants have come were, however, not in existence at the time of this book. Schools were attached to mosques and taught by mullahs; learning to read Arabic and memorizing the Qoran were integral parts of an elementary education. Religion continued to be at the core of education through the university level. The School of the Four Gardens, where Javad Aqa of this book goes to live, might thus be called a theological college or seminary, but there was no alternative secular institution. Its atmosphere was more that of a monastery than that of an American residential college. Iran is not only Muslim but is, more specifically, Shia, the branch of Islam that believes the legitimate successor of the Prophet Mohammad was his son-in-law, AIi. Most Iranian Shias are "Twelvers," who believe in a series of eleven successors to AIi, thus making a total of twelve Imams. The violent deaths of the first three Imams, AIi and his two sons, Hasan and Hoseyn, and the events leading to what Shias see as their murder have remained fresh in Iranian minds for over a thousand years. Particular importance is given to the martyrdom of Hoseyn in A. D. 680, which is commemorated by mourning processions through the streets (sometimes repressed under the Pahlavis), dramatic readings, and full-scale plays, called ta'ziyehs, which have been compared to Christian passion plays. Various aspects of these plays have been the subject of a recent volume edited by Chelkowski (1979); most of the characters mentioned by Jamalzadeh in this book can be found in their stock roles in an English translation by Pelly (1879). Jamalzadeh's use of these characters in his

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writings is but one reminder that the traditional Islamic life herein described is particularly Iranian.

The preparation of this volume was made possible in part by a grant from the Translations Program of the National Endowment for the Humanities, an independent federal agency. Three Iranian students played major roles in this translation: Nader Afshar, who knew firsthand from country life the unchanged cus­ toms of half a century ago; Hasan Halabian, an Isfahani whose pleased reactions to the author's remarks on Isfahan and its inhabitants as­ sured me of the setting's reality; and David Yaroushalmi, whose background in Persian literature and idioms alerted me to much I might otherwise have missed. I thank them for their patience and wish them well in their future endeavors. The sketches were prepared by Pragnesh Parikh in consultation with Reza-shah Hosseini of Yazd, both of whom are from Gujerat University's School of Architecture in Ahmedabad (India). The sketches are based on the photographs in the Persian text and on other mate­ rials supplied by the author. I am indebted to Mark Dresden for turning my attention to this text as a possibility for translation; my debts to him go back to the days when he introduced me to Persian language and literature. Bill Hanaway and Cornelia Emery patiently read a bulky first draft of this manuscript and generously gave me the comments of a Persian scholar and an intelligent layman, respectively; Elizabeth Emery pro­ vided clerical assistance in reshaping the manuscript after that. At Princeton University Press, I would like to thank Margaret Case for her early and continued interest in this translation and Marilyn Campbell and Barbara Werden for seeing it through publication. To the many other friends whom I have not named but who have helped out with a word or a phrase—and often far more—I here express my nonspecific but totally sincere thanks.

I S F A H A N IS H A L F T H E

WORLD

In the famous name of my dear birthplace, the celebrated city of Isfahan, where my clay was shaped and beneath whose earth I also long to rest.

Vol

uvhc

* Reminiscings and Beginning

PREFACE

1:7

Sar ο Tah-e Yak Karbas, "Cut from the Same Cloth," was written eleven years ago and is now presented with some revisions to my beloved countrymen. It is almost entirely a tale from the author's childhood, and because the arena of those events and incidents is Isfahan, it can also be called Esfahdn-ndmeh,"The Isfahan Story." 1 On the whole, it is the tale of adventures of forty or fifty years ago, and perhaps in this respect will not appeal to the taste of younger elements of the present period who in truth are men of today and tomorrow, thirsty for vitalizing transformations and dreaming of revolution. They are usually dissatisfied with the past, considering it deficient and the source and agent of our miseries today. Being hos­ tile and antagonistic toward the past, they therefore think a battle with it is twin to preparing the groundwork for a tomorrow which should have happiness, comfort, and justice. For that reason they voice objections, saying it would be good if a certain person did not send to his countrymen from the heart of Europe reminiscences of half a century ago, smelling of rot and decay. The thing they should know is that man is generally like a traveler who first goes up the mountain of age in his youth and is not concerned about what is behind him; however, when he starts coming down from the moun­ tain, whether he has reached the top or not, he looks behind him with somewhat more love and regret as he comes ever closer to the final stages, and he takes pleasure, as you know, in anecdotes and accounts of the past and imagines it possible for them to act as warn­ ings for others. Following the same general rule, this writer, too,

1:8

spontaneously took pen in hand one day and like an aged father act­ ing as storyteller for his own children, he set out to record events and incidents of his own past, which perhaps in their turn will not contain any benefit or warning either. In order to increase the interest of any reader they might find, he then also gave them a little of the 1 The title and subtitle of this translation of Sar ο Tah-e Yak Karbas were chosen by Princeton University Press.

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Preface

color and bouquet of a tale or story, and finally he turned them into a book which he now presents to his dear countrymen and, in par­ ticular, to his fellow citizens of Isfahan, who have gotten used to this far-off storyteller. To free myself from blame, it would perhaps not be inappropriate meanwhile to note one point. As I have already pointed out briefly in the introduction to Talkh ο Shirin, "The Bitter and the Sweet," I consider the future as fundamentally rooted in the past. That is, I consider history a fundamental influence and agent in people's destiny and I am convinced that in the season when we can, as is right and proper, bring water without much being wasted to the fields of our hopes and the farms of our objectives, we will recognize its fountainhead. Aside from social foundations being in the past, since the soul is (or is seen to be) essentially like a bird whose feathered wings have, you might say, been created for flights in the past, inasmuch as it has easier and better flights in that space, I feel in myself a special affection for the past, and although I see the world's destiny in the future, I yet consider truth to be in the past. Like the lover who by inclination and preference meditates on worlds of love and past pleas­ ures and enjoys that activity, I too delight in making past memories live and I want to shape adventures of the past into a story by thread of writing. May my countrymen be also given some brief pleasure and enjoyment from reading it!

1:9

Perhaps as a consequence of these circumstances, most of what I have written until now has been connected with the past. I have no regrets and am even happy to leave the future to the zealous young writers whose feathers of the putrid past have been consumed by the invigorating fire of yearning and excitement and whose flaming eyes are fixed on the present and hope-filled future. Like major prophets and possessors of revelation, they have put the past life behind them and are contemplating the future, holding the worries of tomorrow and wanting to tear apart with axe of aspiration and pick of selfsacrifice the eroded palace of the past filled with snakes and scor­ pions, wanting to be the architects of tomorrow and wanting with help of pen and speech to scatter seed on the natures of their ready countrymen which tomorrow would grow and flourish and bear fruit and bring bread, prosperity, and learning to hungry, deprived, and needy people. AU of that does have its place, but it ought not be forgotten that attachment to old and indigenous manners and customs, which west­ erners call "tradition," is, if not among the requisites of civilization, at least counted among its prominent marks. During the long years

Preface

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which this author has lived in Europe, he has ever been a witness to the extent of Europeans' attachment to their customs, manners, and traditions. Time and again I have seen for myself the annual Swiss festival celebrating local costumes of the twenty-two cantons. Those of my countrymen who have traveled abroad have also seen what strong affection for the past and things from it is shown by civilized nations, whether behind the Iron Curtain or in front of it and whether eastern or western, and what time and effort are spent in preserving old tools and instruments and traditional forms of verse, music, and dance. They plant love and affection for things which are mementos of their fathers and grandfathers—and which so often provoke laugh­ ter, derision, and scorn from many of us Iranians—in the fields of the hearts and minds of their children. They are, in fact, teaching them to worship beauty. Some years ago, after Iranian hats had been exchanged for western headgear at the dictates of Reza Shah, the author wanted to take a sample felt cap back to Europe with him from Tehran. As God is the witness, I rummaged through all the streets and bazaars of Teh­ ran, including the secondhand dealers' bazaar—there was no store I had not gone to and searched—and in no place at all could such a cap be found, and with amazement and regret, I returned to Europe emptyhanded. In contrast, in the streets of western cities and at important meetings and international conferences, one sees east Indians with simple hats and tight, white cotton pants and Scots with pleated kilts and Austrians from the Tyrol with feathered, green felt hats and Chinese women with their long and simple slit dresses. I have now been living in Switzerland for twenty-five years and each year I have seen the pains and efforts taken by the government and by individuals to preserve and protect their ancient manners and customs. They also celebrate holidays commemorating various his­ torical events, like the Festival of Freedom on the first of August and the local festival in Geneva on the twelfth of December, when little kettles of chocolate are given as gifts in memory of the kettle of the old woman who dumped its boiling contents on the heads of the enemy scaling the city walls one night. And they celebrate grapepicking festivals to encourage the vineyard keepers and have harvest festivals and fairs to exhibit their cows and goats and sheep and other festivals with Swiss-style wrestling. People dress in their traditional clothes and engage in the local activities such as weaving and spin­ ning and milking and cheese-making. They believe that this attach­ ment to the past is the very basis of love for native country and affection for homeland and for freedom and independence and it is

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Preface

this reverence for national and ethnic customs and habits that makes individuals ready and eager to sacrifice life and property to preserve and protect their ancestral land and water. One should recognize that attachments to the past are inborn and instinctive. No matter how much a person may be a revolutionary and have his eyes fixed on the future and consider salvation in tomorrow, he is in his heart attached to his own past and that of his country; and one should not imagine it possible, by any proof, argument, or reason, to declare as justified and beneficial a war with the manners and customs of the past (especially where they are accepted, rational, useful, and desirable). From days of yore it has been thus and even Plato, who was in favor of a republic and new and novel systems, said he considered the Egyptians correct in protecting their ancient customs although, according to history, it had been carried to such excess that all the songs and dances the children learned were prescribed and fixed, and often given a religious aspect with no one permitted to make new melodies, songs, or dances. What is called "style of life" in French and what people in the United States refer to as the "American way of life" is, in my opinion, the same as customs, manners, and traditions, and without them, no people or nation will truly have the personality and individuality to which all the beauty and value of a civilization in the first rank are tied. The author of this book is not a mummy-worshipper nor at all a partisan of rotten, stinking things, and he is the enemy of all things bad and harmful and unreasonable, though they be from the time of the legendary king, Jamshid, but he is convinced that his countrymen have imitated foreigners excessively. They have gotten to a point where notwithstanding all the basic beauty in the Persian language, they give their newborn children western names and call their daughters Victoria and Jeanette. It has even become customary in their capital to celebrate the westerners' New Year with a pomp and splendor not one whit less than that of their own ancient New Year's festival at the spring equinox and in distinguished households of the metropolis, a number of delicious Iranian foods still sought after by foreigners are by stages disappearing and being replaced by foreign dishes. Little by little, drinks made with sweet and sour syrup or yoghurt and cucumbers, for all the virtues which they did and do have, cannot be seen on sofrehs (if those have not been changed to tables—and may that not be!), and American drinks with amazing names are taking their place. This author says imitation is not a good practice and when we have something with good in it that's our own, we

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should not rush so eagerly to adopt something with badfromothers. Iranians need not be hostile to every faith and belief just because the Russians have said, "Religion is the opiate of the people," nor need they look for excuses to uphold by might of force or fist whatever incoherent words seem right to us laggards, as do young American brutes who smash a man's mouth and jaw to a pulp with their fists as soon as they're told their eyebrows are over their eyes, nor need we confuse top and bottom in accumulating gold and silver, just because the English with their commercial natures have said, "Time is money," and thereby deprive ourselves of the amenity of reflection and repose of which an hour is considered equal to the worship of men and jinns (and, really, reflection and repose are the most valuable of amenities and are specialties of our great, learned, and accomplished men). Going even a step further, this writer does not count on his compatriots practicing the precepts of the poet, Sa'di, who said, "Embellishing one's own old clothes is better than asking to borrow some," and the poet, Sana'i, who has said, "One's own manure is better than the stranger's musk," and even though he is not going to chime in with Sana'i in saying, "Don't continuously pick the fruit of this and that when you have fruit-bearing trees of your own," he intentionally repeats here that when we have something with good in it that's our own, we should not rush so eagerly to adopt something with bad from others. With all these long and lengthy preliminaries, it is hoped that individuals reading this book will not be very surprised when they reach a point where the author praises the past and, for example, advocates the hookah and defends the aba or eulogizes seminary life and the detachment of some of the old-style students and wandering and roaming far and wide on foot and horseback. It is also hoped that the readers will meanwhile further bear in mind that exaggeration and hyperbole are sometimes not only harmless for advancing an aim or purpose but many a time turn out to be useful. In the event that aba and hookah and desert wandering and pilgrimages to graves be not much sought for themselves, possibly the mention and explanation of them would to an extent serve the purpose of somewhat reminding the beloved readers of the past and making them mindful of our national manners and customs and would thus lead to the conclusion that injudiciously borrowing from others will in the end produce bankruptcy and shame. Geneva, fall 1955. Jamdlzddeh

Go to Isfahan so that you see the second paradise! Send greetings to its Zayandeh River from my eyes! [Bahar]

PART I *

Memories of Childhood Times

1-18

Everyone knows that I am a legitimate child of Isfahan and born of its pure earth. 1 That Isfahan is called "half the world" is enough to describe the city. That by making a profession of contentment, which is one of their excellent characteristics, its people have been satisfied with "half the world" for a city that is really worth a hundred worlds suffices to describe them. Hafez of Shiraz, who was orginally an Isfahani, considered his Shiraz better than our Isfahan, even though he called our Zayandeh River the Water of Life. Love for homeland is no fault, of course, and given his eminence, I have no alternative except to quote his own phrase, "Praise be on his pure but mistaken view!" Fortunately, others who are fair and perceptive and know the truth have another opinion about our Isfahan, the image of heaven. The poet Jamal-od-din Abd-orrazzaq has said even about its earth: "Reason would take the earth of Isfahan for eye salve." Fakhr-e Gorgani of Isfahan, who is sometimes called the Pride of Iran, and other notables who have had some acquaintance and dealing with Isfahan have all come up with sayings which are bywords in praise and eulogy of it. One has said: Who says, "Isfahan is half the world"? If there is a world, it is Isfahan! Someone else has sung: 1

(Jz)Although my father was born in Hamadan and came to Isfahan as an adult, he is still known everywhere as an Isfahani. In contrast, my mother is from generations of Isfahanis and is a descendant of Baqer Khan Khorasgani, who governed Isfahan during the Zands [A.D. 1750-1794] and claimed sovereignty, calling himself Shah Baqer. One of his sons, Mohammad Hoseyn Khan, was made governor of Isfahan in A.D. 1789 and another, Mirza Mohammad Khan, wrote poetry and was also governor for a while in the early Qajar period. My mother's father was Mirza Hasan Khan.

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Memories of Childhood Times

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They said, "Isfahan is half the world!" They half-described Isfahan. 1:19

Another poet who had lost his heart to nature's beauty got to the gist of the matter in these two short couplets: The lip of the Zayandeh River and the breeze of spring, The lip of the adored and the delicious wine, Uproot sorrow from the heart as The prince's dagger uproots oppression. Khaqani sent the message from his road far away: Is it the houri's perfume or the air of Isfahan? Is it the houri's forehead or the face of Isfahan? When Khezr's hand found not the spring again, He made ablutions with the trampled dust of Isfahan.2 The sun's eyes always were in pain, With envy of the kohl-producing earth of Isfahan.

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They have also said a lot, both good and bad, regarding Isfahan's people, but there is no room for doubt and no one denies that they are a sharp-thinking, hard-working, simply dressed, clever, and witty people, and though they pull the wool over the heavens' eyes, no one can pull the wool over their eyes. It is these very Isfahanis who built this historic city and its comfort and thriving state are not the work of recent days; it thrived and flourished for centuries before the Safavids. Naser-e Khosrow Alavi, the writer and traveler who passed through it about a thousand years ago, has written this about one of its lanes: "There was a lane called Street of the Embroiderers in which there were fifty excellent caravanserais and in each one sat many ven­ ders and shopkeepers." Elsewhere he says, "A caravan which we accompanied had one thousand, three hundred donkeyloads and, when we went into the city, we could stop without having to look around twice for there was no problem of a shortage of space nor any diffi­ culty about the stage-stop or fodder." Regarding provisions and Is­ fahan's climate, he writes, "The people there said no one had ever seen less than fifty pounds of bread for one dinar, and in all the Persian-speaking world, I have seen no finer or more complete and thriving city than Isfahan. It is said that wheat and barley and other grains would not be ruined if they were stored for twenty years." 2 Khezr, sometimes equated with the prophet Elias, is supposed to have found and drunk the Water of Life to become immortal. The ritual ablutions (layammori) of Mus­ lims may be done with sand when water is not available.

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Furthermore, it should not be imagined that Isfahan's comfort and thriving state are simply a gift from God; rather, an important part of it is undoubtedly thanks to the efforts and expertise of its people. Otherwise, the Zayandeh River's water is, as all know, increasingly brackish and Isfahan's earth is so tough and hard that it is generally recognized that "the Isfahani peasant takes his daily bread from God by force." Those who have taken walks around the outskirts of Is­ fahan during the growing season have seen villagers bringing water out of the mountains and bedrock with the point of a pick and the blade of an axe. Among those, AIi Jowahar Kalam has written in his exquisite book, The Zayandeh River (printed in A. D. 1933): Last year in summer, the author was present in the Rudasht district of Isfahan. The peasants were drawing water from wells at the sides of the fields, fearing the rain would not come and the crops would dry out. With no machines or pumps to use, the middle-class peasants had fastened their cows and mules to the well wheel and the poorer peasants had fastened their wives and daugh­ ters. They drew water by going up the hill and coming down, and after collecting water in a large vessel, several people would take the end and tip it over at the foot of the fields, for if they poured the water from a bucket into an irrigation ditch, it would dry up right in the ditch and not reach the fields.

1:22

Any witness viewing the drudgery of the night-soil removers going back and forth in the villages around Isfahan at the morning call for prayer knows what great importance dung and manure have in that region's agriculture and why it has been said: "The income of Isfahan's people is derived from the outlet," and the golden jug of the melon from the nearby village of Gorgab will sweeten the palate of the sarcastic Tehranis until the sweet life of the Gorgab peasant is about to leave him. It is by the zeal and perseverance and knowledge of these same people that not a drop of water of the Zayandeh River, which is famous for the thousand and one canals pouring into it and which runs a length of fifty parasangs from the spring of Chakhan to the salt marsh of Gaw-khuni, is wasted uselessly. It is obvious that when lazy and self-indulgent people see the com­ fort of Isfahan's people and grasp that "Isfahani" is actually equiva­ lent to "clever" in the calculations ofabjad3 and that the Isfahani will 3 Abjad is an arrangement of the Arabic alphabet assigning to each letter a numeric value between 1 and 1,000. For "Isfahani," the values are 1 + 90 + 80 + 5 + 1 + 50 + 10 for the letters 'sfny, and for "clever," the values are 7 + 10 + 200 + 20 (zyrk), the total for each word being 237.

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somehow or other bail himself out and will somewhere or other get hold of money and food and drink, no matter what the obstacle, it arouses their sense of envy. Then they begin the disparagement: Isfahan is a heaven full of amenities! Whatever you might imagine possible is in it. Everything about it is excellent except— It should have no Isfahanis in it. 1:23

Little by little it reaches a point where the thought of the Isfahanis' orderliness, prosperity, and satisfaction even precludes their compa­ triots' sleep and disturbs their dreams. It is said: A mystic saw Satan one night in a dream. He said, "By Bu Torab, O Satan, Aren't those born in Isfahan your students?" He replied, "Those are Their Exalted Excellencies, the teachers!"

1:24

From the ancients, we pass to the wits of Tehran and today's jest­ ers in the capital. They show courage in making cracks about the Isfahanis, and while pretending to imitate their accent, which like many of their other peculiarities is basically inimitable, they change short vowels to e even where the Isfahanis do not and have great fun parodying the Isfahani clothsellers. But paying no attention to this tasteless insolence and banal vul­ garity, the Isfahani is busy as an ant, day and night, at his own work with utmost assurance and confidence. He continually exchanges the products of his factories and the toil of his peasants and craftsmen for coined gold and silver on all sides and in all regions, foreign and domestic. He purifies the dusty, gumlike substance which he pulls off by the tenth of an ounce from the thorns and brush of his plains, and in the form of a wholesome and delicious paste mixed with musk willow and almond and pistachio kernels, he puts it to sleep in the heart of white flour like a pearl hidden in an oyster and, under the name gaz and inside those noted wooden boxes on top of which he glues its picture, he sends one donkeyload after another in all direc­ tions of Iran and the world beyond, and purse after purse and bag after bag of round two qerdn coins and paper bank notes, peace upon them, are attracted to the Zayandeh River's banks. The association of Isfahanis with intelligence and shrewdness is not of recent origin. Their knowledge, expertise, and experience have been famous from days of yore, and not without reason has it been said:

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A king should have four categories of people from four places, So he may be permanently distinguished on the throne of leadership: Minstrels from Herat, confidants and cronies from Qazvin, Military men from Tabriz, executives from Isfahan.

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Have you not heard that the Sassanian king, Khosrow Parviz, had 373 generals of whom 200 were Isfahanis? Have you not read in histories that the caliphs selected most of their court officials and agents from the people of Isfahan? Was not the Abbasid general, Abu Moslem, originally an Isfahani? It is said that Isfahan's people are not openhanded and are, in their terms, stingy, but was not Jamal-od-din, the famous vizier of Mosul who became known as The Generous for his abundant generosity and bounty, an Isfahani? The Isfahani is among the distinguished creations of this world. Everyone who has come to deal with him knows that, like those Jom-Jom (Shaking) Minarets which are so much a source of pride and boasting for young and old in that city, even if the Isfahani quakes for a lifetime, he is always still firmly in place, seated where he be­ longs. 4 He is exactly like the Zayandeh River, which is yet a fountainhead afresh for masses of lush greenery even when it is dry. The very surprising point is that despite all the Isfahanis' outward profit-worship, such that you would think of high and low as being created only for accumulating wealth and property and adding fifty dinars to a hundred and that money is, so to speak, bound into their lives, never do they neglect also to remember God. Under the pro­ tection of their innate cleverness and shrewdness, they conform to the Arabic words: " H o w beautiful are religion and worldly things when joined together!" and they have reached a stage where few peers and equals can be found for them on earth. In bringing together this world and the hereafter and this life and the next, which really is taking two watermelons under one arm, the Isfahani openly dis­ plays a dexterity and skill which verge on sorcery and sleight-of-hand and leave human intellect amazed. If God has woven the warp of their existence with the thread of cash and capital, he has fashioned their weft with the yarn of piety and goodness. It is exactly as if the Isfahani were keeping the means of living in one pan of the scales of practical knowledge and making room in the other pan for the means of salvation. He continually goes back and forth on the rope of 4 The Shaking Minarets are about three miles west of the city and wave back and forth slightly if pushed.

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worldliness and the life to come like the most skillful tightrope walker and seldom does it happen that he steps outside the sphere of equi­ librium and loses his balance. He is serene and quiet and gets along with priests and police and comes to terms with governors and mul­ lahs, tricking them both and hiding half a bowl of earthly profits beneath the bowl of rewards in the next life with such mastery and cleverness that Satan says, "Congratulations!" If he has one foot in the stirrup of this world, his other is in the stirrup of the Day of Seventy Thousand Years. You surely know about Akhond Molla Abdollah Yazdi, one of the ulama with many noble qualities and teacher of the father of Sheykh Baha'i, and his coming to Isfahan. After just one watch on the very first night, he told his followers to bundle up their bags and baggage to leave the city as quickly as possible because he saw thousands of displays of wine and immoral amusements were arranged and waiting throughout the city. He feared lest God send down some punishment and they too would be burned in the fires from the city. Bags and baggage were readied and they set off, but they hadn't yet gone far from the city when dawn arrived and the great scholar of Yazd focused his mind's eye on the city and ordered them to return instantly because he saw that several thousand prayer carpets had been laid out and thousands of men and women were busy with prayer and worship. At the same time, it should be realized that when it comes to his rights and benefits and he sees himself exposed to encroachments and inequities, how often this same modest, ceremonious, reasonable, naive, and simple Isfahani with those hands coming politely out of his aba lags behind no one in aggression and highhandedness! Just recently, when our country had throughout become a table to sack and had been confronted with all the legal robberies and transgres­ sions of sacred and secular law, only the people of Isfahan acted boldly with every means and measure whatsoever and did not pay black­ mail. In keeping with "None but the wild boar of Isfahan catches the 5 jackal of the thickets of Mazanderan, " they not only kept their hats firmly on their own heads and did not pay tribute to the jackal, but going a step further, by selling the local fabric (we won't go more now into the good and bad of quality and price), they not only saved their homeland but they also made a complete collection of tools for 5 The "jackal" of Mazanderan refers to Reza Shah (the Iranian king who abdicated in 1941) who was known for his greed. In his trips around the country, he would avoid Isfahan because its wealthy citizens, who are also famous for being greedy, would not present him with expensive gifts. The phrase itself is a variation of a folk proverb [see Haim 1956, pp. 278-79]. Jamalzadeh was surprised that there was no negative government reaction to this allusion (Jz-c).

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obtaining the welfare and prosperity of the city and their townsmen. In short, the Isfahani takes the rod of management in one hand and has the cane of trust in God in the other, and whatever happens, he gets his limping donkey to the destination above whose door has been written both "Being Well" and "Ending Well." *

1:28

Alas that not more than ten or eleven years of my life had yet passed when by order of fate (and from fear of excommunication), as will be described in detail, I was separated from such a city and such townsmen! Thirty-five years later when I happened to pass through there again, some of my hair had turned white and the soles of my feet were callused like the knees of a camel from so much useless roaming all over the world. It is true that I had gone ignorant and I returned ignorant, but what a difference between this ignorance and that! The ignorance of the day I left was all purity and innocence and joy and lightheartedness and childhood freedom, and the ignoranee of the day I returned was collected contaminations and anxieties and disillusionments and other mental qualities for which I can't find names. They say the butterfly grows up from a caterpillar; I had gone as a colorful butterfly with lovely wings and was returning as a dirty and disgusting caterpillar. For all that, on that early morning of 1936 in the freshness of one of autumn's nicest days, when the suburbs of that city became visible and my eyes fell from afar on the enchanting view of Isfahan with all those sparkling domes and minarets and I reached the fresh, green gardens of the city's outskirts, which recall bolts of Kashmiri cloth and carpets full of designs and decoration thrown before the feet of a bride, and the Sofeh Mountain appeared south of the city and I discovered myself opposite the pigeon towers which seemed to be looking for me with a hundred white plumed eyes, I suddenly found myself anew at that same age of ten or eleven years old. My heart, which had long been a drum room of sorrow and unhappiness and didn't beat so easily any more, began to beat its wings like a chicken with its head cut off. Noticing my state, my friend seated next to me in the automobile started softly singing, Moving majestically with the caravan on the road to Isfahan, The hundred two-humped camels in a line are lovely. When the moon rises at night, the camel bell ends; The melodies sung by the wayfarer's flute are lovely.

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ίΊ

With loving affection, some friends I'd never met had come out to meet me. We kissed each other thoroughly and, as it happened and as you know (to use Sa'di's phrase), an hour later I became the com­ plete and total master of the house and the giver of commands and bans with no exceptions in a home which I had not seen even in a dream. Our kind host, whose pleasant face I was seeing for the first time, was a son of an old and loyal friend of my father. The engaging features of his dear, departed father were drawn on the tablet of my mind back in childhood and will not be forgotten to the brink of the grave. He was an august sayyid, descended from one of the Twelve Imams, a scholar's son, and known as Ayatollah. He had turned his back on hypocrisy and deceit during that period of autocracy and subterfuge and joined with a group of lovers of freedom and wor­ shippers of justice and had a special status in a limited circle of con­ fidants. Even now long after his death, the rends of Isfahan tell stories of him. They say that one day he was passing in front of the famous Sayyed Mosque in Bidabad. He saw the mosque attendant, one of Isfahan's innumerable turban-wearers, with broomstick in hand at­ tacking a gaunt and spiritless dog. With the callousness and cruelty which is always and everywhere the earmark of those nearest the seat of religious law, the attendant had battered the dumb animal bloody. Even then he didn't desist, and he was beating it to death while the common herd like cattle formed a circle like propped-up planks around the beater and the beaten, blocking the poor dog's means of escape.6 Ayatollah approached that faithful Muslim and turbanned Ebn MoIjam and addressed him by his full name, "Haj Hoseyn AIi, it is wellknown that: The Arab in the desert eats locusts; The dog of Isfahan drinks ice water!

1:30

Now ice water really is an extra, but tell me, why are you beating that animal of God this way?" He replied with an Isfahani accent, "The damn—the damned bastard went into the mosque and polluted the house of God!" Surprised, Ayatollah said, "Hey now, that poor animal doesn't have any intelligence or sensitivity. But as for me, well, I do have intelligence and sensitivity—and you've never seen my feet step into a mosque." 6 The description of the observers of this episode uses two Qoranic allusions: "They are like cattle; rather, they are further astray" (7:178) and the phrase "propped-up planks," which occurs in the chapter titled "Hypocrisy" (63:4) (J z _ c )·

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This great and august sayyid was present one day at a party of one of the Isfahan ulama and the soil of Isfahan came up in conversation. One of those present said, "The soil of Isfahan is the soil for taking bribes, as is well-known." Appearing to take the right side, Ayatollah said in the Isfahani dialect, which somewhat accentuates the meaning of the words, "Then that must be the reason why the distinguished ulama of this city are commonly called the dust on the feet of the faithful."

1:31

After he was already grown up and had a wife and children, Heydar AIi related, "My father's people, who were all mullahs and saintly men and people of the cloak and turban, came to meet with my father one day right when I was going to school. As soon as we brought them tea, they said with one voice, 'We won't touch our lips to any food or drink so long as you send your son to school.' Not until my father promised not to allow me to go to school any more were they ready to drink tea. But once they had left, he said to me, 'Run and get your books and homework and go off to school!' I was delighted and said, 'Then what happens to the promise you made?' 'Piss on that promise!' he said, and it was just that pissing which brought about my prosperity and that of my family." In short, we arrived at the house of such a father's son who himself didn't fall short of his father, and may the son's life be as long as his father's death! I saw kindness and brotherly love in that Inn of Af­ fection such as I had never seen in my own house. Even now when a lifetime has passed since that period, whenever I remember the sheltering peace of that hospitality and generosity which during my stay in Isfahan became the lot of one like me, completely unknown and a stranger in that city, I raise both hands to the heavens for myself and my countrymen, rather, on behalf of all the Orient's in­ habitants, and pray to the beneficent Lord that in this era when we have generally been proud and even eager to kick away many of our ancient practices, we at least be left this attribute of hospitality which has always been characteristic of us Orientals in the eyes of foreigners and has always been praised by them. Now we return to Najd and the friends of Najd, 7 that is, to Isfa­ han, the image of paradise, and the beloved Isfahanis and their qual­ ities. Our kind host left us completely to ourselves and we saw each 7

The phrase about Najd is from The Masnavi of Rumi: Speak again of Najd and the friends of Najd, So that you bring joy to the suffering heart. Najd is a Muslim pilgrimage place; returned pilgrims love to recount long stories of events of their pilgrimage 0 Z " C )·

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other almost only at the colorful sofieh for meals at noon and in the evening. Where he was active and apt in all activities, I was idle and inept in every activity. He had one head and a thousand cares while I was a stranger, care-ridden with no head or home. During those days you can count on your fingers of my stay in Isfahan, I heard so many savory phrases and well-coined jokes and pithy remarks that they would make a book if I wrote them all down; I'll leave that for another time. One day a conversation among friends turned to whether Isfahan had progressed or declined since the 1906 Constitution. In general, they believed that aside from the number of factories, it had declined, but one of them insisted that it had made quite a lot of progress. When they asked him for proof and evidence, he said, "Have you forgotten that our night-soil removers formerly loaded donkeys with night soil in sacks and took it from the city and haven't you seen with your own eyes that now those same night-soil removers load it in tin containers from the oil companies?" We laughed so much we nearly split a gut. I've said less than I could about the love and candor of my other fellow citizens. The first question of every person I encountered was, "Have you seen the Jom-Jom Minarets (the Shaking Minarets)?" "I thought I would see some of the city's other historical buildings first," I would say. "What are those!" they'd say with an Isfahani accent. "Shove those aside and get yourself to the Jom-Jom Minarets which are among the wonders of creation and which even westerners have been incapable of understanding!" But alas, with absolute shame and embarrassment, I must confess that fortune was no help and I said farewell to Isfahan without having seen the Jom-Jom Minarets. During those very first days after arriving in Isfahan, as soon as I could clear my shoulder of the onerous burden of the customary visits back and forth, which are among the social duties of Isfahan's idle and unemployed (among whom most of our compatriots are to be reckoned), I escaped from that house stuck on the famous Avenue of the Four Gardens like a runaway child fleeing from school. I don't know why, but that avenue with all its charm and splendor seemed to me like a body with only skin and bones left on it. Somewhat further on, I reached the Zayandeh River and saw Isfahan asleep in the lap of the riverbed like a suckling babe drinking the milk of comfort and prosperity from the bountiful breasts of that loving nurse. When I passed beneath the thirty-three arches of the very beautiful Bridge of Allah Verdi Khan, I remembered Ziya Kafrani's verses which I had seen in my father's book of jottings that began:

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O idol, roaming gadabout, Alas! Would you end up in disgrace? and goes on until he says: Don't drink wine in drinking cups with anyone! Don't go and walk in the Four Gardens! Or if you go, don't go poking around under the bridge! Don't brand our heart red like the tulip! It's a dangerous place beneath the bridge; It's the dwelling ground of dauntless lutis, The bud going there is slit like the rose! Accounts are cleared again there.

1:34

Across the river to the left, my eyes fell from the distance on the Muslim cemetery, Takhteh-pulad, and as is customary, I brought my right hand to my chest and pointed its index finger toward the cemetery, and saying, "Hello to you, O people of the grave," I sadly and sincerely offered a Fateheh abbreviated at both ends to the prisoners of the earth among whom generations of my maternal forefathers also slept. Then I went on from the river bank without any goal or purpose. Going somewhat higher, I came to a humble, lighted coffeehouse at the edge of a thicket opposite the exceedingly beautiful and exciting Khaju Bridge. I sat cross-legged on one of those wooden benches that was falling apart with boards in which the fire of pipe and hookah had made holes like a sieve and spots like a leopard skin. Since

"It's a dangerous place beneath the bridge . . .!

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following the precept of Hafez, the Invisible Tongue of Shiraz, who has said: Throw wisdom in the Zayandeh River and drink wine, To the songs of Iraqi youths!

1:35

was not possible, that is, I had no intelligence to throw in the water and I was also excused from drinking wine, being content with less and missing my friends a thousand times over, I drank several thimble-sized glasses of fragrant tea of a nice strength, one after the other, and to round out my pleasure and enjoyment, I also ordered a hookah with proper tobacco from the village of Hakan and smoked as long as I could. One day I went to the graveyard of Ab-bakhshegan. On Thursday nights in my childhood, my mother had frequently taken my hand and said, "We'll go have some fresh air and get ourselves perked up," and she took me to that very graveyard not far from our house. A picture of it has remained in my mind like a dream or fantasy. In a state which cannot be described, I amused myself looking at the graves. Among them, the grave of a woman named Shah-jehan attracted my attention, for in addition to the name and date on her tombstone, this picture had also been engraved:

I grasped nothing from those mysterious engravings and when I returned home and came to the point of investigating it, it was determined that this woman had woven the long, white veils worn with chadors and those engravings would have been her loom and the tools and instruments for her work. It is said that 142 guilds of artisans and craftsmen formerly existed in Isfahan and got their daily bread by their skilled workmanship; most of them remain even now. I was shown a book titled Sea of Jewels, which listed those guilds, and I saw in it occupations whose names I had never heard, such as heel-maker, turban-twister, thread-beater, stitcher of the velvet or-

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naments called taklu, henna-pounder, shuttle-maker, and others, such as janah tardsh, sadaq anddz, and weavers ofjahak, which still mean nothing to me. After having tea and a hookah, I tore myself away with a thousand sorrows and regrets from that agreeable coffeehouse, and making inquiries all along, I set out by highways and byways for the Ahmadabad quarter, which was my mother's quarter. My mother's folks all lived right around that quarter near a square which the Isfahanis call a saheh. I have now forgotten its name, but I recall that there was a public bath at one end. I still remember that since my father was often in flight from Isfahan on account of the mullahs and the government and we had no man to take me with him to the baths, my mother cast caution to the winds one day and took me with her to that public bath at the morning call to prayer when it was not yet crowded. My head still hadn't been soaped nor the dirt on me dissolved when the women just arriving began to gripe and be abusive, "Oh, alas, dust on the part of my hair! Did you want to bring his daddy as company too, sister?" As soon as my poor mother saw there was about to be a ruckus, she was quite dis­ concerted, and with her eyes about to overflow with tears, she scrambled me out of the baths half-washed, like a mouse pulled out of the water, and took me home. Even now when forty years have passed since that date, every time I happen to remember that day, I feel myself dirty and unwashed. Now that my mother's quarter and her relatives have come up, it would not be amiss to also say a few words regarding my grand­ father, considering he was apparently a special man. Mirza Hasan Baqer Khan died before I was born. A portrait of him was left which was painted during his lifetime. The painter, named Mirza AU, painted him as Abu Zar Ghafari, a devoted companion of the Prophet, with a turban on his head and a cloak and sash, standing behind His High­ ness the Commander, AU, and facing Ghambar, AU's Abyssinian slave. Alas, as the particulars show, he was a man of mystic tendencies, interested in only three things: first, practicing the nasta'liq script; second, alchemy; and third, marriages. He had some talent in nasta'liq, and for years after his death, in every nook and corner of his house, underneath rugs and inside books, many pieces of his exercises were found which were aU proof of his natural talent and good taste and the powers of his fingers. One thing I do know about his alchemy is that the major portion of his possessions were used up by it, and my mother still relates with rue and regret that in the dowry prepared for her ahead of time, there were some silver vessels which her father

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gradually took from her piece by piece, and promising to change them into gold, he turned them over to dervishes and alchemists. As for his marriages—like other notables of that period (and this period and all periods), the deceased had an especially large appetite for that business. In addition to the three wives which he had under his thumb in Isfahan itself, he also kept under his hat in the suburbs some other permanent and temporary wives, who still have descendants left in Na'in. Right in the Ahmadabad quarter, three or four large and small houses had been joined together, and there he housed his three city wives with their countless offspring, male and female. Among these city wives, his third and favorite wife had strange and surprising turns of mind about which my mother repeatedly told me stories. Among them was the third wife's claim to be a friend and companion of the jinns and fairies and to have one of the jinns in love with her. 1:38

At the close of day when the sun was golden, she would go to the roof and dance for some time with her eyes closed, calling it dancing with the fairies. Once she threw a bucket into the well to draw up water and the bucket happened to come up full of sugar and rock candy. Briefly, she quite charmed and infatuated her husband through these very tricks and manipulations, so much that once a year she sat him in a dark room, which they even showed me in my childhood, for a so-called forty-day devotion and then she plastered up the doors and windows. Down through a hole she had fixed in the ceiling, she threw him a few almond kernels a day as provisions. After her hus­ band's death, this cheat, who also had an ample share of beauty and a bewitching loveliness, claimed that the late Khan had made her his one and only heir. The other heirs lodged a complaint against her, and on the day she was about to be sentenced in the ecclesiastical court, she suddenly brought out a flaming fire from underneath her chddor and said, "By this very light of the Prophet, I swear that truth is on my side and whatever I have said is the absolute truth." Since lighting fires with flint was a difficult job in Isfahan at that time and required tools and apparatus, the judge and plaintiffs were dumb­ struck on witnessing that conspicuous miracle and visible magic, and the claim of that tricky and deceitful woman was upheld. Some time later when matches had become prevalent in Isfahan, they realized

1:39

that this deceiving woman had obtained some through the Armeni­ ans of Julfa and had settled on them as the means for furthering her claim, as has been described. I had many uncles and cousins on my mother's side and among them, I had a special affection for my Uncle Hoseyn. The reason for this affection was the difference in the makeup of Uncle Hoseyn and

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the other uncles. They were all literate and educated people and men of pen and paper, whereas my Uncle Hoseyn had spent his youth in hunting and traveling and tours and excursions. When he came back from the hunt late in the evening with a hunting cap on his head and a muzzleloader on his shoulder, with a bag at his waist and with his leg wrappings, gaiters, powder flask, fuse bag, ramrod case, shotbox, hunting horn, hunting knife, and high boots, with that sunburned face and his luxuriant mustaches and dusty face and hair, and when in a masculine manner he emptied the knapsack full of partridge and quail in the middle of the courtyard and my eyes in that imaginative world of childhood fell on all those bloody birds and animals of various kinds, he shined forth in my view as Rostam, son of ZaI, and Sam, son of Nariman, and I boasted to myself about being the nephew of such a sportsman and hero. That was the period when Zell-os-soltan, the Qajar prince then governor of Isfahan, had just built near the city a spacious and pleasant garden called the New Garden, using materials taken up from the Avenue of the Four Gardens. Uncle Hoseyn spent most Fridays with family and friends and comrades and companions of his in that garden, which was open to the public. On one Friday, he took me with him to the garden too. AU the preparations had been organized perfectly. They had hardly entered that extensive garden with the river running through its center when they lit the samovar and set the kettle of pilau on the fire. They took off some clothes and hung their hats on the trees. While waiting for dinner, they were busy whooping it up with various games, one of which was questionsand-answers, with losers getting our water-soaked sashes flicked at them like a whip. The garden was filled by the crowd and with the utmost joy and mirth (of which I unfortunately saw no traces when I returned to Isfahan forty years later, although Zell-os-soltan and troublesome mullahs like Aqa Najafi weren't around any more), a handful of people had formed a circle in one corner of the garden. Taking pebbles and bits of stone in hand, they struck them together and in loud voices sang this ballad which had no end and which I suspect they had improvised themselves right on the spot: We go to the New Garden for a walk, walk, walk. We eat the apricot for its pit, pit, pit. We break the pit for its kernel, kernel, kernel. We eat the kernel for its taste, taste, taste. 1:41

Sometimes the sound of Zell-os-soltan's well-known laughter from afar also coiled around all sides of the garden like a well wheel's

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sound when its rope has come apart. People were aware from the sound that the prince was also in a good humor and this further increased their joy and mirth. It is said that talk begets talk. The conversation about Uncle Hoseyn reminds me of his wife. In those days of my visit to Isfahan, Uncle Hoseyn's wife, who was still alive (and I hope she is passing her life happily and well even yet), came to see me one day. I greatly enjoyed seeing that pious woman, who had been a model of good taste and housekeeping and pleasant speech right from her youth, and hearing that perfect, unalloyed Isfahani accent of hers. She insisted that I return the visit one day. Since aside from those virtues men­ tioned, this woman was the first person to teach me the alphabet, I accepted her invitation and went on the appointed day to the Mirzas' Lane in the Crossroad of Ali-qoli AqI quarter in search of her. She had watered and swept the house and was seated waiting for me with a passel of family and relatives young and old whom I had never seen or heard of in a room with carpets which she had woven all with her own hands. It was indeed a gathering worth seeing! They completely surrounded me and the sound of smacking kisses rose. One of the saintly and pious sayyids with a long beard, who had taken off his turban following the decrees of Reza Shah Pahlavi and had put on a hat, brought his hands out from under his aba and took the seat of honor with his hat on his head, at pains to appear dignified like the proverbial mouse seated on a bar of soap. It seems he was the hus­ band of one of the daughters of my maternal uncles. After taking tea and various kinds of homemade sweets, the gentleman took his lips from the yard-long hookah tube and asked, "Where have you been visiting these many years, Your Excellency?" To make matters short, I said, "I was on the Continent." The blessed beard began wagging, and from its various layers a voice came out, asking, "By the Con­ tinent, do you also mean Bombay?" "It's that indeed!" I said. " M y uncle, Haj, may God drown him with His mercies, was also in Bom­ bay for a while," he said, "and he described how they wrap each grape in cotton and sell them for a half a qeran each." "And a curse on whoever denies it!" I said. After that gentleman, my maternal uncle's wife began making her inquiries, "Let's see now, what did you do about prayers and fasting in Europe?" "You're asking what I do, dear aunt?" I said. "I say prayers and keep the fasts." (God's curse on the liars!) "Then why have you taken a European wife?" she said. "She's become a Mus­ lim," I said. "You're trying to put something over on me," she said. "How does a European woman become a Muslim?" "She said, 'There

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is no God but Allah,' and became a Muslim," I said. "You probably gave her such a bad time," she said, "that she got cross and said, 'There is no God but Allah!' " 8 Anyhow, most days I freed my collar by Isfahani tricks from the clutches of the thousand-for-a-penny involvements and went secretly to the Zayandeh River's edge and sat in a corner all alone and un­ known and turned back the hands of life's clock some forty years. Instead of all those novels and stories long and short which I had read in different languages about peoples of every kind, I returned to the tales and stories of my own early days, and opening the notebook of childhood tales, I started reading, turning the pages, and I found each time some new pleasure from looking at its unusual, old-fash­ ioned handwriting and composition. The amazing thing is that in contrast to books of children's tales whose bindings are torn and whose pages are falling apart from so much page-turning, my tales had remained so untouched and undamaged after forty years that they seemed to have come freshly out from the shop of the book­ seller, Destiny. Albeit some pages were worn, yet the writing re­ mained just as it had been, with no traces of erasures or strike-outs, and the meddling fingers of Time had left the bookmarks placed between some of the pages during childhood untouched in their place. I sometimes cut the thread of reading and like a child playing kites, I tied the kite of my thoughts to the weak, worn string of memory, and entrusting it to the swift hands of the winds of the minutes and hours, I sent it traveling in the misty world of the past. The worlds which I then traveled had no connection with the worlds of this earth. Like lovely shades of smoke rising from the earth, strange details from childhood began parading before my eyes and gradually took life and started staging a play, and the smoky memories of forty years ago appeared as good dreams and bad which had, so to speak, just now been interpreted. Sometimes the sound of the washing of the printed cotton called qalamkar tore into my naps and I saw the washermen, barefoot and half-naked with skullcaps on their heads, busy washing qalamkar at the river's edge. Taking the qalamkar in their palms like a whip, they drenched it with water and pounded it on the rocks as hard as pos­ sible for hours. Observing them, I said to myself, "Evidently, like the sons of man, the qalamkar doesn't get endurance and stability or 8 "There is no god but Allah" recited in Arabic is an essential of the Muslim profes­ sion of faith. It is also, however, often uttered by women in major or minor crises or in irritation at someone.

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become worthy of the bazaars of the discerning either unless it beats its head against the stones." Then I would get up and begin wandering about in the lanes, drift­ ing without direction, aimless and confused, like someone setting out at night with eyes closed in the shining light of the moon. I didn't know where I was or where I was going and moving always for­ ward, I enjoyed seeing one after another of the squashed-down houses of mud and sunbaked brick, full of holes and fissures, clinging to each other like timid, old women who cherish life and who, when faced with danger, do not move or raise their voices. I passed the foot of wobbly, cob-plastered walls which you would think would drop at any moment like loose, rotted, and decayed teeth, but yet they stay firmly in place for a time, carrying out their work.

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I passed long hours in those dark and narrow lanes called Recon­ ciling (because two people must be reconciled to pass in them), and in those curved and crooked long and narrow lanes full of ups and downs, I followed that sayyid child of six or seven years old who rolled in the dust and dirt right in those lanes thirty or forty years ago with children of his own age and who heard juicy insults in the thickest Isfahani accents from passers-by and didn't even turn a hair. Alas, this nosy little no-good kid got lost like a song in infinite space and like a perfume disappearing in air and I'll never get him back again! I passed in front of hundreds of stores whose total merchandise, if anyone should sometime seek to buy it, would not yield more than the price of a dozen or so pounds of bread and a few ounces of meat per store. The shopkeepers were seated right there with arms around their knees, hunched down next to their humble displays, and it wasn't at all clear how the Provider would satisfy their stomachs or how they would clothe their scrawny bodies. I too was busy going back and forth among those people and the groups of passers-by and I felt that no one saw me. How much I wanted to stop them and introduce myself and have a conversation with them, but it seemed as if I feared they wouldn't understand my language and would poke fun at me and overwhelm me with the brand-new wisecracks which are the mint coin of Isfahan. I was sur­ prised. Why did no one among this crowd notice me? Why weren't they aware that I was a dead man who had returned from another world? Why didn't they think of surrounding me and asking for news of that other world? Like someone dreaming, I sometimes felt that I had grown feath­ ered wings and was flying and other times my feet were so heavy

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that I feared I would fall to the ground. I wanted to reach the New Quarter where we had had a house in my early childhood and finally I did. The stream of water still passed through the middle of the lane as before and the house of the doctor and the vestibule of Haji Mirza Fathollah, who have now both undoubtedly rotted away forty shrouds, were right where they had been. Why then did that wide lane seem so short and narrow now? Why had the house which in my imagi­ nation was a lofty mansion thus become so small and humble? Was our other neighbor, Shams-oz-zakrin, with his blotchy face and red beard and mustaches and thick neck, still in the shackles of life or was he, too, busy rotting away shrouds? Although that man was nominally a rowzeh-khdn, he was in fact a small-time hustler and he worked hand over fist to somehow or other get a little food and drink for his wife and children. His children were limited to two daughters, but what daughters! The rowdy daughter of Sa'di would have to pay tribute to them and kiss their hands! They were goodfor-nothing amazons whom men and women of the quarter took into account. I recall that as soon as they had a hunch that no one was in our house, they would take a lasso and come down through a hole in the roof of the room called the matnba, where Isfahanis first put water before it goes into the courtyard tank, and strip the cherry trees and carry away the plunder through the same hole. I remember well that sometimes they took me to their house and the older daughter would set me on the soles of her feet and walk around the courtyard awhile on her two hands. How often I would later behold the world from the summit of Europe and Asia's highest mountains and from the top of Egypt's pyramids and the highest points of various con­ tinents but never did it seem to have the beauty and fascination that it did atop the feet of the daughter of Shams-oz-zakrin. It was in that house in the New Quarter that I tasted the first cup of anguish and affront at the hands of perfidious fate. Charcoal had been brought for us, and since there had been some delay in paying for it, for reasons which need not be explained, the charcoal-seller came daily, bold and cheeky, and demanded his due in a loud voice, rude as he could be. One day he was so pestiferous and impudent that my poor father couldn't stand it any more, and with his turban on his head, he flew at him like a fighting cock. In that world of childhood where every child considers his father a Rostam-e Dastan, I was certain my father would give that disgraceful ghoul his just deserts in the wink of an eye, but alas! The cheat of an opponent, belligerent, shrill, and contentious, base and blackhearted as possible,

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". . . a woman named Habibeh Soltan who sat behind the spinning wheel day and night . . . "

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was ready for a scrap and the battle didn't turn out as my heart desired. I was so depressed and disappointed that even today when I remember it, the world turns dark and dismal before my eyes and a remorseless hand in my chest seems to squeeze my heart. Contrary to my long-standing custom of somehow or other accommodating myself to the world, I then hurl curses and imprecations on fate with its cruel practice of so often casting contempt on lovers of freedom. There was in our neighborhood a dark and narrow house, like a beehive with its many cob-plastered rooms, and in each room lived a whole family. In one dwelt a woman named Habibeh Soltan who sat behind the spinning wheel day and night for seventeen or eighteen hours, spinning wool, and she raised her fatherless little boy, Taqi. The memory of that woman is even yet a model of industry and peace of mind and self-sacrifice. Another event which I still remember is the calamity that came upon the doctor's son. The old-style doctor, who had a house almost facing ours on the other side of the canal through the middle of the lane, was one of the definite friends of my father. He had a goodlooking, cheerful, and jolly son who was more attached to his own worlds of high life and high times than to the jujube and myosotis of his father's traditional medicines. As mentioned earlier, the people

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of Isfahan at that time would go on Fridays and holidays to the New Garden made by Zell-os-soltan. It so happened that one day a herald proclaimed that on the coming Friday, the New Garden would be the special preserve of the city's women and no man would be al­ lowed to set foot in it. It seems from what happened that Satan got inside the doctor's son, "Come and dress in women's clothes and with chddor, chdqchur, and veil, put yourself into the scene and have an ample share of the highly delectable sight of those lovely faces." Passion and desire prevailed upon that ignorant young fellow and he went to the New Garden in women's clothes and heedlessly cast himself among the women. But since there does exist a difference between the way men and women walk, a eunuch of Zell-os-soltan's harem, who had brought a number of the women in purdah from the prince's harem to the garden, noticed the unlucky fellow's gait and instantly consigned him to the hands of the lackeys and the agents of torture and punishment. The next day they mounted the hapless youngster backwards on a donkey with his face covered with makeup and wearing those women's clothes and walked him around the city for several days. His poor father, a famous and respected man in the city, was about to die from grief and shame, and not until he made an "offering" of all that he owned did they let go of his son. It was in the same house where my mother took my hand one day and led me to the maktab for the first time. She supplied me with a reed pen, a tin slate, a green mosaic footed-inkstand to be held in the left hand like a candlestick while writing, a book made up of Qoran selections and called a panjelham, and a mat to sit on; with her own hands she put the ink pad in my inkstand and poured ink on it from my father's ink bottle. For a couple of days before taking me to the maktab, every time she heard a crow calling, she would cast a loving and affectionate glance at me and sing this ballad, "Caw, caw, a cotton cloth bundle; tomorrow my little son goes to work," since schools for all ages mean "work" for the Isfahanis. The schoolmaster was an dkhond known as "the son of Molla AIi Asghar." That bushy black beard and that tar-colored chest like a wineskin have still not been blotted out of my mind. His face resem­ bled one of those round platters on which the wheat is sprouted for the New Year's festival; none of it was visible because of his mighty beard and mustache and his mouth in the middle was like the hole left to make room for a hookah in the middle of the green sprouts. The maktab of the son of Molla AIi Asghar was one of two rooms which, along with a well and a stinking, cracked, sieve-sized tank and a dark, little hole they called a kitchen, formed the house of His

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Honor, the Akhond. The tnaktab door opened directly onto the lane opposite where the students gathered; it was always left wide-open in such a way that the riffraff and loafers of the quarter could usually amuse themselves for hours by watching us students right from the lane. There were several groups of students. The first were those like me who had to learn by heart the Qoran's "He is the Opener, the Omniscient" in Arabic and, Then blessed be he like the imperial glory of the phoenix! 9 May the beginning of things be in the name of God! in Persian before coming to the alphabet. The second group had gone through that stage and reached the point of joining Arabic letters together and every day before noon they became heralds of their teacher's fame, mingling their voices with cries of the vowel com­ binations for long hours. All my fellow countrymen of that period seem to know still those famous formulas by heart as they do the Qoran chapters beginning "Praise . . . " and "Almost. . . . " There I also learned to pronounce the long a and consonants without vowels, to hold a doubled consonant, and to recognize certain orthographic signs, and if I didn't recognize them, I would suffer the switch on my hands and feet a hundred times until I did.

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In the afternoon, the older ones, who were generally sprouting some fuzz above their lips and had passed through Arabic, meaning the panjelham and Qoran, came to Persian. Just as soon as the son of Molla AIi Asghar himself had led the noon prayers and the ranks had broken up, he opened the book by Judi, a verse elegy well-known to the professional elegy-reciters, and his students who could read Persian raised their voices high in unison and chorused together with the akhond: You are heir to the kingdom of Soleyman, What happened to your finger and your ring too? Open your arms and take Zeynab in your embrace! 10 Ask me, "Where is that veil of yours?" 9 The "phoenix" here is the homd, a bird of Iranian legend; having its shadow fall on one is supposed to presage kingship. In a general sense, fan is "splendor," but can mean more specifically the divine aura of kings. Jamalzadeh added in correspondence that he felt the children reciting these lines did not understand either them or the line in Arabic of the preceding paragraph, and perhaps the mullah did not either. 10 The verses are addressed to Hoseyn by Zeynab. One of Hoseyn's fingers was supposed to have been cut off after he was killed; the ring was supposed to have once belonged to Soleyman (King Solomon, considered a prophet by Muslims) and to have magical powers (Jz-c).

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At that point, the weeping and wailing of the dkhond's wife also rose from behind the always closed doors of the other room of the house and the quarter's businessmen and shopkeepers gathered in front of the school struck their foreheads with their hands and wept and wailed too. The very first day I set foot in the maktab, I was like a bird dropped into a cage. My heart's beating had not yet calmed down when the dkhond asked my name with such a display of passion and vehemence that you would say he was wreaking a hundred-year-old vengeance for his father's murder on me, an innocent child. With trembling voice, I said, "Sayyed Mohammad AIi." He said, "Sayyed Moham­ mad AIi, you'd better realize that this is what's called a maktab. It's not a place for mischief and fooling around. You make any noise and I'll put your toenails under the falakeh, " n and he pointed a finger at the armful of pomegranate switches laid out on the ground opposite his mat.

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Hearing these words, I became tongue-tied; my breath caught in my chest and my tears flowed forth. Beginning to grumble under his breath, he said, "Bring your tin slate! I'll give you an example." Trembling the whole way, I brought my clean and shining slate be­ fore him. With pomp and swagger, he wrote a line at the top of it, passed it back to me, and said, "Write neatly, and bring it to show me in the afternoon." I won't hide it from you—it seems I didn't correctly understand the meaning of "to write," and I thought he meant for me to keep my slate neat and show it to him in the after­ noon. I therefore wrapped it in the handkerchief my mother had for the first time put in my pocket and with utmost care made room for it under my mat. In the afternoon, I heard that same grating voice again, "Sayyed Mohammad AIi, bring your exercise!" I was panicstricken. Frantically bringing my slate out from under the mat, I went in front, frightened and trembling like a sparrow going toward the open gullet of a horned viper. In a twinkling, the falakeh and switch were ready and the two feet of the wronged sayyid child went into the air, and the descendant of the Prophet of God and the apple of the eye of Fatemeh, the Innocent Virgin, tasted for the first time the poison of injustice of the sons of Adam, and from that hour, he " The students are tied by a cord (tanab) to a wooden instrument called the falak(eh), lit., "pole." The ends of the falakeh are usually held by older students while the teacher administers the beating with a stick or switch (chub or tarkeh) on the soles of the feet. Severe physical punishment, though not necessarily in this form, would seem to have been commonplace for Iranian grade school boys well into the 1960s, judging by Iranian students' comments to the translator.

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became thoroughly disappointed and disgusted with science and learning and letters and penmanship. When the dkhond closed the maktab and dismissed the students with the well-known expression, "Hasum!" that same afternoon, I re­ turned home crying. After telling my mother the details of my thrashing, I dug in my heels, because I wasn't going to the maktab again, with no ifs and buts about it. Beginning to cry too, my mother kissed my feet over and over again and promised that she herself would come with me to school tomorrow and bid the dkhond not to beat me again. But the next day, for some reason which I have for­ gotten, I set out for school alone. Luckily, on the road I saw some­ thing such as I had never seen before and which seemed to me the most amazing thing in the world. It was a woman, a European, with an extremely narrow waist and an absolutely enormous straw hat, riding on a horseless vehicle consisting of only two iron wheels and she was moving like a howling wind. I forgot not only the maktab with its lessons and its son of Molla AIi Asghar and its falakeh and stick but the rest of the world too and, panting hard, I went off on her trail. She went so far that she disappeared and I went so far that when I came to my senses, I had lost my way to the maktab and to my home. I raised aloud the little ones' cry of "Which helper would help me?" in Arabic, and I wept so piteously that a good man ap­ peared. Taking my hand, he brought me home and entrusted me to my mother. Much as I wanted to tell her about the extraordinary wonder which I had seen and to at least gloss over the matter of not going to the maktab by that expedient, I couldn't manage it. My mother did, however, understand that I wasn't in shape to go back yet, and deep down she did not want to witness her own child of tender years face to face with the sharp point of the fiery dagger eyes of Molla AH Asghar's son or to accustom her child to the sting of the pomegranate switch. It was, therefore, a couple of days after that when she again took my hand and brought me to another maktab. The new maktab was located in an upper room of the mosque known as the Sayyed Mosque in the Bidabad quarter. The school belonged to the Akhond Molla Taqi whose thin, yellow face had no beard and "whose hat had no wool," as is said of ineffectual people. The special customs and habits which he made the fashion in his maktab ought, however, be justifiably regarded as original and novel discoveries themselves in the science of pedagogy and education of His Honor. Among others, he had appointed one of the students, naming him Sniffer, who, to put it crudely, went around every time an unpleasant smell arose in the maktab environments and knelt on the ground in

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front of each student to distinguish the guilty from the innocent and the wicked from the good with the help of his sense of smell, and then Akhond Molla Taqi administered the law which must be obeyed "so that he will be ashamed of his weakness" with blows of his stick among the students. Among his other novel doings was that he also never prepared his own lunch, and as soon as the afternoon call to prayer rose and the students undid their lunch bundles, he put aside the stick, which you would have said was an inseparable member of his body and with which he had come into the world, and went around, pausing some­ what longer in front of the fancier lunches, and in fact the outsider became the central eater and in that manner filled his paunchy stom­ ach with various kinds of food. After eating lunch, he usually went about his own business, freeing us to our imagination. One day he happened to show up unexpect­ edly and saw my disgraceful self busy with some mischief which was in truth deserving of the bastinado. I wept and wailed and begged enough to melt a heart of stone, but the despicable akhond didn't turn a hair. Dripping tears, I clung to his skirts and said, "I was eating . I did wrong, I won't do anything like that again." As soon as he heard that wretched sentence, "I was eating " he put the stick on the ground and asked "Are you really ready to eat it?" Compulsively, I said, "Yes, by God, I'll eat it." With no delay he called up the monitor, a strong, slender student named Rahim, and said, "Take this rotten son of a bitch out to the privy and don't come back until he eats a finger-length of it." Then he turned to me and said, "By the Lord of this very mosque, I swear that I'll smash your fingers under the stick if you return without eating it." It wasn't the place to haggle. I thought in my heart that there's many a slip be­ tween cup and lip, and crying like the children of Hoseyn's martyred cousin being led off by the murderer, Hares, I set off after this ghoul without horns or tail. These unprecedented instructions suited Rahim's taste perfectly. Absolutely strutting with arrogance, he cocked his hat and threw out his chest and, gripping my hand firmly, began pulling me to the place of execution as if he were ZaTs Rostam who had with his lasso caught his Turanian enemy, King Afrasiyab, and was pulling him along behind. But I only appreciated the unhealthy nature of that order when I found myself in that foul and repulsive enclosure whose atmosphere was throughout a most perfect example of filth and pol­ lution and when that sharp, rude, ungentlemanly youth acquainted his dirty hand with my shoulder as ordered by the undiscerning

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akhond and requested the prompt conclusion of the duty which was his responsibility, saying, "Get going! Eat it!" in an unambiguous tone which needed no comment at all. I've said less than I could about my helplessness and lack of resources at that hour, and I don't know where my actions might have led if the Lord hadn't sent Sayyed Javad, a cloth merchant who had a shop on the platform in front of the mosque and was a friend of my father and knew me, to my cry for help. In the end, the no-good monitor was obliged to keep me back from doing something which was later forced on me repeatedly, literally and figuratively, over the course of my lifetime by each more treacherous monitor without any cloth merchant or other relief com­ ing to my cry for help.

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I shed so many tears that my feet hadn't the strength to walk. Sayyed Javad took my hand and brought me home, described the situation to my mother, and directed her not to let me go to that maktab again. My mother went to trail down another maktab. But before I come to the changing of maktabs, it would not be inappropriate to also say a few words summing up the matter of our changing houses, which took place simultaneously with these events. During the time I had been going to the first maktab, my father purchased for 600 tumdns a house between Behind the Ramparts and the Crossroad of Ali-qoli Aqa and we moved from the rented house in the New Quarter to our new home. This house was located in a long, dark, vaulted, narrow lane with a dead end and was known as the Lane of the Needlemakers. It was more like the corridor of a nest of ants than a street for human beings and, without doubt, no equal could be found for it on the face of the earth. It was so dark that you couldn't see the white of an eye in daylight, and it was impossible for people who were strangers to travel along it without a lamp or candle. It was said that when the Afghans came to Isfahan over two centuries ago and every day cut off the heads of members of one of the city's guilds in the well-known way they cut off each other's and the turn came for the guild of the needleworkers who were living in that very lane, they were all so pale and thin and gaunt and emaciated that the Afghans' commander was amazed on seeing them and asked the reason. Showing him a needle, they said, "This is a group of needlemakers and they've gotten in this shape as a result of making the iron thin and sharp this way and making the hole in its tip by hand." The commander laughed and said, "Set them free, for they will die by themselves." That sums up the historical lane in which we had our house. A

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long time had passed since the whole tribe of needlemakers had sewn the clothes of death with the needle of poverty and had cut the fine thread of their lives with the scissors of the appointed time, just as the foresighted Afghan had anticipated. Not one of the lane's original inhabitants was left, but the lane itself, in the same state of days past with the narrowness of the hole of a needle and the length of the thread of hope of the doomed, was an object of dread and terror for me every afternoon when I returned from school. Our next-door neighbor was an aid-weaver with his family and he was busy year in and year out from morning dawn to setting sun with weaving abas, which is one of the most difficult and tedious jobs in the world. For every yard of an aba which he wove, he re­ ceived a certain amount in wages. When days grew short in winter, his income was sometimes not enough even for dry bread for his immediate family. My father was very distressed by the condition of that household and helped them in different ways. I remember that once a week on Thursday nights, which was regularly the night for eating pilau, a plate of it was also sent to the aid-weaver's house. Now listen to how the aid-weaver acknowledged the gratitude owed my father! One night when one of my father's hat-wearing friends was a guest at our house, he and my father were seated beside a little garden on a carpet spread in the courtyard since it was summer and the weather was warm. As this person (may my tongue be mute!) had the habit of drinking (God willing, with the doctor's prescrip­ tion), he had brought along half a bottle of arrack and had with his own hands placed it next to the ice in a bowl of water. Every so often he filled his glass from it with as much discretion and circum­ spection as possible and, with the kind of grimace which you know,

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upended it into the confines of his throat. Not an hour of that eve­ ning had yet passed when the scuffle of a crowd with insults and abuse was suddenly heard behind the door of the house and a great hue and cry rose up under the guise of orders for lawful acts and injunctions against unlawful acts, "Hey, Sayyed with martyred ancestors! Babi! Freethinker! Sheykhi! Nonbeliever! Atheist! By God and the Prophet, aren't you ashamed to be drinking arrack with that black turban on your head and green sash at your waist? We'll throw your turban around your neck and run you around the city with the 12 sash tied on your foot. . . ." 12 The epithet "freethinker" (dahri) refers to one who believes all happenings of the world are according to natural law, instead of believing in one God. The Sheykhis are followers of Ahmad Ahsa'i, who opposed the following of pure tradition. The black turban is usually worn by an akhond or a particularly learned and pious man; the green sash (shdl) is a sign of being a sayyid.

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There is no need to explain the state of the people in our house at that moment. We were horror-stricken! My poor father rushed to throw the glass of arrack and its paraphernalia into the cesspool of the house, confirming, "The well and pit and the well water are among the necessities required by houses of Isfahan." Arrayed in turban and cloak, he went just outside the door of the house and with indescribable difficulty convinced the pious and faithful that there was no way on God's earth that the house of descendants of the Prophet and the home of invokers of the Martyr Imam, Hoseyn, would be the place of forbidden and reprehensible acts, and he put the upheaval to rest with the help of tales and traditions and rescued the collar of his guest from the hands of that terrible calamity and impending disaster.

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Some investigation revealed that every evening when the noblenatured afta-weaver returned home, tired and beaten, he habitually hurried through a perfunctory prayer and set out for the roof without a mouthful of food having yet gone down his throat. Stealthily get­ ting to the roof of our house, he lay right there on its surface with his chest glued to it and kept himself busy for long hours at the gutter hole, watching the happenings in our house and the activities of its people. On that appointed night he had achieved his desire, throwing that handful of mud which we know about into the water. Now isn't this the place where we could say, "A curse on whatever Isfahanis are ill-natured!" Anyhow, the good-natured aba-weaver cut off his nose to spite his face since he didn't see any sort of pilau of ours again from then on. My father, who really was noble and forbearing, said, "That person couldn't help but go to such lengths in this matter because of his extreme poverty and misery," but, just between us now, the action of the afca-weaver, like the sting of the scorpion, was clearly dictated by his nature and had no connection with wealth or poverty. Now that we are talking about poverty, I would like, with my esteemed readers' permission, to briefly offer a few words on a point which has stayed in my mind in connection with the poverty and destitution of the people of Isfahan. I remember that one day our servant came and told my mother, "Every day when I go to the butcher store to buy meat, the butcher asks, 'Then do you have guests every night so that you buy "twenty-five" meat every day?' Since I'm afraid that he may finally give you the evil eye, I suppose that from now on I should split the 'twenty-five' between two butcher stores." Now if we reflect that "twenty-five" of Isfahan is less than a pound, we can trace from the butcher's very words the poverty and destitution of those who viewed the purchase of less than a pound

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of meat for one family's daily consumption as among the unprece­ dented wonders. In addition to being situated in that dark, narrow lane which recalls the Isfahanis' hookah tube, this new house of ours had two other special features which I will never forget. First, in the closet of one of its rooms was a very ancient black mulberry tree which had gone through the ceiling and into the upper-story room above it and out through that roof, too. Every year in mulberry season there were huge amounts of those juicy black mulberries whose taste is still in my mouth and which were the cause of claims and litigations by my mother with the neighbors during the course of the year. Second, our courtyard was covered end to end with trellises and props for vines which also furnished every year quantities of various kinds of grapes, like "mothers and daughters" and "autumn," which is the same as the "grandpa's beard" of Tehran, and "ruby." Every day after coming home from school in grape season, I would take off my shoes and clothes and go up through them and busy myself beneath the leaves and branches for many hours with the leftover bunches spared by the knife and still hidden from the view of people in my house and unpicked, and perhaps this very seeking and searching and poking around has caused the dream about grapes that I still have at least once or twice a month. My maternal aunt, Fatemeh, also lived with us in this same house along with her husband, Aqa Abd-ol-hoseyn, a cloth merchant, and three daughters of various sizes by the names of Khanomchi, Hamideh, and Farakhondeh. My poor aunt longed to be granted a son, but although a son was born, he died. I was a child, and I remember well that one day my aunt asked me, " D o you strike with your head or your foot?" I didn't understand the question but when she de­ manded an answer, I said at random, "With my foot." It was one of those hot summer afternoons and I'd fallen dead asleep when sud­ denly my ankle began to sting as if bitten by a scorpion. I jumped up from sleep and saw my aunt seated at the bottom of my feet and in her hand she had a brass spoon. She had apparently heated the spoon red-hot at the instruction of the felgir13 and applied it to my ankle, since I was the family's youngest male child, so that if a son were born, he wouldn't die. Alas, yet again she gave birth to a son whom they quickly laid to rest beneath the earth of the graveyard of Ab-bakhshegan! Then they resorted to throwing themselves on the 13 The filgir makes prophecies by randomly opening a book, usually a volume of poems by Hafez, and interpreting the verse he has turned up.

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mercies of the tasgir.14 One day a turbanned man with a pitch-black, dustpan-shaped beard and bushy eyebrows came in together with his companion, a little boy some twelve or thirteen years old. They filled a bowl half full of water and seated me, as the "innocent child," on one side of the bowl and the little boy on the other. They threw a prayer shawl over our heads and the tasgir began reciting incantations and ordering the jinns to bring the throne. He summoned the king of the jinns, named Za'far, and seated him on his throne surrounded by all the other jinns, according to custom. When the tasgir asked the little boy whether or not he saw in the water exactly what the tasgir said, it stands to reason that the boy always repeated his answer, "Yes, yes!" Although I saw nothing beyond a slight movement of the water, I disgracefully didn't refrain from also saying, "Yes, yes!" whether from bashfulness or the importance which they gave me, or perhaps the pure mischievousness of the accomplice wound me up. At length, the jinn who was guilty and had not let Aunt Fati's sons remain behind was found. It seems that on a Tuesday night my aunt had poured boiling water on the head of the son of that jinn, whose name I unfortunately don't remember, and in revenge for the harm and injury which had befallen the Light of his Eyes, the father de­ stroyed each time the sons to which my criminal aunt gave birth. Catching the jinn on the spot by power of the incantations, the tasgir imprisoned it in a thin bottle, fastened the bottle tightly at the end with hot wax, put it in his employer's hands, took his honorarium, and left. As proof of the pudding, Aunt Fatemeh gave birth to a son by the name of Abbas who, by the blessing of the tasgir's spirit, did not immediately set out on the road to Ab-bakhshegan and only hurried to the world of eternity when his teeth had just come in. Incidentally, I must say that later when Aunt Fatemeh realized that all my saying, "Yes, yes!" was a fraud, she bestowed on her own sister's son, that is, on me, the little innocent, a slap with her hand such that I can still taste it. My moral education also began in that same house. Never will I forget the day my father had company, and after the guests left, I scooted myself into the parlor and was busy smoking a cigarette butt from the ashtray when my father caught me in the act. I was scared to death, but he smiled and said cheerfully, "Good, good! What a 14 The tasgir tells fortunes by looking at water in a shallow bowl (tas) of about a foot in diameter. The incantations (owrdd) used by the tasgir are texts supposed to be under­ stood only by jinns. Ajinngir writes the incantations on pieces of paper and sells them to the superstitious at a good price. Put into a bottle, the spells attract troublesome jinns who are then trapped 0 Z " C )-

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lovely sight! My dear Mamal (a contraction of Mohammad AIi and a name given me by my father) smokes cigarettes too!" That very afternoon, when he returned to the house, he brought with him a black cardboard Turkish cigarette case which had the moon and white star trademark on it and in which tobacco and cigarette papers had been put. Giving it to me, he said, "I brought this for you," and in order to show me how to roll cigarettes, he immediately rolled two with his own hands. Lighting one for himself, he got busy smoking it and gave me the other, saying, "Take a puff1." and called my mother, "Quick, come, look! Splendid, splendid! Your son's gotten to be a cigarette smoker!" Although I inwardly sensed that there had to be some funny business, I still swallowed my father's bait and began puffing in imitation of him. In not over a minute, I began coughing and my head reeled and I felt nauseated and fell to the floor and began to vomit. Even in that condition, my father didn't let up and insisted I take still another puff. It was providential that my mother came to my rescue and freed me. As to the effects of those few moments of distress and hardship caused by my father, God is the witness that from that very hour and minute, I was so repelled and disgusted by cigarettes and smoking that for thirty years after that, I had no desire ever to acquaint my lips with cigarettes. Among the other devices that my father employed in those times with the aim of improving my character was taking me in his arms at night and bringing me to a dark closet or back room which had a frightfully horrible appearance. In that obscurity where you couldn't see the white of an eye, he would call Za'far, king of the jinns, and lecture him with such tough insults that in the beginning my body started trembling just hearing it, but gradually he dispelled my fears and things reached a point where my father left me alone in the dark and he himself went outside, and from behind the door he made me insult the jinns and the peris and snarling bogy men and desert ghouls and "strap-legs" who jump up on people and strangle them and ghosts and other troops of that innumerable frightful and terrifying army. That epitomizes the way in which little by little he shook loose the foundations of superstition in my existence. Now lest you imagine from this description that I was never collared by the grip of super­ stition later in another period of my life, the facts are otherwise. Given that human nature can be said to have been created for receiv­ ing and developing illusions and is like uncultivated earth in which the seed of superstition grows more quickly than any other seed, by the dictates of human nature, the meadow of even my heart remained at no time free of superstition of every kind and color. Correspond-

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My father, Sayyed Jamal-od-din, and I

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ing to the exalted words of the Invisible Tongue of Shiraz, Hafez, who has said, "Dealing with idols has been my religion for some time," the idol temple of my mind has been continually subject to dealing with idols and the transformation and change of delusions, and as soon as I have broken one deluding and deceptive image and cast it to the ground with my own hands, another idol has instantly taken its place, and so the dealing with idols continues and, regret­ fully, my life goes on the same way even yet. Nevertheless, if my father's spirit of destroying delusions and his view of breaking down superstition could not at one stroke cope with an impossible respon­ sibility, that is, cleaning and polishing away the images of supersti­ tion from the spirit of one of the sons of man, and if it could not clear out the weeds of delusion from the salt marsh of his son's ex­ istence and uproot the shoots of error and delusion all at once, never­ theless he did at least teach me iconoclasm and, by the blessing of his holy breath, I have so far never knelt down in front of an idol but that I finally overturned and annihilated it with the weapons that my father handed me, although inevitably that pretentious notion itself can be no more than fancy and illusion. There was in Isfahan at that same time a company called the Is-

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lamic Textiles Company, established with the help of Hajj Moham­ mad Kazeruni and intended to promote the woven fabrics of Isfahan. They made my father an agent to go to Shiraz on that business, and it was decided to pay my mother and me five tumdns a month in Isfahan. At the end of each month, my mother sent me to collect it from Haji Mirza AIi Qeysariyeh, treasurer of the company. Prince Sho'a'-os-saltaneh was governor of Fars at that date and with some antagonism and opposition arising between the government and Qavam, head of a wealthy and influential Shiraz family, the prince devoted unsparing attention to winning over my father. Although the months of Moharram and Safar were not yet over, one day news arrived that my father was fleeing Shiraz and would soon arrive in Isfahan. Qavam had evidently commissioned a wicked black maid­ servant, who was famous in Shiraz for dressing in men's clothes and appearing to be a luti, to do some injury to my father. One night, thinking it was my father returning home on his donkey, she had struck Sayyed Anayatollah, one of the city's rowzeh-khdns, such a severe blow with a broadsword that the poor man's forehead had been split, and that was why my father came galloping back to Is­ fahan with some bags of quince and pear seeds called anchuchak, which are souvenirs of Shiraz. While in Shiraz, my father had published a treatise, "Clothes of Piety," on the promotion of domestic textiles in which was inserted an ode praising him written by the famous poet, Shurideh, and these are two couplets from it: His Honor, Sayyed Jamal-od-din, has pure thoughts, Which mirror the virgin beauty of meaning. He is a sea in the universe above when he rises to the pulpit, A universe in the boundless sea when he goes in to preach. My father had become acquainted with Shurideh in Shiraz and had some stories about him of which I remember some points. Among others, he related that he had seen Shurideh sad and depressed one day. When he asked why, Shurideh answered, "Colors have stayed in my mind until recently despite my being blind, but for a while now they have been being wiped out by stages and I am therefore extremely worried and depressed." When my father was a guest in his house the next day and the servant brought tea, Shurideh ad­ dressed the servant, "You there, you haven't yet swept the room properly!" After the servant left the room, Shurideh said to my father, " H e and many people of Shiraz imagine that I know mysterious sci­ ences and that I am endowed with miraculous powers, unaware that I am taking advantage of their ignorance and simple-mindedness. For

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example, every day I hide a matchstick here underneath the side of the carpet (at that point he brought up a half-burnt matchstick to show my father) and when I want to see whether or not they have swept the room properly, I lift the carpet in a way such that others don't notice and I begin searching around with my hand. If the matchstick has not been touched, that's proof that the room has been given only a superficial sweeping." Telling about other adventures of his sojourn in Shiraz, my father said, "In Shiraz I had two horses and a servant, Hasan, whom I'd brought along from Isfahan, and he was a slick rascal with an Isfahani reputation. In the middle of a summer night when I had gone to sleep on the roof, I awoke at the sound of horses' hooves and the house door opening, and when I went to the roofs edge, I saw Hasan and another person with a felt hat, mounted on horses, slowly and softly riding away. Early the next morning, I resolved on calling Hasan to account and began to investigate. He finally confessed to striking up an acquaintance with some women of Shiraz and going secretly to see them at night, pretending to be a man of substance from Isfahan with strings of mules. The person riding the other horse was a friend and colleague whom he had taken along, dubbed as a servant, to provide credibility and show himself off. After confessing his sins, Hasan fell at my feet, 'Never again will I commit such a sin!' " My father said that Hasan's story suited his taste, however, and he forgave him the sin and said, "Hasan, haven't you heard, 'Lamps that are allowed at home are forbidden in mosques'? What's the need for you to take along someone from outside the family? I myself am ready to join in as your so-called servant on your nighttime expeditions after this." Alas, my father always left the story incomplete and never did I learn whether or not my father was able to share in evening parties with the beauties of Shiraz and to serve his own servant in that city where prayer carpets and Sufi cloaks have been always in pledge to love since olden times and wine and religion have been the lover's plunder. Anyway, my father returned from Shiraz, willing or not. Beneath the camel litter's roof on the long road from Shiraz to Isfahan, the sun beat down on the poor man's head so much that he had become quite sick merely getting to Isfahan and his illness so greatly wors­ ened that the traditional doctors with turbans and the modern doctors with hats all gave an answer leaving no doubt that it was impossible to save him any longer. But God, whose prescriptions are different from ours, did not want me, a child of tender years, to become an orphan so soon, and little by little the fever broke and his sick eyes

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opened and his health was restored. When the night of the Now Ruz holiday arrived and my father set about collecting his customary tri­ fling annual government pension, it became evident that one of his closest friends, Sheykh Jalal, had pretended that he was my father's brother and my father had died, and by resorting to expedients which are throughout the world the earmark of the troop who appear as mullahs and live off the dead, he had taken effective measures at the central office to have our little pension transferred to his name. My father therefore had to give the name, Jalal, to one of his own sons who happened to come into the world at that time and finally had his own pension transferred to his newborn son's name, since he had struggled corresponding with Tehran for quite some time and was unable to have his claim adjudicated. At about the same time, Hasan, our servant with the felt hat and sword, left and was replaced by a man named Sabz-ali, a pious and abstinent man with a small, oval leather cap on his head. Sabz-ali was short and wore a kamarchin; with great assiduity, he kept his beard a rosy red by dint of henna. He was neat and proper, orderly and with good taste, and excessively fond of playing the reed flute. Every evening when he was free from stable work and had curried and spread out the dung bed for my father's rowzeh-khdn nag, one hair of whose forelock was worth a hundred of Rostam's horse, Raksh, and Iman Hoseyn's Zu'1-Janah, and to whom I was sure neither All's mule, Doldol, nor Boragh, Mohammad's steed to the heavens, could measure up, he wet down and swept the ground right behind the stable wall and threw down a ragged piece of felt there. 1 5 After per­ forming his prayers for complete independence and peace of mind, he cocked his hat, proud as the proverbial mayor of Jowsheqan, and put his back to the wall, took up the flute hung on a peg of the stable wall, and began first to hum a dashti melody under his breath and then touched his flute to his lips and got busy playing. 16 He played some couplets so much that they've stuck in my mind:

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Play the flute! Play, for it's spring in Dashestan! The earth's a tulip garden from blood of Moslem. 15 A horse that was well cared for would have a bed of dried-out horse dung (takhteh-peheri) spread out every evening for it to rest on; in the morning, the dung would be swept aside to be used again in the evening. 16 Dashti is a particular scale or mode within the system of traditional Iranian music; it is associated with many of the folk songs of northern Iran. For a recording using this mode, see Danielou's UNESCO collection; for a transcription of several melodies in this mode, see Zonis 1973, pp. 80-82.

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Play the flute! Play, for Zeynab has been abased, She's become a prisoner in the streets and markets. 1 7 or: Friday night I packed off from Kerman. What wrong I did in turning my back on my sweetheart! I reached the edge of an Isfahan stream. I sat down and wept a great deal.

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Sabz-ali's life passed in that manner until one day he snared in marriage an uneducated spinning woman right from that neighbor­ hood for whom the ZaI of Time had not yet completely reached the wool of her beauty and virtues. The back of the stable wall was transformed into a bridal chamber from that very day and having settled on flute-playing as a medium for the game of love, the new bridegroom brought some sweetness and light to his monotonous and uninteresting life with a relish for this kind of affair in old age, which is never completely devoid of a suspicion of artificiality. Sabz-ali was a worldly-wise and experienced man. (He'd twice had the honor of a visit to Qom and once to Karbala!) Sometimes when he wanted to please me and make me happy with him, he permitted me to help him stamp down the dung which he personally carried on his shoulder and brought up to the roof to dry, and for me it was truly a great honor and pleasure. As soon as we were busy at work, he began his harangues from the heart and told me such sweet ad­ ventures! I remember well when one day he asked me, " M y little man, tell me, how much money do you have in your piggy bank?" "I don't have any money or any piggy bank to keep it in," I said. "Believe me now," he said, "you have over a million!" For all my tender years, I understood that he was pulling my leg, but I was going to bluff it out and said, "May God hear it from your mouth!" In a very serious tone he said, "You don't believe it? Come and let me count it out in your hand! First, how much would you want for not getting to see the faces of your father and mother again until the end of your life?" "How would it happen that I wouldn't see my father and mother's faces?" I said. " I f I rub on your eyes some kohl that I have," he said, "from now 17 Dashestan is an area between Shiraz and Bushire. The first couplet alludes to the suffering of Hoseyn and his seventy-two companions on the Day of Ashura; Moslem was a cousin of Hoseyn who died in his defense. Zeynab was taken prisoner after the battle and led before Yazid.

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on you will be able to see everything but the faces of your father and mother." "Even if you would give me a hundred thousand tumans, I would never agree," I said. "That's one hundred thousand tumans," he said. " N o w , let's see, how much are you willing to take to let me paint some kohl on your eyes so you won't see birds and flowers any longer?" "I like the sight of birds and flowers more than my life," I said. " I ' m not willing to have you give me five hundred thousand tumans." "That's five hundred thousand tumdnsl" he said. "So now it comes to six hundred thou­ sand tumans. But, let's see, what amount would you want for not seeing the light of the sun in the day and the moon and stars at night?" "Have I gone crazy then?" I said. "What kind of talk is that? Even if you gave me a thousand thousand tumans, I wouldn't want it!" "You'd offer a thousand thousand tumdnsV he said. "Let's just say that's two hundred thousand tumans more. Altogether it comes to eight hundred thousand tumans. Now, let's see, how much would you want for not getting to hear the voice of a bird or human so long as you live?" "When I'm not deaf, how would it happen that I don't hear someone's voice anymore?" I said. "I know a master's spell," he said, "that makes everyone go deaf instantly if I say it in their ears." "Keep your spell to yourself!" I said. "I don't want to ever go deaf." "Your mother raised you right, God bless her," he said. "Let's say that was two hundred thousand tumans too, which all together comes to a million." How I could drag it out! Little by little, in just that manner, Sabzali bought up all my limbs and four humors and five senses and all my bodily parts for eating and drinking and breathing and digesting and continually increased his stock and before long, I found myself richer than Croesus and really understood that some wealth is not confined to a full purse; I confess that if even today some slight traces of self-sufficiency are occasionally evident in me (alas if they don't show!), it is certainly through the blessing of the seed which the moving spirit of Sabz-ali scattered in the field of my mind that day while stamping down dung. Among the other peculiarities of that illiterate mystic and everyday sage was his excessive fondness for black radishes and he told some rare stories about their virtues. Among others, he said that a bone which the doctors were left helpless to treat had been found in some­ one's stomach. The chief doctor finally took the bone out of the patient's stomach after his death for the purpose of tests and experi­ ments. In order to keep it always in sight, he made a knife handle

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from it and kept it in his pocket. It happened that one day he wanted to cut a radish with that very knife. The knife began to dissolve when merely touched by the radish juice and the doctor realized that the only medicine for the man's pain would have been radishes. To be brief, I had also realized by experience that the key to Sabzali's storytelling bag was radishes. One day I bought with my pocket money a huge radish the size of a cantaloupe, and after peeling its rind with my own hands and putting it on a clean plate with s «It and pepper, I took it to him. Having put his lambskin cap under paper in a stable niche, as was his custom when working, he had put a spare beygi cap on his head and was busily cutting fodder and alfalfa,

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singing and holding the grass-cutting sickle steady with his knee. I put the plate of radishes in front of him politely and said, "Sabz-ali, why do you sing all those songs?" He cast an eye first at the plate of radishes and then at my face and said, smiling, "My dear, the heart calls for song, whether grieved or not." "But—God forbid—you don't have any grief, do you?" I asked. "By the grace of the Family of the Cloak's Five and by the favor of your father, I don't know what grief is at all, and besides, what grief would you expect me to have when I'm one whose meals are always chicken kebab and whose quilt and mattress are swan's down and who has lemon syrup drinks in­ stead of water?" When he saw I was very surprised to hear these words, a whimsical smile formed on his lips in the sanctuary of the henna beard and he said, "Since you're a polite and intelligent child who listens, I'll give you a bit of advice that's come to me from the Master and is worth a hundred thousand tumans." "Sabz-ali," I said, "you're always roll­ ing in gold and silver by the thousands and hundred thousands!" "Listen," he said, "for sometime you'll understand its value." "Please just let it be short," I said, "because you've promised to tell me a story today." "My boy," he said, "don't eat until you are very hun-

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gry. Then dry bread will taste better in your mouth than chicken kebabs. Work hard and don't sleep too much so that you get com­ pletely tired and worn out. Then if you lie on the ground, the pleas­ ure you get will be greater than from a bed of swan's down. Let yourself get so thirsty that you pant! Then clear water filling your palm will be more pleasing than any fruit drink." On the subject of sleeping together, he gave me advice of similar significance whose meaning did not become properly clear to me when I was young and so far as I remember, the conversation in­ cluded the kitchen maid and the fabled Queen of the Climes, but in passing through different periods of life later on, how often I was struck by the truth and validity of Sabz-ali's counsel and I said to myself that in solving problems about the world's affairs, that old man, ignorant of the world, truly had the right of precedence in the ranks of truth and knowledge over the great men in the west who arrived at the same conclusions by dint of long and lengthy calcula­ tion and complicated equations. The next day when I sat on the Zayandeh River's bank during the brief period of my stay in Isfahan and with the tongs of contempla­ tion in hand turned over layer after layer on the hearth of the past and memories of childhood times leapt headlong one after another like half-dead sparks out from beneath the ashes of the days, I hap­ pened to remember a day when my father took my hand and we crossed over the bridge here and went out of the city. Since the weather then was extremely hot and my feeble feet were unable to walk, my father lifted me up to ride with my legs over his shoulders and we set out on the Julfa road to the village of Marnun in which my father's young prayer leader, Sheykh AIi, lived and had a house. I will never forget that along the way we reached a large well which Isfahanis call the Well of the Cow and we saw beneath the burning sun an aged peasant, burnt black and withered, who was busy draw­ ing water with the help of a gaunt and resigned cow on its last legs and he was singing with a melancholy voice this famous song: Our well's had no water for three or four days, Our cow's two black eyes have no light. O Lord, grant the rain of mercy For drawing water from the well takes trouble. Almost forty years have now passed since that day and I still know nothing of whether God granted the prayer of that needy old man or whether even now his sons have to follow behind the black-eyed cow, singing that very song.

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Now to "Speak again of Najd and the companions of Najd," we return to the long, dark Lane of the Needlemakers and the modern maktah which totally disgusted me with reading and writing. The modern maktah was located in an upper room of the Ali-qoli Aqa Mosque and the new schoolmaster was named Molla Taher. His brother, Molla Baqer by name, had another maktah on the other side of the mosque and between the teachers and students of those two maktabs a rivalry arose compared to which the enmity between the Shia followers of AIi and the Sunni followers of Omar seemed pure pleasure. Molla Taher insisted on teaching Arabic to students who still hadn't passed through the intricacies of "I will suffer a hundred strokes on the hands and feet until I know the writing rules," and I, poor little waif, was not left without a share of this forced benefit either. The simple Arabic verb, daraba, "to beat," did not bode well for me and right at the beginning of things, some unbefitting fate seemed to want me to conjugate "he is beaten" and "I am beaten" in practice. The reason was that one of our relatives told me as a joke that Molla Taher had one day said to his brother, Molla Baqer, that baqer is derived from haqara which means "cow" in Arabic. Molla Baqer answered immediately that in the judgment of religious law, the baqara's excrement is "pure," or taher in Arabic. Ignorant and forsaken by fate, I brought up this story with students in the maktah the very next day, and as usual some upstanding fellow immediately brought it to Molla Timer's ears. Falling into such a raging fury that I was sure my life's last hour had come, he roared from his depths, "Throw the blockhead down and put his feet in the falakeh." There is no need to explain to whom "blockhead" referred, but you should at least know that the soles of the feet of the sayyid's innocent child on that day experienced such a beating that notations for revenge on impure (non-taher) Tahers were engraved on the tablet of his mind right from that moment unto the Day of Resurrection. By dint of tears, I convinced my mother to put me in another maktah. There was no other in that vicinity but there was in the row of shops of the Bidabad bazaar a short and turbanned bookbinder named Mirza Hasan, who often bound my father's books, and she entrusted me to him. With him I truly understood the meaning of "to read" anew and I more or less grasped what was expected from learning those curved and crooked marks called "letters" which from the first stages of childhood fall like destructive worms on the brains and life fiber of innocent children and suck the soul's sap until the moment of death. In any case, while Mirza Hasan with mallet in hand was busy hitting the binding tape and pressing the book and its

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leaves into the press on the platform of the humble bookbinding shop, he acquainted me with the world of reading and the universe of writing and books, which are among the most amazing features of the human cosmos. One day Mirza Hasan, who was known as Aqa Mirza, said, " T o night a star will appear in the middle of the sky at midnight and anyone who bares his chest in front of it and seven times repeats, 'Lo, we revealed it!' in Arabic while fixing his eyes on it will become a mullah." I went with my mother to the roof that night. The army of stars so dominated the stage of the sky that there was no place to poke in a needle, but we nevertheless distinguished the promised star, assuming it was the biggest and brightest above our heads. My mother bared my chest and we both fixed our eyes on the star, saying, "Lo, we revealed it!" But now, when forty years have passed since that day, I have to admit with utmost embarrassment that we must surely have made a mistake in distinguishing the star; otherwise, how is it possible that Aqa Mirza's words have not come true and that with all those prayers and midnight incantations and chest exposures and even despite having burned the midnight oil for forty whole years after that, in mullahs' arts I must just be happy and content today with barren, empty incantations and baseless mumbo jumbo. On another day, Aqa Mirza said, "Tonight is the night of the fifteenth of Sha'ban. If you want to see your father, at midnight you must stare unblinkingly at the moon in the water when its reflection falls there, until your father's face appears in it." I hurriedly took the news to my mother and when the moon reached the middle of the sky, we both sat on the tank's edge and glued our eyes on the moon's reflection. Just when the rim of the moon reached the fringes of the tank's water, the moon's reflection coming up ring after ring, like a Chinese plate on which a face had been set, began to dance, tripping and trembling, and always lanternlike sinking into the water and again jumping out, tiring one's eyes. I stared so hard without cease that tears welled up in my eyes, and seeing in the mirrored moon the longed-for face of my beloved father, I waxed enthusiastic and embellished it with feigned discoveries for my mother's happiness. What stories I concocted! Although my mother's expressive smile conveyed that she was inwardly not taken in by my play-acting and faking and fooling around, yet so as not to break my heart she was nevertheless an accomplice in my rejoicing and asked questions about and sought indications of my father's condition and some particulars of his face and features. As soon as I had by stages acquired a little literacy, I was able to

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write letters in my own handwriting to my father who was a wan­ derer, constantly roaming the borders and outskirts of Iran, thanks to the fanatic preacher, Aqa Najafi, and the governor of Isfahan, ZeIlos-soltan. On Aqa Mirza's recommendation, I went to a madraseh located at the entrance to the Bidabad bazaar on the edge of the Baba Hasan Canal. It was a school of turbanned heads, and its instructor was a much-beloved, intelligent, thin-bearded dkhond by the name of Haji Akhond, whose brother, Molla Hashem, was counted as one of Isfahan's famous rowzeh-khans. I too was forced to enter the ranks of those students, meaning that I brought my head under the pressure of that clamp full of twists and turns called a turban, which is ever so much more dreadful than any bookbinder's clamp. After that, my concerns were with the community of students who all had come with woolly beards and turbans to Isfahan from surrounding villages and who had rooms right in the school. Just as soon as the weather got nice, they put aside their turbans and put felt caps on their heads and got busy with trade and business and even manual labor. It was at one of the sessions of Haji Akhond's class in the courtyard of that very school where I first earned a closer acquaintance with the Arabic, "he beat," and "he is beating." From that hour on, I became a source of viciousness along with the other students and our business day and night was to strike and beat the Zayds, Amrs, Bakrs, and Khaleds of traditional Arabic grammars. I will never forget when we reached the Arabic "beat," third person plural feminine past, and Haji Akhond explained the meaning for us in Persian like this, "They beat, a group of women, third person, in past time." In that child­ hood world, I saw a handful of Arab women burnt black, all with long Arab clothing, bareheaded and barefooted in the middle of a

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barren desert, long bamboo poles in hand, attacking a group of weak and miserable men and with the poles going up and coming down, they were beating them as cruelly as possible without its being clear why they were beating or whom they were beating or until when they would beat and even after a lifetime, that same scenery and that same act still materialize before my eyes just at hearing the words "he beat" and "he is beating" in Arabic. They called me "Little Man" in Arabic because I was younger, but please believe that despite my younger age, in regard to literacy and learning (assuming we may read literacy and learning to include its downright absence), I was not behind any of them and even outdid them in distinguishing the irregular verbs with problem letters. I remember one day a peasant came to the school to track down some­ one who would write a receipt for him. The whole group of most

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honored and respected students with grand turbans on their heads refused an endeavor of such difficulty, protesting their inadequacy with complete openness. Astonished, the poor peasant said, "How is it that among these gentlemen not one may be found who can write that I received the sum of three saheb-qerans for one wicker basket of grapes?" With one voice they said, "We have come here for grammar and the fundamentals of jurisprudence, not for writing receipts." When I saw the distress and bewilderment of the unfortunate rustic, throwing caution to the winds, I took pen and paper and said, "Uncle dear, let's see here, what do you want me to write?" All eyes were fixed on me and the peasant said, laughing, "May I be the sacrifice of your green sayyid's turban! Write: This party received the sum of three qerans for the cost of one basket of grapes. It is accepted on such and such a date as stated." I wrote it down and handed it to him. Dipping his finger in the ink pot, he signed the note, took out a quarter qeran coin, gave it to me and said, "May God keep your parents' hearts unscarred!" and throwing a mocking and sarcastic glance at their excellencies, he went out of the school. A murmur arose as if a goose had laid a golden egg. It was agreed that the school servant would immediately buy some grapes with this God-sent money and bring them so my companions could sweeten their palates with the congratulations on the miracle which had unexpectedly come about through me. All those intoxicating compliments and the praise and the cries of "Bravo!" and "Well done!" swept me off my feet so that when I came to my senses, there wasn't even a grape seed left and from that hour on, I completely understood the meaning of "The donkey does the work and the horse does the eating." I was just gaining renown in that madraseh and seeing myself as a great scholar ornamenting the age, when my mother became aware that a modern maktab which taught a European language had opened in our neighborhood of the quarter of Behind the Rampart. Since her brother knew some English and she also supposed that my father would be happy to have his son learn a foreign language, she immediately entrusted me to that school. That modern maktab had been established with the help of one of Isfahan's khans, Mirza AIi Khan, and a money-changer from among the enlightened merchants of Isfahan named Aqa Mohammad Javad. Since its only room was clean and carpeted and its one teacher, although indeed he was turbanned, did know some English in addition to Persian and Arabic, it had become known as Maktab House. It was located in a spacious upperstory room behind the deserted square of Chomlown, which was situated in the middle of the city and transformed several years ago

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through the efforts of Amin-ot-tojar Esfahani's family into a pleasant garden called Hyacinth Garden, and people said it had been made with the help of Babis for their children. I remember well that for the purchase of the first reader, with the title, First Reader Book, in English, we had to go secretly to Julfa and hide the book under our clothes on return lest people notice and we be whipped. Two sons of Hajj Mirza Nasrollah Beheshti, the Prince of Orators, happened to also be studying in the same school. As has been indicated, our fathers spent twelve months of the year, and especially the months of mourning and fasting, in other cities of Iran out of fear of the hakims and mullahs. Sometimes when my father came to Isfahan, he preached in the New Mosque whose prayer leader was Hajj AqI Nurollah, Aqa Najafi's brother, but I don't know any more whether or not his words had any effect in that hypocritical environment. Little by little I found friendship and company in Maktab House with the middle and younger sons of the Prince of Orators. Their older brother had gone to Tehran to study and every time our conversations came around to him, our mouths watered. The house of the Prince of Orators was located right in the New Quarter near Molla AIi Asghar's maktab, and every time I went there, I amused myself for a while in looking at the big feltmaker's shop at the end of the lane. The master feltmaker had two wives, and it was heard one day that when he was sleeping, one of his wives used his razor to cut his head off at the base of the neck on account of some grudge. If we were deprived of the sight of the feltmaker from that day on, we discovered in exchange the valuable truth that a man with two wives either must not shave his beard or, if he does want to shave, he should shave with an electric razor and not a straight razor. Through a gap we had located in one of the basement rooms of the Prince of Orators, we got ourselves to the house of Haji Abbas Murcheh-khari, who was perhaps somehow related on his wife's side to the Beheshti family, and we took a lot of pleasure in doing that. The haji was a short, robust man, and in contrast to most Isfahanis whom you'd say had all come into the world with turbans on their heads, he wore a low potbellied rawhide hat on his head. Murchehkhari lived contentedly with his wives and children on a slight property income and considered himself happy right in his own house and seldom went out. With his bushy beard and qaba and colored cotton gown and quilted cotton print coat, he sat night and day beside the brazier, tongs in hand, shifting back and forth the mended teapots with tea and boiling water and smoking a hookah. His only moves from the room's alcove were to the tank's edge and that only

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for changing the hookah water or for making ritual ablutions anew. Haji Murcheh-khari was a mystic of the common people and a phi­ losopher without convictions, and he was likewise in fact a believer in not believing because although he was busy night and day wor­ shipping and reading divine books, he still remained baffled, wan­ dering around the four paths of the four religions, Judaism, Christi­ anity, Islam, and Babism, and although he considered each of these four as lawful, he still vacillated about which was more lawful and in fact he found himself like the man with four wives who didn't know to which of his ravishing women he should totally commit his heart. A Torah and a Bible and a volume of the glorious Word of God and a volume of the Bab's Bayan were always at his side and he was engaged for long hours in studying them without becoming any clearer about which he should prefer over the others. His prayers and fasting and worship were also in accordance with each of the four religions and obviously he was therefore busy with prayers and fast­ ing and worship most of the time. On Friday he went in public to the Muslim mosque, on Saturday and Sunday he went in secret to Jubareh and Julfa to the houses of worship of the Jews and the Ar­ menian Christians, and at least two or three times a month (in the Babi's months of nineteen days), he attended the Assembly of the Brethren. The precept of the poet, Orfi, who has said, Become so accustomed to good and bad that after your death, Orfi, The Muslim washes you at the Meccan well and the Hindu cremates you, follows the philosophic advice of Sa'di, the Sheykh of Shiraz, who said, " O n e should agree with everyone about his religion." Mur­ cheh-khari was sincere in his associations with all sects and denomi­ nations and was compatible with them all and confirming the words of the poet, Sa'eb, Like water, the enlightened man of blithe spirits, Is of one color with the cup and glass and stone and potsherd,

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he was everyone's color. His patience and forbearance were all-em­ bracing, and when teased, he answered with aphorisms and verses such as: All folk consider me of their own inner purity, For all vessels bring out shiny water of their own color.

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Since he really believed that, If you want everyone to like you naturally, Be just like whomever you happen to be with,

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truly, he found grace in that difficult matter for which youth has no appetite anymore today, meaning that he was a friend in accord with everyone and everyone liked him too and, really, he was indeed like­ able. " M y friends," he said, "prudence and discretion are required in the business of the hereafter and just as a man inevitably reaches his goal if he travels along four roads which pass through a crossroads, the person who practices these four religions, which are the most important of existing religions, will also, somehow or other, inevit­ ably come out successfully." His friends relate that under the pretext that: "There is nothing that enters a man from the outside which can make him unclean; rather, only that which comes from inside him can make him unclean," was written in the Bible, he would from time to time tipple on the sly, but the very next day out of respect for the Qoran's verse, "But then wine and games of chance, idols and divining arrows are filth of Satan's work," he found no peace unless he spent hours in ablutions and purifications and penitence and contrition. Sometimes when he was in fine fettle, he halfway filled a thimble-sized glass unique to him with some "city-sugar," the fa­ mous sugar made locally in Isfahan. Then pouring some tea over it and sometimes also squeezing some drops of sour orange juice into it with his own hands when he was doing favors, he would offer it to us and, truly, even after forty years I can still taste its sweet and pleasant flavor. I remember that one day when a group of us had gone together to see him, the others wanted to get into a discussion with him and said, "Haji, what religion do you yourself have?" He picked up pen and paper and wrote two couplets in his own hand on some sheets of paper and gave us each one and said, "Next time you come here, I'll give you each a prize of one rob' (five silver shdhis) if you have memorized these verses." Those verses, which I still know by heart, are as follows:

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One hand on the Qoran and one hand on the cup, One foot in the church and one foot in the mosque, So what name should the baffled crowd call me, Neither absolute infidel nor total Muslim?

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When we knew those verses by heart, we went back to see him, hoping for the promised rob', and we recited the poem, mumbling but more or less without mistakes, and he said, "Instead of the prize of a rob', I'll tell you a story worth a thousand tumans," and he told a story which I later read in Attar's "Memorial of the Saints" and whose meaning I understood. It goes as follows, "AU the religions, the Jews and the Christians and the Faithful, claimed Ma'ruf-e Karkhi, whose grave they call the tested antidote, when he died. Each group said, 'He is one of us.' " To be stripped of blind fanaticism is, of course, a treasure of great value and worth more than a thousand tumans, but, alas, we never did see the face of that rob'. We were left with longings in our hearts and right from then on, we understood that " N o t one in a thousand of a beauty's promises is kept." There is another event which I will not forget so long as I live. Once every week or two I went with the second son of the Prince of Orators to mail letters to our fathers. The post office consisted of a druggist's shop located next to the Sheykh Lotfollah Mosque. In exchange for one abbasi, or three hundred dinars, he sent the letters deposited there to their destination. We were going toward the post office one day, envelopes in hand, when a strange clamor suddenly arose from the middle of King's Square. We ran in that direction and somehow or other shoved ourselves into the crowd. It was the Last Judgment! The throng of people increased every minute. The crowd flooded in from all sides, from the Qeysariyeh caravanserai with its many shops and from the Bazaar of the Coppersmiths and the King's Mosque and the Sheykh Lotfollah Mosque. Despite its great size King's Square was bursting and had turned into a stormy sea with troop after troop and group after group of men and women as waves and the akhond's turbans in the center corresponding to foam that had settled on top of those waves. When we brought ourselves with a thousand trials and tribulations to the center of the multitude, we saw two respectable men surrounded and being beaten with the in­ tent to kill! We set out to investigate the situation but nobody paid attention to us or had time or patience for questions and answers. Finally we hung onto an old man and said, "Please, uncle, for God's sake, what's going on?" Without even glancing at us, breathing hard he said, "It's a Babi-killing! Hit them!" and threw himself like a madman into the pandemonium. The sashes of those two wronged and helpless bareheaded men had been thrown around their necks and they were being dragged along, bleeding, as degradingly as pos­ sible. They were attacked by people like mad dogs or bloodthirsty wolves—men and women, adults and children, their bulging eyes

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glittering with sparks of fanaticism and viciousness as they tried to outdo each other at hitting and hurting their victims and at shouting insults and abuse and curses and obscenities. They were yelling like lunatics that the two men should be branded and scarred, stoned to death, should have their eyes put out, be torn to pieces, their heads pounded under mallets, burning candles put under their skin, their noses and ears cut off, they should be split apart, stuck in a cannon's mouth, walled up, put before a firing squad, burned alive, horse­ shoed, strung up, buried alive, hung on meathooks, mutilated . . .

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Sticks and clubs, fists and open palms rose up and descended on top of the brains of those two men with no aides or allies. The bodies of those two deserted by fate had no strength or energy left any more. Wan, with half-closed eyes and open mouths out of which came heart-rending rattles like sheep at slaughter, they hadn't the power to move forward at all. But the orthodox and pious men, with a savagery and lack of pity which still after forty years makes my body tremble at the mention, dragged them toward the King's Mosque, that seat of justice and equity for the supreme Islamic law. Meanwhile, an individual came up with a can of oil in one hand and a tin dipper in the other. In a wink, a fire rose toward the sky from the heads and bodies of the two men. Each of the riffraff with right­ eous piety bought a dipper of that oil for a hundred dinars and sprin­ kled it over those two faces. Smoke, dust, and dirt so filled the stage of the square that one eye could not see another. When we came to our senses, Mirza Mohammad AIi and I found ourselves amid waves of men in the courtyard of the King's Mosque. The crowd swarmed all over like ants or locusts. The screaming and shouting of curses and insults set off an uproar beneath the dome and hall of the mosque. Group after group of men mingled their voices, shouting in unison just like on the Day of Ashura and clapping their hands and singing improvised ditties. Suddenly the turmoil and tumult amid all the confusion increased so that a terrible hurricane seemed to have come down from an opening in the angry sky onto the waves of that stormy sea. We two innocent children were all but trampled to bits underfoot. We were being smothered, caught up in the typhoon's path. We did not at all understand the cause of the new excitement but it quickly became evident that they were bringing another god­ less Babi. The flood of the crowd pulled us willy-nilly toward where they had thrown the new arrival on the ground and were adminis­ tering the punishment of Islamic law on his behalf. He cried loudly for help and he continually delivered the creed of "There is no god but Allah and Mohammad is His prophet" in Arabic to prove himself

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a Muslim. The only replies he got were sticks and horsewhips. When we got near, we saw that the person crying out was Aqa Mohammad Javad, the money-changer and founder of our school, who was roll­ ing his rotund carcass around like a snake under a stick, screaming like Abel of the storytellers. With tears pouring down, he now re­ cited the formula of repentance and then uttered the word "martyr­ dom" and next began begging and pleading in the name of his small, innocent children. The eyes of one of the crowd fell on us in that confusion and happened to recognize us. "You and your damned fathers, you little bastards," he yelled aggressively with an Isfahani accent. "What are you eating, you little Babi boys!" Trembling and dripping tears, with a thousand difficulties we pulled ourselves out of the crowd and without having delivered our letters to the post office, we re­ turned home, running all the way like the two children of Hoseyn's cousin, Moslem, escaping the clutches of those Muslims more evil than the murdering Hares, and there we told our mothers what hap­ pened. My mother was completely nonplussed and immediately changed my clothes and said, "I want you to go to the judge's house very quietly so that no one finds out. 1 8 Say hello and tell him, 'When my dear father returns to Isfahan, he apparently has to leave Tabriz by way of Tehran these days. In view of your friendship with my father and since you visit back and forth with the house of Prince Zell-ossoltan, I beg you for God's sake to tell us whether or not it is advis­ able at this time for my father to come to Isfahan with what's hap­ pening these days.' The judge's house was behind ours in that same Ali-qoli Aqa quarter. I imagine that the wife and daughters of Zell-os-soltan were pious and godly and also had some respect for my father. The judge sent my mother the message: "Yesterday I was personally present in the prince's company and as he showed the people there a pencase scis­ sors which he had in his hand, with my own ears I heard him saying, Ί am waiting for that Sayyed Jamil to arrive so I can cut his body's flesh to bits with these very scissors.' " Our house was in mourning that day. My father had fallen into 18 (Jz) Inquiries I made as an adult revealed that this judge was Hajj Mirza Abu'lQasem, the father-in-law of my father's paternal uncle, Hajj Aqa Majles, the son of the famous Hajj Sayyed Abu Ja'far Sadr, whose tomb in Takhteh-pulad in the famous takiyeh is a place of pilgrimage even today. This Sadr family of Isfahan is the same as that of the imam, Sayyed Musa Sadr, the Lebanese Shia leader who disappeared sometime after arriving in Libya in early Oc­ tober 1978 Qz-c).

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disrepute in Isfahan since he was sometimes present at the parties of Mirza Asadollah Khan, the imperial vizier known to be a Babi, and we were certain they would do away with him if he set foot in town. As I later understood it, my father, together with some other broadminded people such as the Prince of Poets, Mirza Nasrollah Beheshti, and perhaps the Glory of Islam, Sheykh Ahmad Kermani, and the secretary of the army, Ali-naqi Khan, and two or three others in­ cluding a clerk in the English consulate whose name I have now forgotten, gathered around together and read the Persian newspaper, The Firm Cord, which arrived in Isfahan from Calcutta, hidden inside loads of merchandise and bags of granulated and loaf sugar and tea, and they expressed their concern about the country and its people. These concerns gradually took on a practical shape with Mirza Sayyed Ali-naqi Khan opening a modern school where modern sciences and 1:93

English were taught but it was quickly closed by the turbanned army of Aqa Najafi. When the friends defined their field of work, they collaboratively wrote an unsigned treatise of some sixty or seventy pages entitled The True Dream and in 1898 had it printed secretly in St. Petersburg with the help of Mirza Hasan Khan, who was at that time a member of the Embassy there and who later received the title Counselor of State. They circulated the treatise in Iran by sending it to a number of people. At that time, I was not only unaware of the existence of such a treatise but also, due to my tender years, did not understand those matters at all. After Iran got a constitution, how­ ever, I heard one day from my father about the above-mentioned matters, and later a copy of the treatise which I still have even now fell into my hands. The treatise was apparently republished several times, including once in Baku and also once in the periodical Armaghdn in Tehran. It was written as the words of one who sees in the world of dreams the world of the Judgment Day with the no-

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tables and the wealthy and the religious authorities of Isfahan called one by one to the foot of the accounting scales, tried, and given their rewards and punishments.

Now given the circumstances mentioned earlier, you'll have to admit that my mother had a right to be disturbed and distressed about my father's coming to Isfahan at a time when the goods and property of that city's wretched creatures were at the mercy of a band of rabble and riffraff with turbans on their heads and when the price

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of a man's life was less than a dog's, the more so when we took omens by opening a volume of Hafez and this couplet came up: We have tested our luck in this city; Our baggage must be drawn out of this abyss. 1:109

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Without delay, we telegraphed my maternal uncle, Mirza HabiboUah Khan, who was then chief of customs at Sanandaj and later in Tehran became known as Farzad, Elect of the Kingdom, to inform my father to postpone coming to Isfahan. Having passed the months of Moharram and Safar in Tabriz and having received the title of Chief of Investigators from the crown prince, Mohammad AIi Mirza, my father was in Tehran prior to coming to Isfahan. He was handed Uncle Mirza's telegram in Tehran and immediately had a feeling in his bones about the situation and requested Uncle Mirza to somehow or other get to Isfahan and bring us back to Tehran. The Isfahanis were still busy killing Babis when Uncle Mirza ar­ rived. In twenty to forty hours, he had sold our house and way of life, and catching the stagecoach, he started off toward Tehran with me and my mother and one or two other brothers and an unweaned sister.19 I remember well that in the vicinity of Kashan we arrived at a hamlet named Ali-abad, which had nothing but bitter, salty water. Even its watermelons were bitter and salty and we had to give some­ one two qerdns to go down hundreds of stairs with candle in hand to bring us a jug of water from beneath the earth. In the same hamlet we encountered a large crowd of men and women, young and old, all lying half-dead in the shade of the walls. With color gone and feet swollen, they were extremely pathetic and groaned from hunger and thirst and sickness and misery. They had apparently been living in Yazd and in 1903 when the Babi-killing began there too in full intensity with the help of the governor, Jalalod-dowleh, the son of Zell-os-soltan and truly a follower in his fath­ er's footsteps, these forlorn and friendless people had been sent out on foot across the desert by the unkind hands of their fanatic fellow citizens. Observing the pitiful state of those wretches, my mother was deeply moved and began weeping and wailing, saying, "Alas, may I die!" 19

Jamalzadeh's parents had six boys and one girl. The first two were boys who died before Jamalzadeh was born; another boy, born after Jamalzadeh, died a few months after birth. At the time of these events, Jamalzadeh was ten or eleven, his brothers, Issa and Jalal, were seven and six, and his sister, Anisseh, was very young. At time of this translation (1980), only Jamalzadeh and his sister were still living (Jz~c)·

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and " O God, grant me death!" Her weeping made me start crying too and little by little some of the village women gathered to look at the Yazdis and us and the stagecoach also began shedding tears. A complete mourning party had almost been set up when the coach­ man's voice rose up to say that the horses were harnessed and we must move on. All along the road, my mother sighed and wept, remembering the poor homeless Yazdis. We were all genuinely sad and grieved and even Uncle Mirza, himself a naturally playful, witty, and good-natured person, seemed quite overcome. He fixed his eyes on the sinuous, serpentine waves of the desert's sand and dust and sat silent and pensive in a corner of the coach.

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As soon as we reached the way station for changing horses, we went to wet our throats in one of those humble brick and mud tea shops which have for centuries sheltered thousands of pilgrims and travelers and wayfarers on foot and on horseback throughout the vast country of Iran. Wrapping herself in her chddor as women do, my mother sat facing the wall on a ragged mat on the corner of a bench. She was clearly still under the influence of what she saw in Ali-abad. The travelers at the tea shop were without exception those burnt and dusty villagers who plod back and forth with empty pockets for twelve months of the year in heat or cold to find a morsel of bread amid those far distant regions of Iran's sparse and infrequent villages and settlements with only their hope in God and their reliance on Allah. All were seated on benches, still and silent with long-stemmed wooden pipes in hand, their eyes staring dumbly at us. While walking from the coach, I had noticed that I'd lost a knife which Uncle Mirza had brought me as a souvenir from Tehran and I was making everyone sick and tired of me, insisting that the coach­ man's servant boy search the road for it. The villagers puffing nonstop on their pipes looked at us just as if deaf and dumb. One or two were aware of the Yazdis' arrival in Aliabad and asked Uncle Mirza, "Good sir, were those Yazdis still in Ali-abad?" The owner of the tea shop turned his head while blowing into the samovar chimney and said, "They say that they're Babis." A villager who seemed older than the others said, "Hey dad, what kind of talk is that? Isn't a Babi one of God's servants?" My mind and thoughts were on my knife. To calm me down, Uncle Mirza produced his pencil and memo pad from a pocket, wrote some lines, and gave them to me, saying, "If you have these two little poems which I've written on this paper for you well-memorized by the time we reach Tehran, as a reward I'll buy you a first-rate English penknife which will be a hundred times better than your first

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knife." Then he said, "Read it! Let's see whether you can read or not." Turning their faces toward me, the villagers watched to see how a little kid like me would acquit himself. In the trembling and unmusical voice of a child, I read these couplets word by word, Tell the one oppressed, defeated with hands bound, To look to destiny and listen for satisfaction. Even those bound hands will finally be untied, And those now loose will be bound again behind. The tyrant's spirit is like the bee, At whose hands the world is groaning. Be patient until one day he falls, So all can trample on his head.

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Uncle Mirza said, "You read it very softly. Read it again louder and more distinctly so that those present may hear it too!" I began reading in a louder voice. When it was done, that same old villager picked his nose with a finger and said loudly, "Someday when retal­ iation on the hornless sheep is taken from the horned sheep, God himself will retaliate on the tyrant and pull his stock up by the roots." When we reached Tehran, I'd memorized the poems like a breeze, as children say, and I don't remember any more now whether or not Uncle Mirza was faithful to his promise, but I do at least know that those lustrous verses he handed me instead of a knife in a sheath that day in that anonymous and unmarked tea shop opposite those even more anonymous and unmarked villagers are a saber more cutting than a thousand Hindustani swords. 2 0

Well, in that manner we suddenly went into exile from Isfahan. I don't remember the year exactly, but it certainly was the year of 20 (Jz) When I was a resident of Geneva about thirty-five years after those events occurred, a book in Persian titled, The History of the Yazd Martyrs, written in large and most excellent nast'aliq and relating the events of the Babi-killings of Yazd, chanced to fall into my hands. While reading the book, I encountered atrocities that reminded me of the cruel viciousness of the Spanish priests at the time of the Inquisition and of Nero toward the first Christians. For people of a community which considers itself religious and civilized, these actions will be a source of disgrace and shame unto eter­ nity in history's court of justice and the divine tribunal. I found this book on the martyrs of Yazd in the library of the Bahai congregation where I had been invited to give a lecture on the traditional Iranian festival of Now Ruz. The sorrowful hamlet of Ali-abad with those helpless and homeless people on the road between Q o m and Kashan appeared before my eyes as I read, and I heard the people's sighs and groans and my mother's wails, and I recalled the cruelty of the candle and the unjustly spilt blood of the moth, and once more the revolutions of the transient world and the reprisals of unrelenting time served as a warning lesson for me.

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Babi-killings. You will say that Babi-killings were annual affairs then. In that case, I have another indicator that perhaps gives a better context for fixing the date. It was the year that the song: You're on top of the roof, dear, You made the pigeons fly, dear, . . .

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had become extremely popular and was being sung everywhere. But before making a final farewell to my beloved and appealing Isfahan, I wanted to take myself once more to the Zayandeh River's edge and sit on the usual slab of stone and again launch my runaway thoughts on travels among the regions and peoples of the lost times of childhood. Now please don't imagine that the thoughts and reflections overwhelming me at the river's edge, such as the memories of Babikillings and the bastinado of Molla AIi Asghar's son and the behavior of Molla Taqi, were always sad and bitter. On the contrary, how often quite pleasant and enjoyable worlds passed before my eyes! Thus one day without reason or precedent, I happened to remember a very beautiful and eloquent poem of the Prince of Poets, Bahar, which he apparently composed early in this century on the occasion of a journey to Isfahan and which commemorated an excursion along this river. Although the poem is surely known to most Isfahanis of taste and learning, I quote it again here: I saw a young girl engaged in begging, Her figure hidden in a gown of a hundred patches. She was exposed to the pillage of bandit glances Though her treasure was hidden in tatters. And though she craved pity from people of heart and faith, She was hostile toward heart and faith with her unbeliever's gaze. I gave her a small silver coin and passed on. She burned, Her wet eyes harvesting me with their fire. In the evening I went to a grove at the river's edge. Suddenly I saw her there upon my path. She passed with laughing lips and sang a song, In contrast to her parched lips and wet eyes before. "You little minx," I said, "was it not you who burned the harvest Of clear-sighted people looking at you an hour ago? What happened to your bitter weeping, sourpuss, that You thus turned a salt-mine laugh to sugar?"

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"I have a sick mother and a feeble father," she said, "Who can't get up on their feet from their beds. My smile is for my own heart's sake, but My weeping was for my father and mother."

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I began singing these verses beneath my breath and my unruly nature dictated that I keep my eyes foraging about in hopes of seeing the Prince of Poets' beggar girl. Craving to give alms and take my toll of her beauty, I entrusted the reins of my restless heart to passion and desire but alas, my mind was more dead than the graveyard of Takhteh-pulad sleeping opposite me beside the river, and the ladies of Isfahan had drawn totally into seclusion, depriving even sun and moon of the sight of their faces when they heard the glad tidings of removing the veil.21 Seated on top of the stone slab again the next day and training the telescope of thought directly on the storybook world of childhood, I was intently digging and delving and searching around when sud­ denly the faces of two friends, playmates of tender years from my childhood, appeared in the telescope tube and for a while kept my thoughts and reflections busy. They were two brothers, AIi Aqa and Javad Aqa. Their father, Haji Mirza Ali-reza-ye Moghareh, was a landowner of the city and a friend of my father. Since the elder brother, AU Aqa, was hard of hearing and basically went his own particular way, he didn't hang around and socialize much with me and his younger brother. The latter, Javad Aqa, was a loving friend and mine to the core, so to speak; it would in fact be appropriate to say that we were one spirit in two bodies. I remember well the occasion when Uncle Mirza had come to Isfahan to move our household. Having put the house and furnishings up for sale, he was busy preparing the means for our departure. Javad and I were busy at our house playing with the swing and seesaw the day when Uncle Mirza came through the door and addressed my mother loudly, "Hurry and get yourselves together because the stagecoach will be ready in another hour and we must be off." When little Javad Aqa heard this news, his face turned white as chalk, his hands and feet went limp, and he fell to the ground from high on the swing. Two hours later, we left Isfahan and for almost 21

In a series of moves by Reza Shah toward secularization in the 1930s, not only were men required to wear western-style hats, rather than turbans, felt caps, or other traditional Iranian headwear, but women were forbidden to wear veils in public. Feel­ ing uncomfortable with their faces thus exposed, many women, particularly the older and more conservative, retired into the seclusion of their homes, as Jamalzadeh's re­ mark indicates.

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forty whole years after that, for all that I frequently remembered Javad AqI, I never heard either his or his father's or brother's name. When I returned from the river to the house of our kind host that afternoon, I was in a position to check up on Javad Aqa and his family. Our host happened to know them well and said, "It's been a long time since Haji Mirza Ali-reza passed some years of his life on to you, as we say, and he has rotted away seven shrouds by now, but I am personally acquainted with his sons and visit back and forth with them. Actually, they sold their old house after the death of their father and for some years now have dwelt in this very neighborhood. If you would like, I could send a man immediately so they can come to visit if they are home right at the moment and otherwise they can come as soon as they return." "I want to go track them down myself early tomorrow morning, without invitation," I said. My host agreed and said, "So then I needn't tell you any biographical details at present. Their story is worth hearing and they will surely give you an account themselves." What sweet dreams I had throughout the night! Among them, I saw myself with Javad Aqa, playing on the swing, smiling and cheer­ ful, and the swing went so high above the earth that our hands reached the roof of the sky and our fingers touched the cluster of Pleiades.

PART II *

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CHAPTER i

The sun had been up not more than an hour or two when I knocked at The Flip of a Coin j a v | d Aqa's door. Opening it, their man asked, "With whom do you have business?" "Withjavad Aqa," I said. "Tell him it's an old friend who's come from far away." Javad Aqa arrived with dispatch. "What luck! How splendid! What a surprise!" he cried out with glad gusto. "It's a fortunate day! I'd be happy to die with such good news! Today will be counted as one of the best days of my life. . . . " The hand of time had changed our features so much that we could not possibly have recognized each other if we hadn't identified ourselves. Despite that, we unhesitatingly threw ourselves into each others' embrace and heartily kissed one another's head and face. Javad Aqa had become a swarthy, slender man with extremely pleasant features and a nice build and height. When I scrutinized his face and features further, little by little the familiar marks and signs of the face of childhood times became ever more visible, like lines written with gold ink on a tarnished copper vessel that become clear bit by bit in cleaning. I saw he was my own Javad Aqa and I felt especially jubilant at this discovery. While sparks ofjoy and enthusiasm shone from his blue-black eyes filled with love and affection, he said, "I knew you had arrived in Isfahan and my heart pinched up to a poppyseed wanting to visit you, and I decided a thousand times to see you but the truth is that fear and awe kept me back every time and my feet wouldn't budge." "Well, that's terrific!" I said. "Then, God forbid, I've become a snarling bogyman?" "No, you haven't," he said, "but after the long years when you were always roaming around the world and its four pop-

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ulated quarters and were tramping over the seven climes while I, with my black fate, have lain like a prisoner in a corner of this ruin and not set foot outside this city, I was afraid you'd write me off as a moldy, old-fashioned Isfahani and local yokel." "It's true that I've circled around the world," I said, "but my cir­ cling was like that of the oil-presser's mule around the millstone. I've circled the millstone many times but never reached a place where an hour's stay is worth the hundred-years journey, whereas haven't you traveled through worlds right in the limits of Isfahan's environs that I have not seen even in a dream? Hasn't the poet, Kalim, said, If you long for the sight of the world, close your eyes! If you want to open your heart, withdraw into yourself!"

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"Those are indeed compliments," he said, "and I see that you're still just my own Mamal of forty years ago and, praise God, you haven't changed. You never could help but be nice and you've be­ come even nicer." He took my hand and seated me beside himself on a wooden settee spread with a small, nicely designed and decorated Isfahani rug on the side of a pleasant little courtyard garden and ordered tea and hookahs. He had the women's quarters asked to send some pieces of homemade nougat and nut patties left over from the holiday. We had tea and nougat and smoked hookahs and gabbed so much there on the divan that the sun came up by stages from our knees to our waists and gradually fell over our faces and we still didn't stop our heart-to-heart chat. I wanted to sit and talk and listen for days right in that spot but I feared I would waste Javad Aqa's time foolishly and therefore I said, "Shall we leave the rest of the conversation for another time?" "Well, God's pardon," he said, "but you didn't use to be such a delicate person. Perhaps you've committed your heart someplace in a se­ cluded corner of Isfahan and you imagine you can put me off and go away to play your own little games." "Brother," I said, "the time for sowing wild oats is past. Even if there had once been the heart and mind for such devilry, now, in the expression of the common man, a mouse could steal millet from my pocket. The truth is that I wouldn't want to make you squander your time foolishly. You can't help but have a thousand kinds of work and involvements in this city. Even if not, you yourself know best how I run off at the mouth and will rattle on straight through until day after tomorrow if you don't shut me u p . " "Stop that kind of talk," he said. "As Sa'di said,

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You've come late, O intoxicating vision! We won't let you slip away early.

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Fortunately, my mind's completely free these days and if you'll be a simple dervish, we'll just eat a bite of bread and cheese here for today and spin out our babbled tales until our bags are emptied." "With love for the guide's grace!" I said. "What could be better! For years I've longed for the day we would again sit together, just the two of us, and talk on without beginning or end just Uke in those childhood days. Now that my longing's fulfilled, I beg you to instruct them to prepare some of those first-rate homemade kebabs for us and to also tell my comrade, the servant, to close the door of the house and tell anyone who comes that the master isn't home." "My pleasure!" he said. "I hear and obey! 'You be our friend and all the pleasures of paradise are yours!' " Half an hour later we were leaning back on fine, soft Kashi velvet cushions in a cozy corner of a cool underground room with a pool of water in it. Opposite us was a ceramic bowl full of ice into which was tucked a flask of aromatic, top-quality Isfahani arrack, and entrusting the skein of our discussion to chance, what conversations we had on every subject! In the beginning, we talked aimlessly awhile about odds and ends at random. Opening the notebook of a tale of forty years separated by distance, we threaded together confessions and explanations like classical singers who answer each other, one phrase mine and one phrase his, each one in turn pulling out a page in that faded story. Javad Aqa insisted that I'd stayed young and he'd gotten old. For a while we argued, disputing that question, and resolved in the end that we'd both gotten old. Then the conversation turned to happiness. This time I insisted that happiness and good fortune had befriended Javad Aqa, who had passed his life comfortably with friends and family and hadn't pointlessly worn out the soles of his shoes, trotting around the world uselessly like a dog. "Haven't you heard that, Water which becomes silted with moving, Becomes clear if it settles down,"

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I said, and I quoted Sa'eb and also Kalim, whom I like best of all. Then I added, "And surely you know, brother dear, that, Taking a trip doesn't clear everything up; Whoever took a trip from himself is complete here."

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But Javad Aqa wasn't worn down by these. He disagreed vehe­ mently and wanted to prove with a thousand lines of argument that, The earth suffers the kick of cow and ass because, Unlike the revolving sky, it doesn't move,

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and that happiness is in movement and change. We argued a lot about this and finally came to the agreement that neither he nor I had been happy and that, as it has been said, happiness is really a jewel, unob­ tainable like the philosopher's stone and our legendary bird, the simorgh. Furthermore, even if it were found, it's like the small boxes inlaid with thousands of little, multicolored pieces which even His Highness the Elephant would not have the patience to set. The conversation had come to this point when suddenly Javad Aqa sat up and said, "Really, brother, enough of this chitchat! You can't bamboozle an old-fashioned Isfahani like me with little bits of this and that like you've been doing. You should at least know that if you're the bucket, I'm its rope. I swear to you that I won't let you set foot outside this house until you've told me the adventures whole and complete of your forty-years flight and absence. Now then, give me an account of your affairs." "Believe me," I said, "My story's nothing fancy and isn't worth giving much attention. You yourself know the first chapters of it. As a brief summary, it is the story of a child who lived his life forty years ago, with eyes and ears closed, innocent as a little gazelle, free of every bond and fetter in a meadow without thorns in the lanes and alleys of this very city, cheerful, full of enthusiasm and little wits. Devoid of concerns and expectations, he had nothing to do in the fabled world of childhood but run and frolic. Then by decree of fate and providence, he was packed off from this country like a dried-up leaf that happened to fall in the path of the gale of events and he has passed the major part of his life with 'maybe' and 'perhaps' in hope and fear like all sons of Adam. Today with his hair falling out and his wrinkled face and gaping maw, he's like an old camel with a load on its shoulder, its hump with sores and its front and back feet blis­ tered and its knees callused and its scraggy flanks ravaged piece after piece by acacia thorns of fate, a camel that has dragged itself along to the watering place of half a century ago and is presently kneeling there on the ground for a few days until the goad of Tomorrow, the cameleer, drives it in some direction and Time, its owner, pulls its bridle somewhere." "Wherever I've gone in all this period, I've seen nothing but the miller's oppression and the millstone's cruelty. The sky has one face

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and the people are two-faced everywhere. If you've stayed a 100 percent Isfahani and still share their trait of making guests comfort­ able, go ahead manfully and scratch me off, deny you saw the camel, and don't let yourself imagine that I had any adventures at all. So let's see now, what things have you seen and what calamities have you suffered in this long period? Apparently you've weathered the typhoons, as our townsmen say, and have traveled many a strange day's journey, all of which is worth hearing about. Believe me, I swear to you that I'm eager to hear about them." " M y friend," he replied, "it's always been said, if I may be so rude, that the guest is the donkey of the host. But now you're using the excuse of being the guest to get a free ride out of us and pull your beard from our clutches." Anyway, we argued a lot over whys and wherefores until in the end we agreed to flip a coin and the side called by Javad Aqa hap­ pened to come up. He began his adventures like this: "When you left Isfahan, I imagined for a while in the beginning that I would remain forevermore without a friend or companion in the world. But in traveling through life, you must have grasped that all this is illusion and the most amazing medicine which the druggist of fate has in his case is that of forgetfulness and none of Plato's pastilles could ever begin to match it. They put that medicine to work on me, and other friends, who will never measure up to your fine goodness, filled from time to time the place in my life that you'd left empty, and little by little with the exigencies of age and years, other occupations appeared so that no place or opportunity at all was left for love and friendship. Fortune also befriended my father in those times as to trade and property and in a short time he amassed enormous wealth and riches so that his name was on everyone's lips. Despite that, he affected the same simple life as before and never did he step off the path of parsimony, to which he gave the name fru­ gality but which ought to be called meanness and stinginess. My brother, AIi, if you remember . . . " Here I cut into Javad Aqa's words and asked, "By the way, where is Ah Aqa and how is he?" "Just the same as before," he said. "He has his own world and most of the time he's out visiting estates, but aside from that, he's very much a fine and kind brother, and although he also has a wife and numerous offspring now, we've still all remained together, shar­ ing house and expenses, and we still go along in tandem perfectly well. As soon as he returns from the village, we'll visit with him so

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that you'll see with your own eyes that he's the same old AIi AqS and doesn't seem much different." "Just having such a brother is among the gifts divine," I said. " I ' m very, very happy. If sometimes I interrupt you, I beg you not to be annoyed. Continue on the subject now—let's see what has happened to you and your father and brother after my leaving." "If you recall," he said, "even in childhood, AIi had worlds which didn't accommodate me. Whereas I sought simplicity and fled from hustle and bustle and running around, he sought banquets and bac­ chanals and was amply attached to luxuries and social distinction. As I gradually grew older, I saw that for all his innate kindness and brimming understanding and intelligence and despite his inward af­ fection for me, we still weren't a close pair; therefore I didn't try to associate much with him socially and he also found his own friends and confidants and didn't involve himself in my affairs."

". . . he's like an old camel. . . ."

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CHAPTER 2 The Greedy Eyes of

[And Javad Aqa continued his conversation like this:] The thing that always disturbed me the Wealthy about that period and which indeed sometimes kept me in extreme agony was the extraordinary struggle and strain and effort and exertion that my father showed in accumulation of wealth and property on the one hand and in miserly parsimony and stinginess on the other and, truly, he would try to skim a profit off anything. If I occasionally cast caution to the winds and raised this matter with him in conversation, I heard no answer save curt gibes and abuse accompanied by acid scowls. "You stupid jerk!" he would say, "I haven't the life of Khezr! All this grubbing of mine is for your sake." "Then why are you willing to have us be always ashamed and embarrassed among friends and equals even today?" I responded. This was his answer: "When I was your age, never did I ever ask someone for a handout, even though I didn't have even one-fifth of the money in your pocket." To be brief, those sorts of ideas and those kinds of discussions made every day and hour of my life bitter. Finally, when I saw that my father wouldn't subscribe to any sensible remarks of mine and that the affection between father and son would possibly be changed little by little into hatred and hostility, I sealed my lips with silence and hid my inner sorrow and suffering in the warehouse of my mind. Worst of all was that my father had no faith in lessons or learning either, and he said, "As soon as a child has managed to read and write, he should get busy with trade and business and make some money." For that reason, he insisted on taking me to his business office located in the Qeysariyeh caravanserai, and entrusting his books and ledgers and registers to me at a most tender age. Would that he had at least left me in peace with some choices about that work! Not a day passed but that under the guise of attending to the books and accounts, he somehow or other found many gross errors and unforgiveable mistakes in my work and exposed me to insults and humiliations in front of comrades and rivals. It sometimes struck me that I should escape and free myself some way or other from this demeaning degradation, but since I knew my sick and suffering mother's intense attachment to me and, basically, I had been brought up to be timid and weak and short of ambition and, in the words of the dkhonds, so wishy-washy, I hadn't the courage to step

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into matters whose end and outcome were unknown to me, so hav­ ing to suffer helplessly and put up with it served me right. As you must remember, AIi Aqa was smarter than I, and over­ coming impossible obstacles, he started a mechanism going to get a little feasting and drinking on his own. Under the guise of dropping in on his properties, he would get out of Isfahan with some friends whom he had gotten together, and with preliminaries and pretexts known only to himself and his spiritual master, he would fleece the peasants and the village headmen and return to the city with a full bag. In this manner he kept his bread somewhat buttered, and it's no secret from you that he sometimes cut me in on the pickings. Under those circumstances, he was always in good odor with my father and my father constantly shoved my brother's practical knowledge and astuteness in my face, saying, "After all, Mr. Grumble, your broth­ er's a human being too. See how he never complains about a lack of money and in contrast to you, he's always all spruced up and happy and laughing, whereas you work day and night, twenty-four hours a day, only at moaning and groaning and whining and complaining!" Alas that I was a friend of the thief and traveling with the caravan or I would at least have explained to him the source of his elder son's luster! What a headache I could give you! Time passed in that fashion and I gradually became a young man of about twenty-two or twentythree. When my brother was married, my father took a stand, "You too must take a wife." I had no liking in the least for that business, but then I said to myself, "Perhaps if I take a wife, I'll get off my father's leash to some extent and come into some means of my own at the same time." The wife whom I took was a woman found for me by my father. She became the calamity of my soul and made me tired of living. She was the daughter of one of the sayyids and re­ spectable landowners of the small town of Fesharak. Her father was a joint proprietor with mine in that area and was well-known to exceed my father in greed and cupidity. He was one of those driedup, saintly types whose robe's skirts would not be dampened by all the waters of our Zayandeh River. That virtuous daughter of his was indeed a copy to the core of her honorable father when it came to being a repository of holiness; in stupidity and foolishness, unique; in goodness and beauty—actually, she could be counted among the 1 wonders of fate! "Let no Muslim hear of it nor heathen see it!" She 1

This is the second half of a couplet whose first half is: "Tell me so that the fire of my soul is calmed" {be-gu ta atesh-e janam neshinand); the couplet refers to events of a ta'ziyeh (Jz-c).

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was the mirror of grief and the dregs of ugliness and a compartmented travel case fitted with a thousand disproportions and mismatchings. Now, one might put up with ugliness of her face, but oh, when the lady's mouth opened! A hundred pardons for the mouth of that icehouse, that stinking icehouse with its brick and adobe scat­ tered and the straw plaster of its door and walls scraped and carried off by the rain. 2 My poor mother in her sickbed kept pulling her hair and wailing and raging, "Dad, what kind of a girl is that you've found for my poor son! You get sick to your stomach looking at her face! Just the sight of that mess is a penance!" And my father kept resigning it to God and mumbling and grumbling, saying, "You feeble-minded female! A man doesn't take a wife so that he can stick her picture on a pen case or lamp chimney or ravishing-hand vase. 3 A woman should be chaste and modest and thrifty. She's the daugh­ ter of a true-born sayyid and a descendant of the noble Prophet and is a hundred times above our heads too!" My mother didn't give in and said, "A girl's beauty is in long hair, after all. That girl's as good as bald!" My father answered like an old biddy, "An ass's tail has long hair. A wife should have talent!" At last, after paying the milk-money 4 and sending cardamom and flowers and cashmere shawls and rings and earrings and mirrors and candlesticks and a handwritten copy of the Word of God and a pair of shoes and a bag of henna and an embroidered headscarf of fine cotton and a brocade skirt and a Yazdi chddor, the wedding night arrived. To the sound of drum and tambourine and cries of "Best wishes, God willing, best wishes!" and "We came, we came happily, we came from the bridegroom's house, all the kings and beauties almond-eyed, we came to take the fairy nymph, to take the brocade chddor," we bungled somehow or other through the long and pro­ tracted formalities of the go-betweens and the wedding ceremony and after the ritual of giving hand into hand, we entered the bridal

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chamber. Brother, the unseen evil I saw should not be a heathen's fate! She was a perfect example of the well-known verse: She had no eyebrows, she had chickpea eyes; She had a dished-in nose, a mouth the shape of a sack. 2 In addition to the obvious comparison of the lady's mouth to a decaying icehouse, there is a pun on "icehouse" (yakhchal), which is slang for a cold or insipid person, rather like a "cold fish." 3 These were European-made porcelain vases; on the outside of the vase, in the middle, a pretty female hand was attached. They were much sought after in Iran of that period (J z _ c )· 4 The "milk-money" (shir-baha) is money paid by the groom to the woman who nursed the bride (generally the mother but sometimes a wetnurse).

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Woe, those hennaed hands and feet and those indigo mascaraed eye­ brows and those coiled and curly locks of axe-blade shape, dangling in the middle of her forehead! Save me from those scorpion-tailed locks and those beauty marks of every color, set with quince-seed paste over her eyebrows and under her lips! What should I say about that cucumber nose, half-chewed up by a horseshoe-sized Aleppo boil! The hair of the lady's eyebrows had been plucked with a thread and pulled out bit by bit through the powers of tweezers and turpen­ tine and with the help of Lorestan raisins, and over her reddened eyelids, the places for hair could still be seen like the raw flesh of a cockerel plucked while fully dry. Really, it was enough to make you vomit! I stared at the bride and said to myself, The angel of death is better for me than your countenance. If the scorpion should bite me, don't lay a hand on it! Help, save me from that beauty spot like a bent-over bush, planted with saliva between the doll's eyebrows, and that counterfeit mole ground in with ink and lampblack behind the smiling rosebud's lips! The sweat from the heat began flowing across the corners of her mouth down to the sides and well of her chin. What else can I say about her lips and teeth that won't seem an exaggeration? The least I can say is, The upper lip looked up at the Throne of God, The lower lip carpeted the ground.

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Following the Qoran's phrase, "Look at the camel, how it was created," I gazed for a while at that astonishing creation and every moment added further to my astonishment at the Nourisher's work­ manship. Furtively fixing my eyes on the heavens, I then wept to the divine court, " O Lord Divine, at the point of prayers in secret, they always say in Arabic, Ό One Who reveals the beauty and conceals the ugly.' I don't know why you have now dealt contrarily with my unfortunate case, that is, why You have seated next to me someone as ugly as a fun-house mirror and have kept the beautiful hidden behind the concealed curtain." And "Praise be to God, may He be glorified and dignified, for obedience to Him is the means of ap­ proach," as Sa'di begins his Golestdn, for really His creation is the source of lessons of warning. I won't bore you too much, but you should at least know that from that very first sight, saying in Arabic, "Looking on you is as forbidden as looking at the naked back of my mother," I executed the Muslim formula of eternal divorce in my heart and recited a

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thousand curses on my intelligence and common sense that to open the mouth of such an image of beauty, I had dispensed with my own lame hand twenty gold coins worth a tuman for "under the tongue" and also another twenty under the name of "viewing the face" so that I might make a pilgrimage to this icon of disaster and this picture of adversity and the voice of such a creature. 5 We Isfahanis all have a thick accent, but on the very first night, which was a sample of the first night in a tomb, when I was trying to grin and bear it and wanted just to exchange a couple of words with my wife, I found her accent so coarse that I started laughing involuntarily. Still, there might have been compensations to some extent if she had at least had some talent or accomplishment but, may she suffer, she was just a dumb cow and completely murdered the Persian language. Besides all that, my chaste and high-born wife had been gotten to the point where she covered her face even in front of your humble servant, and now, just between us, I was grateful for merely that one thing about her and duly rendered thanks to God every day and hour that at least I didn't share the favor of a visit with the face of such a spouse. Sometimes I turned my face to the wall in extreme anguish, and remembering my dear consort, I hummed these verses we learned in school, as you may recall, and mutely expressed the situation, Oh, your mouth more tight than the plaza corner! Woe, your body sharper than the acacia thorn! I am the servant of your firewood-splitting lips. Camels go in file into your mouth! and I complained about my luck and fortune in having been forced to break my fast and with turnips at that. Briefly, when I heard that Christian monks refrained from mar­ riage, I gradually also took up this satisfactory creed of theirs secretly and imitated them in many other principles of life too. A year and eight months of my life passed with those trials and afflictions and then the month of Ramazan arrived. When my father with a turban of yellow-flowered white cloth called "milk-and-sugar" on his head and a cashmere sash at his waist, with a staff and cloak, and mounted on a mule with a silver bridle, was going with my brother and me and servants and attendants toward the Hakim Mosque one day, a dervish with pleasant face and tangled hair, dressed 5 The "viewing the face" (ru-namS) and "under the tongue" (zir-e zabdni) are cere­ monies where the groom gives money to the bride to show her face and speak some words to him. For the latter, the coin is literally put under (zir) the bride's tongue (zaban).

". . . a dervish . . . suddenly popped up in front of us. . . ."

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in white with a dervish's hatchet on his shoulder and a begging bowl in hand, suddenly popped up in front of us and blocked our path, asking help with the dervish's cry, " O God, O AIi!" Lifting his hand, he took the beaten silver reins of the mule that my father was riding and cried loudly, "Love is for the spiritual beauty of the guide! Blessings on your route, Haji! Where are you going?" With mixed anger and surprise, my father said, "Where do you expect me to be going? I'm going to the mosque." "People with riches which a hundred like you can never match have gone on foot to God's house," he said with an impish grin. "I'd imagined you were going to a wedding party with all those fancy trappings." Then he fixed his eyes on me and asked, "Who is that young man?" "What is that to you?" asked my father. "Go about your business and let people pursue their prayers and worship." "Let such prayers and worship break the back of whatever is non-Muslim!" he replied. "I have asked and you must answer." My father turned pale and angrily answered in a furious rage, "He's my son. Whom do you expect it to be?" "Then why does he seem like a purchased slave?" he asked. "You'd think a prison brand had been put on his forehead." To get free of the dervish's evil, my father put a hand in his pocket, produced a sdheb-qerdn, and wanted to throw it in the begging bowl, but the dervish rejected it with a hand and drew back the bowl and said, "I am a messenger of the Mowla, AIi, and I have no need for your money. Let's see now, how many years of your life have passed?" My father was fed up and said in an extremely bad temper, "This prying doesn't become you. Move aside, or else I'll have them beat your head in and drag you along the whole way to the mayor's house." Brandishing a hatchet, the dervish said, "By the Mowla, if you dare, I swear I'll hand you your due with this very hatchet of mine. So, let's see now, how many years have you lived?" Invoking God's strength, my father said, "What's your business with the years of my life, after all?" Taking the mule's reins more firmly, the dervish said, "Why and how aside, I've come from the Mowla. Whatever I ask, answer!" My father, who like the majority of people of this country was not quarrelsome and contentious, became gentle and said, "Very well. Now that the issue is one of force, I'm sixty-two years old. What's the next question?" "How old was your father when he died?" asked the dervish. "Fifty-nine," said my father. "How old was your father's brother?" the dervish then asked. "Fifty-six or fifty-seven," said my father. "How old was your elder brother when he died?" he asked. "He was exactly sixty," my father answered. The dervish paused and asked, "How many more years do you sup-

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pose you'll still live?" "It's in God's hands," said my father. "A man's natural life these days doesn't get to more than sixty or seventy." "Your beard has turned white and some of your teeth have fallen out and your body's wasted," said the dervish, "and I suspect the smell of funeral sweets will be floating up fairly soon. Let's see now, how much are your expenses per day?" Biting his lip impatiently, my father said, " M y good man, has some madness perhaps come over you that you're stopping people in the middle of a public road in broad daylight and asking questions as stupid as the fundamentals of religion?" Uttering, "God is Truth!" the dervish said, "An invisible hand sent me. So long as you don't answer my questions, I won't let up on you. So tell me now, how much are your expenses per day?" Still keeping down his anger and indignation, my father said, "Within the range of two or three to five tumans." "With your sons' expenses or without them?" asked the dervish. "All put together," said my father. Making some calculations to himself, the dervish said, "That comes to between 1,100 and 1,800 tumans a year. Even if, as an absurd hypothesis, you have another thirty years to live, al­ together you won't in any case have expenditures of more than 50 to 55,000 tumans, while I'm ready to swear by AIi, Mowla of the Vir­ tuous, that it won't come to even half of that. Come now, lay off on the lies and keep your vows by rite and religion. Tell me the truth, what's the amount of your wealth, more or less, and how much is your income annually?" My father wanted to avoid answer­ ing, especially since people from the street and bazaar and a group passing by had crowded around, surrounding us and getting up to look over each other's shoulders at the sight of my father's debate and litigation with the dervish. But the dervish raised his voice higher, looked my father in the eyes, and said, "Haji, you yourself know that the liar is God's enemy. I swear by the Mowla, I have a feeling that you won't prosper in this world or the next if you tell a lie. The rest is up to you." On hearing these words, a strange condition took hold of my father and he said with trembling voice, "God himself is the witness that my holdings are mostly property and estates whose value isn't accurately known and even those who say I own thou­ sands and half-millions are talking with no basis. However, my an­ nual income from every direction comes in the range of 8 or 9,000 tumans." A marvelous smile formed on the dervish's lips, and taking a handful of change from his begging bowl, he said, "Come, poor man, take this, too, and increase your wealth!" Then letting go of the reins of my father's mule, he stepped back somewhat, and with the hand and body movements customary to dervishes, he began

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singing these couplets addressed to my father in a very loud and captivating voice,

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You have two or three rusted nails, And even those collected as alms. You'd say that I'm lord of the world, From my happiness over those few scraps. Pulling your soul out from the world's four pegs At the time of departure is difficult. The man who was hard in this Abode, Has a hard death at the time of departure. Then he drew a distinctly contented sigh and raising his voice still more, he started off on his way singing and disappeared amid the crowd while his voice could still be heard from afar, chanting Sa'di, He said, "The greedy eyes of the wealthy, Are filled with contentment or the dust of the grave."

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That event made a profound impression on me. I followed along calmly without any noise behind my father's steed, but at the same time in my mind's eye I saw his coffin shouldered by four people taking it toward the Ab-Bakhshegin graveyard which, if you still remember, was located right in our own quarter near the Crossroad of Ali-qoli Aqa and it seemed to me as if my brother and I, clothed in mourning, were following along after the corpse. Although I wanted to keep my thoughts busy with something else, it wasn't possible, and that coffin with the shabby black covering thrown over it continued to materialize before my eyes. Suddenly I saw my father's frail and yellow mummified hand with the change given him by the dervish was hanging out of a corner of the coffin and however much the people walking all around the coffin tried to conceal it beneath the black cloth, it fell out again. A cold sweat broke out all over my body and a strange weakness possessed me and my teeth began chattering like a man with malaria and my feet had no strength or energy to move forward any more. Little by little I lost consciousness right in the middle of that street and when I came to my senses and opened my eyes, I saw I was lying in bed at home and the first thing to appear before my eyes was the unlucky face of my wife. I closed my eyes a second time and longed from the bottom of my heart, "Oh, would that I never again open my eyes!" I was attacked by a severe fever and in the burning, molten world of fever and delirium, I constantly saw the dervish's face and his words rang in my skull like a whistle echoing beneath a lofty dome.

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My father's attitude was also changed from that same day on. Most of the time, he was alone in a dark room, engaged in prayer and worship, and wouldn't enter into discussion or conversation with anyone. Three months later, my disappointed mother, who had long been ill and bedridden, found release from pain and suffering in this world. My father decided to take her corpse to the holy shrines for burial personally and to reside there himself. My brother and I and a group of friends and relatives escorted him as far as Najafabad, some twenty miles away, all decked out with proper trappings. Tears poured on all sides at the time of parting and many promises were traded. It was agreed that as soon as my father had gotten himself moved into the most noble city of Najaf, site of Ali's tomb in Iraq, we would all go in groups to visit him, killing two birds with one stone or, in the Tehranis' expression, enjoying both a pilgrimage to Shah Abd-olAzim's tomb and a visit with friends. Eight or nine days later the news came that my father had caught pneumonia in the vicinity of Kangawar, some 250 miles northwest, and passed away there. My brother and I set off for it instantly. There we loaded our father's corpse on the same mule carrying that

"My father decided to take her corpse to the holy shrine for burial personally "

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of our mother and set off together with the caravan. After reaching the exalted graveyard and entrusting our mother and father to the earth and after a pilgrimage to the tombs of the Immaculates, we returned to Isfahan with our hearts full of pain. Being someone not so easily overcome by sorrow and mourning and lamentation, my brother quickly managed to provide the means for a life run according to his wishes, and knuckling down to his own work, he entrusted me to God. Day by day I became even more depressed and dejected and my constitution constantly became weaker and more sickly. Following the prescription of a private physician and also the dictates of my natural instincts, I gradually consigned the business affairs that my father had bequeathed me to an old clerk of ours and for a while in the beginning, I closed the door on stran­ gers and family, and without touching anything good or bad, I lay for long days in a corner of the house, shiftless and idle. Then like a bird with clipped wings that has gotten free from the cage, bit by bit I began walks and excursions around the city and its suburbs. Ac­ tually, I forgot to tell you that immediately on the arrival of news of my father's death, I had divorced my wife and had happily sent her with double her marriage portion back to her father's house and thus freed myself from the evil of her and her from the evil of one like me, a husband in name only. By chance, on the holiday of Barat when the city's men and women go in groups to Takhteh-pulad for a pilgrimage to the dead and bur­ ied, I threw myself among them and as I walked along the Avenue of the Four Gardens, I said to myself that there was no harm in dropping in on the departed and the prisoners of the earth like the others. However, just as soon as I crossed the Bridge of AUah-Vardi Khan, a fresh thought also came into my head, and I said to myself, "Uncle dear, the living have the right to go and visit the dead, but you yourself are no more than dead and undoubtedly the dead have no need for inquiries about their health from the likes of you." In­ stead of going left on the road to Takhteh-pulad, I set out toward the mountains and desert along the same road on which I had come, and when I came to my senses, I found myself on the slope of Sofeh Mountain near a tiny, little spring whose waters were, without ex­ aggeration, the length of a mouse tail and which flowed in the area, running and leaping like a lizard. Just then I heard a voice and I saw the same white-clad dervish of two years ago, squatting on a piece of stone with a cluster of grapes in hand which he was busily eating, grape by grape, completely serene and comfortable. Saying hello, I introduced myself. "Welcome!" he said. "Grapes

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are the fruit of paradise! Come, eat grapes!" I sat down, and little by little every topic of conversation came up. When he heard the news of my father's death, he smiled, recited a couplet, and said, "Just as he came a beggar and remained a beggar, he inevitably also left a beggar. As Sa'di says, Ά beggar is a beggar although he's given all the world.' The gold remains and the discontented die. That's just the rule of fate. As Sa'di also said, 'They collected and stored it and with regret they departed. . . When I saw him showing some desire to hear me talk, very slowly I brought up quite frankly in some detail the condition of my life and related to him a portion of my misery and despair. "Young man," he said, "with your youth and brawny build and intelligence and accomplishment and especially that enormous wealth which has fallen into your grasp and the name and fame and respect which you have in this city, I don't see what you are complaining about." "I've remained alone in this city," I said, "and even, please believe me, in this world and I get no enjoyment at all from luxury and elegance and riches and possessions and fine food and drink." "Stop your joking," he said. "If you aren't happy with all these fancy trappings and youth and good looks, when will you be happy? 'If you want to die, go to Gilan,' as the saying goes." "The difficulty in this is that no one understands the pain in my heart and everyone I gripe to laughs in his beard at me," I said as my tears started to flow without my volition, and I'm a man who seldom cries, in contrast to the ordinary man on the street in our country whose sleeve always has the musk of tears on it. The dervish looked reflectively at me and said with some headshaking, "Apparently the Mowla's views attend you and poverty's die has stamped your forehead. What luck for you! Wipe your tears and pour out the pain in your heart. Let me see how dedicated you are and on which road you are a disciple and what path you seek." Little by little our conversation flowered, and my awe and fear of the dervish vanished, and I recounted for him the whole of my life. Like someone having a discussion with his most intimate friends, and with the lamp of candor and trust in hand, I gave him a tour of all my inner shrines and secrets. With a cheerful face, he scrutinized me anew and said, "Since I see you need spiritual direction and guidance and, as I've said, you undoubtedly are looked upon favorably by the Mowla, divine grace will encompass your situation, God willing. AU those who reach the inn of their goal have set out from that same place. Be stouthearted, for you aren't alone on that road and the Lord himself will be your aide and ally."

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"I want to put on those dervish clothes too," I said enthusiasti­ cally, "and be free of these irksome bonds and attachments." "Friend," he said, "in the words of Hafez, 'You're going quickly, my dear! I fear you'll be exhausted.' 'Threshing harvest isn't work for a goat,' as Rumi's proverb goes. A dervish needs the wayfarer's feet and the giver's hand and the seer's eye. Purity alone is not enough. An en­ lightened heart is also required. You're still very young. You must practice for a while until you are mature and experienced and worthy of grace." "If it be permitted," I said, "I would complete that period of discipleship in your service." "I myself am still a student," he said, "and besides, I have no established residence or dwelling and am a newcomer of the Mowla's and have entrusted the reins of authority to the hands of another who pulls me each day in some direction and takes me to the place his heart desires. But I know someone in Isfa­ han who is a sympathetic sufferer.6 Possibly I could entrust you to him. If he consents, I am certain you will find release from your despair and confusion." "I will be indebted for your favor, sir, until the end of time," I said. "Go to the School of the King's Mother on the Four Gardens," he said, "and inquire about the cell of Molla Abd-ol-hadi.7 Say hello to him for me and tell him the dervish Sobhan said that the password is that he handed me the hookah of love thirteen years ago at the grave of Shah Ne'matollah VaIi at Mahan in Kerman. Say I said, Ί entrust to you this young man on whose forehead I have seen the stamp of purity and sincerity. I suspect he is worthy of favor and I hope that with the grace of your blessed spirit, he will rise to high stations.' I have another personal message which I beg you not to forget. Tell Molla Abd-ol-hadi that the der­ vish Sobhan said, 'God willing, you haven't forgotten that the ac­ count with the cook in Qomisheh for the sheep's-head stew has not yet been settled.' " 8 Saying that, he rose from his place, flicked his lap clean of dust and dirt which had settled on it, and said, "Then good-bye for the 6 The "sympathetic sufferer" (ahl-e del ο dard, lit., "people of heart and hurt") refers to a man who loves all beings and feels pain, indeed embraces it, in an effort to understand God, His world, and all in it. In this mystical sense, it is a phrase much used by Sufis (Jz-c). 7 Hadi is an Arabic word meaning "guide" and is thus appropriate for an ideal type of man, worthy of guiding his countrymen, especially the youth, both morally and physically Qz-c). 8 The sheep's-head stew, which may also include the sheep's trotters (kalleh-pacheh, lit., "head-foot"), is made in Iranian bazaar shops by a special cook, the kalleh paz, lit., "head cook," in the morning, especially in winter. Plates of it may be eaten at the shop itself or the servant of a well-to-do family may bring it home hot to be eaten by the family as a group. It is usually served with an Iranian bread (Jz-c).

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present. May the Mowla be your support and refuge! My comrades are expecting me and the road is long and life short." Then without waiting for my reply, he put one foot in front of the other and plunged down the mountainside. I remained alone in solitude on the mountain slope. My gaze fell on the Isfahan plateau. The sun was going down, and as far as the eye could see, from the mountainside to the Zayandeh River's banks, the land beneath my feet appeared desolate, burnt dry and empty, lifeless and exhausted, with its maize color tending toward red. In the sun's rays, the doleful yellow of Isfahan's facade beyond the thickets of the left bank of the Zayandeh River and behind the leaves and branches of the ancient plane trees on the Avenue of the Four Gar­ dens and the gardens of the southern part of the city brought to mind the pale and mournful face of a despondent mother visible behind the net of her veil and head-covering. Staring at the graveyard of Takhteh-pulad and the scene of the city's lights and shadows and parading the untamed colt of my thoughts and ideas on the race­ course of the living and the dead, I sat there so long that the sun disappeared. It was just twilight when I too came down from the mountain and set off toward the city. I wanted to drop in on the School of the Four Gardens en route and to inquire about Molla Abd-ol-hadi, but the hour was late and I was afraid it wouldn't look good. I couldn't get to sleep that night. What thoughts I had! At the time of the morning call for prayer, my eyes were just getting heavy with sleep when the sound of a horn at the Ali-qoli Aqa bathhouse cut into my slumber. That sound had not yet died when it seemed as if Dajjal, the antagonist of the Twelfth Imam, had appeared with his well-known donkey from each of whose hairs emerge music and song, and from every direction there arose a wondrous jangle and chaotic clamor. You'd think that the relentless army of flies was just waiting for that call to arms so that it could swarm down to bring forth groans from my very foundations. I found myself so powerless on that Plain of the Last Judgment that I banished desire for rest and sleep from my heart completely, and while sending tons of curses on wakefulness and sleep and on myself and strangers, I got out of bed, quite sluggish and weary, while still groggy with sleep. I cleaned up my hands and face very deliberately as sick people do, and drinking only half a glass of tea, I sprang out of the house with the hope of meeting Aqa Abd-ol-hadi and in my heart I longed that never again would my foot cross that threshold or my eyes fall on that house.

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What a wonderful elixir is service to the Magi's pir! I became his dust and so many ranks were given me. It was the zeal of the Magi's pir and the rends' spirit, Which freed me from bonds of the days' sorrow. [Hafez]

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CHAPTER 33 CHAPTER

It wasn't long until I reached the School of the Four Gardens. 1 Its The Magi's Abbey and other name, as you certainly have­ n't forgotten, is the School of the Their Pir King's Mother and it is the same school that Shah Soltan-hoseyn Safavi's mother built. I had a long­ standing acquaintance with it. At times of sadness and mental an­ guish and when entangled by inner crises resulting from fate's incon­ sistencies, I had time and again fled from house and bazaar and kith and kin, and in a mood to meditate, had taken refuge in a corner of

" I t w a s n ' t long until I reached the School of the Four G a r d e n s . " 1 The School of the King's Mother (Madreseh-ye Mader-e Shah) is just around the corner from the Caravanserai of the King's Mother, known to tourists in the 1970s as the Shah Abbas Hotel. The school functions as the abbey of the title; the Magi's pir, an allusion to the perfect spiritual guide in Sufi terminology, in this and succeeding chapters is Molla Abd-ol-hadi, the spiritual guide ofJavad Aqa. The word 'magi' is itself an Iranian word in origin and has been historically associated with the fireworshippers or Zoroastrians.

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that very school. Each time my feet brought me into that revitalizing and invigorating atmosphere, every grief and sorrow in my heart was forgotten and like the intoxication of liquor or hashish, the influence of this spiritual environment penetrated the pores of my existence. As the begrimed and dirty man enters the warm and gentle pool at the baths and has his body scoured of the encrusted grime and dirt by the rubbing of a skillful bath attendant's mitt and soap, I found the comfort and relief of being like a newborn child and truly felt that a breath of paradise breezed into me and renewed my soul. Sitting long hours at the edge of the stone pool with those charming channels of water and the enjoyable waterscape of limpid waters flowing like tears in all directions with the designs and decorations of the green and yellow tilework of the dome and minarets and walls and pillars appearing to continually tremble in it, I envied the calm and serene life of a limited number of nameless and unknown detached individuals called students and mullahs who withdrew their skirts from the world in the corners of their cozy cells behind closed doors made with oiled paper instead of glass and spurned created things to pass their lives in tranquility, dealing with nothing but books and theology and metaphysics and problems of heaven and earth. It is not that I would think of denying the elegance and beauty of other buildings of Isfahan, for each in its own place is an indisputable miracle of fabrication and elegance. But in my humble opinion, the Iranian spirit, which is by nature fascinated with water and freshness and greenery, is more in harmony with the School of the Shah's Mother, which is truly perfect in every respect and is, in my view, a piece of paradise fallen from heaven to earth in this corner of Isfahan, than with, for example, the Sheykh Lotfollah Mosque, which despite all its beauty and novelty has less atmosphere and space, or the King's Mosque, which should undoubtedly be counted as one of the seven wonders but hasn't enough fresh moisture, or the AIi Qapu palace, which has little of its former splendor and glory left today. When I entered the school that day, the pale and revivifying, pleasantly mild sun of early morning had just shone on the roof and on the stout, ancient plane trees, infinitely increasing the purity and spirituality of those sacred surroundings. The gentle breeze like an angel's breath drifted by and the plane trees seemed to be busily clapping applause with their leaves which closely resemble the palm of a hand. Except for the murmur of creeping water and the hushed whisper of trees and bushes gossiping, not a sound could be heard from one end of the school to the other. I sat in the northeast corner of the school beside the porch of a cell with closed door which is known

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to have belonged to Shah Soltan-hoseyn himself and lit a cigarette in peace and quiet, and freeing the crippled little bird of my thoughts, I entrusted it to the waving cycles of passing time. A time and a life were displayed before my eyes which were better than that conceiv­ able even in the world of imagination. A world appeared that was free of war and dispute and void of fuss and feud and with no room for man's usual passions and desires, such as greed and avarice and ostentation. The discussions and controversies were all about logic and learning and literature and poetry and the investigations were totally devoted to minute subtleties of heavenly and earthly meanings in points of religious jurisprudence and its fundamentals, and of met­ aphysics and aesthetics and cosmography.

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I saw Shah Soltan-hoseyn's mother who is said to have personally washed the dirty clothing and apparel of the school's students as an act of charity. In my imagination there materialized the dignitaries and rich and distinguished notables of the city of whom stories are still told and who customarily after making vows in prayer put various kinds of food and assorted fruit drinks on trays of devotion with covers of gold and silver and brought them to those retiring in their cells here at the imperial university. I wondered in that hour whether I too might find for a night some release from the push and pull of adversity and misfortune of my house and life and its commotion and perhaps be able to rest my head on a pillow in one of those half-crescent belvederes surrounding the school, occupying myself for long hours with the spectacle of the stars between the golden minarets and dome, entrusting my ears to the chirping of nightingales nesting in the heights of those ancient trees, and tasting for a moment the flavor of peace and rest and the pleasures of youth and life. While I was engaged in these thoughts and longings, the oiled-paper door of a cell on the other side of the school opened and an old dkhond with one of those long-necked brass pitchers made in Isfahan in his hand, a skullcap on his head, and simple canvas slippers without socks on his feet, came down from the porch and went toward the tank. He was no more than a handful of skin and bones and it could be said with justification that he had the body of a sparrow. He had a lean face and a short, thin beard and even at that distance his eyes flashed with a cheerful electricity sparkling to this end of the school. He sat at the tank's edge, com­ pletely calm, busy washing his hands and face and filling the pitcher. Rising spontaneously, I came toward him to inquire about the cell of Molla Abd-ol-hadi but, as God is the witness, I guessed by some inner sense just as soon as I set eyes on him that it was indeed he. I

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approached and sat crouching a short distance away, greeted him respectfully, and said, "I really do apologize but I want to call on the Akhond Molla Abd-ol-hadi." He looked curiously at me with half an eye and said. "What business do you have with him?" "I've brought him a message," I said. "From whom?" he asked. "From the dervish Sobhan," I said. He was so shocked at hearing the dervish's name that he nearly dropped the pitcher in his hand. This time he turned his face with its every facet suddenly suffused with joy completely toward me and said with a thick Isfahani accent, "What things do I hear? You say you've come from the dervish Sobhan? What are you talking about? Tell me, where was he and what did he do and when did you part from him?" "Just yesterday afternoon," I said, "in this very city of Isfahan right on the slope of Sofeh Mountain." Despite his age, Molla Abd-ol-hadi sprang quickly and nimbly from his place, and coming up to me with arms akimbo, he said with mixed protest and surprise, "Good heavens! Isn't that something! The dervish was in Isfahan and didn't let me know! All right, just wait till I meet that phony dervish! Well, then, let's see, where is he now and how is it possible to get in touch with him?" "When he left me yesterday," I said, "he said he was expected and I thought he would come to Isfahan but he set out on the mountain road, going toward Lenjan, and he kept on without any major change until he disappeared from sight." Mowlana 2 indignantly stared at the ground, pursed his lips, shook his head a while, and then turning both palms to the heavens in consent and resignation, he said, "Wherever he is, may God be his support and refuge. So, now, let's please see what message you've brought." Although I had no inner misgivings remaining that it was indeed he, nevertheless out of prudence and discretion and because I hadn't actually come out with the request, I said, "It may be rude, but the message is for the Akhond Molla Abd-ol-hadi." "Well," he said, "do you think he should be someone with horns? I am Molla Abd-ol-hadi himself, your servant. But now tell me the truth. You're not thinking of teasing me and poking fun at me, are you? I'm afraid you've been pulling my leg and you want to make a fool out of an old man like me." "What kind of talk is that?" I said. "Am I anywhere close to such 2 Mowlana, lit. "our master," (in an Arabic construction using the suffixed first person pronoun, -na) is a form of address used for Molla Abd-ol-hadi in much of the remainder of this book.

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rudeness? Besides, I've also brought a token of proof." "Show me quickly now," he said, "for my heart's turning to water." "It's not something to show," I said, "but the dervish Sobhan said the token would be that thirteen years ago in the village of Mahan in Kerman, he handed you the hookah of love on the tomb of Shah Ne'matollah VaIi." "I give up!" he said. "There's no room any more for doubt or uncertainty. But, finally, why should such a decent man leave me uninformed of his arrival in Isfahan like that! Perhaps there is some secret about his behavior. May God's hand be his companion! If it be fated, we'll see each other again, on the condition of being alive. Good! Now, let's see, tell me what message you've brought me." I relayed the dervish Sobhan's message word for word just as it was engraved in my memory. Molla Abd-ol-hadi looked at me reflectively and said, "The dervish's view is sound. You are welcome. If the Nourisher's grace includes our situation, I hope the gates of bounty will open before us. Has the dervish sent any other message?" "Yes," I said, "there is another message, but I don't know if it's serious or if he said it to be funny." "The dervish Sobhan is a strange man," he responded. "AU his actions and remarks have both an inside and an outside lining and one doesn't rightly know whether he intends to be serious or funny. In any case, tell me now, and let's see what he's up to this time." "He specifically instructed me to inform you that the account of the man in Qomisheh who cooks sheep'shead stew has still not yet been settled." Hearing those words, Molla Abd-ol-hadi began to howl with laughter and said, "Really, that's him all over! But if sometime in your life you see him once again, tell him what's-his-name said he may rest assured that we haven't stayed in debt to the cook and the account was cleared up years ago." "I'm afraid I won't see the dervish again very soon," I said. "The dervish is like a comet," he said. "Once in a century he flashes by, then he disappears right away again, often without even seeing his friends. May God be his support and refuge, for he is indeed a man of God!" "I don't want to be pushy," I said, "but this matter of the stew cook sounds strange to me and the truth is that I would like to ask whether you could possibly please tell me what it's all about so that perhaps it may even be a lesson of warning for a raw and ignorant youth like me." Molla Abd-ol-hadi began to smile again and said, "There's not really much to talk about, my boy. All affairs of qalandar types like the dervish Sobhan are clear as the sun and nothing is kept hidden from anyone. And besides, from now on I consider you my friend

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and confidant and I hope I can lay before you any private secrets there might be. The story of the cook of sheep's-head stew in Qomisheh is as follows." Interrupting his own speech at that point, Molla Abd-ol-hadi said, "But why are we sitting here? Get up and let's go to my cell. I'll steep some tea, you can moisten your throat, and meantime you'll see a dervish's hovel, my humble home and habitat." "I hear and obey," I said. "Any way you desire." The mullah's cell was completely representative of those thousands of rooms that for thousands of years have thus been the home of students and scholars in mosques and madrasehs from one end of Iran to the other, and I don't imagine there's any need for an introduction, description, or comments. It was a room four yards square, connected in back to a tiny dark storeroom with an area of not much over four or five square yards; a faded, washed-out cotton print curtain separated the storeroom from the main room. Mowlana's furniture consisted of a felt rug, a secondhand pilgrim's coat, a piled carpet, and a set of bedding rolled in a Yazdi spread and put in a corner against the wall. A mat had been thrown down in front of the bedding and after entering the room and the usual courtesies, Mowlana sat on the mat, propped up against the bedding. The objects to be seen in the room's niches included an oil lamp with its chimney smoked up so that it seemed as if a big leech were stuck on its glass, a domestically made mirror with the mercury gone, and two or three glazed bowls and plates. In addition, a tin samovar with its paraphernalia could also be seen in a corner of the room. Besides these, a water flask and a covered pot, a teakettle and a jar and a tin brazier, a hookah and a maize-yellow ceramic tobacco bowl and a copper jug and a terra-cotta colored bottle of the kind used in Isfahan for drinking water completed the full list of Akhond Abd-ol-hadi's possessions. I have forgotten to say that a long-sleeved sheepskin coat hung on a rusty spike in the wall next to the bedding. When I later became more familiar and intimate with Mowlana and had more or less penetrated his untold secrets, I found out that in the storeroom he also had a pick and some firewood and brush used for fuel in Isfahan, a clay pot of charcoal and coal-dust, two large demijohns of sour pickles, a demijohn of vinegar and grape juice mixture, a bag of soapwort, a bag of soda-plant, and some onions. IfI want to leave no obligations unpaid, I must say that he also had an earthenware pitcher for the toilet and an ewer without a handle which he kept on the porch outside the cell. His clothing consisted of a disheveled turban and a nightcap and a skullcap, a qabd and a quilted coat, an aba

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and two shirts, two pairs of pants, and a pair of local canvas slippers. Later on I noticed that he also had a thick Khansari aba extra for the cold season which was moth-eaten and had been sent out to be darned. In the beginning I imagined he surely had other clothing, but with the passing of days and increasing of familiarity and rapport on both sides, I saw that he really did not; he really was like the hero Rostam and there was just that one set of weapons. He generally wore his clothes such a long time that he threw away the rags or he caught someone poorer than himself and gave them to him. He washed the shirt and pants and turban once or twice a month by hand with Qomi soap, soapwort, and soda-plant, and he spread them on a rope right on his cell's porch until they were dry. On his wall he had hung this quatrain of Khayyam, written in very choice nasta'liq script with excellent illumination: I saw a rend seated on the frosty ground, With neither atheism nor Islam and neither the world nor religion, Neither Truth of God nor reality and neither Shari'a nor certainty. Who in these two worlds would have the courage for that? 1:156

and every so often he stared at it, engaged in murmuring the words very softly under his breath. Later on when I was better informed about the worlds of his moods, every time my eyes fell on the quat­ rain lines, Mowlana's cheerful and enigmatic face materialized of its own accord right before my eyes and I said to myself, "Don't let those two couplets be a description of him!" I cast caution to the winds one day and said, "Mowlana, why did you pick that surprising quatrain from among all the couplets and quatrains that exist in our language?" He fixed his quick, sharp, gimlet-eyed gaze on my eyes and with a meaningful and enigmatic smile forming in the corners of his mouth, he said gently with his lips barely moving, "The color of its illumination pleases me and perhaps it would be for a curse on the author." When we entered the room, he wanted at first to go and buy me some tea biscuits but I wouldn't allow it and said, "I'm accustomed to drinking only a glass of tea for breakfast and I've done that already and that's enough." "Cut out that talk!" he said. "You can drink tea any time," and he picked up from the foot of the samovar the little hammer used on loaf sugar, broke off two or three pieces of the city's sugar, tossed them into a glass, and said, "Drink and may you always have a good taste left in your mouth!" "Honored Akhond Molla

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Abd-ol-hadi, you've taken up a sensible and simple life," I said. "Just this much is even more than I should have," he said. "Any amount by which a man lightens his load will get him home quicker and more easily. 'Go unencumbered, for the passageway to well-being is narrow.' " "How nice that you're so happy!" I said. "Oh, would that I had copied you!" "Everyone goes on some road bound by his tastes," he said. "The man in the royal palace can be both with God and with himself." "All that in its proper place," I said, "but you agreed to tell me the story of the sheep's-head-and-trotters stew and now I fear this philosophical debate will blank out the matter." "Thank God, it's not possible to hoodwink you!" he said. "When you drink a second glass of tea, I'll tell you the story." In eagerness, I drained the second glass in a gulp and said, "Keep your promise!" Touching his thin salt-and-pepper beard with a hand, he said, "It's thirteen whole years this year since I first made the acquaintance of the dervish Sobhan right in the Mahan district of Kerman. We were both young, he from one region and I from another. After rambling through every square foot of Isfahan's nine counties, I'd prowled around and arrived in Kerman. Our tastes and enthusiasms matched right at the first meeting and we happened to be two of a kind. Passing quickly through the stages of an acquaintanceship, in a short time we reached a position of genuine unanimity and really indestructible friendship. Bit by bit we became informed about each other's circumstances and affairs and agreed not to let the scissors of time cut the thread of our comradeship. At the same time we happened to get acquainted with one of the city's sash-weavers, a poet named Hakim Qasem Adib, and with his guidance we made many very fascinating trips, wandering about the surroundings in that province. We three usually set out from Kerman with empty pockets between the setting of the moon and the rising of the sun, and having no destination, we would take any road that came before us and stay on our feet as long as they would go forward. I will never forget the day that we passed through the middle of farmers' fields, left the villages and towns of Laleh-zar, Shirinak, and Chahar-taq behind, and arrived at the peerless Mountain of the Thousand, famed for the thousand kinds of flowers that grow there." "Hakim Qasem had some skill at writing prose and poetry along with sash-weaving and had written in the Kerman bazaar dialect a book called The Thorn Thicket, which also contained a dictionary of popular, common words. He was a bold, dauntless, talkative poet, a rake and a rascal, robust and argumentative, and he knew every inch of the area like the back of his hand. He had many friends and ac-

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quaintances, including even the sweet and humorous poets in our Isfahani dialect, Sadeq Molla Rajab and Mirza Qashamsham, and corresponded at length with them and had many valuable letters and poems in his possession." Breaking into Mowlana's speech, I said, "Excuse me for inter­ rupting you, sir, but the truth is that I've heard Sadeq Molla Rajab's name many times but I haven't heard of Mirza Qashamsham." "You haji's boy!" he said. "You've been dealing with muslin and calico and barley and wheat and don't know anything about what strange and amazing people have come and gone in Isfahan and how often over the centuries they have left long orations and quite excel­ lent poems as their memorials. Goldsmiths, butchers, physicians, manuscript-painters, and even farmers of our city have been poets and sages in the total sense of the word. Mirza Qashamsham has beautiful satiric poetry; he once went to fight Sadeq Molla Rajab, as the latter alludes to in these couplets: 1:159

My friend's lips and cheeks have a lovely kiss coming; After the lovely kiss, the seesaw is coming. His nonsense is becoming to the poet, Sadeq Molla Rajab, Neglectful of Mirza Qashamsham coming to fight him. 3 I knew them both personally. Sadeq died in 1889 and Mirza Qasham­ sham in 1894. May their souls be happy, for truly their language was spicy and their spirits cheerful and they were models of taste in this city." "I'm indeed ashamed of my foolish ignorance," I said, "and I beg you to not shame me further and to continue your most delectable story." He took a long puff on the hookah and continued, "With such a calamity of a qalandar as a guide, we were busy a total of two or three months, traveling in the vicinity of Kerman. I'll never forget the lovely days we spent in the towns of Fathabad and Qal'eh-ye Dokhtar and particularly in the district of Laleh-zar and Nigar. The dervish Sobhan and I were in dervish's clothing and without whys or where­ fores, Hakim Qasem put them on too, and we three traveled around the world together. Alas, our Kermani friend was very young and aggressive and careless so that during our first two days in Segach, two or three parasangs from Mahan and Sheykh AIi Baba's tomb and located in a pleasant spot on the slope of Siraj Mountain, he 3 Mirza Qashamsham is a name given to sophisticated persons who are proud of themselves but a bit ridiculous. In this particular case, it is the name given to the rival of Sadeq Molla Rajab by the Isfahanis. The seesaw (alia kolang) alludes here to the sexual act ()z-c).

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started a quarrel with people there and began using his club and cracked some hands and heads. Finally they cracked his head too and dragged him along toward Kerman to hand over to the governor. Although the dervish and I wanted to intercede and free the collar of the sashweaver poet from the crowd's clutches, it came to nought and, as we saw it, we too were more or less implicated and perhaps would be dealing with the police and the governor, the law court and clerks and magistrates, and the executioner. Furthermore, while the scoundrels were tying his hands behind and taking him to Kerman, Hakim strongly urged and insisted that we entrust him to God and go ahead our own way. "You don't know what armed Shemrs the riffraff of this area are," he said. "They wait to get hold of excuses so they can fleece some servant of God, however poor and innocent he may be, and plant him under water. If you fall into their clutches, you won't get free, whereas I can cope with them and will get myself to wherever you are." "On the strength of vows and promises, he at last defeated us and, like it or not, we entrusted our head-cracking friend to the Master with total regret and a feeling which can't be expressed, and casting ourselves out of the gulf of perdition, we took the road to the desert ahead." Breaking in at this point, I said, "May God not want the sashweaver poet to feel much pain or torture." "Never fear!" he said. "As later became known, he freed himself by kicking and biting before reaching Kerman. Some years later, when I'd taken off dervish clothing and put on that of a mullah and become a resident of this cell which you see, I inquired about his fate and condition through a Kermani student and I gradually tracked him down. We corresponded for a while and he even wrote a story about the events at Segach, appending it to The Thorn Thicket, and he sent me a copy which must still be among my papers." At this point, Mowlana took out a book from among the few arranged in the corner of a niche, and soon after he began searching inside its leaves, he handed me a faded envelope, smiled, and said, "Open it and read it!" It was a letter sent by Hakim Qasem several years before and the promised story was written on a special sheet in a very legible handwriting and now I'll quote a short version of the copy I transcribed on that occasion with Mowlana's permission: The Story When we decided to set out on a pilgrimage to Sheykh AIi Baba's tomb and a trip to Segach, it was the season when there were plum-

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sized holes in every street and all sides of the bazaar were in flood. We went out the mosque gateway, sailing along like the gale wind and singing a song together. We passed the night at the foot of Mahan's waters and ate Kermani snacks until morning. Then we strode out on the road to the desert, clicking our fingers. When the outskirts of the tomb became visible, we went and lodged in the new courtyard. Some fellows arrived and smoked a hookah. We poured some rice into water and cooked sheep's-head stew with stuffed heart. In the evening when the moonlight illumined the world, we were the confidants and joint choristers for the fish pond's ducks. The stuffed heart was not cooked and still raw when the dervishes booted us out, leaving their mark on us: The road to escape was closed to the band of sash-weavers, With each one's beard in the hand of a dervish. They used force and in their palms was left Some scalp lock and mustache and beard.

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We cut short that night in the Long-Hats' district and decided on Segach in the morning. We made our home at the foot of the plane trees and had some money to eat local foods. In the morning we paid our respect to someone called the Kadrak and we gave tips. That night we deemed it appropriate to play Sheykh San'an.4 We asked for helpers, a pillow and cloak were prepared, we twisted a handkerchief, and the game started. With so much yelling, the partridges raised their heads from the bushes, imagining a trumpet blast. There was shouting and calling over hill and dale: One troop held their stomachs with gales of laughter, One group fell on its back in tears, And from every mountain rise such a song arose That you'd say it could be a peal of spring thunder. The game became hot and gripping, praise be to Allah, with the sheykh and disciple, the dervish and lady nurse, all nimble and brisk according to rules and regulations. No eye had ever seen a sheykh with that elegance, A nimble disciple behind like a turning wheel. 4 One version of the story of Sheykh San'an is given by Attar in his Language of the Birds, a long allegory in couplets of the soul's search for God. The saintly Sheykh San'an falls in love with a Christian girl and, for her sake, becomes a Christian and herds her pigs. Prayers and fasts of his Muslim disciples eventually bring about his return to Islam; his Christian girl has a vision, is converted to Islam, and dies; for more details, see Nott 1954, pp. 34-44. The translator has not been able to find the rules for the game based on this story.

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Sedate and with songs, with winks and blandishments, Sheykh San'an and the dervish, the bride and the lady nurse. 1:164

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When Molla Abd-ol-hadi inferred from my eyes that I'd come to the story's end, he said, "It's not bad for a sash-weaver, but the main purpose was to introduce Hakim Qasem, who in my humble opinion must really be among the elect and elite of this world in chivalry and gentlemanliness." "If he's still alive," I said, "may God prolong his life and if he is united with the Divine Compassion, may God absolve him. One thing I'm afraid of, though, is that one digression leads to another and we'll lose the original topic of the story of the head-and-trotter stew." He laughed and said, "You really are a typical old Isfahani and no one can pull the wool over your eyes. Now that you insist on hearing the story of the stew, you should know that after becoming separated from Hakim, I traveled around the world with the dervish Sobhan, sometimes on foot and sometimes on horseback, and one can't imagine a better traveling companion than he. The dervish maintained that so long as he hadn't turned his own home, meaning the land of Iran, inside out, as was its due, and hadn't gotten to really know it, it wouldn't be worthwhile setting foot outside its boundaries, but when he saw me insisting, he gave in and said, 'I'll love whatever the Master has destined!' and we set off. Sometimes as a pair on foot and sometimes riding in the company of a caravan, we proceeded from Mahan and Zambilabad and Bam Narmashir and the Mouth of the Nightingales, supposedly so named in connection with the sounds of volcanic mountains located on all sides, and after a number of agreeable and disagreeable events and countless good and bad incidents and many thirsts and hungers over which we didn't turn a hair and after drinking a huge amount of bitter, brackish water, following a journey to Sistan and Baluchistan, we somehow or other got first to Peshawar by way of Karachi and Hyderabad and from there to Kabul. By mere chance, we became acquainted in Kabul with an Indian dervish, known as the Kabuli fakir, who wore saffron robes and was one of the pupils and devotees of the famous Indian mystic, Ramakrishna. The truth is that I'd never heard of Ramakrishna, but the dervish Sobhan was perfectly informed about the

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particulars of his life and teachings and he later related to me things about the miracles and spiritual attainments of that great sage, then dead some fifty years, which all attested to his greatness. He also said that after Ramakrishna's death, the students and devotees, who could be considered apostles, founded an order to propagate his teachings with its center in a monastery in the city of Bilur near Calcutta. The order has many branches and monasteries, numerous schools and hospitals, magazines and newspapers in different languages, and mil­ lions of adherents with faith and belief who live not only in India and Burma but also in distant countries."

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" 'All that has its place,' I'd told him, 'so tell me, briefly and clearly, what do you believe were the actual words of that messiah who appeared in this century with his strange and unusual name and what do his adherents say?' The dervish Sobhan laughed. 'India is a coun­ try where belief spreads to the heavens like the wind, brother,' he said, 'and each thorn tip has the sign of a saint's footprint. How can you ask me to analyze in two words for you the thoughts and inten­ tions of one of its greatest gnostics? The truth is that I myself don't know them properly and I know only that the basic aim and objective of the Ramakrishna chain of succession, as mentioned in its book of fundamentals, is to improve man, and they are convinced that to fulfill that aim, it is necessary for the brain, heart, and hand, meaning the faculty of thought and perception, the emotions of love and af­ fection, and the love of work and activity, to all be developed and reinforced in man.' 'Just between us, my friend,' I said, 'you're being quite excessive about this person, carrying it to the point of idolatry. I fear that you're gradually putting him in God's place.' 'Rest assured that he wasn't more than three years old when people in India whom you and I can't begin to match in understanding and intelligence gave credence to his being God,' he said, 'and they conceded that he was a divine manifestation and that the soul of God had transmigrated into his body.' " "The fakir from Bengal spoke Persian fairly well and because like us, he was a stranger with no relatives in Kabul, we formed a mutual attachment and passed most of our time together. During the day we generally separated from each other with a view toward earning our livelihood, and each roamed in a different direction of Kabul's old city. The dervish Sobhan hit it off particularly well with the city's inhabitants, since Kabulis are naturally fond of poetry, and he im­ provised appropriate poems for each place and person at the dictates of his glib and exuberant nature. But thanks to the blessing of my

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meager voice, I too shared in the generosity and hospitality of Ka­ bul's citizens so that I never returned home with my begging bowl empty. Only for the fakir from Bengal was nothing known about his means of obtaining bread and generally when he went out of the house with us in the morning, he went straight out of the city with head bent, and no one knew where or for what purpose he was going and then he'd return in the afternoon or at dusk." " O u r business of the day was like that, but at night we generally sat around and put a large kettle on the fire for fixing tea and engaged in long hours of discussion and conversation. The fakir from Bengal was quite enamored of Ramakrishna and whenever his name came up, a strange joy and rapture took hold of him and like the infatuated lover automatically rising on hearing the beloved's name, he'd say, 'Rama!' and begin dancing, and with the flavorful accent and flavor­ less tune of the Indians he would begin reciting poetry of the medi­ eval Muslim poet of India named Kabir, who according to the der­ vish Sobhan was also a cloth-weaver like our Hakim Qasem and whose poems Ramakrishna had liked extremely well. The dervish would become so excited that we'd very gradually get into a good humor too with his singing and ecstasies and be overcome by rap­ tures ofjoy." "One night when as usual the talk turned to Ramakrishna and my friends were absorbed heart and soul in discussion and their conver­ sation flourished actively without their paying any attention to me, I was fed up and interrupted them, saying, 'Dear friends, you have carried on a conversation with so much praise and veneration of this august person that the mouth of even an ignoramus like me has started watering and little by little without knowing or seeing him, I've attached my heart to that caravan leader. How nice it would therefore be if you would complete your generosity by telling me more details about the wisdom and learning of India and its sages and wise men, and especially about the life and teachings of Ramakrishna, so that my begging bowl is not left entirely empty of that divine harvest!' Ί myself am even more thirsty for that than you,' said the dervish, 'and my information is too limited for me to be able to quench the thirst of others. If you have a request, you should cross me off and put the touch on our respected friend.' And he pointed a finger at the fakir from Bengal." "Shaking his head, the fakir said, 'You yourself know better than I that India is an unusual country. I have smelled only one rose in the wide rose garden and that is indeed the heavenly rose of Rama­ krishna, the best flower the gardener, Time, ever planted. It was a

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fiery flower whose flame set fire to every place and person it reached and what voice would you expect to rise from what's consumed? Hasn't your poet said, "It died consumed and hadn't made a sound."?' " 5 " 'You say that in the tumultuous forest of India's wisdom and learning, Ramakrishna has been enough for you!' I said. 'How happy is your good fortune and success! Alas, and a thousand times alas, that we arrived too late! It's the fault of fate and horoscope. Today he's in a caravan I know I will no longer reach. It's enough that the clang of the caravan bell reaches me from afar. If we are deprived of the rose garden, the smell of the rose can yet be sought from rose water. I hope by the grace of your spirit, sir, to pluck at least one flower and obtain one leaf from those holy gardens.' 'Although Rama went to the Abode of Eternity at the age of fifty,' he said, 'and spent half his life with lips closed, silent in a world of abstraction, observation, and contemplation, even that short life of his was a boundless sea, and picking up its water with cup and palm is like digging a mountain up with a needle.' " 'We'll be content with a drop from that sea,' I said. 'Haifa cup, rather, a thimble is enough for our intoxication.' " 'Now that the sea and the cup have been brought up in the conversation, ' he said, 'I'm reminded of an evening we were surrounding him on the Ganges River bank, one parasang from Calcutta, in the garden of a temple entrusted to him under five trees planted with his own hands and known as Panjavati, since panj means "five" there, and we were occupied with looking at the bright stars of the sky and the dark waters of the river. Ramakrishna was always extremely moved by the beauty and loveliness of nature and he suddenly went into a trance, clearly immersed in a world of abstractions. Some time passed before he came out of it. One of those present asked where he had been. Rama smiled and said with the very calm and soothing voice which was his trademark and whose melody will never leave my 5 Consistent with the fakir's references to rose gardens, this line comes from The Rose Garden by Sa'di. It occurs in the introduction and refers to the standard Sufi image of the moth attracted to the candle, meaning the seeker attracted to God; the following couplet makes clear the parallel destinies of the moth and the seeker: O bird of morning! Learn love from the moth, Which died consumed and hadn't made a sound. Those pretenders in search of Him are uninformed, For he who became informed, when informed did not return. The remarks of Molla Abd-ol-hadi in the paragraph following indicate that he has identified the reference to The Rose Garden. The search for mystical knowledge of God, i.e. to be informed or have news of Him, and the desire to be united with Him, recur several times in this chapter, as well as elsewhere in this book.

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ears, "I'll tell you the story of a doll of salt in answer to that question." We cried out unanimously that we were all ears. "Once upon a time," he said, "there was a doll of salt who went to measure the sea one day with a cup and a yardstick. When it reached the edge of the sea, it just stood there, busy watching it. The salt doll existed right through that moment, but just as soon as it entered the sea and its feet touched the water, it became one with the sea, meaning it melted and disappeared, vanishing completely. The salt of which it was made had come from the sea and returned to it again. No other salt doll can return from the sea to tell us the story and inform us about its depths and abysses." ' " "The fakir from Bengal stopped talking, totally engaged for a while in silently pondering and scrutinizing the noble meanings and valuable truths of that wise story. Then suddenly the voice of the dervish Sobhan rose like an eagle soaring up from the earth and gradually reaching the summit and with the special melody used by singers of The Masnavi, he began a song with these couplets: Like the drowned, the arrivers know, O son, When they gaze on His attributes. When your head's on the bottom of the stream, How do you look at water's color? You saw the stream. Pour the jug into it! When does the water escape from the stream? When the jug's water goes into that of the stream, It becomes absorbed and resembles it. When it leapt into its own origin of the sea, It was freed from the sun's heat and the wind and earth. I glanced at the fakir. His eyes had closed and he seemed to have dried up in his place so that not even the sound of his breathing could be heard. In the same still silence, the dervish altered his scale and tune and started singing these couplets of Attar: Lose yourself in His sea like the drop, To find a share of your origins. When in fact you arrived at the Truth of God, You reposed in the sea like the drop. Recognition will suddenly result; Like the drop, you'll arrive in the sea. You'll be joined to Him like the drop and the sea; You'll find a share of your own existence. When you sit in the sea, you become the sea;

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You see nothing else but the sea. Bring out the pearl and break the shell, So you may understand the sign of one who knows. If you become informed of its meaning, You will become united with the spiritual sea. Discover the meaning, the secret of Reality! Like the drop, go into the sea of Unity! At the end came man's union with God, Like the drop introduced to its sea. It went into the sea again and became just like it. As it was in the beginning, so it became at the end. Like the drop, I am united with His sea. . . . The speech was cut short, and Allah knows best. The dervish Sobhan was silent once again. Like a statue molded from stone, the fakir from Bengal put both hands on his knees in the peculiar manner which is a trademark of India's mystics and yogis and sat erect and motionless in his place with no sign of any trace of life. I went up to shake him and bring him out of his trance, but the dervish Sobhan put a finger on his lips and said, 'Don't disturb his raptures of exultation because he's traveling in the happiness of a world from which no one who becomes informed of it returns informed, and it's the same journey of ascension that is called samadhi in India.' " "I returned to my place and sank into a sea of observations about those wondrous states. When I opened my eyes, night had passed and the feeble light of the first morning hours was falling into our room." "The dervish Sobhan was still asleep but I saw no trace of the fakir of Bengal. I was surprised that he had gone outside so early and I was afraid he might have set out in his unconscious state of last night and, God forbid, he'd be injured. I put my hand on the shoulder of the dervish Sobhan and woke him. 'Our friend slipped away,' I said. 'It would be good for you to get up and we'll see where he's gone to, lest he get hurt.' No matter where we wandered in Kabul and its outskirts, no trace of the fakir turned up nor did anyone have news of him. We returned home with tired feet. The next day also passed, again with no news. 'I'm certain he's gone outside the city,' said the dervish Sobhan. 'He himself was saying that he fancied going to Tibet for a pilgrimage to the monastery of Ramakrishna proponents there. May God's hand be his companion! If it be destiny, one day perhaps we'll meet again.'

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"The next morning, we too walked off toward the desert and mountains with our backs to Kabul. The dervish Sobhan fancied going to Samarkand and said, 'Shah Ne'matollah VaIi spent some days in the mountains of that area, engaged in extended austerities in the height of winter's cold, all alone in caves on Samarkand's outskirts, passing forty-day periods in secluded devotions. It's been written that the roads were closed because of so much snow and when some hunters happened to be in those regions in the spring after the snow and ice melted, they saw the sayyid, who had been engaged in worship and austerities absolutely alone with no kind of equipment or tools or provisions and who was still in a cave and perfectly sound and healthy.' "

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"I personally did not, and do not, much believe in that sort of miracle but, on the other hand, I also did not want to deny cases of that sort; I therefore consigned control over me directly into the dervish's hands and said, 'Friend, to love is to trust. I have no authority over myself. Now that we've consigned the reins to destiny's hands, I'll follow you anywhere you go.' "Travel by cart, stagecoach, and carriage had become easy by that date but once or twice when the chance arose for us to travel several stage stops by those means, we realized that the spice of the journey had disappeared; that kind of speed is good for someone in a hurry with his work, but not for the likes of us, people who intentionally stretched out the hours and whose purpose in traveling was to see the world and its people. When a cart flashed by like a whirlwind full of dust and dirt, or a wheeled coffin moved past opposite the villages and settlements, which were sometimes fresh and green like heaven and sometimes dried-out and burnt like hell, and we found no opportunity to have at least a few words of conversation with those villagers of amiable and sunburnt features hurrying from every side for a look and also found no opportunity to understand what kind of people these were and what their work was and what kind of thoughts they did (or didn't) nourish in their brains, we became peevish; every nook and cranny of our minds envied the pleasant night journey of those in caravans, and our mouths watered at the memory of the joy and delight of the travels to staging houses far and wide and the clanging of bells and clamor of the caravan, and the mornings of departure and the traditions of camel-litters and tentkeepers, and at last the day arrived when we made a vow, promising ourselves to never again set foot on the running board of cart or coach or other modes of travel made only for individuals in a rush." "The weeks and months passed in a leisurely manner and many a

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town and hamlet passed beneath our feet. By force of horn and cud­ gel and by the poems and panegyrics appropriate to time and place that we so often improvised, our bread was buttered wherever we went. We ate the bread of Sunni and Shia, said thanks, and went ahead with happy hearts and minds at ease." "We were gradually entering Turkestan when news of the war naming between Russia and Japan was published and our plans and ideas were totally disrupted." Ά curse on the graves of the fathers of Japan and Russia!' said the dervish. 'What have we to do with war and peace of the yellow skins and white skins.' We set out on our own path with All's love, but encountered obstacles and difficulties on the Russian frontier which perforce obliged us to reverse the asses' heads, to put it crudely. Staying for a while right at the border, we were happy in the corner of a ruined caravanserai and since there was no rush and the weather had become exceedingly warm, we ate the foods of Turk and Tajik, especially the noted green tea of the Turkomans of that region, and we sang them silly nonsense." "One night when the dervish Sobhan was busy at the foot of the wall preparing a rich and delicate onion soup thickened with eggs, I was pressed by homesickness to sing a song under my breath and had reached these words, 'Don't seek the bounty of your homeland's morning in the Syria of strangers,' 6 when the dervish jumped up suddenly like a man stung in the foot by a scorpion and fixing his sharp gaze on me, he said, 'Can you pass up the goodness of this egg-and-onion soup?' 'What do you mean?' I said. 'Such a strong desire for friends and home suddenly hit me that I haven't the pa­ tience to cook anymore,' he said. 'If you'll listen to " G o ! " get your­ self together immediately so that we free ourselves of the evils of this nasty caravanserai and set out on the road to Tehran and Isfahan.' " "I sprang up dancing from my place, and in no more than an hour we were busy pacing off the road to Mashhad, our knapsacks on our shoulders." "We stayed no more than three days in Mashhad and after kissing the four corners of the holy sepulcher of Imam Reza, sometimes called Guarantor of the Gazelle because he once protected a gazelle from hunters, we took the caravan path and proceeded by stages toward Isfahan, the image of paradise. The misfortunes that now befell us and the obstacles we passed and the pleasantness and un­ pleasantness we saw will be left for another occasion. With the help 6 There is a play on words here, since sham, translated as "Syria," can also mean "evening meal, supper."

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of God's lamp, and He is the Truth of Assistance, the sofreh of our stomachs was somehow filled and we proceeded two or three parasangs ahead. I won't hide from you that every day we also increased our savings for a rainy day with a little something in a corner of the begging bowl or the fringes of our sashes." "It was evening of one of these extremely beautiful autumn days when suddenly the halls of the city of Qomisheh, later known as Shah-reza, appeared in the distance. Qomisheh is in fact the gateway to Isfahan and with the smell of the invigorating odor of the familiar native land and with the glad tidings of soon seeing friends, flower upon flower blossomed for me and I couldn't make myself stand still. I wanted to put forth wings and instantly fly to the holy courtyard on the Avenue of the Four Gardens and to the seas of joy of the Pavilion of Forty Columns with its reflecting pool. Although claiming to have wiped the tablet of his mind totally clean of marks of friends and home with the rose water of detachment, even the dervish Sobhan was defeated by nature, inasmuch as he, like you and me, was born and nourished by the same water and earth. Twisting up mystical stages and divine treatises with his natural thoughts, he tossed them into a corner of his begging bowl and shared in my joy and enthusiasm and began to whoop and holler." "Alas that this rapture and exhilaration didn't last! A raucous noise rose suddenly and by the time we realized what was up, we found ourselves like a ring's gemstone in the midst of a crowd of hairy Lors, sun-blackened louts who'd sprung forth from the earth like demons and afreets with glittering, glaring eyes, muskets on their shoulders, mounted and afoot, completely surrounding us and hopping up and down. You'd think they'd learned only the words, 'Strip down!' in the Maktab of Creation and that no sound but that iniquitous phrase had ever sprung from their gullets." "Directing my words toward the shaggy, stupid lout who was clearly the gang's leader, I said, 'Honored chief of the tribe, pay no attention to our appearance! We have great rank and honor in the governor's house in Isfahan and if it comes to the governor's ears that there's been some affront to us, he'll not overlook your offence.' 'Strip down!' he said. 'After all,' I said, 'this country has authorities, it has courts of justice, it has laws. Do you think this is some city of anarchy that you're stopping God's creatures in broad daylight and you're wanting to rob people?' Clearing his throat and spitting disrespectfully on the ground, he said, 'Strip!' 'What good will these old and worn-out cloaks and qabas and hides and woolen cords of two of Ali's dervishes be for you anyway?' I said. 'Speed it up! Strip!'

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he said. 'We've come a long way,' I said, 'and our feet are blistered and our stomachs are hungry and our friends and family are on the lookout for us.' Getting quite gruff with us, he said, 'Strip!' 'Where have mercy and generosity and faith and religion gone anyway?' I asked. 'Aren't we all brothers in religion? Aren't we all people of this water and land? Aren't you a Muslim and a Shia of Mortaza AIi? So, don't you fear the punishment of the Day of Resurrection?' With his voice still harsher, he said, 'You, strip!' 'We've returned from a pil­ grimage to Imam Reza of the Strangers, after all,' I said. 'We praise descendents of the great prophets and the pure imams. We'll lay the dervishes' curse on you!' Like the evil Caliph Yazid, he turned to the followers of his miserable slogans and said, 'Strip them!' These words had not yet passed his lips when his men, crude and coarse as hell's agents, attacked us. I thought to myself that a certain someone had made the most careful arrangements to hide his savings in the fringes of his sash, safe from the larceny of those two-legged animals, but alas, they seemed to smell it out. The first thing they did was start ransacking my sash and the waistband of my pants, taking possession of my several months of reserves with such total shamelessness and insolence that you'd think I'd consigned it and stored it up for them. The dervish Sobhan had more experience in the world than I and was willing to show some valor and practice resistance. I didn't want to let my teacher down, but by the time we managed to move, our opponents had some sixth sense about it and immediately increased their deference, that is, they doubled the intensity of their accent by giving a much more forceful taste of clubs and fists. There was no way out. We entrusted our bodies to fate and chance and in a twin­ kling, every piece of our outfits had fallen into the hands of a bandit. We begged, implored, and pleaded enough so that they did pass up our underwear, and then leaving us undressed, bareheaded, and bare­ footed in the middle of the desert, they disappeared from view, rid­ ing full speed, as quickly as they had popped up in front of us. You'd say not a soul had come and not a soul had gone and not a dervish of the Master had been left head and naked." "Laughing and staring at me, the dervish Sobhan shook his head and said, 'How are things with you, friend?' 'There's love for the morshed's beauty,' I said. Ί give up!' he said. 'There's room left for thanks,' I said, 'because we at least came out alive and healthy. Those wretched pagans might have crushed our heads under rocks just to give their message meaning.' 'Life and property are held by the Nourisher's power,' he said. 'That's all true,' I said, 'but what should be done now about these empty pockets and our looking like bur-

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glars on the lam?' 'Don't grieve over the goods,' he said. 'The Master of the Virtuous, AIi, has said in Arabic, "Goods belong to God; divide them equally among you, devotees of God!" If you've read the exquisite story of "The Thief and the Judge," you know that no judge or Muslim jurist could give thieves an answer based on logic and reasoning.' 7 'All that in its proper place,' I said, 'but the stomach of this well-wisher is beginning to growl and I'm afraid that with these empty stomachs and bare feet and the desert full of stones and thorns, we'll never be able to reach Qomisheh once it gets dark.' 'Praise be to Allah!' he said. 'Though the Lors took all your things, your wits are still there. I too am convinced that we must hurry our feet without delay so that with the help of the Master, we'll arrive in time to scramble around for some food and drink.' "

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"We arrived at Qomisheh in a state of collapse. The city had gone to sleep, the doors were locked, and not a soul could be seen in the streets or bazaars. Fortunately, the weather hadn't yet gotten very cold and we somehow passed the night in the caravanserai corridor. We wanted to move on toward Isfahan at the morning call for prayer before the gates and shops opened but our hunger tortured us terribly and our feet could scarcely move. Halfway through the bazaar, we just happened to pass by one of the shops for sheep's-head-and-trotters stew. Its pleasant smell so robbed our heads of sense and reason and prudence and caution that we entered the shop automatically like the calf of Haji Mirza Aqasi.8 We ordered three pounds of barley bread and a big bowl of the stew and by drinking half a dozen glasses of tea with plenty of sugar, we rid our bodies of exhaustion and fatigue. I wish you'd been there! Never in our whole lives had such delicious food gone down our throats! The dervish was putting on quite a show and I took his hand, 'Flower of mullahs, it's not your hay, it's your hayrack, as the expression goes.' 'After the Lors' charity, there's nothing left of ours but the hayracks,' he said. 'I'll pass the test with flying colors, so don't cut yourself short; the provider will be another.' 7

This is a popular tale by an anonymous author in which a judge of Baghdad, elaborately dressed with full entourage, goes to pray in a beautiful garden, carrying out a Tradition. A bandit stops him, the judge invokes one Tradition after another with the bandit topping each with another Tradition, and eventually the judge has to dismount and turn everything over to the bandit (Jz-c). 8 Haji Mirza Aqasi, prime minister of Fath AIi Shah (reigned A.D. 1797-1834) was a theologian of good family but reputedly ignorant of matters of government. He had a calf which he let go indoors when and where it pleased and which thus became known and dreaded in Tehran. The phrase, "the calf of Haji Mirza Aqasi," became proverbial for someone of no importance who is nevertheless known to everyone (Jzc).

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"The cook's shop was pleasant, warm, and cozy. The aromas that went to our stomachs also went to our heads and we were understandably gratified. The dervish Sobhan quoted the old proverb of Sa'di, 'When water rises over your head, one reed-length is the same as a hundred,' and ordered tea and lemon water again." "Then he gave a respectable belch, yawned luxuriously, and putting his hands one on top of the other behind his head, he lay down, stretched out majestically, and said, 'Since the shop isn't crowded at present and no customers have come and no one's started any commotion, let's take a nap.' I saw nothing wrong in what he said and copied him, stretching out beside him. If the cook's servant boy hadn't waked us up (and with such scolding and so belligerently!) God knows how long we'd have slept!" "The dervish rose and unhurriedly picked up the earthenware pitcher and was busily wetting his head and face when I whispered softly into his ear, 'Now's when you'll catch your donkey's head in the wine cask, my friend!9 What's to be done about the money?' 'That won't be your problem,' he said calmly and went forward. I trailed after him like a dog patted on its head." "With perfect nonchalance and self-assurance, the dervish stuck out his chest, lowered his head, and started out of the shop when the stew cook restrained him and let out a yell, 'Hey, you stupid ass, where are you going? You think this is a mosque and people give out head-and-trotters stew as alms?' Without losing his aplomb, the dervish answered, 'You're a decent person! Do you realize what you're saying? Don't you even know whom you're up against? So how much does the bill come to?' Mollified, the stew cook said, 'Now there's a good fellow! You had three pounds of barley bread; that comes to one sdheb-qerdn. You had a bowl of the stew; that comes to three pandh-dbddis. You had eight glasses of tea and lemon juice; that's another two qerdns. All together it comes to four qerdns and ten shdhis.' Without losing his composure, the dervish Sobhan said, 'May God forgive your father! I've paid five qerdns, with the part left over as a tip for the good-mannered servant boy.' "Hearing those words, the stew cook flew at the dervish so that I thought he'd make his stomach into a sofreh. But the dervish wasn't 9 This refers to the story of a peasant of Qazvin, a town whose inhabitants have a reputation of not being very smart. A peasant's donkey gets its head stuck in a wine cask. Several other peasants suggest stupid solutions and then the mayor of Qazvin comes along and says the solution is easy. He cuts the donkey's head off, still cannot get it out of the cask, and therefore breaks the cask. He then asks the peasants, "What would you have done without me?" (Jz-c).

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disconcerted and stood like the Mountain of Abu Qobeys and dug in his heels, 'You've taken your due, so why take my life?' "People were crowding around. Men and women had surrounded the shop so that the expression, 'no place left to poke in a needle,' was no joke. I could bore you now with what happened between the dervish and the stew cook and the words that went back and forth and you should at least know that an account would be sweeter and more elaborate than the famous story of'The Thief and the Judge.' In the end, we set forth on the road to Isfahan, looking righteous but indebted to the stew cook of Qomisheh, while the poor fellow's abuse and curses escorted us for half a parasang." "The story of our crossing the midst of the magnificent mountains of Marq and Mahyar, which are worth seeing, and our arrival at the place where one lone tree appears at the edge of a narrow spring known as the Spring of Farewell on the road to Shiraz, and a description of our delight and elation when we approached Isfahan and from afar our eyes fell on the mountains to the south, each of whose names and locations we knew, starting from the Sofeh (Safi) Mountain to the Takht-e Rostam Mountain, the Khajik Mountain, and the KolahQazi Mountain, is itself another tale unconnected with this one. As I have already mentioned, as soon as means were available, I betook my disgraceful self to Qomisheh on my own two feet and brought my shoulder and that of the dervish out from under the burden of that obligation. In addition to an apology and a prayer for a blessing, under the rubric of seeking exoneration and legitimacy, I also poured something over and beyond my debt into the stew cook's bowl." When Mowlana's tale was finished, I said, "You've done intelligent things! Whoever said, 'When water remains in its place, it stagnates,' certainly put it well. Oh, would that I could get out of this dilapidated city and breathe freely and see things and places and people I haven't seen." "First," he said, "you must know that the best journeys are those which a man makes inside himself, in his mind and his soul, and second, the gate to the world isn't closed in anyone's face. Be ambitious, and leave the rest to me! I give you my word that if you're man enough for the road, no one will restrain you." "The difficulty there is that I haven't much get-up-and-go," I said. "It isn't even my own fault; it's the way I've been brought up. I'm afraid of things I've never done." "Little by little I'm getting a feel for you," he said. "You're like many individuals of this period who are sick of their life and in their hearts want many things but they themselves don't know exactly what they want or fear or aren't capable of doing."

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"I imagine I do know to some extent what I want," I said, "but so far I've found little and returned empty-handed, however much I've searched." "If you actually know what you want for yourself," he said, "you are an intelligent man. There are few in this world who really know what their hearts want. Now that we've become mutual friends, let's see what you are after and what your heart desires." "I don't get very much satisfaction from this world where everything I see is transitory and which has rightly been called a borrowed world," I said. "I have become attached to many things but have regularly been disappointed with them all. Innocent children of tender years made me quite happy and the amount of pleasure I took in their sweet conversations can't be measured or defined and sometimes I longed that I might spend all my days and nights with them, but by the time I'd blinked my eyes, they'd grown up and their teeth had come in and they'd begun to bite. If they're boys, in a twinkling their voices get like those of half-breed cockerels and their Adam's apples round and swell like a mountain goat's hoof and their darting eyes race this way and that like those of a young goat, 'What's going on, sir?' Congratulations to their parents! They've reached puberty! From that day on, dissipation and double-dealing and foul and filthy passions and desires affect their appearances and their activities or inactivities so that when you watch them, you hate them. But if they're girls, it's a hundred times worse. Those lovely striped and spotted snakes have not even started talking when nothing comes into their heads but husbands. In order to fascinate some poor simple youth and use him for their subsistence and adornment, yoking him in perpetual servitude, they take on lewd airs and mannerisms that would never occur to a jinn." Interrupting me here, Mowlana said, "Don't trample on truth, my friend! Individuals greater and more knowledgeable than you and I have called women the rose garden of the world and have said that without the presence of women, the world and life would have no grace and sweetness. So why at your age are you so aggravated by this noble sex?" "Perhaps it's tactless," I said, "but if I may be so rude, why haven't you yourself chosen to be married, sir?" Mowlana gestured with his hand as if wanting to say that the time was past for him, but I wasn't deterred and said, "That answer won't do." "Why hide it from you," he said. "When I was young, death wouldn't grant a reprieve to the one whom I loved and who had

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branded my heart. Today the time and season for marriage is already over and with the precept of Hafez, who said, When you grow old, Hafez, get out of the tavern! To be a rend and sing lyrics is better in the time of youth, 1:184

I've thus rid my head of passions, and without cooking flour, I've hung the sifter on the wall. Besides, although I still hadn't yet heard the holy Tradition in Arabic, 'Goods and sons are temptations,' I nevertheless intuitively felt that for all the social advantages propounded for it, marriage too is among the traps that nature's hand has scattered over the road of helpless man, and any free man entangled in it must immediately have hopes of peace of mind and freedom driven from his head, as signified by the words of Sa'di: O prisoner encumbered with a family, Don't get ideas about peace of mind again! But for you with your youth, let's see now why you're proclaiming the evils of women!"

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CHAPTER 4

I briefly related to him the events of my marriage and divorce, and Heartache because of the friendship and t^en familiarity that had been solidly established between us in that short time, I also set out for him my untold secrets. I didn't conceal that some time after being freed from the hands of the sayyids' girl of Fesharak, it so happened that in the customary manner of a youth, I conspired to a little flirtation with an outgoing and affectionate young lady nearby in our neighborhood who, if I'm not mistaken, was up to a little something too. Before I knew it, I had quite a crush on her and the business of being in love gradually reached the point where I passed up food and sleep and didn't know night from day. At last a meeting took place where she came to my house without letting anyone there notice. I imagined this humble self had found the road to the holy harem of heaven, but just as soon as we had skimmed with lightning speed through the beginning stages of our desires and arrived at more delicate points, putting together pages of hugs and kisses read in the same light, the smell from her mouth, which happened that day to be slightly disagreeable, reached my nose, and like a mallet coming down on an elephant's head, it blasted me so that I wanted the ground to open

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up and swallow this young lady whom until just that moment I'd wanted more than life itself. "Uh-huh, uh-huh," Molla Abd-ol-hadi was saying, and then he interjected, " O h boy, basically it's clear that something was going on in you! But, by God, you were a little off there. Sa'di, who has taken hundreds like you and me, my good man, to the edge of the stream in matters pertaining to women and love and heart and has returned them thirsty, has said on this particular matter: The smell of an onion from the mouth of a pretty face, Seems better than a rose from an ugly hand. And now you, my chick newly hatched from an egg, you're knock­ ing your luck about what goes on! A young lady's breath doesn't smell of fragrant musk. By rights, you deserve the bastinado!" "Please don't forget that Sa'di is from Shiraz," I said, "and like all those from Shiraz, his dough was kneaded with love and he played with beauty from his very first day. There is a difference of heaven and earth between the man who's drunk the fiery waters of Shiraz's stream of Ruknabad and a man like me with a sewer mouth down which no water tainted by the grape has ever flowed to its cesspool." "That's an excuse worse than the sin," he said. "But basically it would be better to drop the subject. You'd agreed to say what your heart wanted, and now for a whole hour, you've been continually discussing things that your heart doesn't want and that you are tired of." "Indeed, it's just as you say," I said. "I am tired of these folks and this age and time. I'm tired of human apes and vulgar bastards about each of whom one can boldly say:

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What's in the purse is the Kaaba for them all; What's in the pants is the qebleh for them all. I'm even tired in spring with its world of excitement and delight. I planted a rose with my own hand, and I saw with my own eyes that it first sprouted and then it shot up and later matured and flourished and bloomed but afterward it withered and faded and drooped and dried up and dropped its leaves and it went to sleep, died, and de­ cayed. I'm even tired of tulips and lately, as soon as my eyes fall on a flower, I've felt the truth in these words: See the perfidy of time, when in one week The rose appeared and budded, bloomed and fell. Briefly, I'm not tired of relatives and strangers; rather, I'm tired of

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all kinds and categories of distinctions and appointments and of everything attainable and easily come by." "I'm tired of all the useless get-togethers and successive visitings back and forth and of that repeated filling up and emptying of the stomach which is called life. I'm tired of these surroundings and the household paraphernalia and head-to-toe wardrobes and the phony 'In the name of God' and 'but, please,' and the arid, empty, sham compliments and insipid, artificial formalities. I'm tired of all this hypocrisy and flattery which has taken over the face of the earth and made the wellspring of the sun dark and dull. I'm tired of muftis and morals officers, of His Reverences and His Eminences, of all those khans and mirzas, those commoners and sayyids, those landlords and peasants, those revenues and expenditures, those toys and gewgaws with fancy names which men adore and worship, and I'm also tired and disgusted and repelled by the hundreds of passions and desires and the thousands of other insanities of kinds whose names make the hairs on my body stand straight up like skewers whenever I hear them." Showing a little bad temper, Mowlana said, "You truly do have amazing skill at confusing the issue. You pious man who hasn't even seen a mosque! You agreed to tell me what your heart wanted, yet you've tried to hoodwink an old baldy like me and you've been beating your chest for two hours now with the stone of 'I'm tired, I'm tired!' and I imagine that given free rein, you wouldn't be worn out by saying 'I'm tired, I'm tired!' till the Day of Resurrection. Just say, 'I'm tired of all creation' and give me some peace!" "I beg your pardon a thousand times," I said. "I haven't very often bellyached to anyone and I got carried away. Your kindness and sympathy, sir, moved me to heave out whatever I'd hidden in the corner of my heart all at once with no constraint. Now that the knots in my heart have burst apart and I've found a way to breathe again, whatever you say will be obeyed." "What should I say?" he said. "But it seemed agreed that you'd tell me what things your precious heart wants from God, if you please." "The things my heart wants are inexpressible," I said. "My whole being brims with such strange and astonishing longings that you'd undoubtedly call me crazy if I set out to describe them, and perhaps you'd even have a right to. Indeed, what things doesn't my heart want? My heart wants me to do great deeds, very great deeds, and to become the source of many major services. My heart wants these thin and scrawny arms which you see to grow so long and powerful

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that I can embrace this sphere of earth and like a loving mother kiss it fervently inch by inch. My heart wants me to find the road to true happiness for unguided and untended people of whatever race and color and to safeguard such happiness (which is not the inflated hap­ piness of filling purse and stomach) by sacrificing drop by drop all the blood that flows in my veins and arteries so that with my own eyes I can see each drop forming a flood with rosy waves enveloping the world in all directions. My heart wants me to be the shining sun of the fountainhead of eternal grace with harvest upon harvest of shining rays filled with the splendid light of joy and mirth pouring down on heaven and earth from my rib cage. My heart wants that my work be unceasingly a gift, and my thought purity, and my litany fidelity, and that the trickle of my lofty ambitions for noble existence fill the world's empty cup to the brim. My heart wants me to deliver an outcry of unity and concord to the ears of the world and those in it, and to cross out at one stroke every kind of dispute and contradiction and every sort of evil and ugliness in the book. My heart wants to fall like a burning spark on the harvest of hypocrisy and villainy and to uproot the ominous trunk and branches of all kinds and classes of meanness and impurity and to annihilate their seed. My heart wants to create other meanings and senses which are beyond this time and space surrounding the powerless thought and reason of wretched man like a bookbinder's clamp or a blacksmith's tongs and pressing him ruthlessly to the edge of the grave, and which can claim to be comparable in magnificence and grandeur but would not simultaneously cripple human intelligence and reason in under­ standing them, and thus can open a window to hope, comfort, and confidence for men with neither friends nor allies." Pursing his lips in a token of reproach and ridicule, Mowlana said, "May I be the sacrifice of your heart full of longing! My dear man, why not tell me all at once, 'My heart wants me to become God,' and spare me?" " N o , by God," I said, "my heart doesn't want me to become God but it wants all created beings to reach a divine level." Fixing on me his critical glance like a swift, sharp needle thrust into an unheaded infection, he said, "It's clear you haven't heard these pleasant verses of the seventeenth-century religious authority, Naraqi, You entered as a resident in urine and blood, You departed by two paths of urine. For you that is the beginning and that is the end, The state of a sack of filth and pollution.

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ίί5

But that aside, what have you thought about and what path have you found for achieving those easily obtainable desires?" "Where's the connection between a confused and mixed-up man like me and sound thoughts and ideas?" I said. "What comes to my faulty mind at present is breaking out as quickly as possible from this rotten environment and loathsome marsh in which I've passed my life and which has bent and poisoned my soul and spirit, so that I can at least draw a free breath and little by little, through the bless­ ings of your saintly inspiration, sir, and in the shadow of sublime grace, find some path and solution." "If your only hope is my saintly inspiration, Ί fear you won't arrive at the Kaaba, O Bedouin!' ' n he said, "but by the same token, I'm indisputably under obligation heart and soul if only by the rec­ ommendation of the dervish Sobhan, and I'll not withhold whatever can be done by my feeble hands." "For the present," I said, "I ask you to please help me find a home perhaps under your shadow in a corner of this very school." "If you imagine that making a home in this school is enough to untie the knots of your affairs, I won't object," he said, "and it won't even be a difficult matter. It happens that the cell right next to mine has been empty for two or three days. It belonged to a student named Molla Kheyr-ali, a native of Chahar Mahal. His brother was a mullah there and when news of his brother's death arrived recently, intent on succeeding his brother and eager to take in hand the district's affairs of religious law, Molla Kheyr-ali rushed pell-mell to leave his cell and studies in order to become His Eminence and His Reverence. Since I have a long-standing acquaintance and friendship with the school custodian, I don't suppose he'll raise any difficulties. The one thing that would perhaps be advisable is for you to change your outfit somewhat and put on the clothing of men of learning and scholars in religious studies." "Don't worry about that," I said. "There's no difficulty in chang­ ing clothes. I'll trade the merchants' milk-and-sugar turban for a somewhat larger and looser bleached cotton turban and I'll also loosen up my qabd and quilted jacket so that they'll seem more baggy and sloppy, like an dkhond. Then I'll be a genuine student!" "Well done, leader!" he said. "It's clear that you're more of an old hand at this than I'd imagined. I'm becoming hopeful. Right now I'm going out for supplies of food and drink and I'll drop in on the 1 This is a couplet of Sa'di which has become proverbial for "being on the wrong track." The second half reads, "This road you are taking is to Turkestan," the latter being in the opposite direction from Mecca and the Kaaba for someone in Shiraz.

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custodian along the way. You'd better get busy with preparations for your own affairs. Today is Friday and it's a blessed day and auspicious hour and according to the almanac's appraisal (curses on its denier!), a change of residence is appropriate. Perhaps we can finish off these affairs today before the sun has set and then get some rest." I went straight home from the school. The stuff needed to organize my cell was quickly ready to go. I ordered it loaded on a mule and taken to the school and there entrusted to the school servant, Karbala'i Qorban, to be put in the cell of Molla Kheyr-ali. When I was free from that job, I had planned to meet my brother and inform him about the situation and settle on some agreement with him about my affairs. I was told he'd made complete preparations to go to one of the city's gardens with a number of his friends three days ago and they had even taken dancers and musicians along and had left instructions that their peace not be disturbed. "May they be happy!" I said and I wrote him the following letter to have delivered whenever he came home: "May I be the sacrifice for my brother who is my life! If pious acts don't work, one must sin; By whatever strategy, a way must be made into the friend's heart. For reasons which there is no opportunity to describe or explain, I've worked hand and foot for a cozy place to rest in the School of the Four Gardens and I plan to live from today on there in a corner of one of its serene and tranquil cells. I hope this untimely melancholy and madness of mine doesn't cause sadness for my dear brother's mind with its manifest love. By virtue of this very document, all my holdings and whatever I possess belong to you from this day on and my only request is that you kindly instruct some reliable and well-organized merchant to pay yours truly the sum of fifteen tumdns on the first of every month so that I may pray for you with my heart at ease. I needn't remind you that I'm entrusting all the relatives and people at home to your care. I won't trouble you beyond that and I'm asking the beneficent Lord for my loving brother's glory and success and long life."

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Evening prayers were being said when I returned to the school. On Mowlana's instructions, the school servant, Karbala'i Qorban, had watered and swept my room and thrown down the carpet which I had sent and placed my things here and there. I bade him replace the torn oiled paper of my cell door with new oiled paper tomorrow,

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and putting two saheb-qerdns in his fist, I entrusted him to God and was left alone. This "I was left alone" had a world of meaning for me at that hour. It seemed as if I'd been reborn. I saw myself in paradise, so light that I thought in one puff I'd go up in the air like a pigeon feather. No higher happiness can be imagined than mine in that state. You'd think that a thousand windows had opened to my soul at that moment with every window commanding one of the thousands of gardens of paradise, and in that world of freedom and deliverance, I drew a long, deep breath, like a man coming out from under tons of pressure, and casting aside my turban and redd and putting my head on top of the small pillow, I stretched out full length on the floor. When I came to my senses, Mowlana was standing over me, smiling, and he said, "Very good! You thought studenthood was just lying stretched out with your feet up toward the ceiling. 'You've retained some things and some things escaped you,' as it's said in Arabic. It's now half an hour since the third hourly drum after sunset, my good man! Don't you intend to eat supper?" Jumping up from my place, I said, "I beg your pardon. I was really tired and worn out and I guess I fell asleep. I'm not even hungry and, if you permit, I'll sleep right here without any supper." "Cut out that talk!" he said. "The first condition of studenthood is always being hungry, ready and waiting for a meal any moment. Get up quickly, for I've got an eggplant stew on the fire the likes of which you've never in your life eaten." I wish all my friends had been there. I ate a supper whose taste still lingers in my mouth. The sofreh had not yet been cleared when the delightful song of the samovar arose and soon I'd swallowed two or three glasses of hot, sugary tea one after the other. Then going outside the cell with soap and towel to wash our hands and mouths, we started off toward the canal that ran through the middle of the school. It was an extraordinary night! Never in my life had I seen so many stars in the sky! And what stars they were, too, each shining like the fabled jewel called a "nightlight" and pulsing like a heart up there! "It's very pleasant to sit under a starry sky at the edge of running water," said Mowlana, "so just sit right here until I come back from fixing a hookah." "If a cigarette from your humble servant would satisfy you," I said, "it's here for me to offer." Declining, he said, "Those cigarettes are fit for beaks of men with no taste who rush about with no ties or sense of tradition and under the label of fondness for things European take an axe to the roots of

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our desirable customs and habits and with their own hands destroy and annihilate part of the things which have supplied peace and pleas­ ure to us Iranians for centuries. A man with taste doesn't abandon the hookah and smoke cigarettes. If you've properly gone into the fine points of a hookah, you'll acknowledge that it's the complete and total embodiment of all strands of the fine arts. Like painted pictures, it has ravishing colors of every kind; like statues, it has beauty and grace in form, shape, and body; like music, it has modes and melodies of a mother's lullaby and a nurse's ballad, giving sweet sleep to the hearts of all born and bred by this land from the time of cradle and infancy. The white ashes sitting on top of its fire go flying at the gentlest breeze like spring blossoms and pigeons of Mecca and they cast men into reminiscences about the past that's vanished, gone with the wind. Don't you know that on behalf of this long, twisted reed with coil upon coil of Isfahani workmanship, Hafez of Shiraz wrote: Last night in our circle there was a story of your ringlets; Until dawn, the conversation was about the chain of your hair.

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With fire filling its crown-shaped air-hole, the hookah is in fact like a small fire temple still alive and bright in every Iranian hearth and home. Now that you've understood why I prefer hookahs to ciga­ rettes, smoke your cigarette right here, if you want, while I go and get my hookah ready." "Hey there!" I said. "That disgrace, which has been called 'the long corridor of Molla Baqer' 2 and has made half the country's citi­ zens short of breath, hasn't got much to say for it. A cigarette's just a handy hookah, but all that notwithstanding, you needn't trouble yourself, sir. I'll fix a hookah and bring it for you now." "Never, never!" he said, " Ά guest for a single night and a wellwisher for a hundred nights.' Seeing the moon and stars reflect on the water is said to hold a reward, and even were there no reward, it would be a pleasure. You start looking, and I'll be back in a wink." He returned and half-submerged the turquoise-colored hookah in the tank's footbath and smoked it busily with complete enjoyment. "I didn't really believe that I'd escape so freely from the hands of 2

(Jz) The allusion is to a couplet which the Isfahanis use in a riddle about the hook­

ah: The long corridor of Molla Baqer Gurgles until the final drum. The final drum is at midnight. The corridor is the tube (ney-pich) several yards long through which the hookah may be smoked. Another style of hookah is smoked through a wooden stem (ney) (Jz-c).

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that dismal life," I said. "And in fact if the dervish Sobhan hadn't arrived in the middle of my life, I'd have been left in that sewer, rolling about until I choked." Very slowly letting out little by little from the chink between his two thin lips some of the smoke which he had collected in his mouth, Mowlana said, "Your biography reminds me of the story Mowlavi tells in The Masnavi about the gazelle caught in the donkey's stable." Then attuning his warm and engaging cadences to the murmur of the running water, he started singing these couplets very slowly while puffing on the hookah from time to time:

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"The huntsman hunted a gazelle; Merciless, he put it in the stable. Like a tyrant, he imprisoned the gazelle In the middle of a stall full of donkeys. The gazelle dashed from side to side in panic. At night the huntsman scattered straw before the donkeys, And with hunger and appetite, each cow and donkey Ate the straw as if it were sugar cane. The gazelle sometimes shied from side to side, And sometimes faced away from the smoke and dust. The days of the fragrant-musk gazelle Were torment in the donkey stable. One donkey said to it, 'Behold, O father of wild beasts, You have the nature of kings and the silence of princes.' Another mocked it, 'The jewel was brought By the tide's ebb and flow, so he gives it cheaply.' And the first donkey said, 'You're so fastidious You should mount on the king's throne to rest!' And that donkey got indigestion and stopped eating; Then he called the gazelle in an invitation. The gazelle cocked its head thus, 'No, go, fellow! I have no appetite; I'm not strong.' 'You're fastidious, I know,' said the donkey, 'Or you're avoiding it on principle.' The gazelle said to the donkey, 'That is your fodder Which makes parts of you alive and new. I have been an intimate of the meadow; I have rested in the garden's dews. Tulips and hyacinths and even sweet basil Have I eaten with thousands of graceful airs. If fate threw us into torment,

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Would an elegant nature and disposition then go away? If I become a beggar, would I look like a beggar? And though my clothes become old, I am new.'

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That night I slept straight through until the noon prayers and despite wanting at least on that day to awaken early and pray with the Qoran recitation so as not to be written off as unsuitable and incompatible by my new colleagues and people at the school, fatigue and sleep didn't give me the opportunity and my prayers went by the boards. When I jumped out of bed and stood up, I realized that I felt young and strong for the first time. Whenever I'd gotten up in the morning before that day, I was invariably tired and exhausted and depressed and dejected and listless and only by the force of splendid yawns a yard wide and successively pounding on my chest and thighs and sides and by means of a period of steadying my nerves was I able to stand on my feet. Furthermore, you too in your childhood had a house in that same narrow Lane of the Needlemakers and, if it hasn't slipped your mind, you well know that after a thousand efforts and agonies, a man has not yet found a little peace from attacks of the night's mosquito lancers and human eyes have only gradually gotten heavy with sleep on each morning of God's days when on the one hand a man's body from head to toe becomes a target for the boundless army of the day's fly spearmen and on the other hand, a hundred kinds of strange and surprising noises rise up on every side although it still hasn't really become light outside. First, the cry of "Wake up!" from neighbors' roosters curls through the air from far and near. At the sound of the roosters, the muezzins go up to the roofs and towers and minarets, and the call, "God is great!" deafens the ears of the heavens, and the clamor of calls to prayer and glorifications of God draws the bathhouse keepers to the bathhouse roofs and the sound of their horns draws packs of hungry, rabid dogs out howling from the holes and hollows and culverts of the city, setting off such a hubbub that heaven and earth cry out, Then what great Resurrection is this that's arisen From the earth to His great throne without the last trumpet blowing? as the poet, Mohtashem, said. The dogs' barking results in the donkeys' braying and with the excuse that it's time for the barley to come, they set the pillars of the universe atremble with the wind blasted through the trumpets of their throats. Now comes the time when the neighbors' children of assorted sizes, male and female, nursing

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and weaned, begin bawling in the racket of this undiscriminating congregation and at their ceaseless weeping and wailing, heaven and earth cry out, Then what is this uproar of the world's creation? What moaning, what mourning, what lamentation is this? as Mohtashem also said. Saying " O Provider" and " O Causer of Causes," the quarter's shopkeepers are busy opening their shops at that time and sounds of door boards, bars, and padlocks fill the streets and lanes and in the meantime, The sun raises its head over the mountain; A pretty face taps a finger on the door,

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when knocking is heard on the doors of fifty houses. Gradually at that time men and women spring out, willing or not, from the folds of warm, soft beds and with one foot shod and the other bare, groping drowzily, they bring themselves groggy and befuddled to the tank's edge without trying to keep up a noble front although the sun already fell on the roof corners some time ago. With half-closed and swollen, mosquito-bitten eyes on the corners of which three sleepyseeds of chickpea size still stick, they square accounts with God, bungling through a half-swallowed prayer of two genuflexions in such slapdash haste that you'd say they were breaking a wishbone with someone and playing, "I remember and you forgot." 3 With such a prayer (well, yes, they do bend at the waist) half-completed, tired and worn out, sluggish and grim and edgy, they attack each other like mad dogs and the bazaar heats up with abuse and complaint, nitpicking and profanity, accusations and slander which no Muslim should hear or heathen see! Meanwhile, from back lanes the shouting and wrangling of peddlers, hawkers, and venders with the various accents of the nine districts and the villages far and near of Isfahan's suburbs rise up and then for a time no sound can be heard save, "Hey, lettuce!" "Hey, round onions!" "Hey, dried buttermilk!" "Hey, fresh juicy plums!" "Hey, autumn grapes!" "Hey, rose-water apples!" "Hey, sugar-sweet apricots!" In that unseasonal uproar and commotion like a Syrian bazaar, obviously the usual, well-known voices of the mullahs in the Jews' quarter of Jubareh attempting to 3 This is a game beginning with the breaking of a wishbone (janagh shekastan) and is usually played by two relatives or close friends who have been eating together. The game continues, sometimes for months, so long as each person says "I remember" when handed something by the other person. When someone forgets to say this, the other one wins, saying, "I remember and you forgot!" The loser then has to pay some penalty.

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". . . the shouting of. . . peddlars . . . 'Hey, round onions!' " 1:200

warm up the trading and buying and selling (qabas—laces—brocades—quilted jackets) considerably intensify the hubbub and chaos. If you take into account that the Isfahani tradesmen have always risen early and that the sun's rays have not yet fallen on the Sofeh Mountain's summit when countless artisans and members of the 142 guilds get busy at their trades, and if you harmonize the slamming sound of the twenty-pound sledgehammer of the coppersmith, Haji Samad, and the monotonous song, "Give me a brick, my love," of the bricklayer, Master Gholam, with some contrasting songs and sounds in bass and treble keys mixed together with the raucous cries of a multitude of poor and miserable, blind, deaf, and crippled beggars, and if you increase the clamorous give and take of the disputes and arguments, the skirmishing and litigation, between the people at home and the cheeky and importunate night-soil removers of Isfahan with

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". . . with the raucous cries of a multitude of poor and miserable, blind, deaf, and crippled beggars . . . " their bent-ended shovels on their shoulders, their clothes and knapsacks stained with excrement, and their generally filthy appearance, who betake themselves to people's homes stealthily at dawn to carry away the kitchen ashes and empty the cesspits, and if you then throw all these sounds into the dark and narrow drum of the Lane of Needlemakers, perhaps you'll understand to an extent how impossible it would be for even a poor little waif born deaf not to fly up from sweet slumber a hundred times each hour, frightened and confused,

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and not to ask the Lord of Day and Night—who, whether they lie or tell the truth, created sleep for peace and night for sleep—for the death of himself and of every animal from whose throat any sound comes out. Those were the circumstances for sleeping and awakening in my father's house. But in my new home of the School of the Four Gardens, when with auspicious happiness I woke up that very day after ten or eleven straight hours of sweet sleep, like a man just coming out of a warm and gentle bath and a massage that did just what was needed, I saw myself as the good-looking owner of stout neck and shoulders, and I took a righteous pleasure in seeing my broad chest and knotted arms, and like the neophyte athlete coming out of the zurkhaneh, I wanted to find an opponent so we could lock horns and grapple together—and I'm a man who never in his life had a taste for exercise and had not set foot in a zurkhaneh except for once or twice kept secret from his parents and, even then, only for the spectacle. I began running in place and then planting my arms and legs like four iron pistons as I'd seen in the zurkhaneh, and saying, "AIi, AIi!" thirty times in one breath, I did push-ups. I then washed my head and body with cold water, spruced myself up, and strode proudly toward Mowlana's cell. Leaning back against the bedding in his usual way, he sat at his place, busy reading with the hookah at his lips. I said hello and entered. He raised his head, and a beautiful smile formed in the corners of his lips, and he said, "I was afraid you might have been in the sleep of the Companions of the Cave." 4 "You wouldn't have gone completely wrong," I said. "Never in all my life have I slept so comfortably and well. For that too, I'm indebted to you, sir, for the favor." "Brother," he said, " 'Cut down on the compliments and increase the purse,' as they say. It's half-past twelve and time for lunch. Let's see now, what do you want?" "With your permission," I said, "I'll instruct my comrade, Karbala'i Qorban, to go to the little bazaar of Darkushk and bring two servings of the special grilled meatballs with all the trimmings from the shop of Master Ghambar, whose reputation I'm sure you know, and then you can do me the favor today of being a guest of your humble servant." "Why ask about something nice?" he said. "But tell Karbala'i Qor4 These are generally identified as the Seven Sleepers of Ephesus. One version of the story occurs in the Qoran, Chapter 18, "The Cave," where the youths and their dog stay in the cave and sleep for 309 years.

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ban to hurry because I'm getting hungry and my eyes are beginning to blur."

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CHAPTER 5 r, ..

Resurrection

My fresh, new style of life began with those arrangments. For the c

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T

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first ten or twelve days, I enjoyed its unspoiled simplicity so much that like a man under the influence of liquor or hashish, I didn't properly notice the passing of the minutes and hours or the succes­ sion of days and nights or the change of day into night and night into day. A strange smoky haze obstructed my view and everything ap­ peared to my eyes in another shape and color markedly nicer than usual. I had a fairy-tale world, and I took great pleasure in living and breathing, eating and sleeping, walking to and fro, and standing up and sitting down. When I came out of my daze and looked around, I saw that the smallest details of people's lives in that school had a freshness for me and I enjoyed watching. But the most wonderful effect of this new situation was that I, who until that day had disliked any of those two-legged animals called " m a n , " and had been dis­ gusted by the sight of them and had fled from them and had counted the human species equivalent in the ranks of creation's misfortunes and calamities to plagues and deadly scorpions, pestilential winds and Moroccan locusts, now for no apparent reason found an overflowing 1:204 love and affection for people. I was pleased by everybody and fond of everyone and even sat for long hours with the servant, Karbala'i Qorban, in complete harmony and sympathy and sincerity, taking great pleasure in exchanging confidences in heart-to-heart talks. I had been a resident in the school for two or three weeks when one day during a conversation with Akhond Molla Abd-ol-hadi, I said, "Even if I'm not a student in practice, may the evil eye keep away, I am, after all, a student in name. Although I don't consider myself worthy, it would still be nice if you would also arrange some lessons for me so as to make your generosity complete." "Who told you that being a student requires taking lessons?" he asked. "Most of those you see here with turbans on their heads like my disgraceful self drag around for as long as God wishes and until our last breath comes. AU that aside, do you want to be a human or a mullah?" "A mullah human," I said.

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"Your desire is reasonable," he said. "But still, I congratulate you for not saying a human mullah, for in that case the job would be quite difficult and even supposing it weren't virtually impossible, it would be a very tedious task in every respect." "You yourself know best what I should learn," I said. "I wouldn't mind understanding what the point is of all this ma qui and manqul and elm-e adydn and abdan they're talking about." 1 "That's no work," he said. "Manqul, meaning things which others have said and written, you can and may read for yourself, God willing, and there's no need for lessons and discussions or teachers and instructors. Ma'qul means those things acquired by thought and reason and the blessed and exalted Lord has given you sharp, quick intelligence and reason for that too. Think, and you'll find them yourself, and when you do, you'll value them even more. Now we come to elm-e adydn and abdan. Elm-e adydn is the science of religion which also means the science of knowing God. For myself, I think only God Himself can know God in this world, and that's that. Knowing Him is far beyond the reach of us creatures defective and deficient from head to toe and basically I consider attempting to know God as unmitigated meddling. As for elm-e abdan, the science of body and substance and matter and things which we see, hear, and feel, you yourself have eyes and ears and likewise the tools called the five senses so there's no need at all for lessons or books. Most individuals like Moses, Jesus, the Prophet Mohammad, the Buddha, Zoroaster, Plato, Pythagoras, Galileo, and the Englishman, Newton, and the Frenchman, Descartes, whose names we have seen repeatedly in Arabic books printed in Egypt, in coming to some point on this path, have reached the ranks and positions we know by the blessings of their minds and thoughts and comprehension. If you yourself also think properly, you will confirm my words. Isn't it true that people call someone learned who is able to read and write and has read many books and the person who is illiterate is called ignorant? In spite of your still being very young, you yourself have perhaps also observed that the world is full of ignorant savants and erudite ignoramuses. In its true sense, the term 'learned' applies only to persons who know and understand and those who do not know or understand must be considered ignorant. Books and notebooks and reading and writing don't have any connection at all to knowing and not knowing. How 1 These terms continue to be used; University of Tehran, for example, has a department of manqul and ma'qul. The latter includes logic, philosophy, and metaphysics Qz-C).

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often illiterate, uneducated persons who haven't gone to school be­ come teachers on questions for a hundred instructors! 2 They furnish proof that 'Intelligence is one thing and schools are another.' " "Your Excellency, you're undermining everything all at once! You don't even have faith in education and instruction!" I said. "Make no mistake," he said. "I believe in educators, but I consider an educator someone who teaches people how they should learn and paves their way to enjoying learning. Anything left after that is just a lot of talk." "Your remarks all seem sound to me, sir," I said, "but please believe that I do very much want to understand things and learn things but I don't know what path to take or what work to d o . " " D o just what you've been doing," he said. "That's not an answer to hold on t o , " I said. " N o t everyone can be Jesus or Moses and arrive at his destination guided by his thought and reason. I have no trust or confidence in my own thought and reason and I'm certain that if I gave them free rein, they'd guide me to the place of no return, the place the Arab throws the flute. I've put my head on Your Excellency's threshold in hopes of finding direction and guidance." " H o w sad for you if you've really come here for that!" he said. "Those who continually consider themselves in need of a guide and leader and a pir and morshed will never get anywhere. A man must stand on his own two feet. The road is clear and open and all that's needed is ambition. Only those whose feet have no strength or en­ durance take staves in hand. In the words of Ansari a thousand years ago, If you're a man of the road, the door of the Friend is open. Otherwise it's a long tale if you seek the story. Don't reiterate the useless grammarians' phrase, 'Since we were given paradigms like this, we too do this.' If you listen to me, you must first of all take sifter and sieve in hand and sift and sieve through all thoughts and beliefs and whatever you've heard people say until to­ day and then throw away the rubbish and keep only those things which are nearest the truth, meaning those which seem correct by your reasoning and answer your spiritual needs. You've heard of course that /nil's have seven marks without which the requirements 2

This alludes to a Hafez couplet: My sweetheart who didn't go to school and didn't write a line, In a wink became the teacher on questions for a hundred instructors.

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for being a luti aren't considered complete. 3 The true man should also have a mark and that one mark is surely the sieve about which I've spoken. Running purposelessly after this and that, imitating sheykhs, and rushing around are signs of shallow, hollow, empty men. How well our townsman, the physician Mirza Abd-ol-baqi has said, Don't pointlessly pursue each preacher and ascetic, For there is no information about the one informed."

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"At the maktab I went t o , " I said, "our teachers were persons who read The Masnavi in secret and they gave us from it a couplet of Rumi's beginning, 'The pir may be the ladder to heaven,' as an ex­ ample to copy. Now you, sir, have disavowed the pir and morshed and the holy path and guidance." "Yes," he said, "it's true that Mowlavi has said, 'Being blind with a guide is certainly better than alone,' but he immediately added this sentence, 'It's one disgrace for the former and a hundred disgraces for the latter,' meaning that he considered both a disgrace. As we have repeatedly seen, he has counted only reason as esteemable, and he ultimately propounds two kinds of reason, one of which he calls particular reason and the other, universal reason. He always com­ mends universal reason, meaning that which has passed through the sieve and is free of rubbish and chaff and every kind of contamination and embellishment and has become pure. As he has said, The reason of the elect flies with Gabriel's wings For miles to the lote tree's shade in heaven. Partial reason, O Destitute, seems a vulture, Its wings joined to a carrion-eater, and the carrion-eater is surely the parasite at the table and one who edges around the wares of others. Try to have feet for searching and eyes for seeing so that you don't need a staff or guide, for 'Seeing eyes are better than three hundred staves,' as Rumi said. Similarly, Ό happy is that traveler who seeks the path without a guide.' I understood Mowlana's point more or less and after that day I 3 The "seven marks" (waslehhd-ye hafigdneh) are: 1) a bowl (jam) of bronze for drink­ ing water (lutis do not drink alcoholic beverages); 2) an iron chain (zanjir) about a yard long for defending themselves; 3) a long-stemmed wooden pipe (chopuq); 4) a curved dagger (qameh) about 1½ feet long or a slightly longer straight dagger (qaddareh), car­ ried under their tunics (sardari) of broadcloth (mdhut) or some other fabric; 5) a tobacco pouch (kisseh-ye tutun) of a fine fabric, such as velvet, satin, or brocade; 6) a knife (chaqu or kdrd) with a protective hilt; 7) a red-throated singing finch (sehreh) which the luti keeps in a pretty cage and often takes along with him. Other lists of these "marks" may be somewhat different 0z-c).

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didn't pursue the business of lessons again. I bought a notebook, and whenever I found some free time, I made notes summarizing my teacher's statements so that, God willing, if some day divine favors encompassed the case, I might publish it under the title, The Path of the Honored Mowlana Akhond Abd-ol-hadi-ye Lenjdni-ye Esfahdni, for the public's benefit. Although Mowlana had no job, he still usually had a thousand kinds of business depriving me of the grace of his presence. How­ ever, two or three times a week on the average he came directly to me early in the morning when I was still in bed and awoke me with appropriate verses and couplets such as, "Awake, O you who have not slept comfortably in the world!" or: Enough, O sleeping luck! Night's come to an end! Arise, for it's morning and the sun's come up. or, following Hafez: The wine sun's risen from the goblet east! If you seek a leaf of life, abandon sleep! and we'd drink tea together and set out. Since I didn't want us to pass places where I could see familiar faces again, I asked on the first day we went out together from the school, "Where are we going?" " T o Unknown-town," he said. "Where's that?" I asked. "Any place before our feet," he said. "Any place toward which fate and destiny draw us, any place where we don't know anyone and no one knows us, any place where thought and spirit may be soothed and totally free from the bonds of various anxieties and obligations." "In that case," I said, "I'm ready with thanks until the Day of Resurrection for any place you go and if it's agreeable with you, I'll follow behind you with eyes closed and rope on my neck."

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We went out of the school with no destination or purpose and roamed for hours, and often for days and nights, inside and outside the city, and we engaged in lengthy journeys, traveling on excursions far and wide. Although I'd been born in Isfahan and had grown up and matured in that city, there were ever so many wonders and beautiful, worth­ while sights in the city which I hadn't seen and whose names I hadn't ever heard! Mowlana, in contrast, was a living and talking history and a tongued and moving geography of that city. Foot by foot and inch by inch, there was no nook or cranny of the city he didn't know by name and reputation as he knew the secrets in the corners of his

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own bountiful pockets. He knew stories and tales and anecdotes and many constantly interesting historical matters worth hearing about for every point in the city and its suburbs. It was clear that he also amply enjoyed these excursions and the matters which he recounted for me, but sometimes, in fear of mentally exhausting me or boring me, he'd fall all over himself and I'd have the impression that he wanted to sew up loose ends and shorten the conversation and then I'd fall on my hands and knees and begin pleading, "Please believe that these explanations of yours, sir, are more valuable and beneficial to me than you think. I beg you not to omit even the most trifling point, for what a pity if it should remain unknown and possibly, like a life that has slipped away, never come to hand again." "Young man," he said, "I myself have been created with a talka­ tive and long-winded nature. If you urge me on like this and get me all fired up, I'll lose control completely, and perhaps like the wellknown inconsiderate reciters of pilgrimage tales, I'll babble on until I make you so dizzy and confused you won't know what hole to hide in." "Your Holiness, Mowlana," I said, "all of this really is news and information that will disappear completely if you don't tell someone and it isn't recorded." When he saw me persist, he shook his head and said, "You old Isfahani! You could charm a snake out of its hole with that tongue. I have no difficulty rattling on, but if you go out of your mind, it's a calamity that you've brought on yourself." Then, pointing his finger at something, he'd start expounding. I'd be all ears and expend all my efforts in committing everything to memory and as soon as we'd return to the school, which we'd named Haven of Rest, I'd immediately pull my notebook out from the cup­ board and write down in detail all that I'd heard as far as my memory would serve. Everyone knows the historic buildings of Isfahan (although per­ haps no one knows them so well as Mowlana) and there is no need to mention or introduce them, but Molla Abd-ol-hadi drew me to places where people generally didn't go and he told me stories about things that most people didn't know. I remember that during one of those first days, he set out toward Takhteh-pulad, saying, "Come, so we can go visit the dead for an hour or so. Go to the graveyard! Sit a moment in silence! Look at those silent and eloquent ones!"

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Then along the way and before reaching the bridge, he pointed to a simple, high and half-ruined tomb beside the road and asked, " D o you know whose tomb that is?" "Although I'm tired and weary of living," I said, "I still am not expecting so much from the dead that I'd go visit them. When I was forced to pass through these parts once or twice escorting a funeral procession of a very close relative, I was in such a hurry to finish the job and get back to the city that I paid no attention to the living or the dead, and especially not to such a poor and forlorn grave that happens to be on the wayside." "The natives of Isfahan call this the Pilau-giver's T o m b , " he said, "and they firmly believe that anyone who comes here on a Thursday night and recites the Fateheh gets his share of pilau given as a charity, and therefore the dervishes and the poor and hungry come to visit it but no one else." "The owner of this grave was one of the great sages and mystics of recent times," he said, "and since he in fact became a martyr to his own liberal nature and pure mind, his noble tomb should prop­ erly be a place of pilgrimage for people of heart and sensitivity and upright men willing to risk everything and courageous people with pure hearts. The person who has slept here for more than two hundred years now beneath the feet of people passing back and forth is Molla Mohammad Sadeq-e Ardestani. As it happened and you know, he became the target of slander and accusations from the dry, encrusted ulama contemporary with him and an order of Shah Soltan-hoseyn forced him to leave the city of Isfahan with his wife and family. Since he hadn't the means to go further, he stayed right here beyond the city gate, suffering such misery and affliction surrounded by his wife and children that he had perished from cold and hunger by the time of the Afghans' attack. Since his enemies carried fanaticism and vi­ cious injustice to the point of not even letting his blessed corpse be committed to the earth of Takhteh-pulad because it was, in their words, the graveyard of Muslims, the relatives of the poor innocent man dug the earth up right here at the side of the road and buried him on the spot." "May God absolve him," I said, "for Socrates' soul entered his body and, like Socrates, he became a martyr to the spite and malice of the long-bearded and beturbanned ignoramuses." "Excellent!" he said. "You even know about Socrates and you've hit on a very fine point. I remember reading somewhere that when they'd condemned Socrates to death, he said that the reason for his destruction was the rancor and malice of men of his time who had

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made many nice people victims of the desires of bigots and who would make many others victims also, for he felt there was no hope of his being the last oppressed by the villains' crimes. With that being so, you should vow that if you achieve your heart's desire, God willing, and arrive at your goal, you'll give a stone to be made up for the tomb of this Socrates of Ardestan and you'll also have written on it this couplet by Hafez which is written on his grave in Shiraz, When you pass by our tomb, ask for zeal, For it will be the shrine of rends of the universe." 1:214

"I will do so," I said, "but since my desire is the disappearance of these villains' seed from the face of the earth, and since that's a desire that will clearly never be realized, I fear the noble grave of Molla Mohammad Sadeq-e Ardestani will remain without a stone until the Day of Resurrection. But it seems other individuals have also been buried here; there are some black stones and dark earth also visible." "Just so," he said. "This is the grave of a successor of Ardestani whose name was also Mohammad Sadeq. He took the pen name, Light, and wrote in his will that he should be buried right here. The other grave, which has fallen into total ruin, belongs to Mirza Mo­ hammad Sa'id-e Ardestani, the famous poet of the beginning of the Qajar dynasty, who was called Scholar of Poets and Poet of Scholars. He probably foresaw the fate of desolation and disturbance for his eternal resting place when he said, What grief for us with a happy place in the cage's corner, If the gardener gives our nest to the winds!"

* Traveling on the Horizons and i n the M i n d

PARTI *

Roaming and Getting Acquainted CHAPTER 1 j-, ,

I was still in bed heavy-eyed with sleep one day when my chamber door opened slowly and the usual beaming face of Molla Abd-ol-hadi appeared. After reciting an appropriate poem as an invitation for me to awake and without replying to my greeting, he asked, "Have you ever gone to our village of Kolahdown and had a look at the Shaking Minarets and the Fire Temple nearby it?" "I'm disgraceful," I said, "but since I haven't gone to visit any of the cities worth seeing of Islam, how should I have seen the Fire Temple of the Zoroastrians?" "Then you get a move on while I fix a morning snack," he said, "so that we reach there before the weather's too hot." I obeyed, but fate didn't want my foot, the foot of a Muslim who hadn't seen the mosques, to reach the fire-worshippers' temple that day. Thus it was that along the way, just as we happened to be passing through the Towqchi (Taqchi) Bazaar, we saw that halfway through it a noisy crowd had built up. We investigated and found that a transaction between an old grocer with a store right there and an army colonel was ending in a quarrel and that, in the Isfahanis' terms, there'd been a swindle. Coming closer, we saw one of the most complete and perfect of those old-style officers, a military man by birth, whom no Muslim should see nor any nonbeliever hear. It's a type you'd say comes into the world from their mothers' wombs complete with flinty mustaches and thick prizefighters' necks, booted, insolent, daggers at their waists, and the emblem of Lion and Sun on their caps. As you know, nature has closed their eardrums to words of right and reason and i35

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their faces are rubbed with a glaze which admits no shade of shame and disgrace, and from the beginning to the end, meaning from the cradle to the brink of the grave, their job, their talking and thinking every day, is only to make trouble. In the name of a "mustache tax," they eat up the property of great and small; unjustly and with no accounting they dispossess defenseless creatures, trampling hard upon their every right, unfairly, with profanity and swearing. 1 With utmost disrespect, they carelessly cast the honor and reputation of God's creatures to the winds as unstintingly as stream water. With not a wrinkle on their brow, they eat no honest bread until their day of death when, without having heard a blessing from friend or stranger, they are lost in their graves and at last free the world of the evil of themselves and free themselves of the misfortune of a life of oaths and curses from beginning to end.

11:7

Such was the sinister presence of the colonel, coarse and uncouth, like an Ebn MoIjam painted on the dervishes' backdrops. 2 He was dark, and his face an opium brown, his shameless, sunken eyes were like cracks in a little bell, his lips blue-gray, his cucumber nose widenostriled, and his mustache with curl upon curl recalled a ram's horn. His disorderly duck-tailed hair spilled out over his forehead as much as a handspan from under his military cap and his dark blue kamarchin with Lion and Sun buttons up to his neck was fastened with difficulty over his body. With the asperity of scorpion venom and the ill-omen of a vat of serpent's poison, he had taken under his arm a melon with the length and diameter of the small earthen vessel which Isfahanis call a tapucheh, and while his eyes protruded from their sockets like two bowls of blood, he stood angrily lording it over the feeble grocer with his thin, white beard. The colonel's mustache was shining and his sewer mouth continually opened and closed while from the back of his blockhouse jaw and from inside the ruined ramparts and battlements of his decayed black teeth, a volley of profanity and abuse mixed with saliva rained down on the head and face of the helpless grocer. And furthermore (may God make it no man's lot!), he rinsed it with profanities that snake and viper venom can't begin to match. You'd say a monopoly on those profanities had from eternity's be1 The "mustache tax" is a literal translation of baj-e sebtl, a phrase usually translated as "blackmail" or, as for this chapter's title, "extortion." Most of this chapter was translated into French under the title, "L'insolence punie" in Choix de nouvelles (1959, pp. 58-77). 2 Itinerant storytellers, who are sometimes dervishes, go around to villages with backdrop curtains on which stories of the martyrdoms are painted. They unroll them and point to the relevant picture, such as a scene with Ebn Moljam, as they talk about a particular incident.

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ginning been put at the disposal of the military class for members of the regiments and columns, and it's impossible to find examples of those words except in the swordsman's dictionary! The aged grocer had most tastefully arranged the heaps of chickpeas, beans, vetch, and lentils in his shop. A large number of melons of Gorgab and Samsuri and Susaki, which, like the poems of Hafez and the rose water of Qamsar and the wines of Khollar and the twilights of Baghdad and the dawns of Nishapur, have no equal, poured out of the front of the store like jugs of pure gold, and to signal their cheap price, the grocer had lit a small tin lamp, known as a "mouselamp," on that shining heap which, like his own life and that of his townsmen and compatriots, glimmered dimly, smoking and struggling to survive. With torn and spotted felt hat, threadbare buckram qabd, and dark-blue cotton pants with a wide waistband, the storeowner himself stood like a condemned innocent in front of a bloodthirsty executioner. He'd lost all his color, he was frightened and quivering, and the stammered words he wanted to speak knotted up in his throat and wouldn't come out. Finally his weak and trembling voice was heard explaining his case with that pleasant Isfahani accent, "Colonel, Your Honor, I am your servant, your errand boy, your slave. I have tasted the generosity of your exalted self. It's wrong of me to take this liberty. Whose dog am I to be insolent in your exalted presence? May my tongue be silent! My life and property belong to you, sir. We lower classes eat our morsels of bread through your charity. What's come over me, saying yes or no in front of a man like you, sir! Don't take your knife just to the melon, but cut my vocal cords out by the roots and toss them in the middle of the bazaar! A dirty drop of blood like me, a man with only a thin qabd, isn't worth getting you, sir, in a bad mood over nothing. Whatever you command is my pleasure! But there is something I'm going to say. You honored me with a visit, sir, and without paying as much attention to your humble servant as to a dog, you picked out a melon, hefted it, poked into it with your knife and made a hole in one end, tasted it, and put it right back in its place, saying it was rotten. Then you picked out another melon and again made a hole in it and said it tasted like water and put it back in its place. You cut up four melons that way and left them on the ground until the fifth just happened to suit your taste and you said, 'Weigh it! Let me see what it comes to!' 'With pleasure,' I said, weighing it right before your eyes. I took its weight on the light side and said, 'It comes to one qeran and four shdhis.' You said, 'It doesn't matter. I'll take it and send you the money for it later.' 'So what happens about the cost of

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the other four?' I said, and I humbly begged you to pay cash since I still hadn't had any income at all today and my family's had a good wait for its bread and water. Then Your Excellency's mood changed and in a vile temper you started making insulting remarks and saying whatever popped out of your mouth to me, an old man, and—if I may take the liberty—you still haven't given up on that business yet." His Honor the Colonel yelled out belligerently, "You stupid jerk! Your stuffs rotten! Who's to blame for that? Bad stuff sticks to its owner's beard! By the manly mustaches of Mortaza AIi, the sheath of the sword at my waist, and this Lion and Sun that you see on my head, if you say anything, I'll lay you so flat with my fist that you'll never get back u p . " Saying that, he held his clenched fist like a blacksmith's hammer right under the poor grocer's nose. A group of shopkeepers and some riffraff from that section of the bazaar, idle, listless, and pallid, with the sunken, lackluster eyes of a cut-off sheep's head and with scrawny necks like statues molded from castoff clay, formed a circle around the old grocer and the sword-bearing customer. They watched, so still and silent, with no sound or sigh and no trace whatsoever of compassion and sympathy or revulsion and indignation apparent in their countenances, as if their eyes didn't see and their ears didn't hear and they themselves were the moving dead who happened to be outside their graves. Stammering like a mother whose child has just died, the grocer continued to raise his hands in supplication and humble entreaty, all but throwing himself down to kiss the dirt on his customer's feet and put it on his eyes. I supposed the colonel's heart would be moved by compassion and he wouldn't deprive the needy old man, but suddenly a dreadful sound like a bugle's alarm leapt from the confines of his throat, and he roared, "You dumb idiot! Lay off those Jewish tricks! Do you think you're up against a babe in arms? Don't your ears hear what I'm saying? I'm saying the melon is bad and it's rotten and it should be worth as little as you yourself! Don't hand a customer bad mer­ chandise or you'll get what you deserve. Only respect for your white beard keeps me from pounding your stinking brain right on the side­ walk of this bazaar until you start seeing those already dead and gone. I'm giving you lawful money and in exchange I want to take home proper merchandise, not this filth which you show people as a melon and which even a dog would vomit if you put it down his throat. This melon's fit only for the teeth of Jews in Jubareh quarter, not for

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the table of a respectable person like me who sits side by side with amirs and viziers. . . . " The discussion of the colonel and the grocer went on at length. On the one side, all was meekness and humility and politeness and courtesy and on the other side entirely threats and discourtesies and rudeness and swearing. Timid and frightened and trembling all over like a beaten schoolboy with a question he hasn't the courage to explain, the grocer finally opened his mouth to speak, but the colonel didn't give him time and suddenly advanced and raised his hand and unceremoniously slapped the old man on the ear so that the sound reverberated under the bazaar roof. The grocer's eyes closed a few moments; his head dropped down as if hit by a club. A slight noise like a sigh escaped from the spectators' breasts and conveyed fear and panic, but beyond that, their eyes, already bewildered in the bazaar's light and shadow as though with sunstroke, only squinted somewhat more and their faces tightened a little. No outward traces suggesting an inner turmoil were visible at all, and they stood unstirring, mute and silent, with mouths twisted and necks stretched out, as if petrified. Although the grocer's face was already full of wrinkles and folds from top to bottom like the old, dried-up leather of Isfahani buckets, the marks of the colonel's fingers were engraved here and there, not unlike the copper hands attached to walls of public fountains.3 First the grocer opened his mouth and twisted it around and left it open that way for a few seconds. Some of his teeth had fallen out and the tip of his tongue stuck out from inside those that were left. He gradually opened his eyes and in that weak and helpless, half-dazed state, he bent over and brought up his qabd skirt, covering his eyes and the part of his face where the colonel's slap had landed with his hand and skirt, as if embarrassed in front of people. From the regular rise and fall of his shoulders, it was clear that he was choking with hatred and gasping for breath, but wanting no one to see his weeping and tears. I couldn't stand it any longer then and was about to throw myself into the middle of the arena and say to this armed Shemr with the Lion and Sun on his hat, "So why hit him, you unfair infidel!" But again, at the dictates of the caution and prudence that came in with mother's milk and will go out with life itself and with the dissimulation that has become our second nature, I, like the others, bit my lip and didn't move from the spot and transferred the job of punish3 Pious people would attach a copper plaque in the form of a hand to the wall of a public fountain. The hand would be inscribed with the name of Hoseyn, whose family suffered terribly from thirst at Karbala (Jz~c)·

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ment to the Invisible Avenger, whose accounts so often differ greatly from ours. But amid all that confusion, I saw Akhond Molla Abd-ol-hadi cutting through the crowd and reaching the colonel and saying with complete calm, "Excuse me, sir, but did you make conditions about cutting into these melons so that if you didn't want them, you didn't have to pay their price?" With a ton of pride and conceit, the imperial favorite turned ever so slowly to face Mowlana and said, "Butting in doesn't suit you. I'm dealing with this individual here and now and he's got a tongue of his own longer than this sword sheath. You lousy akhond with your turban and your little goat beard, what right do you have to meddle in other people's affairs? No one here needs some deputy of AIi or anyone else to interfere. You're not worth some cheap old cheese! Why don't you pack yourself off to the privy!" The color fled from Mowlana's cheeks, but he still contained himself and answered with the customary calm and dignity which were among his excellent characteristics, "In the end, we all have to go. We're all Muslims and brothers in religion and people of one earth and among the orders and commands of our faith and religion are instructions for fairness and injunctions against abominations. I want to perhaps make peace between two brothers in homeland and religion. . . . " The colonel made an obscene gesture showing the utmost rudeness and contempt and said, "Shove your head down your collar and your twisted turban with it! What business does a dirty akhond have with this talk? Go and see where they're making charity sweets and cram your stomach with food. You sheykh of funeral feasts! Your business is to talk over problems and say prayers for the dead and discuss women's periods and childbirth and ritual impurity. What's come over you that you're messing in matters of logic? Beat it out of here fast and get lost! Shut up and leave the moaning around and the martyrs' stories for houses of retired old ladies or else I'll arrange for your beard and mustache to be shaved off on the spot and for you to be locked up in a corner of this bazaar where the water basins for the mosque's toilets are." Mowlana's lips began to move and he seemed to be busy praying to suppress his anger. Although fire poured out of his eyes, he remained calm and said distinctly, "Those remarks are not fitting for a respectable man who would have his parents' esteem, sir. All those gathered here are ready to testify that Your Excellency stuck a knife into the pure and delicious lawful merchandise of this oppressed old

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man, you cut it up, rejected it, and tossed it down here, and yet you're not ready to give him any money. My question is why didn't you pay him the price if these melons are yours or, if they're not yours and belong to another, by what right did you take possession of someone else's property when you're not ready to make compensation?" At this point the honorable colonel again flew completely off the handle and exploded like a cannon. Advancing two steps toward Mowlana and fixing his fierce and fire-blazing eyes like those of a man-eating wolf on Mowlana, he ground and gnashed his teeth, roaring, "Pimp! Do you know whom you're up against and who it is that you're fighting in the bullring? If you want to know what it means to take a tiger by the tail, come on! I'll show you a battlefield and also a club as hard as any frozen ice cream that's ever broken your teeth." "Pimp" was an insult Mowlana couldn't stomach, and the colonel's words hadn't yet come to an end when Mowlana's hand reached out from under his aba and with lightning speed his five fingers smacked like five fresh cucumbers on his insolent opponent's face, making the colonel blink as his hat complete with Lion and Sun flew off and spun to the ground two yards beyond and the colonel himself staggered like someone delirious, going further and further back and all but falling smack on the ground like his hat. But while still in that state, he opened his eyes and stood up straight and in one movement drew his sword from its sheath and lunged in Mowlana's direction like a savage beast of prey. I was sure that Mowlana's head would be split through right to the eyebrows, but wonder of wonders! Mowlana didn't lose a moment and with astonishing speed, he threw his aba off his shoulder and with uncommon swiftness, he jumped like a cat from the spot, put his hands out, and grabbed the guy's wrists in midair, putting such pressure on that Mister Officer's fingers from thumb to little finger straightened out stiff as nails and his weapon shot out of his hands and fell to the ground. The wonder and astonishment of the onlookers and myself in particular were beyond measure or explanation. We saw it with our own eyes, but we didn't believe that one akhond, an old man with a small body, could show such strength and valor. We all remained silent in our places, fingers on our mouths in the traditional pose of surprise, when suddenly the colonel's cry rose, "At least let go of my wrist, you godless akhond. My bones are being crushed!" Paying no attention, Mowlana bent over and with his free left

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hand, he picked up the officer's sword from the ground, put it under one foot, broke it in two with one blow in the middle, picked up the pieces, and hurled them out over the heads of the crowd. Then he turned to face the colonel and said with his usual calm and dignity, "Come on now, give him the money for the melon!" The colonel was struggling to free his arm from Mowlana's grasp and he kept on squirming, panting hoarsely for breath, but it was clearly impossible for him to bring his wrist out of the vise of Mow­ lana's grip. Mowlana addressed the colonel yet again, " D o you want to give this man the money or not?" and he pointed his left hand at the dumbstruck grocer whose mouth hung open but in the wrinkled layers of whose face a quite cryptic little smile was starting to appear. The colonel opened his mouth to say something, but Mowlana increased his fingers' pressure so that willing or not, the poor guy, bareheaded and with hair in disarray, gradually came down on his knees in front of the old grocer while his lack of fortitude let the pain appear on his face. Squeezing the colonel's wrist tightly in his palm, Mowlana asked the grocer, who had gradually somewhat recovered himself, "What is your good name, dear uncle?" Like a person wanting to pray, the grocer raised his hands to shoulder height with palms facing and said, "Your servant, Hamzeh." "My brother, Hamzeh," Mowlana rephrased. "May the Lord make your future prosperous! I beg you, Karbala'i Hamzeh, to weigh these melons picked out by that person. Let's see what the price comes to!" The two pans of the scale started moving and in the presence of the crowd, Karbala'i Hamzeh quite precisely weighed the melons lacerated by the colonel, then for a few moments his lips and fingers started moving to calculate the price, and facing Mowlana, he finally said, "It's not a quarter ounce more or less than thirteen and a half pounds. The total is an even five saheb-qerans and one panah-ababi (ten shdhis)." My gaze fell on the colonel right at that moment. I saw his droop­ ing mustaches and dishevelled hair, his lips which at first were bluegray and had now become exactly like two black leeches, and his eyes which had turned all blotchy from the intensity of pain and anger and impotence. He writhed incessantly to no avail, like a sly serpent that has fallen into a trap, and he was sweating and panting for breath. Again directing his words to the colonel, Mowlana said, " N o w

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that you've heard the answer and have enjoyed a taste of the torments of the weak and understand that sometimes they too talk with a tongue in the same condition as yours, unless you want to be even more shamed and disgraced before God and his creatures, first, you must apologize to this comrade of mine, Karbala'i Hamzeh, with no quibbling and seek his forgiveness and, second, you must pay the money for the melons politely like a child of Adam and go about your business in the peace of God."

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The colonel raised his head and like a rutting camel, he threw a sharp and vindictive glance at Mowlana and said, panting, "You mean you're ordering a person like me, with commission and insignia from the country's ruler and with two regiments of soldiers under his command, to seek forgiveness from this man with only a thin qaba?" "By the grandeur of God," said Mowlana, "you should certainly know that when you unjustly struck that oppressed old man's face, the sound drawn out echoed beneath the roof of God's throne and made the bodies of His favorite angels tremble and by now tears have come into the eyes of God's Beloved and sympathy has accumulated. I really don't know what answer you'll give Him on the Day of Resurrection, but I do know that for your own interests and welfare, you should get rid of your absurd high-and-mighty attitude and listen to what I say, so that some good from it will come to you in this world and perhaps in the next." Hearing these words which had transformed those present, the colonel's glaring eyes constricted as if he'd awakened from a deep sleep. A change indicative of an inner revolution appeared on his face and he said in a quiet tone, "It doesn't matter. I'll obey whatever you command. Honorable Karbala'i Hamzeh, your humble servant begs your pardon, sir!" Then he rose and addressed Mowlana, "There's the apology. What orders do you have next? Now then, let go of my hand again, for my bones have been crushed to a pulp and my blood has stopped circulating." Mowlana said with a caustic smile, "May God forgive the father of the reasonable man! Now he's just begun to talk to you. Give him the money for the melons quickly too, so that our accounts will be completely cleared up. God willing, your accounts with the Lord will be cleared up too. When you've given him the money, we'll separate from each other as friend and brother, entrusting one another to God." With his free left hand, the colonel searched awhile in his side and breast pockets and said, "It seems I haven't brought along any money." Laughing, Mowlana said, "Well, aren't you a fine man! AU that

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boasting and empty pockets! Maybe you think the property of Mus­ lims is bear grass to take for nothing while you leave and don't even say a Fateheh for its owner?" Put to shame, the colonel said, "As God is the witness, I'm not telling lies today. I accidentally forgot to bring money with me. But it doesn't matter. I'll have it brought to him." "Uncle dear," said Mowlana, "you're not reading your lines nicely anymore. You may be the bucket, but we're its rope. We too are children of this pure earth and we're not taking the rope to the well. People of this country are thoroughly acquainted with your type. With empty pockets and lofty pose, you want to eat well and drink well and dress well and be 'Mister' and 'Sir' and 'Leader' and 'Chief everywhere. Unless you want to finish by stepping into the ring with us here, straighten out this man's account so that these Muslim folks won't be kept back from their work any longer." "Glory be to God!" said the colonel. "I say I'm a bull and you say to milk me! I say I don't have money and you say to give it!" "In that case," said Mowlana, "you must give some security until you bring the money to recover it." Then he turned to the crowd and said, "I beg one among you to take this gentleman's tunic off him." A stocky, square-shouldered man with a round, bushy beard as black as a raven's wing, an oval felt hat on his head and a striped qalamkar jacket on his body, and a greasy leather apron that clearly indicated he had a kebab shop, thrust out his elbows and raised an eyebrow like an athlete entering a zurkhaneh pit, pronounced a Mashhadi's splendid "Peace 'pon you!", bowed his head in front of Mow­ lana, and said, "Your servant, Master Safar, the kebab man. I have a shop just ten paces from here. If it would be permitted . . . " and he gestured with his head toward the colonel's tunic. Mowlana nodded in a token of assent. Master Safar stuck out his chest and with slow grace walked up to the colonel whose fingers in Mowlana's grip had turned the color of a dead candle and with total indifference and deliberateness, as if he were taking a packsaddle off a donkey's back, he took the tunic off the body of the exalted intimate of the emperor. Still with the same calm, he flicked off the dirt and mud which had settled on the tunic's skirt and sleeves in the scuffle and carefully folding it, he put it on the ground in front of Karbala'i Hamzeh. Coughing several times from the base of his throat, he withdrew with continued dignity and elegance to stand in his place. Pointing to the colonel, Mowlana asked Karbala'i Hamzeh, " D o

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you have someone to accompany that person and take what's owed you and bring it here and to then take the tunic and deliver it?" Karbala'i Hamzeh called a little boy, ill-clad and sickly yellow from head to toe, who had been clinging to the ground like a kitten in a corner of the back room of the shop and said, "This is my errand boy, Chickpea." He pointed the colonel out to Chickpea and said, "Open your ears! Hear exactly what I say and forget the funny busi­ ness. You go along like a good boy with this gentleman to his house and don't take the smallest coin more or less than five saheb-qerans and one pandh-dbddi and bring it back here at a run. Then take this tunic and deliver it politely and respectfully and come back again. If they give you a tip or bonus, accept it with thanks, but return quickly." The little child, who was scall-headed down to his forehead and had mucus running out of both nostrils, seemed in a daze. He shifted his eyes like a squirrel, one time from his master to the colonel and another from the colonel to his master, and in an undertone like a cracked little bell, he said, "Yes, good, I've got it." Only then did Mowlana let the officer's wrist go free again. Pick­ ing up two melons, he put them under the colonel's arms and he told Chickpea to take the other two. Pointing the way for the colonel with his hand, he said, "Go forth with the grace of God!" Meanwhile, some rascals had apparently taken advantage of the disturbance to pinch the guy's hat. The colonel set off without hat or coat, and with the marks of Mowlana's fingers forming a chain around his arm. Chickpea followed right along after him. At that very moment, one of the bazaar tradesmen jumped up on his shop platform. Putting his hand in back of his ear, he raised his voice and said, "May the tongue be cut out that doesn't say, 'Bless­ ings on Mohammad, Beloved of God, Seal of the Prophets.' " The sound of the blessings wound beneath the bazaar roof and proclaimed the occurrence of this amazing and unexpected event to everyone there. The first blessings still weren't finished when another of the faithful more loudly requested the blessing: On the eleven Imams, those sons of Abu Taleb's AIi, On the moonlike faces of each one individually, blessings! and the people also delivered to him lengthy blessings and thus for a while the prolonged prayers repeated one after the other for the sake of "The soul of AIi and that of Mohammad" and in memory of "The King of the Golden Dome, His Highness, Reza," at pitches contin­ ually reaching greater heights, granted refreshment to the depressed

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and drooping minds of the passing people, who generally had no pleasures or amusements other than these incidents. The blessings still were not completed when another voice rose, "Curses on anyone who torments people!" A clamor arose in answer to him, "May there be many and not few!" Another called out, "Curses on anyone who's a usurer!" Shouts leaping from hundreds of breasts answered him, "May there be many and not few!" In the meantime, a bunch of those clever and mischievous Isfahani children who had stolen the colonel's hat had put it on the end of a stick and had tied the broken pieces of his sword to it with a cord and hoisted it like Yazid's flag and set off in procession. They ran spinning around the flag and at the dictates of the poetic nature Godgiven to the offspring of that pure earth, they improvised with their wit and taste a ballad in the rhythm of the famous ballad about the killing of the Caliph, Omar. Jumping up and down and clapping their hands with enthusiasm, they sang this song with accents wholly and completely Isfahani: Come, children, there's a big, fat fuss, The colonel's been a pain in the neck. Clap, children! Clap, children! The sword's in bits and pieces, The old guy's in bad shape. Clap, children! Clap, children! The colonel's under halter, The melon turned to venom. Clap, children! Clap, children! The dkhond did beautifully! He terrified the wolf! Clap, children! Clap, children!

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Clapping and dancing like that, they blocked each step of the forlorn colonel's path and, just between us now, when the honorable colonel, who an hour ago was slaying the world with his boasts and bluster, now bareheaded with messed-up hair and swordless sheath and unjacketed body, the two gouged melons under his arms, his neck bent and head hanging, was proceeding in military step with those novel honors and special ceremonies, down the middle of the Towqchi bazaar while the marks of Mowlana's fingers chained his wrist like the necklace of a curse or the armband of a criminal and while Chickpea bobbed along behind him, his general appearance was not befitting of a real army man nor becoming to a brave and noble, esteemed and respected soldier.

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But before Mowlana could free himself from the clutches of the crowd of his townsmen, whom you'd have said were dead and now had suddenly become alive, his voice rose once more, addressing the colonel, "Hurry off now, with God's hand as your companion. Never will you forget this day and hour and I am certain that some day when you and I are both sleeping beneath a yard and a half of earth on the slopes of Takhteh-pulad cemetery, you'll understand what a service I've done for you today."

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"But before separating, there are two things that I want to tell you as a brother. First, you soldiers must not forget that you're the guardians of your brothers in country and religion, not their robbers and executioners. Second, you should know that powerful hands of vengeance quite often come out of sleeves a hundred times dirtier than those of a weak and, in your words, lousy akhond like me. Now, I again entrust you to God. Go, and may His hand be your compan­ ion!" The love and respect shown by the crowd of men and women surrounding Mowlana was unbelievable. First Karbala'i Hamzeh came up to kiss Mowlana's hand, but Mowlana pulled his hand back and drew the old grocer into his embrace and as brother kisses brother, he kissed the face on which traces of the colonel's slap were etched. An unusual murmur rose. Everyone was praying in some way for Mowlana's life and soul and honor. "All of us in this part of the bazaar, young and old, are dedicated to you," they were saying. " O u r lives and property belong to you. May the Lord make our children your alms and sacrifice! May the Lord not shorten or dimin­ ish your shadow over the heads of us, the poorest of the poor! God himself sent you to end oppression and injustice done to defenseless creatures. You're our protector, the crown on our heads. The reward for this deed of yours today will be greater than for a thousand fasts and prayers and pilgrimages. May the Lord take years from the lives of us and our wives and children and the rest of our household and add them to yours. The Prophet himself would kiss your face if he were here today, for you upheld his honor before the other prophets. They wouldn't let up and most of them were shedding tears and weeping loudly from happiness. They brought their lips to Mowla­ na's hands and kissed them with faith and devotion and then rubbed their own faces and eyes. A half-blind old man with a cane insisted on coming close enough to rub Mowlana's saliva on his eyes to re­ cover his eyesight. The other shopkeepers had stopped thinking about trade and the give and take of business. Karbala'i Hamzeh, may God

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again forgive his father, sliced a large, plump melon, put it on a big copper tray, and came to our rescue. "Stop suffocating this poor man," he cried. "Be fair and give him some room, anyway, so he can at least have some refreshment." The others didn't want to be left behind by their comrade. Each according to his circumstances scurried to bring forth gifts with com­ pliments matched by devotion. The owner of the tea stall brought tea and oranges. The confectioner tastefully arranged some milk fudge, cookies, and nut patties on a plate put on the ground in front of Mowlana. The wholesale grocer brought a branch of rock candy crystallized on a string and a pound of Aqpar tea. To be brief, it wasn't long before as much as a muleload of every kind of edible had accumulated in front of Mowlana. Suddenly that dapper gentleman, the kebab seller, with his neck pulled back and his drumlike chest puffed out like a pigeon's ruff, came forward. Respectfully bending his head, like a duck wanting to dive into the water, he said, "Rev­ erend Sheykh, God is the witness that your devoted servant is terri­ bly ashamed and embarrassed. Everyone here today has offered pres­ ents according to his ability and ambition except my unlucky self who has been busy at his unfortunate work. However hard I think, I don't have brains enough to find some way of showing my sincerity and devotion. I beg you to permit me to make you some of my excellent kebabs tomorrow and bring them wherever you say." Squatting on the ground and busy eating melon and sweets, Mow­ lana said, "However hard I think, I don't see that I've done anything worthy of all this love and kindness from my dear brothers; not letting his brothers be oppressed is just the legal duty of any Muslim. Don't you know that in our religion a warrior in the path of God is ranked as a martyr? But don't despair if despite all that, you're sometimes still oppressed, for you ought to know that this world has been called the House of Retaliation." After those comments, he pointed a hand at all the gifts with which they had complimented him and said, "Now, about these expensive gifts you've brought to your well-wisher, they amount to enough to set up a proper shop. But during the prayers you said on my behalf, you wrote a bill of exchange for me to be rewarded and compensated by God, and I don't understand why you want to renege on that transaction which was to my benefit from beginning to end. You yourselves are businessmen and know better than I that changing terms after a deal's been made is not good business. Come and let me keep the terms with God, and not be shortchanged by having these gifts now instead."

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Having said that, he left the gifts where they were and after a series of good-byes, he put on his cloak and departed. I left too, following him like a shadow. For a while, neither he nor I spoke even a word, but when I no­ ticed that he'd switched our path and was turning back to reach the road to the school, I broke the silence and said, "Excuse me, hadn't we agreed ξο go to the Fire Temple? Now I see Your Excellency has set off on the road to our Haven of Rest." "Some time has passed," he said, "and the weather has gotten too hot. Besides, if our purpose was a pilgrimage to a fire temple, Mr. Officer today showed us not only a temple of fire but a real hell as well." "If it's not presuming, sir," I said, "the truth is that you showed him hell and you weren't content with only showing him. You pushed seven generations of his into the fire and burned his father too!" "I have not been, and am not, a man for that kind of action," he said, "but that man causes rebellion. For two thousand years, the helpless people of this country have been prisoners of a handful of unprincipled rogues and rascals and even now, for all those conver­ sations coming up about tyranny and the need for justice and consti­ tutions, no end to it is in sight." "But, God forbid, Your Excellency's not in favor of tyranny?" I said. "God's curse, may He forgive me, on anyone who is a tyrant or wants tyranny," he replied, "but no matter what I think, I realize that the external form of government as such is something unimpor­ tant. Whether a country has a tyrant or is a constitutional republic, so long as its leaders are not noble and wise and concerned with the welfare of the people and their country, affairs will continue un­ changed." "Then what should be done?" I asked. "AU our misfortunes are from that oppression," he said. "People of this land have become so accustomed to oppression that they imagine that it's the same every­ where in the world and that every man has to coerce his inferiors and yield to his superiors. No work on reform itself will be effective until the roots of oppression are dug up from the land. It will always be the same soup and the same bowl; the fundamental law of the donkey doing the work and the horse doing the eating will continue to prevail throughout the land. All the dust we pour on our heads and all the drudgery we go through, from forging a constitution and setting up a parliament to organizing finances and establishing an army and expanding the schools and making education universal, will be useless and to no advantage. The only difference will be that

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today illiterate men are cowering in captivity and tomorrow it will be men who have gone to school and know geography and history who will be cowering in captivity, and that's all. Taking into consid­ eration the literacy and learning acquired, the effects of oppression and injustice will perhaps seem even harder and more bitter and bur­ densome to them." "In our country, two Isfahani rowzeh-khans, one an dkhond and the other a sayyid, and one Kashani journalist shook the foundations of a tyranny 2,500 years old, and they started a constitutional govern­ ment on its way. 4 But, alas, in the almost twenty years since then, the constitution hasn't taken shape for two reasons. The first is that the seed was sown in unprepared land, among hungry and undiscerning men who prefer bread and soup to freedom and justice and equality and who understand only the last letters of the word 'law.' 5 Second, the leaders of our revolution apparently neglected one essen­ tial point; they imagined that a revolution could be produced peace­ fully, unaware that, even if such a revolution were feasible, it would require a very long and extended period of time. In a land not turned over and under by shovel blade and plowshare and not cleared of stones and clods and weeds, no seed will ever develop easily." "Then what's the remedy?" I asked. "I am no more than a poor student," he said, "and, in the words of Khajeh Hafez, the business of kings requires contemplation and deliberations which are outside the responsibility of an inept man like me. But I have realized more and more every day that the first step in reform and liberation must be to teach these people to hate oppression and coercion. People must be made to understand that the harm and danger from oppressive human beings is many degrees greater than that from wolves and jackals, wild boars, and snakes and vipers. Just as people are enemies of fierce animals and beasts of prey, they must be enemies of op­ pressive humans too, whether with the clergy's turban on their heads or with the hats and neck scarves of government officials. A clause must be added to the essentials and the subsections of religion and every child must be taught from its very first day that war on oppres­ sion is among the obligations of religion and humanity. People must be made to understand (and made to understand so that it becomes their inner faith and heartfelt belief) that oppressive and unjust men 4 The two rowzeh-khans referred to are Jamalzadeh's father and Nasrollah Beheshti; the journalist is Sayyed Jalal-od-din of Kashan, who edited The Firm Cord, which first appeared in Calcutta (Jz-c). 5 The word for "law" in Persian is qanun. Its last syllable, nun, is a common pro­ nunciation of the Persian word for "bread."

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are among the defilements, just like blood and urine and excrement, and their removal is necessary for, and incumbent on, every individ­ ual; to be oppressed is an unforgiveable crime and sin and transgres­ sion." When Mowlana's lecture reached this point, he suddenly inter­ rupted his speech and said, "Haven't I been talkative, tossing about weird nonsense! I must have made your dear head ache. May God destroy the house of that inhuman officer, who not only upset our plans for today but also let me go on this way with rigamarole and empty talk. But now, given the constraint that we must pass up the Fire Temple for today, how about going to some place closer that's also pleasant and worth seeing?" " 'I'm at your command, whatever you order,' " I said. "I'll go wherever you do and obey whatever you command."

11:29 LHAPTER 2

People of Purity

eat

lunch

at

Mir

's §rave?

k

's

a

cheerful place to relax and its waters are colder than hail and clearer than crystal." "Long live Mir!" I said, and we set off. It wasn't long until we reached Mir's Takiyeh. It was in fact a charming and invigorating place, located on the way to Takhtehpulad. Gradually I recalled that once or twice in childhood, I had come here with my mother and other women of the house for some vow made to God and perhaps we had even cooked some soup then vowed right here. "It's a very nice spot," I said, "and refreshes one's spirit. I'm ashamed to say, however, that I know nothing about Mir save his name, even though I did exercises tracing his handwriting for a time in child­ hood. How nice it would be if you'd relate his biography for me in a few words!" Mowlana began to guffaw and said, "You are truly an ignorant Isfahani! This takiyeh, dear boy, has no connection with the calligraphist, Mir Emad. This grave is that of the famous Mir Fendereski, called Teacher of Wise Men." "I've heard the name, Fendereski," I said, "and I know that people of Isfahan relate things about him, but please do admit that young merchants' sons like me haven't dealt much with wisdom and wise ana Truth

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Mowlana did some thinking and said, " H o w would it be to go and

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men. How lucky for me to have the honor of visiting this place in your service today, sir! I'm certain I'll have an acceptable pilgrimage, especially if you recite a portion of the life story of this illustrious wise man instead of the pilgrimage prayers, please." Pointing a finger at the tall tombstone engraved and decorated on every side with poems and Qoranic verses, he said, "Mir Fendereski is sleeping beneath that stone." The grave resembled that of an alien. Dust and dirt had settled finger-deep on it, and although there was daylight inside, it now seemed dark and clearly no guest had come to call on the master of that house for a long time. Mowlana offered a Fateheh to the earth of the ever-silent host of that shrine, then he shook his head as an indication he was moved and he said, "The person asleep here is among the very rare men of this country. His name, as you know, was Mir Abo'l-qasem Fender­ eski Astrabadi and he's been asleep here for almost three hundred years. He was the greatest sage of his time, but the reason for his distinction is that he became a proverbial rend and rogue. The stories surviving on the subject all point to how free-thinking and truly liberated this extraordinary man was. According to the stories, he paid no attention to his clothes and in a dervish's cloak of rags, he associated mostly with unknown and anonymous men of no principies and was happy in that society. One day Shah Abbas taunted him in reproach, "I hear some of our ulama are socializing with the scum of society, attending cockfights and debauched and dissipated par­ ties." Pretending not to understand, Mir Fendereski answered, "I myself have always attended that sort of parties and gatherings, and contrary to what you have been informed, never have I seen any of the ulama there." The poor man got so fed up with Isfahan's envi­ ronment of flattery and hypocrisy and with associating with sancti­ monious dissemblers that he set out for India. He spent some years there and found such fame in that land for his talents and accomplish­ ments that the Indians came to believe his body was a philosophers' stone and that everything he touched would be transformed to gold. It is well-known that after his death in Isfahan, the Indians residing in this city planned to tunnel through the ground, steal his corpse, and take it to their own country. His grave, which we see right here, was therefore fortified to the utmost with lime and mortar on every side so that it would not be possible to steal his corpse." "It is also said that he was meeting one day with the scholar, Sheykh Baha'i, when a lion from the royal lionhouse suddenly broke out of its chains, came into the meeting, circled it, and went out. Sheykh

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Baha'i was frightened and brought his aba in front of his face, whereas the sage, Fendereski, didn't stir from his place at all and didn't give way to any apprehensions. The portraitist has illustrated the state of the meeting at that particular moment on the enclosing wall of one of the famous buildings, Eight Heavens. I myself have repeatedly seen that painting in that building, which is still standing; it sticks in my mind that the face of Sheykh Baha'i was drawn with a thin beard. The many fine poems left by Mir Fendereski also indicate that he had simultaneously two contrasting sides (although the contrast is out­ ward). One was that of a learned man and mystic, best exemplified by the famous poem beginning with this couplet: The sphere with these fine, marvelous stars is beautiful; The form it has underneath is whatever's up above. The other side was that of the rogue and libertine and professional lover, and if just the following two couplets had survived, they would be perfectly sufficient to illustrate that second side: Since constant drinking has become possible, constantly is best! Since wine-drinking is forbidden, the forbidden month is best. 1 Give one kiss on your cheek and your lips, So, having tasted both, I may say which is best." "Truly," I said, "he was a great person, may God forgive him. But now, if you permit, we might drop in on some other chambers too and incidentally also find out whether the servant of this takiyeh would offer to fix a small lunch and a glass or two of nice, hot tea for us." Having had lunch and tea and a short siesta, we went out of the takiyeh two hours later. Mowlana pointed a little more quickly to another grave which clearly no one had come to locate for a while, and he said, "That is also the tomb of one of those about whom Iran boasts." "I'm ashamed to say," I said, "that I'm not familiar with those about whom we boast." "It is the dervish Mojid, the Muslim master of the shekasteh script we use every day," he said, "who died in A.D. 1771, as you may read on his tombstone, and on whose behalf they've said, Not since God invented the tablet and pen, Has anyone written shekasteh as he did." 1 The "forbidden month" (mah-e haram, more often translated as "sacred month") is Moharram, when certain things, notably fighting, were forbidden (haram) even in pre-Islamic times in Arabia.

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"If you're in the mood," he said then, "possibly we could pay a visit to Julfa before returning to the city; it has some things worth seeing." "It's clear that today we've been written an assignment on the seventy-two sects that are supposed to exist," I replied. "First we planned on the Fire Temple, then fate and destiny pulled our reins toward the cemetery of Islamic sages and mystics, and now we're going to visit the Armenians. May God make its conclusion good!" In Julfa, we inspected the Armenian church and their museum and the exquisite door panel full of designs and decorations that is the only surviving reminder of the House of Mirrors. Next we looked at the handwritten decree about the Armenians issued by Shah Abbas to the city's mayor, " O n the basis of what has been heard, some grapes were taken from the Armenians' vineyards. You of course intend to investigate and search out the criminals and subject them to interrogation and punishment. With the fines you take, make compensation to the Armenians for ten times over the damages. If they do not get the criminals, give compensation from the govern­ ment property at a rate of ten to one." Mowlana then drew me to the Armenians' graveyard, and although I wanted to avoid it, he didn't stop. "I want to show you a foreigner's grave and tell you a wonderful story," he said. "I've heard of vows to be present at fortyone sessions with a rowzeh-khdn in one day," I said, "but you, sir, seem to be making a vow of forty-one graves! In the name of God, I'll be reciting Fateheh's and seeking forgiveness at your command for every Muslim and heathen until the Day of Resurrection!" But he went on, pointing to a ruined and deserted grave in the corner of the cemetery, "If our country had a hundred of the likes of this youth sleeping here, our affairs would be a hundred times better than they are." "Then why is he found laid to rest here in the Armenians' grave­ yard?" I asked. "Don't be in such a hurry!" he said. "This youth was neither Ira­ nian nor Muslim but rather came to this land from far away and, as you will note, all his hopes went with him to the grave." "I beg you not to melt my heart in vain," I said. "You yourself know very well that I'm extremely anxious to hear his life story and so, if I may take the liberty, don't drag it out." "I hear and obey," he said. "His name was Rodolph Stadler and his occupation was watchmaking. He came to Iran at the age of twentyfive, in the seventeenth century during the reign of Shah Safi the First, and was from Zurich, the largest city of Switzerland. He made by hand some beautiful and elegant clocks of gold and silver which

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also chimed and since such clocks had not yet been seen in Iran at that time, Rodolph quickly drew the favor and attention of the shah and a thirty-fuman allowance was settled on him. It was agreed that he would go before the shah every morning and wind the clock with his own hands lest it be ruined and stop working, as had happened once or twice before. Gradually Rodolph's affairs took on some shine and he became Master of the Stables and Servants and Retinue. Shah Safi took great pleasure from discussions with him about the conditions and events and habits and customs of Europe and Europeans and every morning before Rodolph was dismissed, he even ordered that a goblet of wine be poured for him to toast the shah. If should be known that this youth also had some skill in the art of irrigation and a demonstration of his services at this also increased Shah Safi's attachment so that the shah repeatedly proposed raising Rodolph to high rank if he would become a Muslim. Rodolph always refused, answering that one should never kick aside one's faith and customs, friends, family, and country, even though they might have faults and defects. It so happened that one night about that time, when Rodolph was returning to his house at midnight in a drunken state, he was informed that some poor lad, later found to be the chief royal gatekeeper's brother, had jumped down from the garden wall, desiring Rodolph's wife, and at the cries and wails of their lady, the servants had surprised him and caught him. Rodolph tied him to a tree, thinking that as soon as it was light the next day, he would consign him to the hands of the police superintendent, but as the youth acted very insolent and even while tied to the tree kicked a member of the household very hard, Rodolph in his drunken, angry state brought out his pistol and shot a bullet toward him which accidentally hit him in the head and killed him on the spot. Incited by the chancellor, Mirza Taqi, Support of the State, who was unhappy about the familiarity between the shah and Rodolph and who was anxious to keep a certain other matter from reaching Shah Safi's ears, the people of the city assembled the next day in front of the AIi Qapu on King's Square and demanded that Rodolph be killed as punishment." Interrupting Mowlana's speech here, I said, "I beg your pardon, but I would like to know, first, where Your Excellency got this information and, second, why Mirza Taqi, may God not pardon him, was so thirsty for the blood of this foreign youth." "I obtained this information through one of my sincere and loyal friends, an admirable and pious man of this city named Mirza Khan Bangi," said Mowlana. "Since he's highly skilled in arithmetic, accounting, and geometry, and even has the title of Accountant of State,

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and since he also knows English well, he has worked for long years in the English banks and is counted in the first rank of the employees of those institutions. Although he is westernized and wears a hat and I'm no more than a slow and sloppy akhond, for long years we have been close and dear friends. Somehow or other, one evening a week, either he is humble enough to come to my cell or, more often, I'm the gate-crasher at his house, and we close the door to family and outsiders and sit together for long hours in a secluded corner of his courtyard, mustache to mustache, drinking tea and smoking the hookah and having conversations on every subject. Sometimes I talk to him about things worth hearing from Egyptian books in Arabic that I've read and sometimes he translates for me from books in English. It was he who reported to me the story of Rodolph, taken from the travel book of a French merchant who resided in Iran for years dur­ ing the Safavid period and whose books have been translated into many European languages. But on the matter of Mirza Taqi, Support of the State, first, you surely have heard that in the Safavid period, the title of Support of the State was given to the chancellor and, second, Mirza Taqi had apparently agreed to buy many gold and silver clocks from Rodolph but didn't want to pay any money at all. Since poor Rodolph could not, and should not, yet have been aware of the custom of the 'mustache tax' prevailing in our country from the time of Darius, he persisted in pressing his indisputable claim and sent frequent messages on the matter which, since they had a foreign accent, were surely not pleasing to those with the ornate tastes of chancellery style. That aggravated the situation and His Honor, the Support of the State, had right and properly resolved on killing the

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unmannerly youth. The same travel book says that when Rodolph insisted on demanding his rights to the end, Mirza Taqi sent him twenty-three donkeyloads of straw, barley, and alfalfa, and consis­ tent with his lack of familiarity with the customs of our country, Rodolph returned the loads and sent the message, 'Am I then a pack horse to need this straw and alfalfa? I beg you to keep these exquisite materials for yourself and pay me the price of the clocks in legal tender as quickly as possible.' In brief, Shah Safi was forced to put the burden on Rodolph of either entering the religion of Islam or being put to death. N o matter what was done, the courageous youth didn't yield, and he said he wouldn't give up the faith of his ancestors and they could kill him if they wanted to. It is even said that Shah Safi was ready to offer him a major pension and also to give him a daughter from the royal harem as a wife but Rodolph still wouldn't give in. At length they threw him into prison and put on his neck a

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yoke, as pictured in the travel book, which was made of two boards with three holes through which the neck and hands of the criminal were passed." "Finally when Shah Safi's urging had no effect and Rodolph re­ fused to accept Islam despite all the hardship he suffered in prison, he was brought out of prison and consigned to the brother of the slain Iranian youth so he could take revenge for his brother's blood in the King's Square on the appointed day. The brother wanted to sever Rodolph's head from his body with his own hand, as was cus­ tomary, but he couldn't manage it and his sword went past the yoke and landed on Rodolph's thigh. The brother then wanted to strike another blow but people began to raise a rumpus and surrounded Rodolph to prevent it and therefore Rodolph was taken back to prison. With threats and promises, Shah Safi asked him once more to be­ come a Muslim, but Rodolph continued to refuse and they were forced to surrender him to the slain man's relatives who took him to the square and took the yoke up from his neck. After Rodolph fell on his knees and closed his eyes and recited a short prayer, they severed his head from his body in late October of 1637, when not more than twenty-seven years of that youth's life had yet passed. The Armenians brought his corpse to this place here and entrusted it to the earth and also built a hall for him, but because the earth of his tomb is considered holy and some of it is taken away every day for cures, it is continually in the ruined form you observe here, but one must in fairness admit that in this dilapidation, 'it's worth a hundred thousand whole. ' 2 They say the pluck and courage of this youth moved Shah Safi greatly and one day when the youth's name came up again in conversation, the shah said, Ί swear by Mortaza AIi, they couldn't find among us damned rascals one person ready to go to the point of death, as that unfortunate young man was, merely for the sake of God and the Prophet.' " After those explanations, Mowlana wiped the sweat that had set­ tled on his forehead with the sleeve of his qabd and said, " 'Caring for exiles is a reason to be mentioned fondly.' Although our sainted ones not only do not permit petitions for pity on behalf of nonMuslim servants of God but refuse even to use the word 'pitied' for them and instead use the stilted phrase, 'the late lamented,' I don't 2 The phrase, "a hundred thousand whole" (sad hazar dorost), is the end of a Hafez couplet: Make a deal and buy this broken heart, For, though broken, it's worth a hundred thousand whole, and recurs in the two following chapters.

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believe that behavior and those sly tricks will ever please the hearts of God and the Prophet. 3 1 also don't imagine that such a youth with the faith of a pure-hearted martyr, who is a model of nobility and dedication for young and old, even needs prayers of blessing and petitions for forgiveness from disgraceful and sinful individuals like me, but if only to make amends for our inhospitable Qizilbashes, I personally will never be content to leave without reading a Fateheh over the grave of this alien youth." Then facing the qebleh, he hunched over the end of the grave on whose stone was written only, "Rodolph's Place of Rest," and plac­ ing his forefinger on the earth, he started reciting a whispered Fate­ heh with complete sincerity of purpose. Imitating my guide and teacher as I stood there, I too offered a Fateheh at the tomb of that friendless youth and at its end, I impulsively bent down and kissed its earth, apologizing from the bottom of my heart for the injustice and cruelty experienced by that unfortunate young man at the hands of my ig­ norant countrymen. The heat was doing well for itself and still hadn't peaked and bro­ ken although it was several hours since noon. Dragging along, we went toward the bank of the Zayendeh River. Suddenly I saw Mowlana staring as if dumbstruck at the center of the river where the water was circling violently, sinking down in a whirlpool. Boldly putting my hand on his shoulder, I said, "Be alert for AIi so you don't fall asleep." Drawing his gaze back from the whirlpool, he said, "The people of Isfahan say that this whirlpool leads to the marsh of Gaw-khuni and for a while now I have wanted to experiment and see whether that proposition is true or false." "From the time when my fate and fortune helped me become a recluse at the threshold of grace of the Exalted Lord," I said, "I have grasped through experience that one of your prominent qualities in­ deed is curiosity. I have repeatedly watched how you sink down into the inner depths of nature and fix your eyes sometimes like a micro­ scope on things that are very, very wee and small and sometimes like an astronomer's telescope on stars in the sky and the Milky Way and the solar worlds. In the beginning when I wasn't so familiar with your moods, sir, I was very surprised by that behavior and often asked myself what mysteries and secrets one insignificant green leaf or one feeble ant no bigger than the head of a pin could have that 3 The Persian text here plays on two words, "pity" (rahtnat) and "pitied" (marhum), with a common Arabic root, r-h-m. In Persian, marhum is used like "late" in "the late Mr. X . " This is contrasted with the more elaborate Arabic phrase, mi'suj 'alay-hi, translated here as "the late lamented."

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kept this respected individual busy for long hours. Later on, when I'd taken your pulse and you'd sometimes let me share the results of your detailed observations, the point of the work was more or less revealed to me and I understood what strange and astonishing worlds you travel. I haven't forgotten the day when you spent all afternoon watching one of those tiny and delicate animals that in everyday lan­ guage are known as lady bugs. 4 Little by little the discoveries you made about its circumstances were such a source of amazement for me that I must admit that I secretly acquired a ladybug and brought it in a matchbox to my room, closed the door, and kept myself occupied watching the particulars of that animal's life, comprehend­ ing things that are in fact worth writing about. Nevertheless, I don't understand what experiment you want to make with this whirlpool." "You'll see in a moment," he said. Then without acquainting me with his plan or purpose, he took the sash from his waist and the turban from his head, opened them both out and tied them to each other, and apparently intending to make a cord or rope, he handed me one end and took the other himself and began twisting it. Then he knotted both ends of the rope tightly and dragged forward two very large stones from the edge of the thicket and tied each end of the rope firmly and tightly around them so that undoing them would take the patience of His Highness the Elephant. After that, he took off his qabd and shirt and was stripped down in a twinkling. My eyes fell on an astonishing body and build. This man who had outwardly seemed no more than a handful of skin and bones actually had a body and build one could not look at enough. The knots of his arms, the breadth of his chest, the creases of his breasts, the swell­ ing muscles, the exercised belly and flanks, all told the story of one of the regular athletes who had grown up in the zurkhdneh pit. There wasn't a tenth of an ounce of flabby, unexercised flesh or extra fat or fiber to be found on him from head to toe. "Then blessed be God, the fairest of creators!" I said, involuntarily quoting the Qoran. " N o w I understand why His Honor, the Colonel, stumbled to the Throne of God that way this morning after suffering one blow." Mowlana was busy at work and not paying any attention to my bit of Qoran recitation. He gave me an end of the rope, and clasping one of those stones to his chest, he entered the water in just his pants. Gradually he reached a spot where the water was nearly over his head and he then started swimming without letting go of the stone. It was clear that the force and pressure of the water were constantly 4

The Persian "ladybug" is literally a "shoemaker" (kafshduz).

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increasing. Now Mowlana had nearly reached the whirlpool and still he was going forward with the stone clutched to his chest, swim­ ming with one hand. He'd gotten so close to the whirlpool that I feared the water would spin him around and he'd drown. "Where are you going?" I cried out. "Why are you pointlessly throwing yourself into danger? Come on back, for God's sake!" Shaking his head to toss off the water that had gone into his mouth and eyes and turning his head toward me, he replied, "Don't be afraid! Hold the rope tightly so it doesn't go out of your hands and there won't be a problem." He was struggling in a battle with the waters. Sometimes he would disappear beneath the waves and then he would be seen surfacing anew. Now he was caught in the clutches of the assaulting pressures of the swirling waters right in the whirlpool's territory. My breath was pent up and strangled. I wanted to close my eyes so I wouldn't see this terrible sight. Suddenly both of Mowlana's hands came out of the water and with all possible force he flung the stone into the mouth of the whirlpool, and drawing back, he began swimming to­ ward me while saying, "Let the rope loose a bit!" At first the weight of the stone pulled me forward as much as two or three yards but I resisted with all my power and didn't lose my balance. Just as soon as Mowlana's foot touched the ground, he ran all the way to me and also took the end of the rope and together we began to exert all our strength. For a period of not more than half a minute, the pull of the stone and the water pressure was greater than ours, but suddenly, as if the stone had become untied, the rope in our hands slacked and as we began tugging, we saw the stone had been thrown out of the whirlpool and was coming toward us. Mowlana's lip curled and he said, "I knew they were talking non­ sense and that this pit couldn't lead to the Gaw-khuni, but even so, unless I saw it with my own eyes, I wouldn't rest easy." Having said that, he untied the rope from the stone, tied it firmly to his own waist, and said, " N o w I'll enter the whirlpool myself. You must cling tightly to the end of the rope and only when you see that ex­ actly one astronomer's minute has passed from the time of my sink­ ing into the whirlpool and you haven't any news or visible signs of me should you collect your strength and pull on the rope." "I haven't the right to presume on your position, sir," I said, "but God is the witness that no intelligent man has ever done such a thing. Why do you want to endanger your precious life at your own hands?" "There will be no danger in the center, God willing," he said. "You saw how the water itself returned the stone. It has no reason

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not to throw me out too. And besides, that kind of madness is the spice of life. If someone agreed not to handle anything under the sun in his life from beginning to end unless each action passed under the microscope of reason and through the sieve of logic, such a way of life wouldn't be worth a tenth of a penny. I'd personally be ready in any case to throw such a monotonous and colorless, insipid and lack­ luster life out for the dogs, like some scraps or a piece of backbone." "My God, come on and get down off the devil's donkey," I said. "What's wrong in having a peaceful life with no danger that makes you want to throw us into the dragon's mouth for no reason?" "First," he said, "there aren't any dragons or such like in the center and you'll find the job is easier than you imagine. Furthermore, even supposing there is some slight danger, this stolen breath called 'life' isn't much to talk about, after all. Ahmad said, 'Whoever has two identical days Is cheated and a prisoner of doubt.'

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and thus it is written in the Traditions. Take the end of the rope tightly, trusting in God, and you may be confident that this eggplant won't have some terrible accident." I was in the process of coming to my senses when Mowlana threw himself into the water and went rapidly toward the whirlpool. I was so worried and upset that I feared the rope would go out of my hands, but somehow or other I controlled my inner agitation and took my chances, entrusting my great and dear friend to God and clinging hard to the end of the rope. As soon as Mowlana came near the whirlpool, he fearlessly threw himself into its mouth and disap­ peared. The whirlpool swallowed him and he vanished completely. With no trace of him visible, I was carried away by fear and terror so that my eyes no longer saw anything and I could hear the sound of my heart beating. Although my hands and feet trembled violently, I nevertheless labored with all my strength lest the rope go out of my hands. My eyes were fixed on the point where Mowlana had gone under the water and I panted for breath while busy counting so that as soon as I reached sixty and the specified minute had passed, I could pull on the rope. Like the first time when we had thrown the stone into the whirlpool, in the beginning the force of the water and the weight of Mowlana's body also this time pulled me several steps forward, but planting my feet in front and back, I secured myself solidly on the ground, stuck out my chest, and paid full attention with all my faculties lest some negligence arise and be the source of my everlasting misfortune and regret.

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Immediately on reaching sixty, I began to pull on the rope. I was expecting the head and neck of Mowlana to come out of the mouth of the whirlpool at that very moment. I rejoiced in my heart, but alas! As if caught on a firm peg of iron, the rope didn't respond, and no matter how hard I tried and went forward and back, it was to no avail. There was no room for any doubt or uncertainty about some misfortune having overtaken Mowlana, and I nearly went mad at this horrifying idea. I looked in every direction for someone to come at my cry, but there was not a man in sight. Strange fears and terrors overwhelmed me and in great haste I repeated the Throne verse from the Qoran, blowing it toward the whirlpool. The fear and alarm made me tremble inside and my teeth were chattering. Eventually there was no longer any strength or energy left in my arms, and my fingers lost their grip, and the rope went out of my hands by itself and, like a man knocked on the head with a mallet, I fell to the ground, and taking my head between my hands, I began to cry, sobbing like a child separated from its mother.

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It wasn't long before suddenly the sound of splashing water came to my ears and as I raised my head in confusion, I saw Mowlana, standing pale and erect in front of me with his hands on his hips, laughing at the mournful state of helpless me. "Very good!" he said. "Congratulations to you! It's amazing how you managed to do the job! Instead of pulling his old friend out of the water, the haji's boy puts his arms around his knees and sits there, squeezing out globs of tears like the mother of a dead child." Still sobbing, I went up to him and took his hands and began kissing them. He raised me from the ground with his body soaked and dripping, and he embraced me, kissed my forehead, and said, "It's my fault for being a bit late. You surely must have imagined that I'd had it. I apologize, but just as I reached the bottom of the whirlpool and was rubbing around with my hand to see whether it had any way to go out, I found a cryptlike hole. Although my breath was running short, my heart would nevertheless not be content to leave the job half-done and return empty-handed and therefore I somehow or other crammed myself into the hole. Just as soon as I had checked and found it led nowhere, I threw myself out of the whirlpool. It was surely just those few seconds of delay that caused your mind distress." Then he hopped on one foot while putting a finger in his ears to take the water out of them and with his other hand and my help, he squeezed out the turban and sash and spread them in the sun to dry. It was not long before he again tied the sash around his waist and as

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is customary among the turban-wearers, he wound the turban around his knee and put it on his head and said, "The water's coldness numbed my feet. Let's go and walk for a while." "I won't object," I said. "After all that fear and fright, I wouldn't mind walking a bit either." We entered the Jubareh quarter which, as of course you know, is the quarter of Isfahan's Jews. In a very dirty, dark, and narrow lane, Mowlana pointed to a small mud dome above the platform of a ruined little shop next to the Jews' temple and he said, "You'll never guess what meaning that dome has!" "For all that I'm a native of Isfahan," I said, "and I came into the world in this very city and have reached this age and my beard's come in, never until today have my feet touched this lane and this quarter, so how do you then expect me to know the meaning of that dome? It's surely the tomb of a pious and holy Jew." " N o , dear boy," he said, "it's the tomb of our greatest poet, Kamal-od-din Esma'il, whose name you've surely heard. Perhaps some of his poetry has also reached your ears." "It's amazing," I said, "that in every direction we've circled today, we've found something to do with the resting place of a dead Muslim or heathen. The truth is that such a name has reached my ears but I don't know even one couplet of his poetry and I'm entirely ignorant of his life and times and I'm ashamed of it." The platform had a height of a little over two yards and on top had been made the cone-shaped mud dome beneath which Kamalod-din was laid to rest. Mowlana closed his eyes a while in his usual manner and was si­ lent, and then opened his eyes and said, "This great poet, who has been called the Creator of Concepts for his originality of subject mat­ ter, has rested here for almost seven hundred years now. He endured great afflictions and suffered much agony in his grief-filled life due to the Shia and Sunni and Shafe'i and Hanafi controversies in this city. It seems he himself was a Hanafi and lived in this quarter which was the center of the Hanafis. The turbanned Shafe'is resided in an­ other quarter of the city, known as Dardasht. Every so often the two groups of men from the two quarters of one city rose up and attacked each other, spilling blood and giving each other the works. Kamalod-din was so heartsick and disgusted by this situation that he un­ sparingly cursed all his townsmen good and bad together. As he has said, As long as Dardasht and Jubareh exist, No remedy for the slaughter and killing will exist.

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O Lord of the Seven Planets, Send a bloodthirsty army To make Dardasht a desert With streams of blood from Jubareh flowing in it. 5 Increase the numbers in them both: Tear every one in two.

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And the amazing thing is that in a sense this curse came to pass, for it wasn't long until the calamity of the Mongols was afoot. The na­ tives of the Shafe'i sect secretly encouraged the Mongols to take the city and promised to help. Their only request in exchange for such a service was that the Mongols not spare members of the city's Hanafi sect but have a general massacre of them all. The thing is that when the city fell into the Mongols' hands, they didn't distinguish between Shafe'i and Hanafi, and just as Kamal-od-din had hoped, each Isfahani, whether Shafe'i or Hanafi, was split into two pieces. It is also said that the Creator of Concepts was himself killed in the following strange way. When the Mongols took possession of the city, Kamalod-din is said to have become a hermit in a monastery in the Jubareh quarter. Since he was in dervish clothes, the Mongols didn't molest him and a number of the city's inhabitants entrusted to him their jewels and valuables which he then hid in the monastery well. One day a Mongol child happened to pass by there and his thumbstall, the thimblelike object of horn and bone worn on the thumb to avoid injury from the bowstring when shooting arrows in Mongol style, fell into that very well. When the child wanted to get it out, the things hidden in the well were discovered and the Mongols, greedy for other buried treasure, racked and tortured the poor poet so much that he gave up the ghost and it is rumored, right or wrong, that they threw his corpse right into the well and this tomb you see with the platform and dome was built exactly over it." "Hanafi or Shafe'i, God forgive him," I said, "for he had a right to make such a curse on his townsmen. For the happiness of his triumphant soul, I promise that right tomorrow I'll take a volume of his poems in hand and learn some short ones by heart and ask for­ giveness for their author. But my feet are already blistered today from our wandering around so much and it would be nice, with your permission, sir, to gradually return to our Haven of Rest, especially since my stomach is rubbing against itself." While returning to the school, we happened to pass a takiyeh that 5 In Persian, there is a play on words in this couplet, first with dasht "desert" and Dardasht, and then with ju "stream" and Jubareh.

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I also had never seen. Mowlana slowed his pace and with his droll grin, he cast a penetrating glance at me and said, "This takiyeh is known as the Takiyeh of Darkness and the mosque is known as the Mosque of Maqsud Beyg. They say that the tomb of Mir Emad, the famous calligrapher, is in a room in the vicinity of this mosque. For us whose lot today is a pilgrimage to people of the grave, what harm would there be in also reciting a Fateheh for this ill-treated sayyid who became a martyr to his greatness and to the happiness of his countrymen?" "I am most willing," I said, "but on the condition that you give me a biography of him in a few words so that I don't go out as blind as I entered." The door of the room was closed. The custodian appeared and opened it and we entered. After the Fateheh, Mowlana leaned against the wall on which the tombstone was erected and on which the names of the Twelve Imams and the date of death of a person named Hekmatollah Khoza'i were engraved and said with words distinct, "As you surely must know, Mir Emad Hasani Qazvini was in fact the creator of the nasta 'Hq script and the absolute king and indisputable sultan in the realm of that exquisitely beautiful writing which may be called the writing of Iran's Muslims. No one so far has ever begun to measure up to him nor will they. He is famous rightly or wrongly because however firm and clear any handwriting seems to be, it al­ ways shows up as jagged under a microscope, but Mir Emad's writ­ ing is the one exception to that rule and that in itself is the best proof of the unequalled powers of the great master's hand and fingers." "In his youth, Mir Emad made journeys far and wide to perfect his handwriting and to acquire education, learning, and accomplish­ ments. He knelt for a while in the presence of great masters of hand­ writing, such as Isa Rang-negar and Malek Deylami and Molla Mo­ hammad Hoseyn Tabrizi. He also traveled in the Ottoman regions and to Herat and Khorasan during that period. The famed patronage of Shah Abbas the Great finally drew him to Isfahan and he made his residence there. Particularly in 'hidden' nasta 'Hq with its tiny letters, he was undisputed master of the age. All that notwithstanding, when some of the fanatical world at the court of Shah Abbas clashed with his sensitive nature, showing no self-restraint, he expressed what was on his mind in every possible place and thus became the object of disfavor with the shah and his court, so that among all the inscrip­ tions covering the walls of mosques and schools and takiyehs and shrines of this city, all that remains in his handwriting is the famous poem of Hafez beginning:

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The garden of eternal paradise is the dervishes' retreat; The source of grandeur is the dervishes' service, at the edge of one of the rooms of Mir's Takiyeh. There may also be some other calligraphy whose purity and freshness has diminished somewhat with the passage of time on the Hafez mausoleum in Shiraz. 11:51 It is also well-known that Shah Abbas requested him to write a Shdhnameh at the rate of one gold coin per couplet, but he wouldn't take it on and with the high and mighty attitude which was his nature paid no attention to the shah and vizier. His colleagues were also jealous of him and it's said that Ali-reza-ye Abbasi, a famous calligrapher who in some experts' opinion should not be confused with the famous miniature painter, Reza Abbasi, although possibly they are in fact the same, troubled the shah's mind about Mir Emad and even told him that the latter was a Sunni, although he was in fact a Hasani sayyid of the Zeydi sect.6 When Mir Emad saw what love and affection Shah Abbas had for Ali-reza, to the point where it has been written that the shah held a candlestick in his own hand so that Ali-reza could write, he became more annoyed and disgusted. With his disposition, he could not control his tongue or pen and, as is wellknown, he boldly composed some verses of complaint and sent them to Shah Abbas. The two following couplets are among those attributed to him: The jewels which I made into verse in praise of you, Turned cold as hail from your frostiness. What do I profit from the white hand of Moses when you can't tell An explanation in conversation with Moses from the bawling of a calf?"

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"You know very well that in our country's environment, having that candor and frankness of tone, or, as we say, 'having a long tongue,' never brings about a happy ending, and therefore it wasn't long until this bitter truth was also revealed to Mir Emad, for apparently his long tongue finally made the shah so angry that he one day gave tongue to the question of whether anyone could be found in that city to give Mir Emad a helping of what he deserved. This remark came to the ears of a coppersmith named Maqsud, a powerful henchman of the court, who lay in ambush one night with a group 6 The Zeydi sect is a branch of Shias who have only the first four Imams in common with the Twelvers; they then have a different fifth and last Imam, Zeyd, who died in A. D. 740.

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of toughs and hooligans. They surrounded Mir Emad when he was going alone to a party and spilled his blood with blows of knife and dagger. His pure corpse remained there on the ground in blood and dirt until morning when his students and disciples were informed and picked up the corpse of the wronged sayyid and entrusted it first to the earth of the graveyard of Marzaghan, located near the Towqchi Bazaar we visited this morning, and later took it from there and buried it here in the place known as 'Darkness' in this very mosque."

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"Is the year of his murder known?" I asked. "If my memory's not mistaken," he said, "I believe it was in A.D. 1615." "In our country," I said, "it's clear that the destiny of prodigies and possessors of talent and accomplishment is martyrdom. I thank God that I'm not in that category of individuals and I hope to go to my grave all of a piece." " 'If you aren't pleased, alter fate!' " he said, quoting Hafez. "But what's of interest here is that they say that when news of the killing of Mir Emad reached Shah Abbas, he ordered it proclaimed in the city's streets and bazaars that Mir Emad's killers would be safe and exempt from punishment and that royal prizes had been assigned for them. When those individuals appeared in anticipation of his prom­ ise, Shah Abbas ordered the executioner to split each of them into four pieces and hang them on the city gates." "Truly," I said, "Shah Abbas was a great emperor and politician and I thank God that I didn't come into the world during his sultan­ ate. It was the period of Qizilbash domination, although there are always some species of Qizilbashes left in this country and at most their clothes and names change at the dictates of time." Coming out of the Takiyeh of Darkness with melancholy minds, we gradually reached the Avenue of the Four Gardens. There was more traffic than usual and it was clearly the end of the month of Sha'ban and the eve of Ramazan; people were bustling about, dash­ ing here and there in preparation for the month of fasting. It was nearly dusk when we reached the School of the Four Gar­ dens. In front of the school's door we saw a bunch of youths and adults wearing kamarchins and felt hats, lined up in a row opposite the archway and waiting for Mowlana. Most of them were thicknecked, square-shouldered young fellows from whose general ap­ pearance it was quite clear that they had to be from well-known parents and celebrated, dagger-wearing members of Isfahan's under­ world who knew their way around. As soon as their eyes fell on Mowlana, they lowered their heads respectfully, standing there open-

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collared with one end of their abas tossed over their shoulders, and their voices rose with the sound of "Hello, Ί ο ! " and "Peace 'n you!" Among them was someone who seemed older and more mature and I soon realized that he was a famous boss in the city and the only person in the group who wore a bulgy, oval lambskin hat. He took two or three steps forward to kiss Mowlana's hand but Mowlana drew it back and cried out, "How nice! It's our Morshed Yadollah!" and throwing his arms around his neck, began kissing him on the head and face like a brother and said, "It's been ages since we've had a visit, brother! You couldn't face my living on and thought I'd surely died? Let's see now, did the sun come up in some other direction today that after a hundred years you happened to remember this poor wretch? God is the witness that He seems to have given the whole world to me! How are you? How are things going for you? What have you been doing with your life?" With that humility and humbleness mixed with love and respect which is among the distinguished qualities of this beloved class of our country's men, Morshed Yadollah answered with the grave and even voice which is the trademark of the community of /nil's and racketeers who know their way around and which comes from half­ way down the throat, "May God not increase or diminish your shadow over your old servant, sir! As God is the witness, I am and always have been the well-wisher . . . " Interrupting his speech, Mowlana said, "My dear Morshed, lay off on those compliments and tell me now how everything really is with you. The morshed bowed his head as a mark of respect and said, "By the Nourisher's favor, I still have some breath left. If the world doesn't accommodate itself to us, we accommodate ourselves to it. As to my health, you know well that so long as a man eats lawful bread and drinks pure water with his wife and children in the evening, and after resting from the day's work and trade, also lifts the 120-pound Indian clubs in the zurkhaneh pit, he escapes from disease and depression." Then pointing one hand at his comrades all politely lined up behind him, he said, "You surely know these gentlemen and there's no need to name them. Except for two or three of the younger ones, the rest are all from among your long-ago novices and trained at your hands."

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Exclaiming, "How nice!" Mowlana went nearer to them and said, " O f course I know them! Peace upon you, Your Honor, Athlete Sha'ban! What a wonderful build and fine arms you've developed. My, so this is our Athlete Heydar! Keep off the evil eye, God willing, he's become a second copy of Hoseyn the Kurd! My good man, what

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a mustache you've gotten! How nice, this is Athlete Khodadad too! What a blessed day it really is! Come on up, you big bruiser, and let's give each other a kiss. God forbid, we're not strangers after all!" The athletes all began praying in unison for Mowlana's long life and honor and each in turn introduced his own novices to Mowlana. Mowlana was determined to have the gentlemen come to his cell for tea and hookahs, but Morshed Yadollah apologized and said, "It's very late and if it's permitted, we'll state our proposition right here." It turned out that tomorrow on the first day of Ramazan, it would be exactly thirty-five years since Mowlana had taken up exercises in Morshed Yadollah's zurkhaneh, considered to be one of the city's respected zurkhdneh's, and now they wanted to commemorate that day by organizing a festival and having a flower-strewing at the zurkhdneh tomorrow night and this group had gotten together to invite Mowlana. Mowlana tried very hard to dissuade them from that notion. He said, "Hey, you guys, that stuffs over for me now. I'm all hunched over and no lame donkey's worth such a place in front of the fire." But the gentlemen kept saying, "Heavens, no! Certainly not!" and didn't let up until finally Mowlana made them a firm and explicit promise that tomorrow night after breaking the day's fast, he would "deign to come and participate for the honor and glory of the com­ munity of athletes and gymnasts of the city." Just as soon as arrangements had been agreed upon, the gentlemen tamped down their pipes, thrust out their elbows, and went off about their business in God's peace, taking the morshed in their midst. Mowlana and I returned to the school and since we were both tired, we said good-night after having a small supper and each tucked him­ self into his own cell, having agreed that the school servant would put a pot of apricot and meat soup of respectable antecedents on the fire for the pre-fast meal and would wake us an hour before the morning cannon. I slept very badly that night and had anxious dreams until day­ break. I saw myself in the midst of endless whirlpools with dark and gloomy waters whirling around at dizzying speed, tossing and turn­ ing, circling and making circles within circles and ringing around me like hundreds and thousands of entwined snakes and vipers and, like boiling blood going down an enormous, bottomless funnel, they took me down in their dreadful mouths, tossing and turning, and again with hundreds of terrible noises shooting me up toward the sky like a clod of earth leaping out from the mouth of a fountain and again falling to twist and turn and circle anew . . .

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Roaming and Getting Acquainted

At the wine-shop's door are the dissolute rends, Who take and give the imperial crown, Bricks under their heads and feet on the Pleiades' heights, Behold the hands of power and the dignitaries' ranks! [Hafez]

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CHAPTER 3 . . . , . /- ^-.i ·

ι

The World of Chivalry

The next evening after a supper to break the day's fast, we went dir e c d y t o t h e zurkhdneh

w i t h m e

as

a parasite on Mowlana. In the gymnasts' terminology, the zur­ khaneh is a place for the clean and pure and, as you know, evildoers and men of ill-repute do not have the right to strip down in it. This zurkhdneh was located in the Imam's Door quarter, though the Isfahanis say Imum for Imam, in the vicinity of Chumlown. They had put up an archway and had watered and swept and thrown down carpets for a fair distance in front of the zurkhdneh door. A bunch of youths and novices and young toughs stood on both sides of the lane, sprinkling rose water along with greetings and compliments. Above the zurkhdneh archway, an excellent, small carpet had been nailed up and in the middle of it had been hung a large piece of calligraphy in an inlaid frame with the following couplet of Hafez written in distin­ guished, medium-sized nasta'liq: and Manliness

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Wash and scrub, and then walk proudly to the tavern, So that this ruined cloister is not stained by you. As soon as we had passed through that familiar low, narrow door, especially made that way so that the athletes are obliged to enter with heads down and neck and body bent, no matter how strong and powerful and respected they may be, and just as Mowlana's foot stepped into the courtyard filled with the zurkhdneh crowd, the sound of greetings rose on every side. The respect they showed Mowlana was the respect they show to emperors. Cocking his hat and settling on his seat draped with animal hide, like a sultan leaning on the throne of majesty with open brow and head held high, Morshed Yadollah rang a bell hung above his head to honor the athletes. Say­ ing "Purity of Athletes!" he then began beating his fingertips on the drum under his arm and sprinkling wild rue and frankincense on the fire filling a brazier next to him, while in his manly and engaging voice he began singing verses such as: If I'd had news of your coming, I'd have planted your path with fresh hyacinths.

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or: When you enter with your grace and beauty through any door, Those who criticize without cause can't tell the orange from their hand. 1

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The recognized athletes and the respected veterans and the novice athletes in leather knee breeches embroidered with figures of roses and nightingales and other designs and decorations in silk thread of various colors and a number of neophytes wearing Yazdi lungis surrounded Mowlana with total respect on all four sides like a gemstone in a ring, and with a joy not the slightest bit feigned, they began compliments and welcomes in those pleasant and agreeable voices with accents and tones that are the earmarks of this class and community, saying, "Welcome! It's a pleasure to have you! We're so glad you've come! You're the honored crown adorning our heads, our chief and leader." At the same time, there rose again the voice of Morshed Yadollah whose hand was moving on the drum as if bitten by a viper, "There is love for the athlete's beauty! There is love for Zu'1-faqar's possessor, the impetuous Heydar! There is love for the killer of heathen! May the jealous and envious eye be blind! A curse on the impure and polluted and nonpraying!" Those present joined chorus in response to each phrase, "May there be more and not less!" Throughout that whole period, they completed the greetings and blessings in nonstop succession in the name of Arab and non-Arab sayyids, for the glory of the sons of Adam and Mohammad, Moon of Mecca and the Holy Place, and in memory of AIi, Eyebrow of the Moon of the Bani Hashem and the Full Moon of our Eleven Imams. My eyes became accustomed by stages to the varying light and darkness of the surroundings. The zurkhdneh courtyard had been illuminated from one end to the other by a vast number of hanging lamps and tall standing lamps, crystal candlesticks and tulip-shaped candleholders, hurricane lamps and chandeliers, and two- and threebranched candelabra. Door and wall were decorated with expensive rugs and excellent Kashmiri and Khalil Khan woven silks in crimson and lemon yellow and with exquisite handwoven brocades and vatdyed qalamkdr curtains and on every side were hung a multitude of mirrors large and small. A Qoran with velvet cover on a bookrack 1 The couplet refers to the Islamic story of Potiphar's wife, who invites some eminent ladies critical of her love for Joseph to a banquet. Joseph enters as they are eating oranges; the ladies are so astonished by his beauty that they cut their fingers with the knives they are using to peel the oranges.

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had been put in the center of each of the four zurkhaneh galleries and real and paper flowers had been arranged around them. In addition to some large and small pieces of calligraphy in Arabic by different hands, " O AIi, come to me!" " N o youth except AIi; no sword except Zu'1-faqar!" which had been nailed up on all sides, a large piece with the signature of Mir Emad had been hung with special splendor amidst silks and satins at the top of the balcony opposite the morshed's seat, and on it these two couplets could be read: At the wine-shop's door are the dissolute rends, Who take and give the imperial crown, Bricks under their heads and feet on the Pleiades' heights, Behold the hands of power and the dignitaries' ranks! In addition, space had also been made between mirrors and calli­ graphic pieces for a range of framed portraits of His Highness the Commander, AIi, and their Highnesses, Abbas and AIi Akbar, Hoseyn's brother and son, mounted and on foot, with a number of swords and shields and maces and breastplates and steel knee-cover­ ings. On spaces of the zurkhaneh walls that were still empty hung curtains on which had been drawn the seven exploits of Rostam and pictures of heroes of the age of Shah Abbas and other heroic periods, such as Hoseyn the Kurd and Qeymas Khan the Ethiopian, all with mustaches out to their ear lobes, eyebrows a curl of rope, and shiny black eyes, in a style which can be called the Bathhouse Door style, as it is peculiar to the doors of our bathhouses, ceilings of market crossings, and enclosing walls of public fountains and shrine court­ yards, and the sight of which can melt the courage of a timid, feeble man like me. Cages of canaries, nightingales, and finches had been put in the four corners and the chirping songs of the birds added to the murmur of the assembly.

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Every true born and bred Iranian knows that the zurkhaneh court­ yard consists of a rectangular or cruciform covered space somewhat like a bathhouse dressing room. In the middle is an octagonal (some­ times rectangular) pit dug to a depth of about a yard or a yard and a half, with soft mud and earth on the bottom and a layer of brush­ wood beneath for elasticity and then carpets on top. On the sides above are some false arches and platforms in which the athletes un­ dress before coming down to enter the pit. As soon as Mowlana was settled on a three-legged stool brought forward personally by His Honor, Morshed Yadollah, who then re­ turned to his place and sat on the zurkhaneh platform decorated with peacock feathers, the sound of a pleasing song arose and a tall, pleas-

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ant-faced youth with an engaging voice came forward and settled opposite Mowlana and facing the morshed and began singing, Take up the drum of the congregation of the friends of loyalty; Take up the nightingale of the garden of the rootless heart! Yes, your plaint is the polish of the mirror of the soul; Yes, your drum is the crown on the head of the afflicted. Seize the drum of the quarrelsome with your fingertips! Start the music and seize the path of dance! 2 Smiling, Morshed Yadollah lowered his head and again rang the bell and after thrice requesting and delivering those extended bene­ dictions which you know, gravely and solemnly he tucked one foot under his thigh and pulled the drum under his arm. While the athletes and gymnasts one by one jumped quickly and nimbly down from above the pit, he sounded the drum and began singing with all mod­ ulations,

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Despite the heavens, our house of exercise would be A region purer than the angel's eye. The exercise of poverty is in our heads day and night, The earth of wrestling is all our pillow, all our bed. O Lord Divine, we swear that we are dogs of Thine! We are dogs of Thy alley and lovers of Thy face. At the time of exercise, we're plighted to Thy countenance. With weights on our chest, we're in love with the sight of Thee. 3 Don't give the pain of repentance's fervor to insensitive dastards! Don't humiliate true men! Don't respect the unmanly! In the meantime, guests were still coming in one after another or in groups. AU were recognized athletes and respected lutis and rack­ eteers of substance and therefore the sound of the morshed's bell would rise at times out of respect for the newcomers and other new and fresh poems sung in a warm and engaging voice to various tunes could be heard, 2 The "music" [rak) is a particular melody and the "dance" (reng) is a musical form usually considered as a dance form; see Zonis 1973, pp. 83 and 146-47. The " d r u m " of this poem and of Morshed Yadollah in this chapter is a domhak, a single-headed drum held across the lap and played with fingers and palm; for a photograph of one held by a zurkhaneh drummer, see Zonis 1973, p. 11. 3 The "weights" of this verse and this chapter are not western dumbbells but rather parallel pieces of board put together to form a large, flat, shieldlike object, about 1½ yards long, with flat upper edge and rounded lower edge; in the middle is a hole with a handle for lifting it and doing the exercises.

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For a while I pursued lessons and debates, I saw it was a long road for a lame leg. For a while I sat with the qalandars, I saw it was a story of hemp-juice and bhang. For a while I went to the wine-shops, I saw a fool at the foot of the vat. For a while I went to the gambling houses, I saw a fight over matching of aces. My wise pir whispered in my ear, "AU that is foolish nonsense. Rise up and go to the zurkhdneh, Where accounting is with weights and Indian clubs." The iron bow and bell and dance of the tambur, Call for exercise sticks and high stepping. This one is like a lion in valor, And that one like a shark in push-ups. 4

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The time for the business of exercise gradually arrived. Morshed Yadollah strongly urged Mowlana to strip down too but Mowlana didn't give in and rejected the suggestion, protesting, "Your Honor, Morshed, my business with exercise is already past and I must now think of teaching. And besides, there's an obligation to honor the pit and my setting foot in the pit of AIi, King of Men, with this wrecked and worn-out body would be contrary to good manners and an insult to the pit. If permitted, I'll learn a lesson right in this corner by watching the gentlemen's work." "Good heavens, not at all!" was voiced aloud from every side and the morshed said, "You must want to shame us, for I swear by Puryaye WaIi, the athlete of all athletes, that not from the day that I was seated upon this platform have my eyes ever seen such a fine body and build as yours, sir. It is exactly like steel that may rust but won't bend and even supposing it has, as you say, sustained some break, still broken, 'it would be worth a hundred thousand whole.' What have we upstarts come to, talking in front of you, sir, with your trunk and arms and shoulders and sides and neck and back?" 4 The "iron bow" [kabadeh) has a metal stave; its string is a metal chain on which are fastened circular metal discs, making it a rather noisy object. The tambur is usually a stringed instrument, but here perhaps means a drum or tambourine. The "push­ ups" (shenu) are somewhat different than American push-ups; they are usually done holding an exercise stick. There are several variant forms, including exercises done standing, but none done with legs together and in a plane with the torso. Because shenu ("push-up") and the variant form, shena, can also mean "swimming," there is an opportunity for wordplay which is used in the final couplet of this poem and later in the third couplet of the last poem for the bow exercises.

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The massagers brought the knee breeches and lungis. With all gravity and dignity possible, the athletes stripped down and wrapped their clothes in the lungis, put them at the bottom of the gallery wall, kissed the breeches and put them on, and then began lifting the weights there above the pit to warm up their bodies. It was really quite a show and the very sight would grant a man power and strength of arm.

". . . the athletes . . . began lifting the weights there above the pit. . . . "

ίΊ6

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Roaming and Getting Acquainted

The athletes began lifting weights and the morshed on his platform began counting, "The first thing existing and the choicest of beings! God is not two! Causer of all Causes! Curer for the Wretched! Five People of the Cloak! Six corners of the grave of Hoseyn! . . ." 5 Just as soon as he reached 117, his voice got louder and he called out, "Blessings 117,000 times on the beauty of AIi!" so loudly that it set the zurkhdneh trembling. Leaping into the pit, they first kissed the earth of the pit with their fingertips and then bowed their heads in respect and stood in place opposite Mowlam. I saw physiques there that day unlike any I had ever in my lifetime seen. All stood in a circle around the pit with the thick, heavily knot­ ted arms, broad, shieldlike chests, exercised bellies, swelling flanks, bulging oval muscles, narrow waists, taut thighs, solid frames, and hollow cheeks without flesh which are the signs of a gymnast. It was truly a sight to exhilarate any man looking at it! I, the wretched, shaking, quaking haji's boy ignorant of the world, who'd passed his life in large and small caravanserais and market halls and dusty, dirty warehouses with none but bent and crooked, circumspect and greedy, timid and lying men whose lives were bound up with their property and who dealt only with abacuses and prayer beads and account books and contracts and invoices and whose days and nights were passed in fear and trembling, now lost himself completely in these surround­ ings where there was belief in the status of manhood and manliness and manners and respect and forbearance and magnanimity and kind­ ness and trust in strength of arms, and truly, I sometimes thought I was asleep and dreaming. The athletes performed miracles in courtesies and respectfulness toward each other and especially toward sayyids and older and more senior colleagues. No one was ready to accept the places of distinc­ tion earmarked for the captain and the veterans and sayyids and rec­ ognized athletes, and they kept drawing back in front of others, pro­ 6 testing and suggesting the places for other colleagues. If Mowlana and Morshed Yadollah hadn't stepped in and arbitrated the matter, I suspect this difficulty would have remained insoluble, but after get­ ting Mowlana's permission, Morshed Yadollah addressed an athlete 5 The terms in the counting series usually include or have some phonetic resem­ blance to numerals. Thus, "Causer" (sabab-saz) begins with an s and a short vowel as does "three" (seh); "Curer" (chdreh-saz) has an initial syllable homonymous with a common pronunciation of "four" (char). 6 The "captain" (miyandar) stands in the middle (miydri) of the athletes and leads the exercises, much like the captain in front of a football team. In wrestling, however, he acts more as a referee.

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who seemed older and heftier than the others and who was clearly a veteran and well-known athlete, "Your Honor, Athlete Fathollah, since Mowlana is disinclined to dress down and honor us, I beg you not to let us down and to please accept the duties of captain this one night." The other athletes were all in accord with the morshed and each with some phrase urged Athlete Fathollah to be captain and somehow or other, with a thousand troubles and disputes and yeas and nays, "with Mowlana's permission" Athlete Fathollah at last as­ sumed responsibility for the difficult post of captain. Right then began the discussions and courtesies about second place, the place of the chief athlete, who must be subordinate to the captain and stand facing the morshed, and then followed discussions about the third place and the fourth place, and so forth, and finally, after much importuning and insistence, many oaths and Qoran verses, thousands of " M y life for yours" and "I'd die for you," each person was settled in a place appropriate to his rank and fame and seniority. Morshed Yadollah oiled and softened the drum with goat tallow melted on the brazier fire and his quick, nimble, and well-practiced fingers fell to work, first with a flick of the fingertips and little by little with the whole palm and hand as he began singing martial and epic verses which he continued until the athletes were ready for their exercises in the pit. As soon as he saw they were ready, he sounded the plat­ form bell and cried out in a loud voice, "In the name of Allah and by Allah and on the Sunna of Mohammad, Messenger of Allah," and then again acquainting his hands with a particular beat, he cried out, "Love belongs to the beauty of the world's men."

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The athletes each recited whispered prayers and incantations, blew on their palms, rubbed their hands on their heads and faces for good luck, puffed up their chests more than before, and thrust out their elbows, and then fixing their eyes in front of their feet in the zurkhdneh pit, they stood motionless in place, mute and silent, waiting for the captain's instructions. The captain turned toward Mowlana and said, "Permission?" Mowlana replied with absolute ceremony, "May God grant the op­ portunity!" The athletes pulled the exercise sticks for the push-ups out from under the morshed's bench and put them in front of them­ selves on the floor of the pit. After the captain offered his stick suc­ cessively to each one of those ready in the pit and all refused again, saying, "At your disposal!" " N o , please!" "What's that you're say­ ing?" "So do you want to embarrass us?" the captain faced Mowlana a second time and repeated, "Permission?" and again Mowlana an­ swered with his usual courtesy and deliberateness, "May God grant

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"Then the athletes fell with their chests toward the ground, stiffened their arms . . . and began push-ups. . . . " victory and triumph!" Then the athletes fell with their chests toward the ground, stiffened their arms over the sticks and spread their legs wide behind, and began push-ups to the sound of the morshed's beat. The voice of the captain rose up, " O AIi!" The athletes answered in unison while doing the push-ups, " O True God!" The captain said, " O Heydar!" They answered, " O Valiant!" Beating the drum in harmony with the athletes' movements, the morshed began, "Our 'In the name of Allah' begins the Qoran! Merciful and Compassionate! Permission is from God! God is one!" The others said in unison, " O AIi!" After that, the captain began counting as he had done earlier and now the athletes repeated " O AIi!" after each phrase of his: "God is not two!" " O AIi!" "Lord of Beings!" " O AIi!" "Curer of the Wretched!" " O AIi!" "Five fingers of God's hand!" " O AIi!" "Six corners of the grave of Hoseyn!" " O AIi!" "The seventh Imam!" " O AIi!" "The eighth qebUh]" " O AIi!" "The Prophet Noah!" " O AIi!" "Giver without O b ligation!" " O AIi!" "Eleven Pure Jewels!" " O AIi!" "Our Twelve

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Imans!" " O AIi!" "Curses on the black heart!" " O AIi!" "Fourteen Pure Innocents!" " O AIi!" "Fifteen, half the Qoran!" . . . up to fifty.7 When the morshed reached fifty, he started counting back to one while the captain changed the manner and style of push-ups every so often, giving instructions by doing rather than speaking, and the others sought to imitate and copy him, sometimes with push-ups to one side and then the other, sometimes with push-ups of tiny chest shakings or circling the field, and single push-ups and push-ups in triple time and various other sorts of push-ups. As soon as the low push-ups began, the morshed began praising AIi ebn Abu Taleb, whom they consider the true master of the pit and founder of the order of athletics and chivalry and the patron of all gymnasts. His cry circled beneath the zurkhdneh roof, "Ah, the Sayyid! AIi, the Leader! AIi, Son-in-law of the Prophet! AIi, the Lion! AIi, the Valiant! AIi, Uprooter of the Gate of Kheybar! AIi, Foe of the Malevolent! AIi, Master of the Dervishes! AIi, the Good! AIi, the Pure! AIi, he cut off the head of Antar!" The athletes replied right while they were doing push-ups, stretched out with their chests on the ground, " O AIi! AIi, Lion of God! AIi, King of Saints! AIi, King of Men! AIi, Shining Moon! Conquering Lion of God! Master of the Virtuous! Imam in Truth! Son-in-law of the Most Noble Messenger! Consort of the Virtuous Virgin! Lion of Repeated Attacks! Killer of Heathen!" Such a large number of spectators had by now entered that there wasn't room to poke a needle in the zurkhdneh courtyard. I found myself behind Mowlana and next to a young tradesman named Aqa Lotfollah with whom I had earlier gotten acquainted in the bazaar and the Qeysariyeh and who clearly had a wonderful love for the exercises. When the business of push-ups reached an end and the sticks were collected, Aqa Lotfollah, who had brought his binoculars and borrowed another pair, was watching the show intently, all eyes, and he whispered in my ear, "The captain brought the push-ups to an end out of consideration for those who had run out of strength and energy, for although there are some individuals among those whom you see in the pit who can do four or five hundred push-ups as easily 7

In this counting series, there are again phonetic resemblances to numerals in some cases. The eleven Pure Jewels are the eleven Shia Imams following AIi. For the unlucky number, thirteen, a curse is substituted. The fourteen Pure Innocents are the Twelve Imams plus Mohammad and his daughter, Fatemeh. The Qoran is sometimes divided into thirty sections, and can then be completely read, one section per day, in a month; fifteen is thus "half the Qoran."

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as they drink water, most of the athletes have to rid their bodies of the overfatigue and so now they'll engage in the light exercises." 8 The circling began. After taking a series of several steady puffs on the jujube-handled pipe, the morshed drew a new breath and put his hand on the drum to begin a new beat in harmony with the circling and began singing in the scale of Homayun: 9 All those who chose the path of love, All rested in the lane of martyrdom. Victory comes through love in the arena of both existences, Despite its troops being martyrs all.

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The athletes started to spin one after another like spinning moun­ tains in the middle of the pit. Some were spinning like a top that makes a man's eyes blur. One athlete, named Yadollah Zorab and also known as Lasso-thrower, especially drew compliments in his spinning. The soles of his circling feet pounded on the ground so that they made a sound like a European firecracker and he whirled so nimbly and quickly in the middle of the pit that you couldn't tell the front of him from the back. Then he stood up straight as a candle in the center of the pit and did several front and back flips one after another in such a way that not one hair on his head was ruffled. Then putting both arms perpendicular to the ground, he stiffened his legs in the air and walked and ran and jumped, raising himself as much as half a meter above the ground, and coming down again on both hands so that from every side rose sounds of approval and congrat­ ulations, "What a sweetheart! A beautiful j o b ! " Last of all, the captain himself whirled, and with his heavy body and ponderous bulk did front and back flips that were unbelievable. Aqa Lotfollah again whispered in my ear, "Did you notice that the sayyids were given priority over all and were you aware that it was only the captain who had the right to touch his foot to the edge of the pit's wall when spinning and jumping?" "Brother dear," I said, "it's the first time I've set foot in the zurkhdneh. How would you expect me to notice such subtleties?" "Then you surely weren't aware," he said, "that in all the period of spinning, depending on the person's age, the morshed said, Ό Moon of the Bani-Hashem!' if the athlete was young and inexperienced but invoked Mohammad's friend, Ό Salman the Persian!' if the athlete was older." "Shame on m e , " I said, 8 The "light exercises" (narmesh) are a formal part of the zurkhaneh exercises and are done for cooling down after the more strenuous "push-ups." 9 The "scale" (or "mode," dastgah) includes a set of melodies; for that of Homayun, see Zonis 1973, pp. 84-86.

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"for I didn't notice at all and I beg you to open my eyes and ears as much as you can here. I'll really be grateful as all creation for it." "I obey," he said. "Next you have to understand that in contrast to the other exercises, the spinning began with the juniors and finished with the seniors and every time an athlete was busy circling, the morshed tried to mention his name on some pretext. Here he also made a distinction and if someone was a beginner out of nowhere, the morshed said, Ά curse on his denier!' and for someone with comparative prec­ edence, he said, Ά blessing on his beauty!' For example, if the ath­ lete's name was Hasan and he was a beginner, the morshed said, 'Hasan the chosen, a curse on his denier!' and if the athlete had seniority, he said, 'Hasan the chosen, a blessing on his beauty!' " Then came the time for the Indian clubs. Each athlete had special clubs in proportion to his strength and matched to his ability. The clubs of the captain were so big that without exaggeration they came up almost to his navel. I softly asked my friend, " D o you know how much those clubs weigh?" "It must be ninety to a hundred pounds or more," he answered. The morshed changed the beat and began a short poem in a meter having the rhythm of the athletes' Indian-club exercise: When you gave someone your heart, You set two worlds afire. At first, the athletes all put their clubs on their shoulders and began rubbing their backs and shoulders, that is, they very slowly circled the clubs on their shoulders and the backs of their necks and their arms and backs and rolled them over and spread them apart and brought them together again. As the athletes increased their speed and began the real Indian club exercises, the morshed also quickened his beat and with his jaw warmed up and a voice hoarser than usual, he recited:

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Well done, Sultan of Land and Sea, AIi ebn Abu Taleb! Throne of the realm and leader in religion, AIi ebn Abu Taleb! The athletes had gradually warmed up and each in turn came to the middle of the pit and showed off his strength. Although accord­ ing to rule and custom, the captain had the right of precedence, the courtesies still began again and only after the other athletes all kissed the arms and shoulders of Athlete Fathollah and themselves withdrew did he get busy at work. The morshed also requested blessings and making the beat louder, he began singing resounding verses starting with these which evoked heroes of the Shdh-nameh:

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In grace and beauty, the bow of a son of Dastan, You are a world-taker seeking worlds, a world-keeper for a world. With a sharp blade like Barzu fighting with the Turanians, You are descended from Sam or indeed are a son of Nariman, Who catches and imprisons me with strands of curling locks.

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Athlete Fathollah performed unbelievable feats with the clubs. When he had whirled them one after another with astonishing speed, passed them between his legs with all adroitness, thrown them to the arches from behind, and wheeled to catch them right in the air, Mowlana's voice rose from the row up above where he sat; " Ό my darling, what a sweet job!' Ό hero with an athlete's soul!' " After the captain, the other athletes came one by one to the middle of the pit and each in turn did the club exercises. As we've said, each athlete had his own special clubs, and from his bag of skills and experience and expertise, each brought forth fresh and novel master­ pieces which earned the attention and admiration of the spectators. Meanwhile, I became aware that every time a club accidentally fell to the ground from an athlete's hand, the morshed's cry rose imme­ diately, " O h , a curse on the impure!" and this meant that some per­ son who had impurely set foot in the zurkhdneh was at fault. Although his eyes seemed firmly cemented to the zurkhdneh pit, Aqa Lotfollah put his head near my ear again and introduced each athlete by name and address and position and title. Athlete Fathollah, who was known as Standard-bearer, had evidently become director of the city's gymnasts after Mowlana withdrew from the exercises because of his age. Being the eldest of Isfahan's athletes, Athlete Fath­ ollah therefore also had more status and respect than the others. "If you remember," said Aqa Lotfollah, "some years ago in Isfahan, on one occasion the price of bread went up before springtime and the poor and needy cried out in protest. One day when Zell-os-soltan with his servants and retinue and orderlies and outrunners crossed King's Square with pomp and ceremony to the sound of 'Attention! Go ahead! Get back! Beat it! Be off!' suddenly this very Athlete Fath­ ollah whom you see here sprang up in front of Zell-os-soltan, took the horse's bridle, and said, 'Prince, the city's bread has become ex­ pensive for this season of the year without any cause or reason. The food and sustenance of the tradesmen and helpless people has been shut off and all are miserable and curse you. It's rumored that some godless and unrighteous warehouse-keepers have hoarded the wheat and it's even been heard that they nailed a volume of the glorious

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Word of God with a spike to the ground beneath the river so that the Lord would become angry and dry up the river's water which would make the price of the grain go up. You are both the son of a king and the brother of a king and at present the life and property and honor and reputation of this city's people have been entrusted to your competent hands. For the sake of God and the Prophet, you must not consent to having greedy merchants and landlords worse than the villains Shemr and Harmaleh, bottle the blood of these de­ fenceless people or I vow by the world and men that on the seventythousand-year Day of Resurrection beside the Serat Bridge on the Plain of Judgment, I, this very man whom you see with thin qaba and dirty collar, will stand before the people of this city and inter­ rogate you and call you to answer for your actions in the Court of Divine Justice in front of the Scales of Account.' 1 0 As proof of the pudding, the city's bakers lit their lamps even before the sun had set and bread became cheaper from that day on." After Athlete Fathollah came the turn of HaJj Ma'sum Juzani, a teapot-mender, who was the regular captain of the zurkhdneh of the Imam's Door quarter but who had turned his place over to Athlete Fathollah today out of respect. It was clear from his bulk and build and his arms that Hajj Ma'sum was a totally genuine powerhouse. The drum of his chest stuck out so far in front that it's no exaggeration to say an ordinary man could dangle down from it. So much coarse, rough, black and yellow hair had grown on his back and chest and arms and thighs that you'd say pieces of goat hide had been sewn to his body. He also truly distin­ guished himself in the club exercises and it could even be said that he surpassed Athlete Fathollah. Aqa Lotfollah whispered to me about him, "Hajj Ma'sum so far has twice had the honor of visiting Mecca and the sacred Shia shrines in Iraq. Although he is very pious and saintly, he still can't bear to look at mullahs and dkhonds and other turban-heads and he once threw such a scare into them that whenever their eyes fall on him, they flee a block or two away. Several years ago when the preacher, Aqa Sayyed Jamal, went to the pulpit of the New Mosque, whose prayer leader was, as you know, the brother of the fanatical preacher, Aqa Najafi, a group of dkhonds gathered at the instigation of some of the ulama hostile toward the sayyid, since he was a thorn in their flesh, 10 Harmaleh was an officer in the Ummayad army who was especially cruel to Hoseyn (Jz-c); for Shemr, see Glossary. The Serat Bridge is a narrow bridge over which the righteous can safely pass to Paradise and off which sinners will fall into Hell.

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and planned to drag him down from the pulpit and make him the object of disdain and contempt. News of this gathering came to the ears of HaJj Ma'sum, who was a special disciple of the sayyid and also happened to be his next-door neighbor in the Behind the Ram­ part quarter. Right away Hajj Ma'sum gathered a group of the city ruffians who were his supporters and equipped with swords and dag­ gers, and they went secretively to sit scattered among the crowd at the foot of the pulpit in the New Mosque's shabestdn. The akhonds, on the other hand, arrived unaware in little groups from everywhere and also settled here and there all around the meeting. When the sayyid's eyes fell on the gathering from up in the pulpit and saw the turban cloths making the shabestdn courtyard look like a field of black poppy pods, he felt in his bones that there was more going on than met the eye. Figuring that caution was required, he curbed his tongue as much as possible, but even so, the troublemaking akhonds, who had come intentionally to riot and whose ears were sharpened in search of an excuse, suddenly entered some objection to the state­ ments of the poor sayyid and began shrieking and shouting and clam­ oring chaotically and filling the air with cries of'Cursed!' and 'Evil!' and 'Babi!' Trampling people as they launched their attack like hun­ gry wolves on a mute lamb, they brought themselves to the foot of the pulpit. They had nearly pulled the sayyid down ignominiously from the pulpit when Hajj Ma'sum and his pals, with swords and daggers in hand, fell on them and in a twinkling had pulled off their turbans and tied them around their own waists, and with blows of bludgeons and backs of broadswords, they threw them, bareheaded and without their clogs or slippers,-out the mosque door, clearing the mosque's holy space of the defiling existence of those foul crea­ tures and noxious vermin. After the sermon, Hajj Ma'sum and his gang surrounded the sayyid's donkey and delivered him to his house with blessings and benedictions, and for many days following, they kept watch all around his house lest harm or injury come to him or his kinsmen." 1 1 After Hajj Ma'sum, the outrider Nayeb-mehrab stepped forward and became the shining light of the gathering. He was truly a beloved athlete without peer or equal. His manly mustaches came out to his ear lobes, his eyebrows came down to the tops of his eyes, and he had an inexpressible awesomeness and authority. He circled the clubs all around his head and chest so slowly and deliberately that you'd say he was dealing with jugs of gold. He threw a club that undoubt11

This is a true story about the author's father (Jz-c).

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edly was no less than a hundred and thirty pounds up to the ceiling with one movement of his wrist, and as it came down, without turn­ ing a hair he stole up and pushed his thick neck forward in such a way that the club came down on the nape of his neck just where he stood. "Who's this next desert ghoul without horns or tail," I asked Aqa Lotfollah, "and where's he sprung up from?" "Nayeb-mehrab is an athlete known as Horse-killer and is a native of the village of Lonban not far from here," he said. "He was formerly the outrider of Roknol-molk Shirazi, the deputy governor, but it's said that because of his huge weight even the strongest of horses would break down after being under his thighs for a while. It's well-known that an old rib­ bon-seller who hadn't gotten up one day to bow when the chamber­ lain passed through the bazaar was dragged away to Government House by lackeys on the pretext that his weights were short and his feet were tied to the pole to be bastinadoed. Nayeb-mehrab happened to be present there, and being aware of the truth of the matter, he threw himself dauntlessly in front of the pole to intercede. As soon as he saw that the chamberlain wouldn't listen, his hand went spon­ taneously to his sword hilt and he swore that no one who laid a hand on the old ribbon-seller would escape injury from his sword. Then with his own hands he untied the poor old man's feet from the pole and broke it across his knee, smashing it to bits before the eyes of the chamberlain and staff of Government House. After that, he vowed in that gathering on the honor and reputation of his mother and sisters that if ever from that moment on he heard that this staff of lackeys had without cause molested God's creatures and sinless Mus­ lims of the city, he would spare none of them. He then and there resigned his employment in that service and has for some time now had a blacksmith shop and a business that's apparently doing well and, praise God, he himself is in fine fettle. N o one in the whole bazaar has as much authority and status and respect as he, and the bureaucrats and clerks and others at Government House, young and old, take him into account more than they do anyone else, fearing his sword and dagger more than some sudden death or cannonballs and gunfire of the royal troops." When the comments of Aqa Lotfollah had reached this point, Nayebmehrab withdrew to sounds of applause and "Hey, sweetheart! A beautiful job!" and turned his place over to the tall and slender athlete mentioned earlier named Yadollah Zorab, the type of athlete who's skinny as a rail. He had no surplus flesh or muscle but what he did have, "and that itself would be the equal of at least three possessed

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by an ordinary man," was extremely hard and firm and exercised and, so to speak, possessed of all that's legal. He was at an in-be11:78 tween age, having passed his youth and reached the period known as jahel, and had his full height, a long neck and broad forehead, and seemed indubitably more fair and handsome than all his colleagues. The way in which such a graceful and elegant man with a relatively thin body and build could play with such coarse and clumsy clubs and whirl them in the air with astounding speed as if they were two eggplants and catch them in the air behind his head was incredible. "Friend, what type is this next one?" I asked Aqa Lotfollah. "This one has quite a story," he said. "He's from the Lors of the Bidabad quarter. He's their leader and generally in charge of them and his name is Yadollah Zorab, and Zorab is probably a local form of Sohrab. Since it's said, and probably not without some basis, that his job and occupation is thievery, he's knowr around his enemies as Lassothrower and in front of his friends and partisans as Cherisher of the Humble. Despite all that, he is not without talent and accomplishment and his verses written in the language of the Lors and included in the miscellany of Sadeq Molla Rajab have well-deserved fame among the Lors. You may recall that when Hajj Sheykh Mohammad AIi, Aqa Najafi's brother, mistakenly drank oil of bitter almond and was poisoned, a number of processions set out to escort his corpse and some included men cutting themselves with daggers. Fearing that a brawl or riot might build up, the governor gave orders that no one was allowed to take along arms or weapons or even clubs or sticks. But Yadollah Zorab, who had a little unsettled account and an ancient enmity with the boys of King's Mosque, was determined to somehow or other profit from the occasion and take his revenge and had therefore secretly hidden a large number of sticks and clubs and swords and daggers in the coffins and catafalques that were part of the equipage of the Lors. As soon as the group from King's Mosque appeared from afar on the plain of Takhteh-pulad, the Lors took out 11:79 the hidden weapons, just as they had connived and contrived among themselves in advance, and attacked the boys of King's Mosque with 'Hit 'em now while you can!' The Lors scared the daylights out of the King's Mosque gang and whomped and walloped and thoroughly thrashed them so that they never did recover from that day." "Then with his expertise and courage and talent and temperament, in what connection did he take up thievery as an occupation?" I asked. "Folks say various things about that and tell strange and astonishing tales which are indeed worth hearing," Aqa Lotfollah replied. "For example, it's well-known that in his early youth when he'd

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gone once at midnight to the house of an eminent widow, his eyes fell on her from the corner of the roof and he saw she was busy at prayer with light from around her head gleaming to the skies and her eyes ablaze with flames of fire. He was so awed by witnessing this state of affairs that he returned directly home and went to bed fevered and trembling. His eyes had not yet become heavy with sleep when in a dream he saw Purya-ye VaIi, the pir and morshed of all gymnasts and star of all veterans and author of many of the poems which morsheds of zurkhanehs still recite, who lectured him reproachfully, 'Hey, young man, won't you be ashamed before AIi, Commander of the Faithful, Lord of the Virtuous, and the champion of all the world's champions, that with the God-given courage and bravery and with all this intelligence and understanding and awareness and ability bestowed upon you by the Lord, you eat unlawful bread obtained by means of theft?" 11:80

"Yadollah Zorab answered, weeping, 'You can't go grappling with destiny! What can be done when my fathers and grandfathers for generations were all thieves and bandits and burglars and footpads and they've eaten their bread through that and haven't taught me any other work or trade. I've now become terribly accustomed to this work and I take pleasure in staying awake on dark nights when all creatures are asleep and in prowling for long hours in the starlight behind the city's twisted, turning roofs and passing along dark and narrow, always bending roads in the still and silence of the calm and quiet night and with the help of looped and plaited ladder going like a bird straight up the walls and quickly and nimbly getting to the highest pinnacle of Isfahan's buildings and crossing like a snake, crawling along ridges as thin and sharp as the blade of a sword, and jumping down from domes and towers and ramparts and ventilators and chimneys and passing like a cold wind along unknown and never seen halls and corridors and every moment encountering a thousand kinds of risks to life and on the one hand fearing my own shadow and on the other hand being a source of dread and fear to the city's people and confronting patrols and police alone by myself and fleeing and escaping their clutches like quicksilver without a trace to be found or a clue left behind and passing among them like burning fire and by ruse and imposture in the wink of an eye stripping clean and bare as the miserable beggars' palms and the mullahs' empty pockets some magnificent and splendid hall and returning with a haversack on the shoulder like a fishworm in the mouth and flying over roofs of friend and foe and from those heights being a watching witness of people in movement and at rest and seeing and recognizing kings and beg-

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gars and the righteous and the wicked as they are in private, not as they appear on parade, and having the happiness and joy and satis­ faction of dividing the fruit of the night's rounds in some rendezvous or hangout with agreeable accomplices of similar shade when the sun has not yet risen. It's all such blissful pleasure that I haven't a clue in the world of any higher.' " "It's said that Purya-ye VaIi replied, 'Brave man, now when it's like that, if you really are a chivalrous and manly and honorable person and you don't want to hang your head in shame on the Day of Resurrection before Mortaza AIi, Possessor of Zu'1-faqar, you must give your word as a gentleman that henceforth you will practice this precept which I will give you!' After accepting his word, he gave him this precept, 'Steal from one who has extra and give to one who is needy!' and disappeared from view. It is true that Lasso-thrower didn't desist from theft and robbery the very next day, but the water of penitence had poured on his head and he made his covenant with God that never again would the tiniest crumb of bread from theft go down his throat. Starting from that hour, he became engaged in the trade of mdl-forushi, that is, dealing in horses and mules and mares, in which he was not without some expertise, and obtained his bread by this means, and, second, in the line of theft, he crossed off trades­ men and men of meager means as time went on and he also divided absolutely and completely all he stole that couldn't be traced, down to the last dinar, among the poor and impoverished of the city and apparently he often also has added something of his own to it and thus at present on all flanks and fringes of the city he has hundreds of widows and parentless orphans and unattended sick and emptyhanded aged and worthy folks with no means and large families who depend on him and eat his bread and pray for his soul." While AqS Lotfollah was relating these matters to me, I remem­ bered that once when my father was still alive, this same person had also robbed our business office and had, so to speak, vented his venom on us too. I rejoiced inwardly over this discovery of mine and in my heart pardoned Lasso-thrower and petitioned the beneficent Nourisher for the long life and honor of the Cherisher of the Lowly. Next began the stamping. Morshed Yadollah began a fresh beat and started to sing in the scale of Homayun: The head said, "I sit all my life in his lane." The lips said, " I am the bewildered nightingale of his face." The palm said, "I am the comber of his hyacinth locks."

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The heart said, "I make the city paradise with his fragrance." The poor man didn't know his friend was a traveler. While the athletes were stamping intently, AqS Lotfollah pricked up his ears and described for me all the varieties and kinds of stamps, from the first stamp through the second and third and the triple stamps and wild stamps and pounding stamps and hammer stamps and Ta­ briz stamps and stamps sideways and back. At the end, the morshed began to sing this short poem,

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My heart was taken from me again, artfully with planning. You are the lion-bodied idol, novice, and wrestler. Flame of action, look at all the height and form, Bitter and full-strength affliction, just like Shiraz wine, His forelock the hyacinth, his face the flower, and his stature the cypress, Above his head the pheasant's wing just like the felt cap. Your fascinating eyes are full of sense-robbing graces, Captivating narcissuses, thieflike night patrols. Whoever saw your chest bared during exercise Fills his own chest with fingernail scratches. My moon, you are a king in the eyes of the consumed, You are the novice of the Lion of God, the luti of Allah. n Athlete Fathollah took up one of the iron bows himself and gave the others to three athletes in the pit and all four knelt on one knee, each in one of the pit's corners. Morshed Yadollah took a fresh breath, oiled the drum anew, took a lovely puff on his pipe, and cleared his throat a little with the help of a small cough. As soon as the sound of " O AIi, O Truth, O Heydar, O Valiant of the Iron Bow Pullers," rose, he harmonized his song with the whizzing and whirring of the iron bows which set the zurkhdneh courtyard trembling, and like the brave, bold warriors reciting epics on the battlefield, he began to chant these famous couplets of the Shah-ndmeh while the captain was busy counting in the manner previously described: Rostam rubbed the bow in his grasp, He roared like the roaring leopard. He brought up a poplar shaft with arrowhead of water's sheen, On it he'd put four eagle feathers. 12 These couplets are among those included in another description of a zurkhdneh (Beyza'i 1959, pp. 384-86, 394) and are attributed to Mir Abd-ol-ali Najat. The Lion of God is AIi.

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"Athlete Fathollah took up one of the iron bows himself. . ." He rubbed the Tashkent bow in hand, He put his thumb inside deer leather. He stiffened his left arm and bent the right; A howl went up from the curve of the Tashkent arc. When the arrow kissed his finger, It extended to his spine in back. When the arrow struck the chest of Ashkabus, Then the heavens kissed his hand. Fate said, "Take!" and destiny said, "Give!" The heavens said, "Most excellent!" the angel said, "Bravo!"

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U p to that point, the athletes had been handling the b o w w i t h grave and easy movements but suddenly the captain cried out, " O U p r o o t e r of the Gates of Kheybar, come to m e ! " and increased the speed of the m o v e m e n t s . T h e three other athletes sought to imitate him and the show was indeed a sight to beggar description. M o r s h e d Yadollah raised his voice and quickened and sharpened the beat while reciting these verses: When you take b o w in hand, O envy of the angels, It seems the b o w ' s aspiring to the w o r k of heaven. When the club exercise unearths flirtation from those black eyes, It blinds the enemies' eyes with fear of its glance. See! That idol's movements are sweet in push-ups. See! T h e fine waves' splendor is the water of life. Y o u make the heart of old man sky quite mad with envy. Y o u strut in the gymnasium just like a peacock. When the captain reached fifty, he stood u p and the other athletes put aside their iron bows and also stood u p and the morshed requested the blessings. While the noisy shouts of blessing w o u n d beneath the zurkhdneh's ceiling, t w o athletes selected by the captain faced each other in the middle of the pit to wrestle and the morshed began singing "Rose of Wrestling" addressing it to the athletes, " O hero with the athlete's soul: If nerves and tendons dry up on your bones, D o n ' t set foot outside the house of destiny. D o n ' t submit t h o u g h the opponent be the hero, Zal's Rostam! D o n ' t ask favors though the friend be the generous Arab, Hatem."

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After a period of standing face to face a short distance apart, going back and forth and circling to snatch the rival's wrist, the wrestlers finally caught hold of each other and were head to head. While they played around, massaging each other's necks and shoulders, the morshed raised his voice in tributes and then began singing these couplets: M y wrestling T u r k is fond of push-ups, always. Although he's not fond of it with acquaintances, always. N o w o r d s cross his lips with acquaintances about this fondness, But if he has some story, it's of Indian clubs and push-ups, always. His tresses do athletics with discerning people. Look! What things are in the head of that one fallen, always!

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When he acts fond of wrestling, he drowns the boat of my patience In the sea of perdition with the waters of tears, always. I haven't the courage at the time of push-ups to say He inclines Venus toward the equator, always. When he circles, he spins his face from me every moment, His relationship is that of the unfaithful spheres, always. When in his love he takes the weights with the strength of youth, He considers weights and worldly learning as dust, always. The rend is a drunk in public, but in private He has the chasteness of Purya, always. Whoever's ready to sacrifice all wants nought from Him but Himself; Ready to sacrifice all, he rejects all save the Beloved, always. The wrestling athletes had fallen in the struggle and each in turn put to use some wrestling trick or technique and his opponent an­ swered with another. N o w the morshed was again in high spirits, having fun like all the other spectators, and he sang these couplets in a resounding voice: Wrestling is nice, full of twists and turns like the beloved's locks; To obliterate them, a leg kalateh on the calf is nice.

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Mirza Lotfollah kept his head close to my ear, constantly enu­ merating for me the names of the wrestling tricks and techniques. "Watch! They've begun feinting. They're head to head. N o w they're clinching. He's begun the attack. He's putting on pressure. He wants to grab his ankle. He's sidestepped. He grabbed the top of his head. He took an inner arm. He wants to grab the front of his pants. Well done! Both have grabbed the front of each other's pants! God, he's got a hold on him! Well done! How nicely he got him under! But the opponent twisted and it's useless. Splendid! I like that! See how he did a half nelson on him? That's what they call a kondeh, and that variety's called a sheep-throwing kondeh. It's very dangerous! But no, the guy's a wolf! He wasn't fooled. He gave him a hand-breaker. Hey, terrific, you're in the claws of the wolf! He wanted to scissor him. He answered with a chin lock. Great God! He's outdoing him­ self! See how he got his head under his arm but his opponent got up! He's even got him on the ground again! But he's gotten up on his hands and knees and recovered. He wants to turn him front to back but can't manage it. That's called a sagak and by some a kalateh. See how he made his opponent arch over backward to get up! He's got

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a hold on him! He keeps getting him to the ground. But no, he doesn't give him a moment off. He's having a really tough time keeping his back from going on the ground. But, no! He bridged and got up again and now the two have their heads together." 1 3 They really were outdoing themselves and you couldn't get enough of seeing all that power and self-control and speed and agility and ready response. Morshed Yadollah was in wholly high spirits and with a bell-like voice he made the zurkhdneh pillars tremble while he sang these couplets: Who brings the oppressive firmament's back to the ground? Who strikes that worn wrestler straight down to the ground? Whoever has seen his own image in humility, Like Purya, puts his lean sides on the ground.

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Since the name of Purya-ye VaIi had repeatedly reached my ear from the hour I'd entered the zurkhdneh, I asked Mirza Lotfollah, "Friend, who is this Purya who has such status and respect among the sportsmen?" "His story is well-known," he answered, "and I'm surprised you haven't heard it." "We merchants and merchants' sons deal with money," I said, "not with Purya. Don't melt my heart, I beg you, and do tell me his story in two words so that I won't be more ashamed of my ignorance than this." "Purya was the chief athlete of the lands protected by Iran," he said, "and he went to India to wrestle with its famous athletes trained by its king. As he had come at night and unrecognized, in his usual manner of passing the night before a wrestling match in prayer and worship, seeking help from the Lord, he went to the city's mosque. As soon as he was engaged in supplication and silent prayer in a corner of the shabestdn in the solitude and silence of the heart of night, he realized that he wasn't alone and that an old woman in another corner of the shabestdn was also busy with prayer and invocation. She acted very anxious and was weeping tears and he approached her and asked, "Mother dear, why are you crying and shedding all those tears?" "Dear child," she said, "I have a son who is my only child and he is my world, my life, my hope, the light of my eye, the fruit of my heart, and the strength of my knees. He is the king's wrestler and it has been arranged that tomorrow, in the presence of the king 13 Some Persian wrestling terms are directly translatable into English, as pol zadan, "to bridge," used in both languages for arching the back and neck to keep the shoul­ ders off the ground, and qofl-e chaneh, "chin lock." Others are approximate, such as kofier band, which seems to be some kind of nelson; the remainder, including kalateh, have not been identified. Neither this paragraph nor the rest of the passage on wres­ tling should be taken as a glossary of terminology.

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and notables of the country and inhabitants of the city, he will wres­ tle an athlete from Iran whom I have heard has extraordinary skill and strength of arm. Until today my son's shoulders have never been brought to the ground and I'm afraid if, God forbid, he is harmed and loses face, he'll do some damage to himself. I have flung the hand of entreaty on the skirts of God and the pure Imams that they not consent to my only son being defeated tomorrow in front of strangers and acquaintances and being sullied before friends and foes, for I fear he hasn't the strength to bear that and I'll lose him." The words of that old woman weighed on Purya's heart, upsetting him greatly. Although he had complete confidence in his strength of arm and realized from experience that he was unrivalled from one end of the world to the other in the art of wrestling, he promised himself to somehow or other not break that old woman's heart. When he was face to face with his opponent the next day in the presence of the king and vizier with the most elaborate of courtesies, after a pe­ riod of faked struggle and simulated panting and after pretending several times that he was about to overcome his opponent, he threw himself on the ground and with dexterity unnoticed by anyone, he reached a hand to the ground in back of himself, but at that very moment, he saw with his own eyes that one of heaven's angels had spread its own long feathers under his body so he would not be harmed and from the band of angels filling the air from the earth to the Throne of God, a voice proclaimed, 'Glad tidings for you, Purya! Since you practiced chivalry and humanity as do the men of God, you are a true athlete and after this you are beloved of God and vali of the Nourisher and chosen of Truth.' 1 4 From that day on, Purya was called Purya-ye Vali and he is reckoned as chief and leader and patron and protector of the tribe of athletes and the community of zurkhdneh users." On hearing this story, I blossomed like a rose and with greater interest set all my senses to watching the pit and the athletes. I saw two opposing wrestlers fighting quite intently, entwined in battle and twisting and turning, rolling and writhing, struggling as if the world and men were forgotten and their entire beings were seeking to subjugate the arts and secrets of wrestling while absolutely and completely possessed by the desire for victory and triumph over the opponent. As the strain and effort seemed progressively in vain, their faces and movements showed tension, anger, and impatience, and thereupon the captain threw a lungi in the middle as a signal for 14 In this context, vali means "friend" or "supporter"; the athlete's name could thus be rendered as "Purya the Friend." "Truth" (haqq) is one of the names of Allah.

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the wrestlers to separate and deferring to it, the opponents withdrew. The morshed hit the bell with his hand and his voice rose, "The ob­ ligation of the pin The reward of the teacher! The keenness of Zu'lfaqar! The nonexistence of the heathen's soul! The health of those present!" and again the sound of blessings rose and tranquility was established. As soon as all the noise subsided, the captain himself came to the center of the pit to show off his strength and skill in kondeh, meaning getting down on the ground on his hands and knees. Several athletes and gymnasts sought to dislodge his kondeh, but they couldn't man­ age despite all their strength and effort and returned to their places saying, "Fantastic!" The morshed asked a loud blessing on the beauty of men of the world and as the shouts of blessing rose, the flowerstrewing began, which meant that flowers and flower petals and candy began to fall down in quantities like snow from the height of the zurkhaneh ceiling and from holes in the arches. So now the exercises had come to an end and the athletes drank hot sugar-water and took off their lungis and were busy drying off the sweat from their bodies and heads and armpits and the backs of their shoulders and the guests and spectators were at work lighting their cigarettes and pipes and the novices and adolescents got to their feet, ready and waiting to give service with respect and compliments and to offer tea and hot sugar-water. Right in the midst of all that hubbub, Mowlana suddenly stood up from his seat, raised his hand in a signal for silence, and said, "If it's permitted, I would like to offer a few words on a certain subject before we are busy with tea and hookahs." Having said that, he brought out from his aba a small inlaid box wound in a handkerchief. Opening it neatly and carefully, he took out a leather belt with a gold stamp and a pair of steel arm­ bands, kissed them with utmost respect and courtesy as if kissing a tomb or the Word of God or some other sacred thing, touched them to his eyes, and with both hands laid them on top of the platform bench in front of Morshed Yadollah's chair, saying, "Your Honor, Morshed, this belt and these armbands belong to the Athlete of Is­ fahan and have been left with me for fifteen whole years, not on the basis of my merit but rather on account of the kindness and regard which some friends and gentlemen did and do have for their old servant and well-wisher, but it would be wrong when today, praise God, some athletes have appeared in this city whose little fingers I really wouldn't measure up to, that these ill-gotten athletic trophies remain with me any longer and therefore I'm returning them with a

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world of gratitude and thanks so that they may be given to anyone worthy and deserving of them." A murmur arose on all sides at hearing these words, " N o , no, no! God forbid! What's that talk? What words are those? Who is more deserving than Your Excellency? You want to shame us! We are all your disciples and servants and proteges, sir!" But although they insisted and importuned, Mowlana didn't give in, and under duress the morshed finally kissed the belt and armbands, made room for them in a drawer of his table, locked the drawer, and put the key in his breast pocket and voices again rose in blessing and flowers again were strewn. As soon as the hullabaloo had subsided, Mowlana addressed the captain, "Your Honor, Athlete, it would be nice if you said a prayer at the end of the work." The captain bowed his head and said, " M y pleasure!" And then facing Morshed YadoUah, he said, "May the morshed's hands and fingers not be hurt. May God forgive the morshed's father and our morshedsl May God forgive the fathers' of our veterans! A curse on evil people!" The others answered, "Without number!" "A curse on misers!" "Without number!" "A curse on those whom God has cursed!" "Without number!" "Mercy on those to whom God gives mercy!" "Amen!" "Mercy on the righteous vanguard and curses on the evil laggards!" "Without number!" "May God increase the life­ time and honor of our ulama of action!" "Amen!" "May God grant victory to the sovereign of Islam!" "Amen!" "May God annihilate His enemies and evil-wishers!" "Amen!" Addressing the morshed again at this point, he said, "Your Honor, Morshed, I've intruded. No, please, what order is there to be obeyed?" The morshed answered, "Your Honor, Athlete, let's please see what's required of one whose soles touch the floor of the pit of the Commander of the Faithful and Leader of the Virtuous?" "Your Honor, Morshed," answered the athlete, "he must be a man and manly." The morshed further asked, "Let's see, please, what the qualities of a man are." "Your Honor, Morshed," answered the athlete, "a man is one whose heart is pure, whose hand is pure, whose eye is pure, and whose tongue is pure." The morshed further asked, "Your Honor, Athlete, what qualities must he have besides?" "Your Honor, Morshed," answered the athlete, "a man is one who is the support and refuge of the downtrodden and of those without relatives or friends and who is the ally of strangers and the helping hand for the fallen and the father of orphans and the husband of widows." "A thousand blessings!" said the morshed. "Does a man

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have any other qualities too?" " T w o qualities exist," answered the athlete, "in anyone who can be called a man." "What are those two?" asked the morshed. "The first is humanity and the second is chivalry," answered the athlete loudly and then turned back to Mowlana. "First of all, your permission; and, second, what are the commands and orders?" "We are all very much indebted to His Honor, Athlete Morshed Yadollah," said Mowlana, "and it's our duty to have you also say a prayer of benefits for him." " O h , my pleasure!" said the athlete and continued thus, "Your Honor, Morshed, first of all, per­ mission, and, second, you didn't say what I wanted." "What did you want?" asked the morshed. "The health of those present," he replied. "In abundance!" said the morshed. "The extinction of the heathens' souls," said the athlete. "They're annihilated!" said the morshed. "Third, that someone along the sides or in the corners call me to his service and give the first contribution." 1 5 "What happens for one who gives it?" asked the morshed. "By the head of Horr ebn Riyahi, which was the first to be put on the end of a lance on the plain of Karbala," answered the athlete, "may the Lord put bread on that man's table so that a thousand true men may eat and a thousand cowards may marvel at the act!" The sounds of "Amen!" rose from every side and one of those present, evidently the son of one of the city's famous dignitaries, contributed a five-tumdn note. "Go, O gallant man, for God will have this prayer answered on your behalf. The first contri­ bution has come! By the two Earrings of the Supreme Throne, the Imams, Hasan and Hoseyn, may the Lord make the inner and outer vision of the second contributor clearsighted!" "Amen!" A respected merchant's son gave the second contribution. The athlete addressed him, "Young man, may you float up like your money and not hit the ground! May you live to fight the holy war of battle at the end of the world and pray behind the Lord of the Age, the Absent Twelfth Imam!" The athlete faced the morshed again and said, "Your Honor, Morshed, let someone also give a third contribution!" Morshed: What happens to whoever gives it? Athlete: By that light extinguished at noon on the day of Ashura, the Causer of All Causes will not extinguish his youth and life until the age of a hundred and twenty years, and then only at the grave of the Martyr King, Hoseyn. Those present: Amen! 15 The "contribution" is a chardgh, usually meaning "light" or "lamp"; this special meaning for chardgh is also used for the money given to coffeehouse storytellers and entertainers, such as magicians (Jz-c).

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Athlete: Your Honor, Morshed, let someone also give the fourth contribution! Morshed: What happens for whoever gives it? Athlete: On behalf of that Imam who suffered the shackles of the community on his neck for twelve stages, undressed on the camel's back, may the Lord not turn the four pillars of his body into five.16 Those present: Amen! Athlete: Your Honor, Morshed, any gentlemen who gives the fifth contribution will be taken at the waist by the five fingers of the Divine Hand and rescued from the whirlpool of illusion's sorrow and humiliation and distress and on the fifty-thousand-year Day of Res­ urrection will not have the sweat of shame upon his forehead. Those present: Amen! Athlete: Your Honor, Morshed, for whoever sends the sixth con­ tribution, Morshed: What happens? Athlete: God grants to him that he will one day kindle six groups of camphor candles at the six corners of Hoseyn's grave and light the grave of our third Imam. Those present: Amen! Athlete: By the groans which Moses, son of Ja'far, gave in the corner of Aaron's prison, the Lord will keep the body of the seventh contributor from being seized by ague or needing doctors of the four nations. And the athlete continued with promises for further contributors, "The Lord will distribute three favors to the eighth contributor: first, a companion on the road; second, a traveler's foot; third, lawful sub­ sistence so he may cross those roads far and wide and ascend those mountains and have his sinner's eyes fall from afar on the ninetythousand-iMwan dome of the eighth Iman and greet that Imam and hear, 'At your service!' from his lips which sipped the poison. The Lord will keep ninety thousand calamities away from the pure soul of any Shia who will give the ninth contribution! The Giver will liberally reward the tenth contributor ten-thousandfold in this world and the same in the next." At about midnight, after the end of the business of contributions to Allah and the conclusion of the prayers and benedictions when Morshed Yadollah was in high spirits anew, he sounded the bell and 16 This refers to the fourth Shia Imam, Zeyn-ol-abedin, who was not killed at Karbala but taken in chains, as described, to the Umayyad capital in Syria. The four columns are his arms and legs; the fifth is his back when laid on the ground in the tomb Qz-c).

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drum full force and began singing ballads and the zurkhaneh began strewing flowers to the eternal fortune of men of the world and champions of the sons of Adam. As soon as Mowlana and I had come out of the zurkhaneh and set off toward our school and Haven of Rest, Mowlana asked without looking at my face, "So tell me now, haji's boy, what do you think of those people you saw?" "Briefly and concisely," I said, "it was confirmed and verified for me that in fact, 'Friends of God are possible among the riffraff.' I never believed that among the spoiled and fragile, shaking and quak­ ing people of this country, whose mouths might be said to have been shaped with fear and trembling and cowardice, and about whom Qa'em Maqam correctly said over a century ago: Alas for the impious, dishonorable nation, The Kurds of Rey, the Turks of Khamseh, and the Lors of Qazvin! Whoever is wretched and helpless is the enemy wishing evil; Whoever is the enemy wishing evil is wretched and helpless.

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there were to be found any brave and daring and solid men of this kind, who in fact may be called men in the full sense of the word." "Are you at all aware of the life and times of those much afflicted people with dirty collars and just one thin qabaV he asked. "I had a stroke of luck," I replied, "and happened to be situated next to an acquaintance of mine who himself is a gymnast and he summarized for me things about some of the athletes which all amazed me. What surprised me most of all was the life story of the athlete evidently known as Lasso-thrower, whom my friend says steals openly and with no one even hindering his work." Mowlana stuck out his lower lip in refutation and denial and said, "If you want to call it theft, then do, but one should also meanwhile not forget that our religion considers accumulation of property and wealth an ugly business and great men of our religion have said that the true believer must have low aspirations, that is, as soon as he finds himself having a little capital, he should be satisfied with that. Accumulating more than that is not considered permissible and even in the traditions and stories it has been said that the limit of untaxable wealth in Islam consists of one pitcher of water and the food for one meal and trousers to cover one's nakedness; anyone with that much has enough and has no right to complain in the Court of the Nourisher and whatever he has beyond that must be accounted for on the Day of Resurrection. There is also a tradition that if a person has,

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for example, a house and home which doesn't serve his needs and is left empty, it will come up to him on the Day of Resurrection at the station of judgment and interrogation and say, 'Why did you deprive me of a useful existence? Why did you leave me abandoned and neg­ lected, allowing an affront to me? Why didn't you let someone left without house or lodging dwell in me so that he would have been spared the trouble of being without a house and so that my existence would have produced some benefit?' And besides, dear friend, have­ n't you heard, 'Possessions are God's possessions; divide them among you with equality!' in Arabic? It's also said in the Gospels, 'If you want to reach the ranks of perfection, you must sell whatever you have and give it to the empty-handed so that in heaven you will get treasure in exchange.' And I have further seen in the Gospels, 'You should have neither gold nor silver nor coins at your waist and like­ wise you should have neither pockets nor dervish's cloak nor trousers nor staff for the road because the laboring man is deserving of food which will come to him.' "Then evidently our luti friend, Yadollah, is actually commanding the enjoined and forbidding the prohibited," I said, "and he is in reality closing the gates of hell for miserly and greedy individuals who themselves either don't know what's to their own welfare and benefit or don't want to know that." Mowlana nodded and said, "What strange and amazing paths sal­ vation and deliverance do truly have which astonish and confound a man!" "I want very much to have a long and detailed conversation with Your Excellency on this subject," I said, "but for the present, I'm short of breath and seriously in need of some fresh air since the zurkhdneh's air was suffocatingly warm and stuffy."

I long for the melodies of Isfahan, O Lute! I long for the sweet burning wail, O Flute. Rumi, Divan-e Shams

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"It's a nice night," he said, "and there's still some time left until the cannon's fired to mark the begin­ ning of today's Ramazan fast. How about taking a stroll across the Bridge of Thirty-three Arches to walk a while in the Field of a Thousand Acres and on the slopes of Sofeh Mountain." CHAPTER 4 ...ζ* J

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"Actually, 'Nights such as these are no time for sleep,' " I said, "and if you aren't tired and don't feel sleepy, I'm wide awake and ready to go any time you'd like." Before going out of the city, we happened to pass a humble little grocery whose total stock consisted of twenty to thirty melons, half a basket of pomegranates, and some onions. At that time of night when everyone had gone to sleep, the poor grocer sat dozing on the shop's front step in the flickering light of a dim and smoky mouselamp lit up and glimmering on top of the heap of melons and sometimes his eyes and mouth opened drowsily and his cry rose up, "Hey, a golden jug of a melon!" "How about our buying a melon," said Mowlana, "so we'll have a change of taste and this servant of God will also benefit." "You yourself know very well," I said, "that when it comes to the pit of the stomach, 'There's no need to look for omens.' " Using the customary criteria for selecting melons, we picked out with all possible care a melon the size of a lamb, paid for it, and started off walking with our backs to Isfahan and our faces toward the plains and desert. The stars were so bright that we easily distinguished the road and potholes even without the moon. You yourselves know that the purity and delicacy of Isfahan is proverbial, and yet the air of the Field of a Thousand Acres is many times better than the air of even Isfahan itself. The waves of dust and sand both fine and coarse made a strange world beneath the light of the stars. Mowlana's conversation was so sweet that the road didn't seem like much at all and going ahead quite happily, we suddenly found ourselves at the foot of Sofeh Mountain. "Don't slow down," said Mowlana, "for it's delightfully exhilarating on top of the mountain." He knew all the details of every span of the paths as if he'd crossed them every day. We sat down beside a slender stream that flowed from under a stone and tumbled down, murmuring and twinkling in the starlight. While Mowlana was busy filling his pipe, we fixed our eyes on the stars and the Milky Way for a while like hashish smokers and were deaf and dumb, absorbed in the glory and beauty of the worlds of the night. The plain with Takhteh-pulad and Farahabad and Thousand Acres lay beneath our feet and we had a perfect command of the city from that height on the mountain. In the flickering starlight, the Zayandeh River flowed sinuously, crawling with many twists and turns like a battered viper without head or tail and at its edge, the city of Isfahan lay posed as a tired and worn-out old man who had wrapped himself in his cloak and

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gone to sleep. Although silence and darkness enveloped the city from one end to the other and it was clear that people had gone to sleep, there was nevertheless some light scattered about within the black body and dim, dark form of that giant thicket of trees and domes and minarets and ramparts and towers, and the light, shining from lamps sometimes lit and then put out, was not easy to distinguish from the light of the stars. The first person to break the seal of silence was Mowlana. "This night and this air and this situation are conducive to prayer," he said. Then mumbling and rolling up his sleeves and making the ritual ablutions, he stood in prayer right there without any seal of holy earth to touch his forehead to when he prayed. "It may be presumptuous of me," I said, "but it seems to me that you aren't really standing facing the qebleh." With a very expressive smile, he answered, "In the Kaaba, there is no qebleh." Then he pointed a finger at his heart and said, "The qebleh is here." He concluded the prayer right after just one unit of standing, kneeling, and prostrating himself. "I've never in my life seen or heard of a prayer of only one unit," I said. "Being long-winded with God is pointless," he said. "That much was from sincere devotion and more than that would have been only trappings of devotion and in fact a sham. Hasn't it been said in Arabic, 'Grasp the goals and skip the starting points.' The time to cut the melon had come. We didn't have a knife. Mowlana found a sharp stone, bent on one knee like a butcher about to cut up a sheep, grabbed the melon around the neck, and said while he tore into its belly, 11:101

"This knife sinking down to the hilt with purpose, Has never laid open a melon sweeter than this." After our melon, Mowlana suddenly grew silent and fixed his halfclosed eyes contracted like a telescope lens on the jumble of scenery that was enveloped throughout by intricate curtains of dark obscu­ rity. Then he suddenly dropped out of this world and became so precisely and deliberately immersed in a string of meditations and interior explorations far and wide that you'd say he'd forgotten this world and what's in it and was anxious for worlds with things in­ visible to my eyes. For a while, I didn't feel like disturbing his pleasure but finally I couldn't take it any longer and I whispered gently in his ear, "Excuse me, but the fire in your pipe is going out." Like someone waking suddenly from a sound sleep, he came to with a shock and said, "It's

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a wonderfully curious world! What journeys I've made in those few minutes when I was apparently asleep. The two- or three-thousandyear history of this city of Isfahan passed like lightning before my eyes. It's a city which has repeatedly been the capital of this country; even today with all the ruin and desolation, 'it's worth a hundred thousand whole' and matches the best of the world's antique shops. I saw countless kinds of people with all varieties of different languages and customs and habits and rites and religions who came in one gate and went out another and how often not a single creature had been left alive nor any structure left unrazed. Arabs and nonArabs, Turks and Tajiks and Turkomans, Mongols and Afghans, strangers and kinsmen, all came parading through and vanished like phantoms in a dream. The city's history and geography mixed inextricably like fact and metaphor and left my helpless eyes incapable of distinguishing history from legend and truth from falsehood. I saw in the haze a face covered with charcoal dust, the face of a sturdy country youth in blacksmith's clothes who overturned the crown and throne of an unjust king. He was an Isfahani named Kaveh, as is written in the Shah-nameh, and he stood up to the tyrant king, Zahhak. Tying his leather apron on a stick in banner fashion, Kaveh called the people to oppose that despotism and oppression, and asked Faridun to sit upon the throne and then the basis of injustice was uprooted. Flashes of the holy fires of Zoroaster flamed skyward from the tops of many venerated fire temples, lighting up the plain and valley of Isfahan like the Zoroastrians' souls." "Among the clouds and mist I saw Nebuchadnezzar, king of the Chaldees, who sent the children of Israel out of Jerusalem and I saw a group of Jews who had gotten themselves to Isfahan. When they saw its climate was close to that of their native land, they chose to dwell there, in the place known as Yahudiyeh or Jubareh." "Then the world became an arena for one of those amazing revolutions which are related in man's destiny to the ebb and flood of civilization and the rise and fall of nations and which seem like the earth is breathing in and out. Through the blessings of a new religion, called Islam since it's based on acquiesence and submission, a desert tribe of Arabs flowed down in a swift and overwhelming deluge, toppling crowns and thrones. 1 Eventually some villages of Isfahan took Arabic names or Arabicized their Persian names, and under Arab rule the fire temples went out of fashion." "For hundreds of years, Arab caliphs held sway in Isfahan and they 1 Taslim "submission" and islam are both based on the same Arabic root (s-l-m); islam literally means "submission" or "resignation" (to God's will).

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ornamented their parties with its regal wines described by poets in their odes." "The prosperity and comfort of Isfahan's inhabitants kept grow­ ing, and in the bazaars, the storerooms were full of expensive mate­ rials from Baghdad and Kufa and brocades from Byzantium and swords and cloth from Egypt and jewels from Bahrein and ebony from Oman and dishes and fine merchandise from China and sheepskin coats from Khorasan and boxwood and choice clothing from Azerbaijan and Armenia and every kind of medicine and drink." "Then fortune, always pregnant with events, wheeled round again and Iranian rulers replaced the Arab caliphs. Then from Afghanistan came Mahmud of Ghazni who swept the city with the broom of plunder, but all things are passing and his dynasty was followed by the Seljuk Turks. And with the Seljuk, Malekshah, there was com­ fort and prosperity again in Isfahan. Soon after him, our city passed from hand to hand like a polo ball and its people suffered agonies and burned in flames. Then as they recovered, the Mongols' un­ speakable and conscienceless violence and injustice descended on them and their possessions, like a heavenly fire of wrath and rage." At that point, Mowlana closed his eyes in silence as if he had per­ haps gone out of this world into a world of abstraction. From the mountaintop, I too fixed my eyes on Isfahan's surroundings and said to myself that I should be ashamed of being blind to the wealth of this city in which I was born and raised. I had no notion at all of who I was or where I'd come from or who had made all these tombs and mosques and schools and shrines or what tales the doors and gates could tell. The gentle breeze which brought from afar the sound of trees in the woods on the bank of the Zayandeh River whispered in my ear, "You ignorant fellow! That's typical of Isfahan. Like most cities of this land, its fate was written with the pen of injustice, kill­ ing, plunder, famine, and disorder, but still it lives and breathes and struggles, not yet bereft of feasts and banquets and success and hap­ piness. Different tribes and races have burnt the ample harvest of art accumulated over hundreds of years through toil and suffering and talent and intelligence, but soon they too passed away, while Isfahan remains, and now on the edge of the Zayandeh River, thousands of their descendents sleeping in its lap renew and refresh themselves." The novelty of this mood had hold of me and I didn't want it to end, but again the gentle and sensitive voice of Mowlana rose and he continued while staring at the city with rue and astonishment like a mother watching over her sleeping child, "Now the scene shifts again and in clouds of dust I see the unrelenting army of Tamerlane, falling

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like a swarm of ants on the defenseless people of Isfahan and in one day alone seventy thousand of them are beheaded and their heads built up into minarets. For fifty years Tamerlane's successors rule in Isfahan and then his dynasty leaves and it's ruled by tribes of for­ eigners." " N o w in the early sixteenth century, there comes a brave commander named Esma'il from the house of a pir of the Safi order and thus the Safavid period begins. By the end of the century, God's grace has spread its shadow over the people of Isfahan and Shah Abbas has made the city his capital. Aglow with recovery, the city rises from the grave to live and breathe again. It's the bride of Iran, the most beautiful city in the world, the center of trade and commerce from all over the earth. Caravans pass in and out its gates day and night, bringing goods to and from the outskirts of the world. I see muleteers carrying huge quantities of zari, the costly handwoven cloth of gold of Isfahan, to distant parts of Asia and Europe and returning in its place enormous riches and much gold and silver." "For a whole hundred years, Isfahan's prosperity and splendor in­ creases by the day and hour. Nearly three thousand pigeon towers are built in the city's suburbs and 'are settled here and there like the tribe around Leyla.'2 Isfahan is eighty parasangs around and Euro­ pean travelers testify to its population of a million people, its 160 mosques and 48 schools and 283 public baths and 180 caravanserais." "Splendid buildings and palaces ornament all sides of the city and have pleasing names, such as Eight Paradises, Bouquet, Almond Grove, and Garden of Love. Travelers come to Isfahan from the ends of the earth to see them and no one tires of looking at them. Like a cum­ merbund of diamonds, emeralds, and lapis lazuli tied on the waist of the city, the famous Avenue of the Four Gardens begins in the middle of the city and goes down its length, trailing its skirts south to the slopes of the Sofeh Mountain and the Garden of a Thousand Acres. Shah Abbas himself is said to have planted the eight rows of plane trees with a gold coin buried beneath each and the trees give the avenue a pleasant serenity that I imagine has no equal in the world. Each street intersecting the avenue has four rows of trees and a stream of water in the center which pours into the avenue's canal. Along the canal are waterfalls and watercourses and pools large and small, all made of transparent marble backed with mosaics, and in the pools 2 Nezami's Leyla ο Majnun, written in A.D. 1188, is a story of the love between a girl, Leyla, and a boy, Majnun, who are from different Arab tribes. Their parents prohibit their marriage, the young man goes mad, and both die an early death. For a translation into English, see Gelpke 1966.

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are leaping fountains. On both sides of the canal is a paved marble road, wide enough for two riders to easily travel abreast. From the steps and galleries along this incomparable avenue, you can view this charming vista from end to end, no matter where you are." "But then the fateful sleeping evil eye is wakened and the Afghans deliver to Isfahan the judgment of polytheism and nonbelief, with instructions from an Isfahani dkhond called Molla Za'fran. Isfahan is destitute, naked and hungry, 'more desolate than the hearts of dervishes.' Many people have been killed or have hidden themselves and some of the wealthy have fled to India, Turkestan, and Byzantium, and The garden is left empty of beautiful faces, No sign of a rose or a nightingale's song." "The Afghans leave, and then comes Nader QoIi, so greedy that his personal historian wrote that 'even if the leaves of the trees turned to gold, it would not equal a tenth of a tenth of what was demanded.' But he who killed so many was himself killed, and then Bakhtiyaris, Zands, and Qajars argue over Isfahan and streams of blood again flow on every side. And then in 1756, I see another relentless enemy who has dealt with this land from ancient times and who is several times more cruel and villainous than Mongols, Tartars, or Afghans. Its sinister, ill-omened name is Famine and now it gains control of Isfahan and becomes the absolute and uncontested monarch of those men spared by the sword, and it sends forty thousand people to destruction. Now I see an emasculated, beardless fellow, Aqa Mohammad, founder of the Qajar dynasty, who comes to Isfahan with a heart filled with revenge. After bringing an independent Iran into existence, he himself went out of existence, killed at the hands of his own people. Then after bloodshed and murder and plunder and pillage, Isfahan is again an honored and distinguished lady with a few ornaments and jewels and luxuries still left. But that ancient and vindictive enemy, scarcity from famine, visited Isfahan again and: There was a scarcity in eighteen thousand and twenty When cannibalism came into vogue.

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It lasted three years and completely ravaged the wretched people. A great number of towns and villages become absolutely desolate and in the words of the historians, 'The Zayandeh River was so dried up that if a well were dug to the back of the Cow-fish, it would show

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no trace of moisture.' 3 Despite all that, I see the Qajar governor has out of ignorance and greed stripped the city bare of ornament and decoration and has built himself palaces and gardens from its historic materials, heedless that the plundering hand of time will soon strip his house bare of rank and honor in authority and government. Truly, the ways and customs of time have always been and are and ever will be thus. . . . " When Mowlana's conversation reached this point, he fell silent. Fixing his gaze on the thought-provoking, dim, dark panorama of his beloved Isfahan, he said in a softer voice with words distinct, "What things I saw! As if a scroll were very slowly opening before my mind's eye, I saw all that you've heard me tell and finally at the end I saw the Zayandeh River, unconcerned. Family after family and harvest after harvest for generations, the river has patiently and calmly taken the hopes and desires, the feasting and drinking, the mourning and lamentation, and the disappointment, grief and sorrow of this city and its citizens and made them vanish, jumbled all together like the rubbish, dirt, and refuse they pour into the water's dizzying waves, and it isn't at all clear where the river takes them or for how long it takes them or into which bottomless well or secret Gaw-khuni it dumps them." Mowlana broke off the thread of conversation at this point and traces of profuse grief and sorrow appeared on his face and he said in a voice which didn't ask for his inner tenderness to be translated but which trembled so that any listener was moved, "At the end, I suddenly saw myself when I was no more than a simple and unknown seminary student, standing alone and unknown at the age of twenty-two in a corner of that Takhteh-pulad you see in the distance. With a world of grief and anguish, I watched from afar as the girl to whom I had entrusted my heart and faith in this life was herself entrusted to the earth. I hadn't the right even to approach for a final farewell at her tomb and had to stay at some distance from fear of her parents and relatives, confiding my secrets to the cemetery there where I stood with my heart broken and my eyes overflowing with tears as I stammered, O Takhteh-pulad, were I to weep at the separation from my beloved, Your Khaju Bridge could not withstand my tears." 3 The Cow-fish (gaw-mdhi) is a mythical creature, half bull (gdw) and half fish (mahi) on which the earth is supposed to rest.

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After these confessions, Mowlana drew a deep sigh from the bot­ tom of his heart, puffed hard on his pipe, and gradually blew out a chain of smoke from between his lips. After a moment's pause in silence, he cast a final glance which said good-bye to Isfahan, sleeping unconcerned with surely no one awake at that hour except the dying, the dissolute, and the lovers, and then he said, " M y friend, before we are further under the spell of the magic and witchcraft of the worlds of the night, we'd better set off on the road to the Haven of Rest so we arrive in time to eat our meal before starting the day's fast and aren't deprived of the mutton stew and sour pickles, peace be upon them." Then he got up and shook off the dust which had settled on his aba and set out. As usual, I followed along after him like a shadow.

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We had gradually reached the lower part of the mountain. I sensed that he was quite moved and I began some foolish prattle to comfort his tender mind. I said, "Your Honor, Mowlana, you truly did see a strange dream. May it be a blessing with a sweet interpretation, God willing!" "But what a pity that our feet reached the brink of the grave and yet we were still asleep," he said, "and what a sleep that was which either had no interpretation or was intrinsically uninterpretable, for I fear any interpretation would, in the words of Hafez, be nothing but a myth or fable." I saw the advisability of silence and I too sank by stages into long and lengthy thoughts beside Mowlana in that dark night. Walking forward in the dusty desert dirt, Mowlana's warm and compelling voice rose and he began to croon in melancholy tones a litany of these couplets by Sheykh Baha'i, the thirteenth-century scholar and poet, which pleased me so much that I later learned them by heart: "In this ruin full of temptation, Unconsoled by school or cloister, By neither travel nor seclusion did I escape my desires, By neither mosque nor abbey did I profit. I want a world outside this world, So I can find a cure-all for my heart's desire." It was almost daybreak and exactly the time of "It's water and opium" when we reached the school and rushed to polish off quite a 4 meat stew with quinces and some of Mowlana's sour pickles. Since 4 This is a muezzin's cry from the top of minarets during Ramazan, warning good Muslims that it is almost dawn and time for the daylong fast to begin. It is thus also the last moment for a drink of water or an opium pill. The Isfahanis' use of opium

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Mowlana would be a guest of his friend, Mirza Aqa Khan Bangi, for supper after the fast and an evening party tomorrow night, we said good-night and parted with a promise to meet day after tomorrow. I returned directly to my cell and went under the covers half-dressed and it's no secret from you that when I woke up, Mowlana was standing in my cell smiling and saying, "Rise and shine!" Rubbing my eyes, I said, "So what time is it?" " M y son," he said, "you tell me what day and what month it is. Do you have any idea how long you've slept?" "If a year's correct, the rest of it's not worth talking about," I said. "The truth is that I'd gotten very tired and I made up for it prop­ erly." "Well, don't you even know that you slept more than twentyeight hours at one stretch, God willing. The servant, Karbala'i Qorban, says you didn't even wake up for the meal after yesterday's fast or for this morning's meal before the fast either. Maybe you were in the sleep of the Companions of the Cave." I couldn't believe that I had actually slept all that time but even­ tually there was so much circumstantial evidence that no room was left for argument and I understood that I had tasted the flavor of death while still alive and hadn't realized it.

CHAPTER 5 m TT 11 r

The Hell of

"I beg you," said Mowlana, "to 'cut down the compliments and add

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to the purse, as the saying goes. Fanaticism Your excuses are worse than the sin! It would be nice if you would instead wash up as quickly as possible and get yourself organized because they've brought some beasts for us to ride and we must go to Lenjan." Taken aback, I asked, "Then are they making sweets to give as alms in Lenjan? What business would I have there?" "You yourself know," he said, "that I'm from Lenjan and I came into the world in Falavarjan, a village of that county. I passed my childhood there, and I also still have some family and relatives and friends and acquaintances there who drop in to see me whenever they during Safavid times was commented on by contemporary French travelers fjz-c). Chardin (1927, p. 243) noted that men who abstained from wine because it was un­ lawful nevertheless took opium.

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come to Isfahan and who expect me to drop in on them once or twice a year too." "That's all true, sir," I said. "You have friends and acquaintances and kith and kin there all right, but where does that take me and who, God bless him, is waiting for me?" "You'll have to be a hanger-on and round out my retinue," he said. "That will make me more respected and also we can get home sooner by using your name as an excuse. Several days ago someone from Falavarjan came to see me and I gave a message to send riding animals for two people. Now they've been brought and we must go·" "In that case," I said, "a pilgrimage to Lenjan is a must." I was all ready and prepared to go in no more than half an hour. Two mules and one young villager, whose name was found to be Karam-ali, were waiting for us in front of the school. Saying, "In the name of Allah and by Allah," we consigned ourselves to God and with Mowlana and me mounted and Karam-ali on foot, we set out on our way, trusting in God. It wasn't long before we had left the city and cultivated areas and reached the desert plain. The sun had still not come up and the air hadn't yet become too very warm, and crossing the desert and breathing the pure, transparent air had a special pleasure and excite­ ment, inducing a certain lightheadedness, like arrack or opium. I re­ alized that until that day and hour, my eyes had not been open to the rare, amazing, and delightful views of scenery in Iran. As far as one could see in every direction, there was nothing but, The salt desert and salt pan and shifting sands, The life-taking simoon and ferocious lions.

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The earth has its highs and lows like a song and it rolls and coils like a snake or viper. The soft, smooth hills like the breasts of girls who have just come of age gently caress the eyes. The stone of the moun­ tains and earth of the hills have slanting veins of various colors which seem drawn with a ruler, bank after bank, layer after layer, and line after line, bringing to mind striped Yazdi sashes which nature's hand tied on their waist. Beneath the rising sun, our mounted shadows fell on the ground from east to west, so long and high you'd say that they had no end and that it wasn't clear whether we were attached to them or they to us. Beneath the rays of the sun, the color of the desert, first purple and later turning saffron, next tending toward red and then becoming golden, was now so white and shining that it bedazzled and beat upon the eyes. The colors of the earth and rock

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grew lighter every moment in the shining sun and were on display, patch after patch, at one time like white camphor and the next like black ebony and then like variegated reddish brick. The assembly of colors on the plain and mountain flaunted the splendor of the pea­ cock's tail, the turkey's plumage, and the rainbow in the sky. Be­ neath animals' hoofs and peoples' feet, passing to and fro for thou­ sands of years as friends and enemies, the earth of the road had turned into powder like pulverized chickpeas used for our sweets called ghavut, pounded by the tireless hand of fate and made into flour in the pestleless mortar of time. The wind blew sometimes gently and smoothly and sometimes quite violently on the broad slopes, cease­ lessly creating whirlwinds long and lean which suddenly appeared and tubelike stood erect, rose up. on one leg, madly wheeled, twisted around themselves, raced with open gullets and narrow waists around the desert, and turned; they brawled like ghouls out on a drinking spree and in a twinkling they approached, surrounded us, and passed us by with lightning speed and went away and yet anew fell on our tracks; thin and weak and ever growing still more thin and weak, they funneled upward to the sky and disappeared. The different khakicolored lizards, sometimes finger-thin and sometimes thick as a hu­ man arm or thigh, had bowl-like eyes and skins full of folds and wrinkles never ironed, and they zigzagged off like shooting stars be­ neath the fore and hind feet of the mules and vanished in a single, snaky twist. Gradually the sun became a lance above our heads and now it stopped; the fiery earth and salt-pan oven which had not seen water's color for thousands of years was forced by thirst and hunger to pant in the wanton, burning heat. Like a dragon's breath, the sun's heat burned and parched. This earth, which had never seen a peasant or a farmer's foot or plowshare's wound or shovel's blade, had fallen under the oppressive yoke of the unjust sun. The pulsing solar orb in the heights of the sky had turned into a bloodthirsty blackamoor with a gouged face who wanted in his wrath and rage and vengefulness to burn up the world from end to end with sparks from his flame-throwing mouth. We grew silent and sank down in thought and fantasy and even the mules seemed stunned and stupified. I saw the desert remaining naked as at birth, just the way it was created, and never had it clothed itself in emerald silks of spring or golden brocades of autumn. We had now gone still further from the city and were wayfarers in a boundless space which you'd say no human foot had ever reached. Except for the footprints of time, no trace of any other feet could be seen on it. It was a desert without beginning or end which had, in the words of old women, neither water nor hab-

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itations, nor Muslims' exclamations. From end to end of this vast desert and barren, lonely wasteland, no sound or song could be heard save the hissing of snakes and the trumpeting of jinns and the screams and shouts of ghouls, just as the storytellers say. It seemed a preserve existing from all eternity where orders had been issued to get away or be blind. Not even a crow flew by and only rarely was a giant camel-driver visible in the distance, camel-train reins in hand, whom you'd imagine to be a wayfarer from a better world than ours. Ex­ cept for some dusty, dirty, earth-colored bushes which you'd say had 11:126

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been struck by lightning and marked by ashes, there were no other plants or vegetation and only occasionally did some ugly, ill-formed, misshapen grass of the color of worn and rotten cloth raise its head up from the earth's breast. The grass had short, broad, hairy leaves reminiscent of a cow's tongue and even Karam-ali didn't know its name but just said it was known as camel grass. Throwing down their heads, the mules advanced with measured pace and Mowlana sat as motionless and silent on the back of the mule as a statue of stone. To me this desert plain without end or beginning was not made for mere humans like us who live only a few days but rather was worthy of ghouls whose heads reach the sky and whose feet are mountain-weight and who have the life of Noah. This place had been prepared for enormous prehistoric animals in the corner of whose stomachs there would be room for ten humans like us. Bit by bit as if perhaps I were going into a trance, I found myself in a world of unknowns and imagined the broad earth joined to the boundless sky and that made me certain that we would reach the celestial slopes if we continued on our way without pausing. A dark sea seemed to surround me on both sides of the road, arousing my apprehensions lest Karam-ali act carelessly and the mule go off the road and not find it again until the rising at the Resurrection. I feared we would be left wandering astray among these interminable and endless waves of dust and salt in this world of long, round hills and camelback knolls and dangerous salt deserts and we'd be captured and strangled by the strap-legs of whom we'd heard stories in childhood. Meanwhile my gaze fell on the horizon and I saw that a thin, glassy vapor had risen from the slope of the plain and the earth's surface throbbed quite perceptively, like a guitar string struck by a plectrum. Then my head began to spin like a man who's gulped a flask of thick, black fermented wine down to the last drop and I took great delight in that world of seeming drunkenness mingled with fear and awe, and despite my dizziness, wonder, and bewilderment, I found myself more detached and free than I had ever been before.

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I wanted very much to inform Mowlana about the surprising qualities of that state but it seemed to me that at that time and in that world of peace and silence throughout, any word from my mouth would be a brick dropped into a calm, deep sea, forming thousands of circles, curling around and surrounding my powerless self on every side with prolonged and repeated echoes and frightful reechoes which would tear my eardrums apart. Just as I was grappling with such an indefinable world, Mowlana's voice suddenly interrupted my drowsing. "Haji's boy," he said, "be alert for AIi and don't fall asleep. Stick tight to the mule saddle because you're about to lose your balance and fall on the ground." "I don't feel well," I said. "My head's swimming and my eyes are blurring and my ears keep ringing." "That's all from being hungry and having an empty stomach," he said. "You haven't eaten anything for more than thirty hours now. If you want to get yourself back to normal, you must make up for that immediately." "Then what about the obligation to fast?" I asked. "A fast without the predawn meal is uncalled for," he said, "es^. pecially when you're traveling. Not only does the cock's crow from Isfahan not reach here but neither does the sound of the small cannon marking the beginning of the day's fast. The obligation to fast is therefore dropped and you can eat whatever your heart desires with your mind at ease. The difficulty in that, however, is that there is no food to be found in the middle of this desert." Then he asked Karamali, "My son, would you have a little something or other to eat with you?" "Not anything worth it," said Karam-ali. "How about something not worth it?" said Mowlana. "My God," he said, "I do have some bread and onions left from the food I brought with me." "May your house prosper!" said Mowlana. "That's more than we deserve. Get it out quickly and give it to this gentleman whose condition isn't anything to write home about. There's nothing left in his body and I fear he'll fall on the ground, God forbid, and leave us in the lurch." Quick as a wink, I swallowed a loaf of barley bread and an onion the size of a cantaloupe and never in my life have I enjoyed anything so much. Our mules threw down their heads and flicked the flies off with their ears and tails and proceeded with regular and measured steps. Karam-ali had in his hand a stick hung with a piece of chain and he

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sometimes brought the tip of the prod up to the thighs and rumps of the mules to drive them on. It was nearly sunset when the gardens of the village of Falavarjan gradually became visible from afar. Longing for the stable and man­ ger, the mules quickened their pace. The village inhabitants had clearly been on the lookout for us and as soon as they caught sight of us from afar, they came in groups to meet us with greetings and salu­ tations. A warm and tender reception for Mowlana took place such as I had never seen before. Old and young, rich and poor, all sur­ rounded him and each indicated his happiness by his own way of λ displaying affection. When we arrived at the first house in the village, they laid a sheep down and cut off its head despite Mowlana's objections and then took us from there straight to the house of the village headman. Acting as if the headman's house were their own, both men and women of the village entered confidently behind us without any in­ hibitions. Joy and affection streamed from their faces and Mowlana's gaiety was matched by theirs. He called each person by name and inquired about his health and heaped upon them his jokes and jests and banter. How I could bore you! By the time we'd removed the dust and dirt of the road all over us, the time had come for the evening meal to break the day's fast. The meal they'd prepared appeared to have no end. Even if all the people in the village had eaten, some leftovers would still have remained. It was not yet completely dark when we sat down to that colorful spread and the headman was extending courtesies continually and saying, "The satisfaction of the guest is the honor of the host." How I wish you'd been there! But the first mouthful of food had not yet gone down our throats when a strange murmuring arose beyond the wall of the house and then a crowd of men and women flooded into the house of the head­ man. With faces inflamed and eyes raining sparks, with open mouths cursing and a thousand abuses and insults on their lips, they had surrounded a tall and sturdy youth already half-dead, bareheaded and with long locks disheveled. They were dragging him along with kicks and cuffs, all hitting and beating him and scratching and tearing at him according to their strength. They encircled the young fellow like a sacrificial camel, raining slaps and blows down on his head from every side. They'd torn his left ear lobe and blood was flowing from it. All struggled to reach him however possible to get in some blows and scatter their venom. Heedless of any stranger's eye, the women had no less of a hand in

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it than the men and they took off their shoes to beat out the brains of the abandoned youth. You simply couldn't believe that these sav­ age and bloodthirsty men from whose faces poured these ferocious effects would be those same serene and sincere villagers with their loyalty and with their candor and geniality of an hour before. Like a hunted animal captured in a swarm of dogs and hunters, this youth without friend or companion, with swollen, fevered eyes, his gaze full of fear and panic, with bloody mouth and torn lip and ear, had no strength or energy left in his body to move. Panting with mouth open, he breathed with difficulty and glanced frantically in all directions like a dumb sheep at slaughter. He wore only a coarse cotton shirt and a qabd without sash or cummerbund, and part of his wounded chest showed out of his ripped collar with drops of blood here and there where fingernails had dug into it. He gasped for breath as if being throttled and from the trembling movement of his lips, it was clear that he wanted to say something but no sound save a heartrending rattle came from his throat. Cries of "Babi! Heathen! Infidel! Atheist!" and hundreds of other insults and indecencies rose up. In the midst of this crowd, the village dkhond was the coarsest and most merciless of all. His ruthless eyes, glaring like those of a wolf, bulged out from their sockets. Beneath the shadow of his turban, they brought to mind two glowing torches pounded into a graveyard wall beneath a white dome. He roared loudly, "Cursed! Devil! Apostate deserving death! Heretic whose blood may be shed without punishment! Dual­ ist! Infidel worse than a dog! . . . " and his fist like half a brick rose and descended with all possible force on the head and face and back and chest of the youth. Springing from his place, Mowlana hurled himself barefoot out of the room and went up to the crowd, running all the way, and yelled out, "You people, what's the matter? Who is this young man? Why are you beating him? What's he done wrong?" In unison from a hundred throats came the cry, "This son of his damned father is a Babi, his dog of a father is a Babi, his whore of a mother is a Babi. He doesn't even deny it and he eats in daylight during the fast and isn't ashamed before Creator or created and doesn't even fear God." Meanwhile, the village dkhond with his bushy beard blacker than pitch and glaring eyes and flaming glance came forward too and said, "Your Honor, Mowlana, this damned bastard not only doesn't deny being a Babi but even avoids cursing the Bab." Addressing the dkhond, Mowlana said, "Akhond Molla Abd-ol-

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latif, this person doesn't look familiar to me. Perhaps he's not some­ one from here?" " N o such utterly filthy animals can be found in our village, praise God," answered the akhond. "This fine fellow has come here from Aqa-deh supposedly as a laborer for hire but now it is clear that he has a mission to lead our young men astray and make them Babis." As soon as Mowlana heard this explanation, he went up still bare­ foot to the young man and slapped him hard on the face, pointed a finger at the dark storage room located at the end of the room where the sofreh was set and said, "Take this stupid half-wit, throw him in, and just give him some garbage to stuff his gut with so that tomor­ row morning I can punish him in the presence of the men and women of this community according to the commands of sacred Islamic law." The youth was so weak he couldn't keep standing up on his feet. He opened his mouth again to talk but all that came out was some watery blood from the corners of his lips and he slowly collapsed and crumpled to the ground. Akhond Molla Abd-ol-latif kicked the youth hard in the flanks in an effort to ingratiate himself and then signaled to some villagers to carry him to the back room. The villagers opened a path and a few people lifted him like a lifeless corpse and carried him to the back room. Putting a half-eaten plate of food and some bread beside him, they latched the door in his face, and then asked a blessing and re­ turned home for their own meals after the day's fast. Akhond Molla Abd-ol-latif stood there like the murderous villain, Hares, and his rabid eyes and veins popping out were those of a wolf whose prey had been taken from its mouth. He fixed his eyes on the door of the storeroom and clearly wanted to take a single great leap to the door, jerk the latch off, and get the prey into his clutches a second time, but he knew he didn't dare because of the extraordinary respect the villagers had for Mowlana and his status in their eyes. He thus suffered in silence and seethed in rage but was forced by his dignity not to reveal it. Having gone back to the sofreh, Mowlana was busy eating his meal after the fast. Cleverly reading the dkhond's ominous thoughts from his face, he began to act very kind and polite, "Your Honor, Akhond Molla Abd-ol-latif, why are you standing so far away? Why act like a stranger with us? God forbid, you don't consider us outsiders, do you? At least honor us by coming closer so that we may benefit from the dazzling grace of your brilliant presence. This business which Your Honor brought to light today in protecting the territory of Islam and supporting the Mohammadan law brings honor in the eyes

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of God and the Prophet not only to you but also to all the people of Falavarjan. Your reward will be with the Master of Muslim law. No, come even closer still. Close to me, please, still even closer. . . . " Akhond Molla Abd-ol-latif s mouth widened until it almost reached his ears from his extreme joy and pleasure. The aroma of praise and compliments coming to his nose seemed to make the world all his. His limbs started moving gradually and his eyes began sparkling with happiness. A jumble of words, "But you're too kind! What are you saying! You just want to embarrass me! I don't deserve all this! I'm your servant, praying for you! I'm a nothing who did his legal duty and no more . . . " poured out like wheat and barley chaff from under the millstones of his rotten teeth. Little by little, he came closer and sat facing Mowlana beside the sofreh. He attacked the high quality, long-grained rice and the chicken with walnuts and pomegranate juice in the way that dkhonds typically do, but he hadn't yet swallowed the first mouthful when Mowlana's voice rose anew, "Your Honor, Akhond Molla Abd-ol-latif, you've truly performed a miracle today. May the Lord assist you! But please, let's see what ideas you've been having about this evil and errant young fellow. You surely planned to punish him. That's just what he deserves, of course. But I want to know whether or not the legal stipulations have been put together for his case." On hearing these words with no detectable scent of good will, our skeykh,' whose crude and coarse, bearded and hairy exterior showed clearly that he was no more than a vat of ignorance and fanaticism and that he considered the profession of mullah and akhond as con­ sisting of nothing more than a turban domed like the mountain of Abu Qobeys and a sash of fifteen yards and a baggy redd and softsoled slippers, had a feeling in his bones that the wind was blowing the wrong way. If this line of questions kept up, his hand would be called and the evidence of his ignominiousness would be out in plain sight. He stammered a jumble of made-up words but immediately realized that he was failing disgracefully and rushed to say, "Yes, well, actually that's been skipped. I don't exactly remember them. I must go and look at the books. . . . " After a moment's reflection and deliberation, Mowlana pursued the conversation without paying attention to those words and said, "May God ruin the house of old age which itself has ruined my memory completely! Let's please see, Your Honor, Akhond Molla 1

In this paragraph, the author begins referring to the village akhond as sheykh-na ("our sheykh") paralleling the construction of mowla-nd (lit., "our master"), an ob­ vious irony given the contrasting characters of the two persons.

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Abd-ol-latif, in which of the fifty-two books of jurisprudence has the claim of significance about the legal punishment been expressed best and in the most detail? Also, in your opinion are the stipulations in this case in particular those prescribed in the case of adultery with a married woman or are those for slander and calumny valid or are there some other stipulations?" "And furthermore, sir, in your opinion should the sentence for apostate by nature be executed in this particular case or should it be the sentence for apostate by creed? Similarly, have you assessed whether the stipulations about apostasy for this errant youth are correct ac­ cording to legal regulations or not?" The individuals seated around the sofreh had all refrained from eat­ ing, waiting to see what answer our sheykh would give to these strange, unusual, and unheard-of questions. But like an ass stuck in the mud, our sheykh, with a plump chicken thigh in his hand and with his elegant beard in whose strands some rice grains like termites were playing acrobat, looked at Mowlana as bewildered as a mule looking at a blacksmith, and put on a pantomime, partly chewing as he said some words which could not be understood at all. " O f course," said Mowlana, "perhaps it's been erased from your mind and suspended, but supposing we came tomorrow and this young man repented, then could one render the verdict of al-ta'ib min al-danb ka-min la danb li-hu on his behalf or not?" 2 "Yes, what should I say? It's up to you, sir," said our sheykh. "It shall be done however you say, of course." Flaring up, Mowlana said, "What does 'it's up to you' mean in this case? It's not my ver­ dict that provides a valid basis for matters of Muslim law. You are the mullah of this community and I'm asking you how the legal verdict should be established in this case. And, furthermore, is the ruling ma anzala Allah for hadd or for ta 'zirV'3 At this point, Mowlana addressed those present at the party, " I ' m sure you'd like to know the difference between hadd and ta'zxr. Now His Honor, Akhond Molla Abd-ol-latif, will explain it for you." Losing his appetite completely, that poor akhond, with his mouth 2

Mowlana is saying in Arabic, "The repentant from the sin is like the one who has no sin." 3 The phrase is Arabic, meaning "which God has sent down"; hadd is a specified punishment for a specified violation of Islamic law. Violations include not only heresy but also drinking wine, slandering, gambling, theft, and various sexual transgressions; the punishments are generally flogging but may be mutilation or death. Ta'zir is punishment at the judge's discretion and is intended to reform the culprit and prevent him from relapsing; it includes public reprimand, banishment, confiscation of prop­ erty, imprisonment, and flogging; in the case of flogging, the number of lashes is generally less for ta 'zir than for hadd.

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open and his lips and mustache greasy, began clearing his throat as if he'd caught some food in it and he said, "Yes, yes . . . that's correct . . . jad . . . hadd . . . ta'ztr, the difference is that . . . yes, yes . . . hadd . . . " "It's just as you said yourself," said Mowlana. "You haven't kept up with things lately and may need to refer to some books. But before the legal ruling is carried out, one must rest assured about whether this young man is an apostate or an infidel and, if he should be an infidel, whether he is a dhimmi infidel or a harbi infidel. . . ." 4 The poor dkhond's eyes stood still and sweat broke out on his forehead and he began to stutter and clear his throat, and after swallowing his saliva several times, he said, "Yes, I studied all these problems earlier in the Jame'-e Abbdsi, but being so heavily involved, I've forgotten. It seems that the stipulations for the legal punishment in this case are that . . . that. . . . " Raising his voice some more, Mowlana attacked him, "Akhond Molla Abd-ol-latif, what are these repulsive words and feeble phrases coming out of your mouth? Aren't they damaging to you? But supposing that this disgraceful young man would tomorrow be in a position for challenge and debate with you and that he said he was predestined to become a Babi by the ruling of al-muqaddar kd'in and therefore had no sin or guilt, what answer would you give?" The headman and other guests seated around the sofreh all gave their complete attention to the discussion. The villagers had also returned, singly and in pairs, leaving their shoes at the threshold before entering the room. The more elderly sat cross-legged on the floor beyond the sofreh and the younger ones, leaning their backs on the niches in the wall and sinking their hands into their sashes, lined up politely all around the room. Because, like all ordinary men, they considered even being present at gatherings of erudite men and listening to erudite discussions a meritorious act, it seemed as if they were at a session of sermons or a ceremony of mourning as they listened with all respect to Mowlana's comments. The lips of our sheykh trembled like those of a man with a fever and the meaning of the words coming out of his lips was quite unintelligible. "Perhaps you don't basically understand the meaning of al-muqaddar kd'in," said Mowlana. "Could you tell us what it means then?" 4 The term dhimmi refers to free non-Muslim subjects, such as Christians and Jews, living in Muslim countries and enjoying protection and safety in return for paying the poll tax. The harbi are those with whom the Muslims should make war (harb); "infidel" here translates kdfir.

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Akhond Molla Abd-ol-latif, who still had that same grilled chicken thigh in his hand and whose beard moved like a feedbag tied on an ass's nose, said, "Well then, it's clear that kahin and kohneh are about the learned men of the Israelites and muqaddar has the meaning of the pronoun inside the verb maqdara. . . . " 5 Mowlana let out such a whoop of laughter that it spread to people at the party and volleys of laughter rose up on every side. The poor akhond caught himself and said, knitting his brows, "That's not funny!" Mowlana broke in, "What do you mean, that's not funny? It is funny, indeed it's very funny! You pious man who hasn't seen a mosque, what kind of foolish drivel are you giving us? It's clear your knowledge is even rustier than we'd imagined. Can you de­ scribe the afalu al-tafdil and the mushabba adjectives?"6 The akhond's mouth stayed open and gave no answer. "I'll give you the afalu al-tafdll and the mushabba adjectives as a present," said Mowlana. " N o w tell me, which arejarra particles?" 7 The akhond's mouth opened wider but still no answer was heard. "Just between us now," said Mowlana, "you're really carrying this a bit too far. What kind of a mullah are you then when you don't even know the jana particles! At least tell me how many sitta nouns there are." 8 Our sheykh's mouth opened as wide as it could but no answer came out even yet. Acting surprised, Mowlana said, "Alas, I'm ashamed of you! You don't even know that. My good man, the word gives you the answer and any child who has studied the grammars of Jorjani knows that. I'm afraid if I asked you what tense fasayakfkahumu Allah has, you wouldn't know that either. 9 Perhaps you don't know the basic dif5 The Arabic phrase in question means "predestined for the existent." To explain ka'in ("existent, being" with a root k-w-n), our sheykh introduces two words with an h in the middle and thus quite unrelated. His kahin can mean a fortuneteller or a priest, especially a Jewish priest, which seems to be what our sheykh has in mind; kohneh is a completely different word borrowed from Persian into Arabic. The best that can be said for our sheykh in the case of muqaddar and maqdar is that both have the root q-dr, the verb is qadara and pronouns have nothing to do with either of his words. 6 The afalu al-tafdll are verbal adjectives equivalent to comparatives and superlatives in English; the mushabba adjectives resemble participles. 7 The jdrra particles {hamfj are generally equivalent to English prepositions; just as educated English speakers would presumably know what prepositions are, so should the sheykh be expected to know the Arabic equivalents. 8 Mowlana is asking a question rather like "Who's buried in Grant's tomb?" since sitta is "six" in Arabic. 9 The second syllable (-sa-) of this quotation from the Qoran (11:137) identifies the verb tense as future, just as "will" does in the English translation: "but God will suffice thee as against them."

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ference between an infidel and an apostate. What kind of answer will you give God and the Prophet on the Day of Resurrection? Aren't you afraid of divine blame and punishment?" The dkhond's face turned pitch black and his nostrils narrowed and an icy smile like that of a corpse laid out on a plank in the mortuary was etched on his lips. Shaking all over, he said, "Why are you getting your noble self so irritated for no reason? Those aren't things worth talking about. AU right then, I'll go back a second time to review the things that have slipped my mind, just for your sake, sir, and they'll come back to m e . " Mowlana all at once blew up and yelled out, "What amazing nonsense you're talking! Everyone knows that a horse broken when it's old isn't good for anything but the Plain of Resurrection. For you with your dozen pounds of hairy beard, the time for going to school again is past. I'd imagined I was dealing with an educated person. I'd thought you were informed on jurisprudence and its fundamentals, at least to the extent necessary for ruling on ordinary Islamic legal affairs. Now I see I'm dealing with an ordinary illiterate pure and simple, one of those they say can't tell hirr from birr. You're really just an amazing fake and fraud and we didn't even know it. I'm afraid that if I asked why someone said 'Read!' instead of'Learn!' you still couldn't manage to come up with an answer. 10 Now you're getting your just deserts, being unmasked after you've been making asses out of good men. The more you beat about the bush, the more you tarnish your own reputation. You should be herding cows! What business do you have being in the mullah's profession? The existence of individuals like you is a disgrace to learning and a source of shame to learned people. Now then, I see it's my lawful duty not to let you deceive these Muslim people an hour longer. Get up as fast as you can and clear out of here completely! You and your wickedness had better pull out of here and go to whatever hell you want, or else immediately take off your turban and put a regular felt hat on instead and get busy farming in the fields like the others with a spade on your shoulder and sickle at your waist. Earn a little honest bread, so that perhaps the most merciful and compassionate Lord will overlook your sins." Our sheykh still wanted to repair and restore his affairs. He began to wag his tail and fawn and flatter, but Mowlana gave him no respite 10 The Persian imperatives, "Read!" (be-khan) and "Learn!" (be-dan) rhyme as do the preceding Arabic words (hirr and bin); Mowlana is thus doubting the ability of our sheykh to distinguish "cat" and "bat" equivalents in either Arabic or his native lan­ guage.

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and cut him down, saying, " N o more of your stupid gibberish! If you think you can pull the wool over my eyes with that song and dance and that hocus-pocus, you've got holes in your head. Stop meddling and get yourself out of my sight immediately, otherwise I'm afraid I'll show my other side and lose my self-control, God forbid, and in front of young and old of this village, I'll give you a handful of what's coming to you, and I'll tell them to toss you right out like a dead rat. Religious law is no laughing matter and I don't know how it ever happened to be arranged that the duties of mar­ riage and divorce and business transactions were administered by you. Our sheykh understood that this wasn't the place for whys and wherefores. With a world of regret, he put down the mentioned chicken thigh on the corner of a plate at his place at the sofreh and pulled himself together to get up and go, for some of those present were also without any preamble beginning to complain about his ability. "That guy," said one, "where's his education from? When my brother passed away, he couldn't even manage to divide up the inheritance." Another spoke up, "Every time I had doubts about my prayers and consulted this man, he gave such mixed up answers that if you threw them to the dogs, they wouldn't sniff at them." The headman revealed that our sheykh made no distinction at all between permitted and forbidden foods and that children who'd been going to school with him for even two years still couldn't manage to read n Ya Sin and Ar-rahman

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Anyhow, they emptied the long-standing grievances in their hearts onto the head of the dkhond and made him look like small change. All said unanimously that they would never again acknowledge such a man as mullah and then and there they got Mowlana to promise to send them a proper, god-fearing and pious mullah as soon as he returned to the city. Standing up, Akhond Molla Abd-ol-latif wrapped his aba around himself and had to keep his eyes fixed on the ground from shame as he left the party, hanging his head without a backward glance, like a tower of snake venom and the complete embodiment of ignominy and disgrace. As soon as that old dkhond had carried off his filthy presence, the party instantly took on hues of happiness, and like a tribe rid of demons of plague and pestilence, the company was now in good 11 These are the titles of two well-known Qoran chapters recited over graves; even illiterate Muslims would be expected to know at least some of their words by heart Qz-c).

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spirits with sweet and delightful conversations coming up on every subject. Changing both his tone and expression, Mowlana skillfully in­ quired in detail about the grain and crops and stock and herds of one after another of those present and pointed out practical and profitable methods for each. Meanwhile, at the host's signal, the sofieh had been taken up and wooden trays of sweets and fresh and dried fruit were brought and tea and water pipes were passed around. It was two hours after dark when Mowlana asked after prayers for a bed, apologizing for being tired. In the room where we'd been sitting, some appointees of the host spread out soft, warm, brandnew bedding, whose equal I'd never seen even in my father's house, and put a water jug at the head of each bed. Having begged and pleaded for a rendezvous before dawn, they then left us alone. Mowlana indeed looked tired, and as soon as he went to bed, he turned down the lamp, said good night, and hid his head under the quilt. But I had lain down on my own bed two or three yards beyond him and thoughts of the poor, unlucky youth lying in that deplorable condition in that prison corner and the memory of that undeserved slap on his face by Mowlana had completely driven sleep away. Although I rolled from side to side and forced my eyes closed with intense misery and tried by every possible trick and expedient to keep my runaway thoughts from straying, my efforts were useless and in vain. The pitiful form of that abandoned youth, with his bloody chops and wounded chest and eyes swollen half-shut materialized in my mind and the sinister sound of that undeserved slap echoed in my eardrums, making it impossible for me to rest or sleep. I felt as sorry for myself as I did for that maltreated youth. "You dumb kid," I said to myself regretfully, "you saw your hopes changed to despair all at once. You saw your castle of dreams turned upside down with one whack by a Zeyd on an Amr. You saw the wool that you'd spun with all that assurance turned just into selvage! You imagined that for once in your life you'd been in contact with someone worthy of the noble words 'human being' even in this inadequate world which encourages inadequacies. You found out how mistaken you'd been. You saw him take off the clothes of humanity as soon as that bestial nature possessed him and he took on in an instant the same color and character as that fiendish dkhond and his ignorant and simple-minded imitators." I realized thoroughly that not only had that cruel slap wounded the ear of the young man without aid or ally but it also

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had wounded the face of my hopes and desires and "ideal," to use a term of westernized Iranians, and the effects of all this would not be easily erased and made to vanish from my mind. I remembered how the sound of that slap tore my heartstrings and my heart began flap­ ping its wings inside my ribs like a sparrow captured in an eagle's talons. The sweat of shame settled on my forehead and I cursed my lack of determination and lectured myself, "You unprincipled cow­ ard! Why didn't you take steps to protect that youth and why did you just stand there watching those dastards, not opening your mouth?" These painful thoughts so tortured me that I was on the verge of going over and without scruples screaming at Mowlana and dragging him from his sleep and interrogating him, "You dissolute old man, why did you deceive me? Why did you trick me with such skill and cleverness? Why did you, like all people nowadays, behave that way with hypocrisy and duplicity, dissembling to me, a simple-minded youth who was devoted to you? I considered you my god and idol, and like an idolater who has witnessed with his own eyes the weak­ ness and impotence and incapabilities of his idol, I now lie writh­ ing in this strange bed with troubled mind and anxious thoughts and burning body. My mind's only relief is to curse you and your name and what it stands for, and that's enough. You mischief-making dkhond\ Although corruption and impurity have taken over this world from one end to the other, I was happy because I'd found one pure and noble being who himself was worth the world. It was this one single, perfect, and sufficient example that made life taste sweet to me and made me optimistic about life and the eternity of created beings. But ungallantly, you showed no pity for my inexperience and naivete, and with one motion of your hand you so shattered my world that it would be impossible for any power to cope with repairs and reconstruction of it." If it hadn't been so dark, I'd have somehow or other stolen out of the house that very night and taken myself to Isfahan and with the seed of malice toward this man sown in my heart, I'd have tried for the rest of my life to never again let my eyes fall on his and never again hear his name until the final hour. The greatest source of surprise was that this individual could have gone to sleep in complete peace just this side of that dark prison into which he'd thrown the hapless youth and, judging from his regular and steady breathing, he had no anxieties about these events. He'd still be deep in sleep if the world were deep in flood and would never

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bat an eye even if this forlorn and helpless youth died of thirst and hunger in that dark and narrow corner. Anyway, while these painful doubts like thousands of poisonous ants bedeviled my body and soul, driving me to the brink of the grave and stifling me until I was really afraid I'd go mad, I suddenly noticed the sound of Mowlana's measured breathing was interrupted. He rolled over and slowly got out of bed, stood up, and was busy at something in that mixture of light and darkness. Without letting him know that I was awake and witness to his actions, I kept sharp watch on his every movement. First, without any sound he tore from his sash a piece of cloth the size of a big napkin and then from some pastry trays put in niches high and low after the meeting broke up, he took some sweets, stuffed peaches, walnut meats, raisins, dried apricots, dried white mulberries, and mixed wheat and hemp seed, carefully poured them into the napkin, picked up the lamp, went on tiptoe up to the storage room, undid the latch, and entered. After a moment, he came out with the youth following him and a finger on his lips in a gesture of silence. In a gentle voice, he asked the youth, "What is your name?" "Your servant, Zabihollah," answered the youth. "My brother, Zabihollah," Mowlana rephrased. Then he asked, " D o you know the way to Isfahan?" " H o w would you expect me not to know that?" he replied. " D o you also know the way out of this house?" asked Mowlana. Surprised, the youth answered, "Yes, I know it." "Very good!" said Mowlana. "Take this napkin of food and scoot out of the house without any noise and try to somehow or other get to Isfahan by highways or byways. When you arrive there, go directly to the New Quarter and seek out the house of Mirza Aqa Khan Bangi, give him my greetings, and say that Abdol-hadi said that the password is that he and I fixed a vegetable stew right there and I told his fortune from a volume of Hafez. Also tell him I said that he should take care of you until I return to Isfahan and take you over myself." The poor youth stood amazed and dumbfounded, not understand­ ing whether Mowlana fancied a joke on him and wanted to tease him or whether he actually intended to save him. Meanwhile Mowlana reached in his breast pocket, took out some money, put it in the young man's hand, and said, "What are you waiting for? Run away quickly so that you'll reach the city before it's light; otherwise it is possible that in your condition, you may again get involved in some problem with new headaches." Then I heard Mowlana ask, "Why did you become a Babi and eat during the fast?" "Come on now, grandfather, what would I know

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about who's a Babi," he said, "and what kind of talk is that? I've had a stomachache for two whole years now and if I don't eat at least a bit of bread every two hours when my stomach is empty, the ache is such torture that I almost die." "In that case," said Mowlana, "why weren't you ready to curse anyone who's a Babi and why did you endanger yourself that way?" "I'll be perfectly frank with you," he said, "I hate this Molla Abd-ol-latif so much that I never want to see him alive. Even if I were dying of thirst, I wouldn't be willing to drink a drop of water from his hands. If he says it's night, I'll say it's day, and when he saw I wasn't ready to curse for no reason one of God's people, someone I didn't know and hadn't seen and so I wouldn't honestly know whether the curses were right or wrong, then he put me down on his list and when he didn't get any satisfac­ tion out of me, although he well knew that I was a hundred times more a Muslim than himself, he played this trick on m e . " Just then the youth's eyes fell on the jug of water. Picking it up, he raised it to his lips quite greedily and for a while there was loud glugging, but at length Mowlana restrained him. "More than that will hurt you, my son," he said, and taking the jug from the youth's hand, he led him to the door and said, " N o w may the hand of God be your companion! Go, with the protection of Nourisher. We'll rendezvous quite soon in Isfahan." The youth with bundle in hand was intending to leave the room when Mowlana restrained him and said, "Zabihollah, any time you also want to clear up our account, I won't object." Pausing, Zabihollah said, "What account?" Putting his hand on his own face, Mowlana said, "This afternoon I gave you a slap on the face without reason which you have the right to return. Here you are and here's my face." Choking with tears on hearing these words, Zabihollah bent down to kiss Mowlana's hand, saying, "God forbid!" but Mowlana drew his hand back and gave the youth's face many kisses, saying, " N o w hurry and make your escape, for the time is short and the night watch is asleep and the road is long." Zabihollah vanished in the darkness and when Mowlana had made sure that the fellow had escaped from danger, he tiptoed to his bed, put the lamp back at its head, and lay down. Silence enveloped the room and soon there again rose the sound of regular breathing which is the sign of a happy and peaceful sleep of an undisturbed mind. As if a millstone on my heart had suddenly been removed, I was revived. I drew a long, deep breath, delighted that my imaginings had all proved false and unfounded and thanking Providence with

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immense rejoicing. At that moment, I happened to remember Mowlana's promise to the village people and I said to myself, "Tomorrow we'll have to see how Mowlana answers the crowd that will un­ doubtedly collect at this house. They'll be all in a lather by then with hopes of watching this young man being lashed and I'll see how Mowlana smooths things over to make up for tonight's deception." Since I was sure he could manage that problem too with skill and dexterity, I didn't give way to pointless apprehensions. Relying on God, I closed my eyes tightly and the sleep which had flown from my head returned ever so quietly, flapping its wings like a tame little bird. I wish all my friends could have seen how very quickly I sank into sleep's caresses and how sweet and delicious were my dreams.

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The villagers were informed the next day that the fellow had es­ caped during the night so that any hope of finding him again had vanished. After Mowlana had shown great regret and expressed con­ siderable ill-humor, he said, "God will clear accounts with him Him­ self." When we returned to the city, Mowlana said apologetically, " M y friend, the truth is that I have the habit of taking a vacation for a day or two once or twice a year. I therefore entrust you to God for today and tomorrow and hope you'll also take advantage of this favor forced on you and rid yourself of some fatigues from this period we've been together. It's just like when the maktabs and madresehs close for the children to relax and have a vacation. When I take off, I turn into a hermit somewhere outside the city in a faraway, secluded, empty place, if the weather's suitable. If not, I close the door to friends and strangers and try to become somewhat closer to God and better ac­ quainted with Him and myself right in a corner of this room." Surprised, I asked, "What do you do during that period? Are you engaged in worship and devotions?" "Call it whatever you like," he said. " I f I were a gnostic, I'd an­ ust swer, ' J my heart and I know what I do,' but since I've never had such pretentions, I'll say quite frankly that after ablutions and purifications, I stretch out on the earth, face up with both hands under my head and close my eyes. Managing with the least possible, I try as hard as I can to close the shutters of my mind and heart on every thought and idea and to avail my body and soul of peace and calm as completely as possible."

A pious man came to the college from the monastery. He broke the vow of silence of his order. "What difference would there be," I said, "between monks and scholars That you chose this order over that?" "The former pulls his own rugs out of the water," he said, "And the latter tries to catch the drowning man." Sa'di, The Rose Garden

PART II *

Return to the Original or Solving the Problems

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In short,

CHAPTER 1 Λ

j rr,,

^

And They re Cut

I passed

twenty-three

whole months with such a man and

r

from

, truly

enjoyed

m y life

Each o f

God's days arrived from the fra­ grant garden of mercy with fresh fruit and delicacies fresher than fresh and each hour my devotion to Mowlana and my faith in him and my affection for him increased. I've recounted briefly for you a description of some scenes from the first days of my acquaintance with Mowlana. That handful is but a sample from a donkeyload and you may infer the remainder your­ self by analogy. Early most mornings he was present at my pillow, waking me from sleep with an appropriate verse. My eyes would open on the luminous countenance of that enlightened old man whose speech was in fact entirely invocations to God and whose silence was all thought and whose gaze was altogether simply exemplary. Then we began anew those fresh, surprising, and unusual journeys and travel of which each portion and particle would serve as a lesson and a source of wonder not only for me but also for most people of this country. One afternoon at the end of spring, I was busy drinking tea at the hour of sunset, sitting with Mowlana on the porch of my cell, when the heads of two people suddenly appeared in the distance and they were apparently searching for me. When they came closer, I saw it was my brother and Khodadad, one of my father's ancient, trusted servants. the Same Cloth

. . .

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During this two-year period when I hadn't seen him at all, my brother had become more of a wreck than I would have expected. Some of his hair had fallen out and what remained was mostly pep­ per-and-salt. Although his eyes raced with the same old mischief and gave evidence of love and loyalty, he'd picked up a network of wrin­ kles, giving his features a look of particular grief and sorrow. His complexion was slightly wan, like that of a man who has just gotten up after an illness, and his lips seemed thinner and paler than for­ merly. On the whole, I felt an unreasoning pity at the sight of his countenance and it seemed to me that time had shattered his vim and vigor. Without saying even a word, we fell into each other's arms and kissed each other thoroughly for a while. Then taking his hand, I drew him toward Mowlana and said, "Come, so I may show you my spiritual father and the pir of the order and my own true director and morshed and master." Mowlana said with a series of smiles, "May God protect you! God bestowed you two brothers to one another!" Then turning to me, he said, "You were always saying that you don't take after your brother. Now I see that you resemble your brother a great deal." "Come on, grandfather," I said, "where's the resemblance be­ tween us? AIi Aqa is fat and I'm thin, his complexion's black and mine's a wheat color. My hair is straight and his is curly." "True resemblance isn't in such things," he said. "It's in the gaze, the smile, the face's lights and shadows, the voice's accent and into­ nation, the way of speaking and listening, the gestures and pauses and eyebrow signals, the turning of the eyes, and the manner of denial and assent, and in all those respects, you two individuals truly are like two halves of an apple." AIi Aqa sat next to me at the edge of the porch and Khodadad stood facing him, arms on his chest, several paces beyond. With my own hands I put a tumbler of strong, hot tea in front of my brother and gradually the conversation blossomed. The sound of laughter and conversation blended into a song with the wholesome sound of the samovar, and inhibitions quickly stepped aside and a world of very natural concord and togetherness entered. Lighting a cigarette, I handed it to AIi Aqa and said, "Brother dear, how did you happen to remember these poor fakirs all of a sudden this way without any advance notice? I'd imagined that you'd been upset by your unworthy brother's craziness and had crossed him off and were pretending not to know him!" " H o w can you say that?" he said. " N o w you want to beat me on the head with it! You yourself know how attached I am to you. As

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God is the witness, I've wanted every day to come and ask about you but involvements on the one hand and dissipation and indolence on the other have prevented it. Every time I decided to drop in on you—and how can I hide that I'm ashamed—this fickle heart would come up with some new pranks and mischief for me and lay some other desires and distractions in front of me. The days and months passed like lightning and having said today and tomorrow so often, the truth is that every time I thought about you, I was embarrassed about myself." "Then how did you happen to pass through these parts today?" I asked. "Actually," he said, "a group of us who are friends agreed to have a good time together for several days in a garden right around here and we closed the door on family and outsiders. We had gath­ ered together as completely as possible all the things necessary for feasting and drinking and weren't a bit short of anything. It went so well that we thought we would send out for some more provisions so that we needn't set foot out of there until the end of the week. But suddenly without warning this afternoon, as if they'd passed me a bowl of purging cassia, I, who had for years had no other business than fun and feasting and song and dance and sleep and drink, was all at once so revolted by the sight of these repulsive circumstances and these dissipated partners that I actually gagged and almost vom­ ited. Without letting anyone know, I instructed Khodadad to get our mounts ready and we set out. All at once, just as I came in front of this school, I thought of you and wanted to drop by and see how you were and how life's been treating you." "Welcome!" I said. "It's a pleasure to have you! I'm happier to see you than you would imagine! You yourself well know that I'm not a dried-up saint and my motto has always been and still is the Hafez couplet: The prayer beads of the sheykh and the cloak of the winedrinking rend, Go neck and neck, I fear, on the Day of Resurrection." "Therefore I rejoice at this revolutionary change which has come over you and the good news about you which you yourself have given. I'm sure a new, blessed and auspicious era has begun for you today which will undoubtedly be to your welfare and benefit." With his eyes fixed on the dome, my brother puffed on his ciga­ rette and didn't introduce speech to his lips at all. It was nearly sunset and the yellow sun falling on the gold and lemon yellow background of the school's tilework had turned the School of the Four Gardens

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into a golden goblet dropped into a spring of light. The trees' leafbuds exactly recalled bits of emeralds masterfully set one by one in the tips of the branches. The air was so pure and clear and transparent and fragrant and mild that it seemed in fact that a piece of the Garden of Paradise had been dug up and had fallen to earth beside this Av­ enue of the Four Gardens. AIi AqS inhaled deeply and then threw the cigarette butt to the ground. He busied himself stamping it out as if wanting to crush the sorrow and grief of the world underfoot and a long, lengthy sigh escaped from the depths of his chest. Surprised, Mowlana said, "My dear sir, may I be the sacrifice for your heart full of pain! What kind of sigh is that? It's been a while since I've even heard a sigh so full of pain." Laughing to confuse the issue, I asked, "So are there various kinds of sighs, Mowlana?" " O f course!" he said. "The problem of sighs is very curious and we have thousands of kinds. Just as someone automatically says 'Ouch!' if a stone hits his head without warning, similarly on hundreds and thousands of different occasions, some air involuntarily and uninten­ tionally curls up in his chest, and his stomach goes in a little, and then out from his throat escapes this unvoiced sound called a sigh. It's exactly like a bird that's been imprisoned in a cage in the chest and has now found a hole and throws itself out to the world of freedom, flapping its wings. There are no outward distinctions be­ tween sighs, but each in fact has some different qualities or charac­ teristics. There is a great deal of difference between the sigh of rue and the sigh of regret and the sigh of misery and the sigh of hope and the sigh of despair and the sigh of reminiscence and remem­ brance. For example, the sigh of sorrow usually escapes from someone's chest without a bystander being aware or conscious that some hope has been buried. It is a sigh reducible to the adjective 'burning' and it usually comes out from your chest when you are smiling in a club or meeting where all are talking and laughing frivolously. They imagine that you, like they, have no grief or sorrow whatsoever in your heart, and because you also would not decrease your friends' enjoyment, you laugh and talk despite the burden of sorrow bursting your chest. But nevertheless the noise level of the party drops little by little for no reason and the participants are enveloped in grief and sorrow and those who are more sensitive feel sympathetic and then mournful songs and ballads telling of separation and bereavement begin and by stages the lively party changes into one of silence and sorrow. That's when the path opens from the chest and the burning

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sigh comes out. One of its main effects is to comfort, heal, and quiet; you could say the human heart goes straight to the shrine of hidden hopes and with its own tears waters the grave of a buried beloved. The sighs that then spring out from the heart are in fact steam from the erupting tears of soul and spirit, and for that very reason, the sigh of grief and sorrow can also be called the sigh of consolation. By the same analogy, each sigh has a particular sphere and qualities which 'would take an epic poem of three hundred pounds of paper if I wanted to describe them.' "* Raising his head, AIi Aqa said, "Really, you understand exactly! My pain-filled heart is so overflowing with rue and regret that I sometimes feel it will burst. For several consecutive years now I have had no activities other than finding amusement and entertainment and having a good time. My days and nights have passed with music and song and laughter and jokes and wine and kebabs and other necessities for banquets and drinking bouts. I had available whatever was needed in the way of health and youth and strength and money and wealth and respect and friends and companions and sweethearts and girlfriends of every kind to indulge in pleasure. It's no secret from you that I gave myself completely and without restraint to vo­ luptuous self-indulgence. Yet seated here today in the presence of Your Excellency, I see myself as useless refuse, like an almond with its oil removed and not worth a penny, and on these spring days when all the world has found new life and each plant and shrub has greened and blossomed, capturing the world with its perfume and refreshing the spirit with its beauty and freshness, I consider myself as chaff or as rotten logs not useful even in the fireplace. Over these several years I've changed sweethearts a hundred times, thinking each time that I'd then arrived at the object of my desires and caught hold of health and prosperity but in a couple of days more I'd see that I'd made a mistake again and it was the same soup and the same bowl again, a mind full of boredom and a hollow heart full of pain, a cage whose bird has flown and a faded, half-putrid bud that had never experienced its own fragrant perfume." Shaking his head, Mowlana said, "Then may I be the sacrifice for your heart full of pain! My good man, why are you bawling like the mother of a dead child? It's clear that you're sated with pleasure. Put aside your airs and affectations and cast your eyes about you now ' This is a variant of a Rumi couplet: If I want to describe that, it would be boundless; It would be an epic poem of some four hundred pounds of paper. (gar be-guyam vasf-e an bi-hadd shavad, masnavi-ye hafidd man kagaz shavad) (Jz-c).

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"My days and nights have passed with music and song and laughter and jokes and wine and kebabs and other necessities . . . "

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that the hand of destiny has reined you toward this sacred space. See what a Place of Judgment has been constructed by the heartbreakingly beautiful spring and the magician nature." My brother and I both raised our heads and occupied ourselves with watching the spectacle of the flirtatious frolicking of spring. The weather was so lively, gay, and intoxicating that it truly tickled your heart. In that evening hour when it seemed that a gentle breeze from an angel's wing touched our faces, from far and near snatches of the grave and patient song of the people of Isfahan could be heard across the distance as if from a thousand compartments of a traveling case with the regrets and delights and desires and passions and griefs and sorrows sleeping deep in the chests of everyone in the human race.

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The brilliance of the saffron sun had fallen on the eastern part of the school and was reflected back on the courtyard and shabestdn, on the tanks and canals, and on the paving, trees, and lawn, bringing into existence a world as wonderful and rapturous as that seen in dreams and fantasies and making one think it was turquoise and azure and topaz and lapis lazuli and a thousand rare and novel jewels of every kind all over. Drawing anew a long, deep sigh, All Aqa said, "Brother, you're really quite a rend. We thought you'd turned your back on the world and what's in it and had retired to be a hermit. Now I see that, on the contrary, you have pulled the wool right over our eyes and with skill and agility have cast yourself out of that loathsome hole of fears which we name life and revelry and have come to dwell in a climate of unmatched beauty and goodness, cheek to cheek with the inti­ mates of the sacred world and recluses in secret solitude, sharing the cage and the seeds of the birds of the garden of heaven." I wanted to say, "Brother dear, have you forgotten that you once ridiculed all this talk and called me crazy?" but Mowlana didn't give me time and interpreted what was in my mind, "Haji's boy, I'd heard that you considered this sort of discussion a lot of poppycock and laughed in your beard at those who dealt with books and gnosticism and that sort of thing, but now I see that you've outdone us all and are discussing heavenly realms and the world of Barahut. 2 I'd very much like to know the secret of this revolutionary change." Shocked like someone slapped in the face, my brother fixed his eyes on Mowlana's and began to speak very slowly in the beginning but gradually with speed and haste like someone afraid he'd reach his final breath with the words in his heart left unsaid, "Your Excel­ lency, Honored Mowlana, you yourself are learned and know better than anyone that there exist in this world some states and conditions which may be easier to feel than to describe or to explain in terms of reason and cause. You should at least know that the fundamental cause of this transformation and change arising in me is, in two phrases, disillusionment with the world, and surfeit and disgust with what's in it." With one of his meaningful smiles, Mowlana said, " M y distin­ guished friend, a person disillusioned by the world is one who's had expectations about it. I want to know what your heart wanted from the world. You were a person who had apparently only adored and worshipped feasting and drinking and carousing and sleeping and 2

Barahut is a nonexistent and fictitious world of vanished people (Jz-c).

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now suddenly, like a man flying up from sleep, you believe your eyes are opened and you say you are disillusioned by everything and bored and disgusted by everyone." Shaking his head, AIi Aqa said, " H o w do you expect me to know what my heart wants? What I want doesn't have a name in Persian or in any other language either. You ask what my heart wants. What could I say that would be onehundredth of what's in my heart! Please believe that, 1 carry five hundred thirsts in my heart, Combined with each thirst, the hunger of a cow. 3 11:161

My fatigue from wandering and being of two minds, and ten minds, and a hundred minds, is boundless and unlimited, and at present I long to be single-minded or even mindless. If you only knew how much my heart wants to be able to say what I want, but can't with this language and rhetoric. I just know that: 1 am resolved on beauty everlasting; I am disgusted by prettiness not everlasting. Wherever I've turned in this dark and narrow world, I've beat my head on the wall, and now in this cage without holes or air, I'm so short of breath that I'm about to choke. Every moment I strongly feel that 'The desert's vastness is not so extensive as my flight,' and I long for free, open space, unenclosed by walls and with no ceiling to intervene between the eye and endless heavens. I've tired of my lack of direction and dream of the vastness of a nonexistent land. My chest is bursting with longing: How long will my hand be the comb for disheveled locks? How long will desire be prisoner in my chest? I'm disgusted with the confines of this existence and quickly coming to its end in any direction I go. I want something that thousands of miserable wanderers like myself have been, and still are, running after uselessly for thousands of years. What I want is essentially be­ yond this world; it's something with no flesh or fat to rot, no bone to turn to dust, no body to cease existing, and no soul whose per­ manence or transience is still unknown. You ask whom I seek? I seek someone free of the bonds and fetters of childhood, old age, and adolescence, not bound in servitude to his belly and below, and with his body not pierced with holes like a sieve by nature's hand for his 3 The couplet is from The Masnavi by Rumi; the verses following it advise not seeking the water but controlling the thirst, for after that water will bubble up above and below the seeker (Jz-c).

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needs in eating, eliminating, talking, and listening. I seek someone who would not be a walking cesspool or a talking dunghill, someone not a warehouse of hair and grease nor a bearer of filth and nastiness, someone who doesn't split like stone, rot like plants, or like a corpse spend half his life between the filth-filled sackcloth of the mattress and the soiled cotton of the quilt, grunting and puffing and snoring under the guise of sleep. I seek someone who knows who he is and understands what he is and where he's come from and where he's going and what he's doing and what he should do to be aware and informed. I seek someone who has jumped from the state of hows and whys, leapt the bridge of yea and nay and good and bad, and closed the shutters of his mind to both reason and sentiment, some­ one who doesn't lose his color and fragrance with the advent of spring and doesn't wither with the coming of summer and doesn't fade with autumn and doesn't die with winter. I seek someone freed from the confines of nothingness and from the bounds of weight and time and quantity and quality, who has become pure spirit and sheer life and unadulterated perfume and a flawless, undeceiving melody eter­ nal. . . . " If Mowlana hadn't turned him off, I suspect he would have rattled on, but cutting the thread of his statements right there, he said, "Good, good! 'What things are in the head of this mere drop with absurd visions!' as Hafez said. Be a real man, then, and say for once like a child of man, 'I'm seeking God,' and give me some peace!" Objecting, AIi Aqa said, "Never, never! As soon as you put a name on it, it depreciates in my eyes, whatever the name may be. I seek something that doesn't take a name and I sense full well that if you put a name on it so that it falls into the mouths of the riffraff, then it can't touch my pain at all." With his lower lip stuck out in surprise, Mowlana said, "Glory be to God! Truly, the paths to God are as many as the souls of the created. When you two brothers separated, you imagined your waters ran in different channels, but after two years, it is clear today that each has pursued a single and unique goal by a separate road. I re­ member well that two years ago when this Javad Aqa here came to this place for the first time, he wanted to be the crown on our heads and our close friend and companion. One day when I happened to ask him why he wanted to cut himself off from his friends and family and to become a hermit, his answer so closely resembled yours just now that one could undoubtedly swear that both had been cast in the same mold. It is now clear as day for me that the difference between you two has been entirely external and both of you have been on the

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track of a single hope, except that the older brother set out on the path of the tavern and wine-shop and the younger by way of the school and monastery. In fact, as most often turns out, there's no basic difference and all the dispute has been only verbal, concerning path and procedure and course of conduct, and nothing else. In the words of Besmel of Shiraz a century ago, The story of love would be nought but a fable; Each person tells the fable another way."

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"Today the eyes and ears of you two brothers have been opened and you have come to your senses so that you see that all your ar­ guments and fights have been pointless and your quarrels have been over enab and angur.4 There isn't so much difference between the monastery and the tavern, and when two people separate from each other and one goes west and the other goes east on the face of this sphere of earth, they will of necessity finally meet one day, somewhere or other. How well the poet, Sa'eb, has said: Discussion of nonbelief and faith lead in the end to one point; A dream is a dream, but interpretations, diverse." Interrupting Mowlana's conversation, AIi Aqa said, "Very good, wonderful poetry, full of substance! Would you permit me to make a note of it?" " O u r poets and great men have spoken in this vein in a hundred ways," said Mowlana. "Sa'eb said similar things elsewhere and Niyaz of Shiraz said in the last century, They face the goal from the cloister and the forbidden, The ascetic by one road, the tavern elder by another. And someone else again has said, The roads toward the Kaaba are many, I go by sea, you by land.

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And the Arabs have said in Arabic, 'Our explanations are diverse and Thy beauty unique.' " As soon as AIi Aqa was free from note-taking, instead of respond­ ing to his repeated plaudits, Mowlana said, "So since that's how it is, do you think it's appropriate to remake the fire in this samovar and to wet our throats with a glass or two of proper tea again to the success of this lucky day?" 4 The words, enab and angur, both mean "grape," but are of Arabic and Persian origin, respectively.

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Starting to speak contentiously at this point, AIi Aqa said, "On the matter of tea, I'm in complete agreement with Your Excellency, especially since you'll have to excuse me, an unacquainted guest, from starting the samovar fire. I'm sure that, with Javad Aqa's hospitality and precedents in this matter, he'll kindly consent to taking this trouble on top of all the others that he has so far experienced in regard to his degenerate brother. I seriously have something to say, however, on the matter of Your Excellency not wanting to accept a difference between my angelic, flawless brother and myself, a disgraceful sinner full of faults. You yourself will surely acknowledge that it isn't fair for all my excesses and debauchery and fornication and transgressions to be equal and equivalent to Javad Aqa's life of abstinence and obedience at the judgment of the world and the calling to account of the Nourisher." Mowlana replied, "Of course, the beliefs and ideas of an ignorant and unseeing man like me are not an anchor for confidence, but hasn't the Invisible Tongue, Hafez, whom we call the Knower of Every Mystery said, Come, for the luster of this workhouse doesn't lessen With abstinence like yours or with debauchery like mine."

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"Sound reasoning also dictates that just as Hafez has said, 'The beauty of the Friend is able to dispense with our imperfect love,' the shortfalls in word and deed of us humble creatures should not be considered much of an interference in the workshop of the Unity, for isn't there a phrase in the Qoran like 'Surely Allah is able to dispense with those of the world,' which is included among the distinguishing characteristics of Him?" Both AIi Aqa and I raised our voices in objection, "Honored Mowlana, then where does divine justice go? What difference is left between good and bad?" Mowlana silenced us with a gesture of his hands and said, "There is no doubt that justice and discrimination between good and bad do mark the highest degree of human nobility of character but it must not be forgotten that our conversation was about man and not about his Creator. We wanted to briefly take a few steps upward, just for fun, to cross the bridge in that direction and see how things are there. Now permit me to give you an example as an illustration and then I'll ask for a prayer and adjourn the meeting. You have of course noticed the mushrooms, some deadly poisonous and others edible and wholesome, which grow in the thickets at the edge of the Zayandeh River. Now supposing one day all those mushrooms, poisonous or not, were fit to eat. This would undoubtedly be of great

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importance for those who pick them and make kebabs and eat and enjoy them with all appetite, but do you imagine that it would also have the same importance for the Creator of heaven and earth? I personally am of the same belief as our Sheykh Sa'di, who said, What grief has the breeze if the lamp dies And what grief has the moonlight if the linen rots? 5 and similarly said elsewhere, What sorrows does the angel who is agent of wind's treasury Feel about an old woman's lamp dying?"

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"But wouldn't it be basically better not to give ourselves headaches with these intricate and complicated problems and to end the discus­ sion by acknowledging that in actuality AIi Aqa and Javad Aqa are cut from the same cloth, as I have said, and since both are seekers of the mystery and travelers on the path of need, there's no difference between them in the eyes of the Nourisher. Both deserve teaching and forgiveness and my intentions in regard to them and my attach­ ment to them must also be alike and equal." My brother and I said, "Amen!" in unison and we only then noticed that it had gradually gotten dark and we still hadn't lit the lamp.

O Lord, make me die with the faith of the common people! [Akhond Molla AIi Nuri]

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It was one of those incomparable nights which God seems to have bestowed exclusively on the city of Isfahan, and like the perfume of the Mohammadi rose and the in­ toxication of Khollar wine and love's first kiss, any description of it is unrewarding. We three spontaneously raised our heads toward the sky and gazed at the indigo ceiling of the spheres. Like a fisherman's hook on the breast of the ocean sky, the crescent moon was visible above the dome and minarets of the school, and as fish greedy for bait bring their round mouths out of the water, the thousands upon thousands of bright stars were gathered all around it. If it hadn't meanwhile become somewhat chilly, we'd never have quit the joy and delight of just sitting in the moonlight, looking CHAPTER 2 Τ/Γ/· . _, -f Reason

5

Popular belief holds that light rots linen (Jz-c).

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silently at the skies, but I can't conceal that little by little the plain grew colder and colder and, like it or not, we were forced to draw jug and brazier inside the cell. I wanted to bring the gentlemen to my own cell, but Mowlana 11:169 wouldn't accept that and said, "It's not bad for your brother to see his well-wisher's house of sadness. 'If the cottage seems humble and dark, I'll seat you with the bright light of my eyes.' Awakening Khodadad, who had fallen asleep happily at the foot of a tree with his pipe in his mouth, AIi Aqa said, "Khodadad, I want to sleep right here tonight, with the permission of His Honor, Mowlana. I therefore beg you to go straight to my house and bring me a set of bedding as quickly as possible and, while you're at it, also see what's been prepared in the women's quarters for supper and bring us two or three dishes of that too." Addressing my brother, Mowlana said, "You're too kind! I have no objection to the bedding, but now that you're becoming a dervish and you want to be a close friend sitting cheek to cheek with the poor and penniless for a night, it would be better to also share their table and taste their bread and salt. Besides, tonight there happens to be a special treat for us since I've instructed the servant, Karbala'i Qorban, to put some cooked rice with vetch seeds on the fire for us and to fold in as much lamb and raisins and dates as there is room. If that doesn't suit your noble nature, however, the shops are still open. Please say what you'd like and we'll supply it." On hearing rice with vetch seeds, my brother began singing its praises and said, "Javad Aqa is the witness that from childhood, I have preferred that food to any other, especially when raisins and dates and lamb, peace upon them, have doubled its virtues." After supper, we three sat up until nearly dawn in a corner of 11:170 Mowlana's cell, nibbling on dried fruit and nuts, which the Isfahanis call chalsemeh, and having sweet conversations to the pleasing song of the samovar and the cheery gurgle of the hookah with its twisted tube. Appearing especially to enjoy seeing my brother and me together, Mowlana was in totally high spirits and our conversation with him was actually more intoxicating to our mouths than any wine and more caressing to our ears than any song. His explanations and dis­ cussion with all the appropriate couplets and the choicest poetry and the meaningful proverbs and precepts which he continually cited were like pure and limpid water flowing gently in a ruby and crystal stream, constantly bringing along fragrant and colorful flower petals. Like dry earth onto which some rain has fallen after years of drought,

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AIi Aqa was, as Isfahanis say, "a wild beast freed" by this nightlife filled with gaiety and by Mowlana's kindness and sincere and guile­ less actions and pure and candid talk. My brother talked and laughed spontaneously and with no shame or respect, he blasted Mowlana with questions continually, asking strange and amazing things like a child. After some really silly nonsense, he suddenly put his tumbler on the ground and asked, "Your Honor, Mowlana, what is God?" Showing no sign of surprise at all, as if he'd just been asked how yoghurt tastes, Mowlana puffed more steadily on the hookah and answered, "Every schoolchild knows that. There's no need to ask." Undismayed, my brother said, "I know I'm very raw and igno­ rant, but I beg you not to poke fun at me any more. Please get down to the bare essentials and let me see what you believe on this subject, sir!" " M y boy," said Mowlana, "the beliefs of the man on the street don't inspire much confidence and never have. If you go from east to west and north to south, you'll hear no new answers on this sub­ ject. They just say the same thing they always have." Becoming increasingly obstinate, my brother persisted, "Despite all that, I still very much want to know what you personally think on this subject, sir!" With that smile exclusively his, Mowlana said, "It's clear you want to poke fun at me, my friend! When would the mosquito know how long this garden's existed? He's born in the spring and dead in December. These statements require a mouth wider than the sky and, confiden­ tially, this prying is unbecoming to us, the blind and deaf, and Since the veil has not been pulled off the Beloved's face, Why does everyone tell stories with imagination?"

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Entering into the conversation at this point, I said, "Your Honor, Mowlana, it's clear you don't know my brother. He's crafty and cunning and not put off the field with one word. He's dug in his heels now and firmly resolved to know God here and now, in one puff of a cigarette and one swig of tea. It's inconceivable that you'll be able to free your collar from his clutches and it would be better to give him an answer to his question somehow." "So Auntie Longneck is putting her foot in too!" said Mowlana, comparing me to the camel in children's stories. " N o w of course I must scrape up some description of God but you must first accept two stipulations. First, you won't say it's just typical of me, and

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second, if there is something in my rigamarole you don't grasp, you won't ask for explanations. That would only increase my disgrace, since I may not rightly know the meaning of what I say and won't be able to explain it either." We agreed to the stipulations and Mowlana described God, "God is the law of laws of existence and nonexistence and a law having no legislator or interpreter. Now then, if you don't understand, it has nothing to do with my disgraceful self." Like a camel given some iron scraps instead of food, my brother first ruminated a while on these complicated sentences, and as soon as he realized that they weren't made for his teeth and stomach, rather than pursuing it excessively, he instantly flew as usual to another branch of the subject. Still besieging Mowlana, he asked with no shame or inhibitions whatsoever, "Please tell me what faith and creed Your Excellency has." I wanted to jump in and shut AIi Aqa's trap and to apologize for his impudence and to make him understand that he'd stepped out of bounds, but giving no pause, Mowlana said with his customary smile worth the world, "The truth is that if it were somewhat darker here and the perfume of spring weren't sweeping along our trail with each wisp of breeze, these intricate questions might make me imagine that it's my first night in the tomb and I've encountered the two Angels of Death, Monkar and Nakir, who question the dead in their tombs about their faith. May God grant that I get along as easily with them as I do with you!" Then turning to AIi Aqa, he said, "You ask what my religion and creed are. Your questions now make a time mate­ rialize before my eyes when I was still a young man of not more than twenty-six. In the height of intoxication of ignorance and youth, I'd set out walking barefoot and penniless from Isfahan toward Hamadan for a pilgrimage to the tomb of the eleventh-century Sufi mystic, Baba Taher, accompanied by a young man from Khunsar with mystical tendencies. It was a night when moonlight took over the world, and setting out toward the plains and desert, just the two of us, my friend and I proceeded while talking about every subject. Suddenly in the midst of conversation, my friend slackened his pace, stared into my eyes, and asked me the same question that you just did. As though it were only yesterday, I recall quite precisely that 1 threw the battleaxe from my hand into the air with all my strength and pride of youth, said Ό God!' from deep down, and quoted, Ό my heart, the one in love has no creed but abandoning creeds.' Then like an athlete standing up to wrestle, I threw out my chest, braced

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my arms, planted my feet front and back, and conceitedly recited this couplet as an answer, When would I worship the idol of others Since I first broke my own? Looking at me in amazement, my friend asked, 'Then what do you say about the prophets and apostles?' Raising my voice a note higher, I started reciting with much fanfare and flourish: If any heart heard hidden revelation, When did those words and sounds come into existence, For those words and sounds, O bosom friend, Would be thorn, all thorn, with the one who's arrived.

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Even today, if fate hadn't beaten my head on the stones a thousand times and if my hair weren't white and if I still had strength to fuss and fume and rant and rave, perhaps I'd answer you with those same verses too, but no—'The pitcher broke and the cup spilt.' I haven't the daring and presumption anymore now for such officious pro­ nouncements and I therefore make matters easy for myself and am answering you, sir, by saying with complete simplicity and utmost humility and candor that I am a Muslim and a Shia of the Twelvers, and now with one foot in the grave, I leave high-flown talk to the young. Like one of our great men in religion and those of insight with our customs, I too raise my hands in supplication to the divine court and say, Ό Lord, make me also die with the faith and belief of the common people.' " Before Mowlana had yet closed his lips, AIi Aqa again unrolled the scroll of his childish questions as if he'd been left behind and said, "Then why did the Lord create the world and us?" Again I wanted to sidetrack him and, putting it crudely, to shut his trap, but after pouring some Hakan tobacco into a bowl and getting it soaked with the help of a wooden spoon with a broken end, Mowlana continued with his usual patience and gentleness, " M y son, the most sublime words coming from the mouths of the sons of Adam so far are just the words, 4I don't know.' I'd like to say them and free my collar from the clutches of your unanswerable questions, but I know young people, and experience has shown me that when the scent of investigation gets to their noses, they can't be easily reined away from the field. Besides, the night is young and what's the harm in my opening the door of my bin of investigation and together we'll discuss something of these complicated contro­ versies which can be called 'unsolvable propositions.' You ask why

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the Lord created the world and us. I read somewhere that the Hindus' Vedas, perhaps the most ancient religious books in the world, start with 'In the beginning, there was a sleeping God named Brahma and when he awoke, he began creation.' In the thousands of years since those books were written, I don't suppose that any interpretations or expositions by the human race about the world's creation were much better than that. Our Invisible Tongue of Shiraz was well aware of that, for he said, Go, O self-centered ascetic, for the secret of this veil Is, and will be, hidden from your eyes and mine."

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Mowlana hadn't yet finished this couplet when one of his familiar, enigmatic smiles formed in the corners of his mouth. Pointing to a melon which a little earlier he had brought out from folds of cotton in the corner of his closet in honor of AIi Aqa and which he'd put uncut on a copper tray in the middle of our party, he said, "This lowly gnat which you see sitting on the melon and smelling its sweetness is going back and forth seeking to find a way in. It could kill itself in searching until the Day of Resurrection, but it would be impossible for it to understand what this melon is and where it's come from and why it's come and how it's come. Now if you make this melon millions of times bigger and this insignificant gnat mil­ lions of times smaller, then you'll have a very imperfect picture of the world and mankind; you'll perceive your own inadequacy and acknowledge that if we wretches too would try until eternity to understand by science or logic the secret of the world's and our own creation, we'd have no place to hold on to. Whatever we say and think about it will all be 'illusion after illusion and fantasy after fan­ tasy' and nothing more. Worst of all, I fear that those who have said in Arabic, 'the world is sleep and the afterlife is waking and that which is between the two is death and we are all asleep and we see confused dreams,' have been near reality only in the last of the state­ ment. " Without pausing, AIi Aqa said, "Javad Aqa, you know that for all the pranks and carousing and gadding about, I've been a bit big for my breeches since childhood. I've enjoyed this sort of discussion and when I had a chance for one, I didn't shorten the debate. I've repeat­ edly asked some big-shot dkhonds these very questions about why the Lord has created mankind and they've all answered unanimously that it's written in the glorious Qoran that Ί did not create jinns and mankind except to worship Me.' " Mowlana leaned forward and said, "As you know better than I,

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the words of the ulama and dkhonds are of course unanswerable, but there's also no objection to one of the Lord's names being ghani, meaning 'able to do without' or 'without needs.' The great mystics have even said, 'The beauty of the Friend is able to do without our incomplete love,' and in any case the Lord is absolutely able to do without my deficient intellect. I consider even imagining Him to have any need or requirements as simple blasphemy, and I'm con­ vinced that not only does He not pay any attention to worship of Him by us trivial creatures, but even if the whole collection of solar systems would turn topsy-turvy in a twinkling and then disappear, His majesty and power would be unruffled and 'no dust would settle on the skirts of His greatness.' "

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"Now, just between us, even our reason does not believe that the perfect essence of the Nourisher needs our worship. I don't imagine this worship, with its ridiculous mistakes in pronunciation and those words whose meanings we fundamentally don't understand, eases the pain of creation of heaven and earth, but perhaps worship has some other meaning out of the ordinary which no one has yet found and probably never will. Aren't the elect limited and God's saints countable on your fingers?" "In my humble opinion," said AIi AqS, " 'Worship is nothing but the service of created beings,' as it has been said." Pursing his lips hesitantly, Mowlana said, " O n that point too, one can echo the dkhonds, 'That's something to think over.' But even supposing man serves his fellow creatures a hundred thousand million years, with Zeyd shouldering the weight of Amr, and Amr taking the weight of Zeyd, and I help you and you help me, which of course is important from the limited human viewpoint, still the suspicion remains that the value of this from the divine point of view is trivial. It's like our saying that the Lord created millions of trees to cast shadows on each other, and so again we have to ask what the purpose of that is." "They say," said AIi Aqa, "that the purpose of creation is to attain perfection, and that seems fairly intelligent." "Perhaps that's so," said Mowlana calmly, "but I fear those are all words we've made up with our flawed intellects and broken logic, absurd and futile arguments to make our own little hearts happy. Even our own defective intelligence doesn't believe that the defective ever becomes perfect; to the extent that defects and flaws in some­ thing decrease a little, we generally picture it as perfect, although we ourselves well know that the practical difference is that between heaven and earth. And now let's suppose this melon, which inevitably makes your mouth water every time your eyes fall on it and whose belly

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by now we'd have laid open a hundred times if we weren't so longwinded and which at first was no more than a trifling little melon and with the passing of days came to perfection in this form and shape, would after thousands of years become even more perfect and would bulge out like a vat and become sweeter than sugar and would then further grow as big as this school's dome, then so what?" On hearing those statements, AIi Aqa's eyes opened wide and he said, "Then who'll solve this riddle?" Shaking his head, Mowlana said, "It would be better for you to hear the answers to those questions from the Knower of AU Secrets, Khajeh Hafez of Shiraz," and he began reciting with each word dis­ tinct, "Tell stories of minstrels and wine and seek time's secret less, For no one has solved this riddle by reason, nor will they."

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And then without any delay, he took out a horn-shaped, bonehandled knife from his pocket and said, "If we can't open the secret of the ages, at least we can open the belly of this melon." He halved the melon with one stroke and began slicing it. Putting a sliver in his mouth, he raised his eyebrows in admiration and astonishment and said with an Isfahani accent such as I've rarely heard, "It's almost unfair! There's really been a miracle! It's so sweet we can leave sugar for the dogs!" In much less time than would seem possible, not only did we recite a requiem for the melon but we gnawed it down to the rind with no inhibitions. We'd barely despatched the melon when AIi Aqa latched onto Mowlana a second time, "Then what do you say about good and bad and morality and conscience?" Delivering an exaggerated "Glory be to God!" Mowlana said, "Really, I haven't gotten caught in such a culvert since I became a jackal." "Your Honor, Mowlana," I said, "this honorable brother of mine is nothing but an evil tick from whom one can't so easily be freed. Although I've really had it and my head's in a whirl, I still suspect it would be better to give him a two-word answer to those questions of his which are without rhyme or reason, so as to free both yourself and innocent me from him." "Good and bad don't need definitions and commentary," said Mowlana. "The problem is that we've been told so often that certain things are good that we imagine they've been good everywhere from the beginning of eternity and will continue to be good until its end; there are likewise other things which we've been told so often are

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bad that we imagine in every place in the world they've been bad from the beginning of eternity and are bad and will be bad until its end. Personally I fear that what mankind calls conscience is made up according to this prescription and doesn't exist independently. On the whole, however, one must admit that many bad things were probably once considered good and who knows whether they will again one day be considered good. There is no absolute bad in this world and likewise no absolute good. Good and evil and beauty and ugliness, like all other things in this transient world, pass through cycles and turn up in strange and astonishing shapes." "As God is the witness," said AIi AqI, "I have just one more question and then I'll end this session. Nowadays at every party one goes to, the Persian language comes up in conversation and people divide into groups with each having some way they want to reform the language. I'd like to see what Your Excellency thinks about this." "That's a most dangerous discussion," said Mowlana, "and here's where I should say that a careless tongue can lose a healthy head. If we weren't intimates and if I considered it possible for your words to reach the sword-belted standard-bearers of the language, God forbid, it would be foolish for me to let one word, damp or dry or sweet or bitter, fall from my lips about this. Since I'm certain our conversation won't go outside these four walls, however, I'll present my own belief in a couple of words." Then Mowlana paused and stared at the night's light and shadow in the school courtyard while he spoke, "When it was still light today, you surely saw a little stream that passed through the center of this school. So long as it flows and has some current, it rejects any amount of rubbish and dirt and brambles and ashes and filth and impurities poured into it. Although it may become temporarily polluted and tainted, it settles those impurities after some time and the water returns to its original clear purity. But alas for the time when the water becomes stagnant! Then its color, smell, taste, and other special attributes quickly change and it becomes putrid and nauseating, a spring full of misfortunes of disease and calamities. Even worse is when its source goes dry, God forbid, or is clogged up and one must bring in a donkey and load up the disgrace. Language is exactly like that stream. So long as it flows—so long as the learned and able writers haven't put their pens on the ground and kept their exuberant natures from working—it's impossible for any enduring and permanent damage to be done to its purity, no matter how much refuse the pretentious meddlers pour into it. But alas for the day when it falls into a state of stagnation—when its speakers use it only for or-

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dinary, daily needs and the creative natures of the ma'sters of poetry and prose and the overwhelmingly abundant good taste of the cul­ tured are quenched. Worst of all is when, God forbid, the source of the language and its progress—the national genius and the ethnic tal­ ents originating from pure tastes and steadfast natures and powers of originality and especially from freedom of thought and exposition and the desire to seek the truth and speak the truth—becomes dry and by stages disappears, like a spring which waters from rain and snow no longer reach. Then one should no longer weep for either the living or the dead but rather ought not only to say a requiem for the language but ought also to consider the people and society de­ serving of death and destruction."

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These statements of Mowlana made a very strong impression on my brother and me and for a while we both remained silent. But while I was completely caught in the sway of reflection and regret, the voice of AIi Aqa, like a person whose hands have lost the reins controlling a headstrong horse, snapped me awake and I heard him again blasting Mowlana with his strange and astonishing questions, "Your Honor, Mowlana, what do you say, sir, about patriotism and homeland?" I imagined that Mowlana's patience and forbearance had, like mine, come to an end and now some of those juicy profanities, the likes of which you don't know unless you've tasted them, would be lavished on that shameless and ungrateful chatterbox, but no! While putting fresh coal on the brazier and fanning it, he was preparing to answer with his absolute tolerance and kindness. I yelled out belligerently, "Your Honor, Mowlana, you don't know my brother. He's the young man my mother called 'AIi the pest' when he still wasn't into pants. If you indulge him, I swear by God that he'll make you tired of living with all his pointless questions." Mowlana moved the brazier fire back and forth with the tongs he had in one hand while fanning the fire with his other hand and began talking like a mother telling her children a story. "Love and affection for the homeland are like attachment to the natural father and mother and are outside the sphere of logic and reasoning. Even Sa'di, who said, O Sa'di, although the love of native land is a healthy story, One can't die in hardship because Ί was born there,' nevertheless in the end left those other beautiful countries and re­ turned to his corner of Shiraz, notwithstanding that the Mongol ca­ tastrophe had turned his homeland into a form of hell. A man's homeland is first his mother's womb and later the corner of a cradle

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and then the embrace of his nurse, then the courtyard where, if it's not rude, he 'bumps around on his ass' and crawls about on all fours, then the lane where he plays in the dust and dirt with children his age, then the quarter and the city, and by stages it becomes all the land and water where people speak his language, have his religion, customs, and habits, exchange courtesies and conduct themselves in his manner, swear as he does, use the same allusions and jokes, have fathers and grandfathers asleep beneath the same earth as his, and have hopes and desires resembling his." "But what about someone I know whose father is Iranian, whose mother is Turkish, who was born in Egypt and grew up in India, who studied in France and married an Arab, and who has a brother born in Russian Turkestan and now living in China? His father passed away two years ago in Karbala and is buried there and last winter his mother died in Brussels and is buried there. He himself has been a merchant in America for years and is doing well. What should we say is this man's homeland if we don't say it's a place that has no name?" I don't want to bore you, but the questions and answers went on until we realized that the sun had almost risen. Between the false and true dawn, AIi Aqa and I went to my cell to sleep, leaving Mowlana to himself. I must confess that it was two or three o'clock in the afternoon when we awoke the next day. Tidying ourselves up, we went straight to Mowlana. He'd watered and swept the porch of his cell and filled any household vessels handy with flowers he'd arranged all around himself and now was busy reading, leaning on a bolster with his back to the wall. We surrounded him noisily and started to rave and bab­ ble like a couple of drunks. He put the book aside and said, "Have you gone crazy? What kind of behavior is this?" "The smell of spring and the strength of youth and the songs of the birds and the intoxi­ cation of happiness have stolen away our sense and reason," we said, "and we're struck with a desire to sing and dance." "May God let you live to old age," he said, "for you've nearly thrown my old head into the desires and passions of youth, but it's flat without yeast. Come and see what excellent Aqpar tea I've steeped for you and also don't overlook this Fasa lemon juice, which is in itself a miracle." He began softly singing these couplets, Happy is love special to the time of youth! Happy is love with fairy faces! Happy is sitting in accord with a friend,

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Drinking purple wine together. You love better in the time of youth, For in the season of old age you are unable. You are young, and what would there be In abstaining from love except unhappiness and depression. The youth who would not be constantly in love, Is deprived of the days of his youth.

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The courtyard of the School of the Four Gardens at that hour brought to mind the promised heaven. The blossoms and greenery had taken over and blended with the tilework designs and the air was so fresh and inebriating that one could believe that thousands of vats of Khollar wine had been emptied into every nook and corner. Birds rushed in for the water of the tank and streams and started a seemingly endless chirping clamor between the fresh sprouts, the new leaves, and the flowers of the trees. AIi Aqa hadn't yet emptied his tumbler when he glanced around the school and said, "Just between ourselves now, it's the person living in a corner of this school who's a real king. For more than ten years now, I've tramped over every inch of the gardens and pleasure spots of this city, always with my best friends and the most famous musicians and dancers and all the necessities for having a good time but, please believe me, I've never seen or heard of a place so pleasant and free and easy as this. Even its mud and bricks seem to smell of joy and exhilaration and as soon as the fasting man with untainted mouth inhales the air here, he becomes so drunk that you might imagine he'd dumped a seven-year-old bottle of wine down his throat." Addressing Mowlana, he then said without preamble, "The truth is that the Lord himself drew me here and I don't intend to set foot outside here anymore. I humbly request you to take me under the shadow of your benevolence, as you did my brother, Javad, and somehow find me a little cell, even a dark and narrow coal bin, right here near you, so I don't fall outside this holy courtyard and sink a second time into the shameful contaminations of life and come into contact anew with those demons and beasts without horns and tail which are called man." " N o t so fast, my boy," said Mowlana with a gesture, "for I fear you'll fall and not get up again. For all your outward differences, inwardly you two brothers are cut from the same cloth as those who are soused when their lips have not yet reached the cup. Many who have chanced upon your idea, dear son, imagine they can follow the couplet:

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I'll take a room on the street of contentment; So long as half a life's in the body, half a loaf will come,

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and kick aside the world to enter the troop of dervishes and free souls. They've forgotten the subtle point that being a dervish and being liberated is not related to kicking the world aside. Despite what the men of culture say, plucking one's skirts away from society and shrinking back in a corner like a squirrel and waiting for the Creator and created to bring one's daily sustenance as a favor and to pour it down one's throat are not to be considered manliness and magna­ nimity." AIi Aqa began staring intently at Mowlana and asked, "Then why did your esteemed self become a preacher and choose retirement and seclusion?" "Don't imagine," said Mowlana, "that I'm greatly satisfied with this work I've done, that is, with the work which fate has produced. One day nearly forty years ago, when at fifteen I found myself an orphan alone and without relatives in that hamlet of Falavarjan which Javad Aqa knows well, I hid all my posessions, sixteen round sdhebqerans, in the waistband of my muslin pants, pulled off my canvas slippers, hitched up a pant leg, and set out in the grace of God, my back on Falavarjan and my face toward the desert, walking steadily toward the as yet unseen city of Isfahan, which to me at that time was a land of wonders and novelties, a country of fairies, and a re­ gion of those better than I. My chest was brimful of various longings and my head was heaped with wide-ranging thoughts and possible and impossible passions. What calculations I made to myself in that simple world and what designs I drew, unaware that no one in this world is the sole architect and builder of the mansion of his life! Life's gales are so swift and sharp and strong that the reins of choice are torn from men's hands every instant, whether they like it or not. I still hadn't grasped at that time that all the important events of life, as well as inborn characteristics causing happiness or misery, are in another's hands and unrelated to the person himself." "For nineteen whole years right here in Isfahan, not a drop of sweet water went down my throat without some suffering, but step by step I reached my aim and object, and thus more than a hundred theology students were present at the end of my lessons in the shabestdn of this very school. Despite my youth, I sat higher at gatherings of the governor and vizier than some of the dkhonds whose beards came down to their navels. My judgments were carried out in all the city, my words were accepted, and my speeches listened to every-

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where, and it got to the point where any foolishness I babbled was the clinching argument, flawless and beyond doubt, a companion piece of revealed inspiration. In short, I passed as one of the most respected and perfect of people and my distinction and prestige in­ creased daily." "But I came to my senses when I was the target for a group of fate's misfortunes. On the one hand, first the angelic young lady to whom I'd committed heart and soul and then my only friend and companion in the world, whom I loved more than a hundred broth­ ers, were both buried in the bosom of Takhteh-pulad in a period of less than a year. On the other hand, at about the same time the merchant with whom I'd deposited my twenty years of savings went bankrupt, and all that I had went up in smoke and vanished into thin air in the space of a day and a night. On top of that, the city's longbearded and illiterate akhonds, who had for no reason imagined my existence an obstacle to the advancement of their work and authority and whom I'd been irritating without my wishing it or even being aware of it, began slandering and maligning me from every direction, intriguing against me, and spreading scandals about me. It got to the point where they excommunicated me from the tops of the pulpits and counted my blood as lawful to shed on the charge that I was a Babi. Soon the class sessions, to which I was extremely attached, faltered and languished and then gradually broke completely apart. Not only did my best students, whom I in fact counted as my friends and companions, flee from me but since I hadn't the courage to ap­ pear in public, I became a recluse and chose seclusion out of necessity because I had so much become the object of taunts and abuse of unfair maligners and ignorant bigots." "At first I was severely depressed and tormented by these events and often rebuked unaccommodating fate and laid my black days on its neck. Distressed at being alone and forlorn and viewing my ex­ istence as vain and futile, I anguished over my situation and said, Adversity took me rolling along, In the way that the black beetle takes the dung." "After passing months in my lamentable state, suddenly, as if I'd been asleep and just waked up, I opened my eyes and realized all the rationality in isolation and solitude and I came to consider distance from people as a heavenly gift. Before long, I was able to do without anyone and I'd made for myself in the universe of detachment and solitude a world whose joys and pleasures were many times greater than its sorrows and misery."

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"I thanked the Nourisher with prayer every hour and said as I looked with regret at my past life, The world of unawareness has been a novel world! A pity, and a hundred pities, that we late became aware, and I made these words of the Invisible Tongue a slogan, If there's profit in this bazaar, it's with the contented dervish. Make me grateful, O God, with being a dervish and content! 11:191

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At the same time, I also hit on the point that all my moth-eaten words, which I had until that day read into men's ears with pomp and flourish and fanfare as confirmed and undeniable truths and had crammed down the throats of God's servants by force and persecution were frail and empty, nonsense from top to bottom, and wholly meaningless and unfounded." "Then on that auspicious night which I'll never forget, I laid out my aba on the river bank, fixed my eyes on the bright stars jousting in the field of the sky, and sank down into a wide-ranging sea of thought and reflection in the luminous darkness of the night and the expressive silence of the water and earth." "My thoughts were sometimes so delicate that a hundred strands twined together would easily pass through the eye of a needle and another time were so long and bloated that they seemed a scaling rope to the parapet of the Throne of God and knot by knot and step by step I ascended through time and space to where floating cries of angels seemed to reach my ears." "In the morning twilight just as day dawned, with utmost unconcern and as if it were a dirty sack of stinking garbage, I shook the heavy and calamitous load of accomplishments, learning, and superiority, which I'd taken such pride in until two days ago, into the soothing waves of the river. With the rising of the new dawn, like a pious believer who has performed his ablutions and removed his impurities and come forth from the bath with pure body and shining soul, I returned to my accustomed room, rejoicing, lighthearted, and carefree, with polished mind and tidied brain swept clean of the cobwebs of whim and fancy by the broom of good fortune. The first thing I did was fall on the ground and prostrate myself in thanks. Then, like a young prisoner full of passion and desire and freed of bonds and fetters, I threw aside my cloak and turban and began dancing like a madman in the middle of the room, clapping and stamping my feet for as long as I had strength and energy." "From that very moment, I had a taste of a fresh life which made

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me regret my past life a hundred times a day. I was ashamed of all my plots and schemes to safeguard my influence and ashamed of talking my head off with ignorant men in order to show off and ashamed of that lifetime of aimless associations, foolish conferring, continual visiting back and forth, and searching and striving and idle chatter and foolish prattle." "Then my life which was simple I made simpler and still simpler, and though my circle of ties and attachments had become very lim­ ited, I made it still more limited. I closed the oiled-paper door of my room on kinsmen and strangers and stayed alone in a corner of the narrow, half-dark cell." "I grasped the purpose of the couplet by Fa'ez-e Ardabili, who said, Anonymity freed us from the misfortune of celebrity; The work which heaven did was that of my heart's desire."

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"I perceived that on the whole I'd become a docile man and was becoming a man for myself and stepping, so to speak, into the pri­ vacy of proximity and union with God." "From the very hour that I discovered those valuable points, I sprang like a bird from my cage as if the gates of bliss had opened and I felt unbelievably free and at ease on the infinite stage of time. Even more wonderful was that fleeing fortune had, contrary to usual, become affectionate and instantly fulfilled each of my heart's desires, including the means to travel on journeys far and wide whose effects totally transformed my life and, willing or not, I set out on a road which ends I know not where." At that point, Mowlana got up and brought from his cell a plate of early unripened almonds and a salt shaker. Putting them in front of AIi Aqa and me, he continued, "The point of all this talk is that man has in principle been created to live with people and form a family. Man needs man, though it be only for disliking him. If a few individuals like me are exceptions to this general rule, that's a shortcoming of time and fate; otherwise I too, like all men of today, would have a home and nest and children and family and would eat another bread and travel another road." Rolling a plump almond in the salt, AIi Aqa put it in his mouth and said while chewing, "Since you accordingly have no regrets about these events, I don't know why you deny their benefits to yours truly. Are we not servants of God or do you imagine that since we've been brought up as spoiled and pampered haji's boys, it serves us right to have to eat like cows and pull loads like camels and wallow

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in filth like pigs and donkeys until the Final Resurrection when Azrael, the angel of death, arrives and delivers us from the grip of such an ill-starred life?" Mowlana let out a laugh and said, "God's pardon! May my tongue be mute! That wasn't my point at all! I only wanted to say that fleeing from people and crawling like a blind owl into the corner of a school cell isn't such hot stuff either. It can't be a suitable situation for everyone, especially not young men like you two brothers who, for all your claims and talk, have come seeking a name, and it's clear from your appearances and gestures that you still have thousands of longings in your hearts." Like a man who intends to stick to his guns, AIi Aqa stuck his head forward a foot and a half and asked, "Then only the lame hand gets the red apple? Which of our longings has so far been fulfilled that others are likely to be also?" "My boy," said Mowlana, "if you've gone on the wrong road so far, it's no one's fault. You've been pursuing something that is perhaps not to be found at all. If I were in your place, I wouldn't make things so difficult for myself. The more lightly you take things, the lighter they become. All that effort and struggling and straining are signs of raw immaturity and the poet has rightly said, The pot's in a roaring boil when it's raw; When it's cooked and smells delicious, it's silent. I was myself perhaps more miserable than even you. I cooked such raw ideas in the pot of my brainless head that remembering them now, I can't help but laugh. But when I'd hit against a stone wall several times and my eyes had opened somewhat, I understood that it's impossible for the world to accord with my wishes. Fate has its own road forward and travels without paying the least attention to me. On the other hand, I won't hide from you that I also gradually became aware that my efforts had all along been essentially to represent myself as distinct and different from others, and from that auspicious hour on, I put this unlucky and illusory notion out of my head and understood that for all my learning and superiority, which wasn't worth a penny, I too was an impotent and unimportant servant of the Nourisher, like millions of other creatures. There wasn't a hairbreadth of difference between me and those small tradesmen whom we, out of misplaced vanity and conceit and stupidity, call barefoot rascals and riffraff and dregs of society, people with one thin qabd and with collars ripped, the prayer of barbarians and common as cattle and yet most misguided, to draw on Qoran phrases. Even

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though I learned inanities such as Arabic cognate accusatives, "he hits a hit," and words of ridiculous five-letter roots, jahamarasha and qarata'aba, which ordinary men didn't know, they had instead practical information and valuable experience in thousands of other areas which I was wholly lacking and which my nose had never even sniffed. I was then soothed as if waters of peace and tranquility had been poured over my brain and I drew such a breath of relief that you'd think I'd been plunged into a sewer and carried along and now had been pulled out.

CHAPTER 3 "Ό ** ' O l>>

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"Oh, how lucky you've been!" said ^ Aqa. "But then let's please see wha(

. jshould

do next

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should do is clear as day," said Mowlana. "You must give up these little games and be a man! Being a man has nothing to do with constantly bragging to people and thinking only of throwing the rotten stuff of your boasting in some poor person's face as soon as you set eyes on him, but rather you must, like a snake that sheds its skin, cast off from body and soul that stinking skin of conscious and unconscious ostentation and be­ come pure, clean, and innocent, without guile or deceit, and you must above all be simple and unsullied, like a child who's just come into the world." After those statements, Mowlana took out several books from the few that were arranged in the niches of his room. Putting on his glasses, he opened one and said, "This is the Gospel of the Lord Jesus." Finding a page with his finger, he read, "Whoever does not become like a newborn child again will not enter the heavenly king­ 1 dom." Then he opened another, thicker book and said, "This is the Old Testament. Let's see what it says about this." He began to read, "In these passing days which God has granted you, go, eat your bread with joy and drink your wine with happiness and enjoy your life with a woman whom you love." Then he said, "You have surely heard the name of Hasan of Basra and you know what a high standing he has. 2 He said in this regard, 1 This quotation is based on Mark 1:15 and the Old Testament quotation of the following paragraph is based on Ecclesiastes 9:7-9. 2 Hasan of Basra, and Sari of Muscat and Ebn Ata in the following paragraphs, are all early Muslim saints and mystics; for further information and anecdotes, see Levy

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'The faithful one is not happy unless he is heedless, for when he reflects, he becomes sorrowful.' He read us another story, "They told Abu Sa'id Abo'l-kheyr that a certain person was walking on water. He said, 'It's easy for a frog or a water wagtail to walk on top of the water.' They said, Ά certain person flies in the air.' He said, 'The fly and the crow fly in the air too.' They said, Ά certain person goes from one city to another in an instant.' He said, 'Satan also goes from west to east in an instant. That sort of thing isn't worth much. A true man is one who sits and stands among people, and eats and sleeps and buys and sells and engages in exchanges among people in the bazaar and marries and mingles with people but doesn't neglect God for an instant.' "

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Then he closed the book, took a puff on the hookah, and said, "Those words are very meaningful. Other great men have also had much to say on just that subject. Haven't you heard of Sari of Muscat who had a grocery in the bazaar of Baghdad? Someone from the mountains came to visit him and said, Ά certain pir on the mountain sends you greetings.' Sari said, 'Being a hermit on the mountain isn't a difficult job. A man ought to be truly busy in the midst of the bazaar but not for an instant neglect or absent himself from God.' It is also related that Ebn AtI said, 'Be outwardly with people and be inwardly with God!' Hadiqeh ebn al-Yaman, another big shot in mysticism, is supposed to have said, 'The best among you is not he who abandons this world for the hereafter, but rather he who would take a share from both.' In addition to our own sages and mystics, an old French philosopher whose name I've forgotten said something which was translated for me by a westernized friend whom Javad Aqa knows more or less and the general idea is, 'Man's greatness is not in swimming forward against the water's current but rather it is in falling into line with others and being contented just with that, 3 although this in itself is a difficult enough task.' " "Besides all that, isn't it written in Arabic in our own faith and religion, 'Eat and drink! May it be healthy for you!' and 'Marry and unite in wedlock and multiply!' It all goes to prove that the true believer is the one who looks like all of God's servants in this world, the one who by the toil of his hands and the sweat of his brow acquires a little bread and eats with his wife and children and renders thanks to the Provider, and the one who leaves convoluted disputa1969, pp. 19-25, 166-72, and 236-38, respectively. Abu Sa'id of the following para­ graph was another early mystic. Hadiqeh ebn al-Yaman in the paragraph after that was a companion of the Prophet known for his wisdom and virtue (Jz-c). 3 The editor of the Persian text attributes this to Montaigne.

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tions for those eternally and ever idle ones like me who use up their lives pretending it's precise determination when it's actually hairsplit­ ting on why the Lord, greater be His glory, made the ant a racer and the flea a jumper and the louse a dinger and what the reason is for the pomegranate rind being stuffed with seeds in delicately membraned sections and the grains of corn being hung on the hard, dry cob. We thus think up a thousand for a penny whys and wherefores to break some monster's neck and assemble the means of progress for the human race and become forerunners in the caravan of civili­ zation and progress." Suddenly breaking off his speech, he asked me, " D o you know Sheykh Abo'l-hasan Kharaqani?" " N o , I don't," I said. "What's his business? Does he live in this city?" Not even apologizing for his burst of laughter, he said, "You had it coming! You must have thought he was a prayer leader in one of the city's schools or mosques and worked at contracts and marriages. My good man, Sheykh Abo'l-hasan Kharaqani, whose importance and prestige has been talked about by such notables of ours as Sa'di, Mowlavi, and Attar with all their honor and respect, was one of the first-rank saints of God and one of the greatest people of truth and learning of this country; it is almost a thousand years now since his shroud has rotted away. Although Kharaqani was no more than a simple villager, he said, 'My head is the throne of God and my feet are the throne of the earth and my hands are east and west. If I were to sit on an ass and come out of Nishapur and say but one word until the Resurrection, no other wise man would sit on my chair.' He also said, Ί left this world for the earthly and the next for the heavenly and set foot in a place where there was no road for the created.' He further said, 'The Lord has given me a stride such that in one step I go from the Throne of God to the earth and back. Sitting here, I have so much divine power that if I raise my hand, I move the sky from its place.' He also said, 'When I reached the pe­ rimeter of the Throne of God, row after row of angels came forth in welcome and boasted of being cherubim and innocents. I said, "It is we who are God!" ' In sum, Kharaqani was an astonishing creature, but despite that, it is written in all the books that he always mixed and associated with people and, in Attar's phrase, he bore the burden of a family. He collected wormwood from the plains to make a liv­ ing, tilled fields and planted trees, and was not afraid to mingle with the mystics and the masses; he considered freedom and salvation to be in other worlds." After those statements, Mowlana kept silent for a while, and then

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squinting his eyes like a telescope penetrating reality, he stared at a point in endless space while engaged in crooning these couplets: Sit a moment, heart! Quit drumming! Be alone and without anyone while being with all! The ferocious wolf is shepherd for this flock; Stay outside the herd, if you want safety from the wolf!

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When Mowlana reached this point, he gave a long pull on the hookah on the top of which he had unhurriedly started a fire while talking and said, "I've made your dear heads ache talking on this way. You must forgive me. It's been for your own welfare and benefit. I wanted to make you understand that if any greatness and status in this world can possibly be ascribed to that two-legged animal called man, then it is indeed in simplicity and nothing else. This noblest of creatures is, in the words of Mowlana of Rum, like a dog as long as he's hungry and a corpse as soon as he's satisfied. Man has no reason to consider himself mighty without cause and—to put it crudely (I'll hide my face)—to set his ass up on a niche and to brag and boast and to imagine he's brought some specially sweet, melt-in-the-mouth halvah to the bazaar. Remaining secluded and distant from people will never prove our superiority over others in regard to vulgarity, meanness, or insensitivity. In fact, if we don't want to fool ourselves, we must keep Satan's words out of our ears and we must believe that no one in this world becomes great without cause and that the best sign of insignificance is that we use force and persecution to present ourselves as great. As soon as we see someone considered great who has committed suicide, we swear by His Highness, Abbas, that he was one of the double-distilled fools of the time. After all, isn't it a fact that—just between ourselves now—a man trembles for a lifetime like the cotton carder's balls lest some idiot consider him an idiot? I swear by God that even if we translate simplicity as ignorance, the victory still belongs to the simple person. Joking aside, hasn't the world moved according to the wishes of fools for as long as it has existed and hasn't it even been written in the Traditions, 'Most of the people in paradise are fools'? In that case, if some stupid and undiscerning person also considers us idiots, what's the worry and where does it hurt us? The free man is one who walks another line and doesn't attach the least importance to compliments and disclaimers of this and that and who knows that people's thoughts and beliefs pass like water in a stream and have no strength or value. Being afraid of rebuke and reproach is a sign of the chicken-hearted, and I'm of one mind with the poet who said, 'On the road of re-

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proach, you can tell those who are men from those who are not.' I'm convinced that in this world only the person deserving reproach fears it. On the other hand, alas for the forlorn creature on whose back has jumped the ape of airs and affectations of 'Good, good, good!' and 'Bravo!' which then controls him and leads him to the place the Arab throws the flute. Then it's all over with him as soon as his feet touch that spot, although he be even an angel of heaven. As the Mowla of Rum said, In order that they say 'Bravo!' to him, He tied his life's neck with a cord, so the ill-fated fellow with perverse luck has his neck under the collar of'Well done!' as long as he lives and the hands and feet of his heart and soul are caught in the press of the stocks of praise. He'll never savor the taste of freedom so long as he lives and even at the last breath when they pour water mixed with earth from a holy place down his throat and stuff the holes and fissures of his body with cedar oil and camphor, his ears will still be pricked up with hopes of hearing 'Good!' and 'Excellent!' Now you shouldn't imagine that the prerequisite for living and socializing with people in the community is being unanimous with them and appearing to be like them, for that's not true salvation. You've surely seen how ducks dive down in the water and come out without getting their feathers all wet. When a real man casts himself into the whirlpool of life, he too dives into its curling waves, goes down, and comes up without pollution from people staining the skirts of his virtue at all. The poet has likewise said, The sign of the lover is that you see him cold from hell; The sign of the mystic is that you see him dry from the sea."

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Mowlana had much else to say, all of which should be written with gold ink. His explanations and advice, and especially his inflection and tone, all bespoke his sincerity and sheer good will, affecting me and my brother more than you can imagine. Despite having much to ask, we stayed silent, recalling his earlier answers, and sinking into wide-ranging thoughts to the charming song of the hookah and the cry of the evening call to prayer which meanwhile had risen on all sides. Rousing himself, AIi Aqa rubbed his eyes, got up, and went over to Mowlana. He wanted to kiss Mowlana's hand, but Mowlana hid it and instead kissed AIi Aqa's face and said, "My friend, if you agree with all you've heard and you want to make me happy, you must

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take your brother's hand and return to your home this very hour. If your present house is too cramped, fix him up another next to yours, and as soon as possible, find him a nice girl suitable to his tastes from a family of old and honorable houses on both sides. After that, you should both bid farewell to youth and the squabbles and storms that are a necessity of that period of life and get busy with living in earnest. Since Javad Aqa was more engaged in commercial affairs during your father's lifetime, may God forgive him, and you with farming and estates, I suspect that it would also be better if commercial dealings and trade and transactions of the bazaar are in Javad Aqa's hands from now on and affairs related to property ownership and peasantlandlord relationships are in yours. In brief, don't make this short span of life hard for yourselves and your kith and kin. Make a way of life such that you won't hang your head in shame when you approach your Lord and Creator, and you may be sure that anything else is just a lot of talk." Sounding off at the same time, my brother and I dissented, demurred, and asked whys and wherefores, but no matter how much

". . . transactions of the bazaar are in Javad Aqa's hands . . ."

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we tried to get around it, we couldn't find anything solid to hold on to. AIi AqI threw in the sponge more quickly than I and he said in a trembling voice as tears welled up in his eyes, "Your Honor, Mow­ lana, although the shadow of your sympathy and kindness was first cast over me not more than twenty-four hours ago, in that short period I have traveled in worlds that have totally transformed my existence. Seated in your presence right now, sir, I swear by the One and Only God, and by the life of my brother who is a hundred times dearer to me than my own life, that my life and wealth are yours and I consider my welfare and benefits in this world and the next to be in obeying your noble orders. From this moment on, whatever you command will have for me the status of divine inspiration and may curses be on me and mine for seven generations if I diverge a whit from that."

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Mowlana grinned and said, "Then logically, we haven't wasted our breath after all. But alas that the smell of my funeral sweets is rising, otherwise there'd be room for me to have hopes for myself." Jumping into it, I said, "My brother is senior, of course, and the crown on my head, and whatever he orders, I'll obey, but he himself well knows that on the day I set out on the road to this school, I was a wretched hunted animal who'd fled the cruel hunter and with beat­ ing heart wanted to scratch myself out a refuge beneath the brush and brambles. It was in hopes of being immune to fate's wickedness and evil and being safe in the vicinity of Your Excellency's protection that I got to this school. Now I actually do seem to be seeking sanc­ tuary and I'm certain my brother will respect that sanctuary." I expected AIi Aqa to reply to that but Mowlana gave no pause. Pointing his finger at the tank of the school, he said, " T w o years ago when for the first time my eyes fell on your sad and worried coun­ tenance at the edge of this very tank, I instantly visualized a little bird with broken wing which had fallen beneath the feet of passers-by in the middle of a road full of traffic and which was waiting, watching intently to see whether the Lord would send someone with kind and compassionate hands to pick him up from the dirt and put him on the ground in a safe and quiet corner. But, through the Nourisher's favor, today there is no longer any trace of that anxiety and distress in your face, and I really feel that both your feet are now firm in the stirrups of equilibrium and strength of mind. Your former fear and terror of the world's wickedness and of the evil nature of its people has vanished, and the time has come to set to work the powers which either blind nature or the peerless Creator has given you. Like the

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athletes whom we watched together in that zurkhaneh pit on that appointed night, you too will come to grips with Fate, the athlete who kills the crippled and tortures the weak, and we'll see how strong a fellow you are." Although I argued up and down trying to dismount Mowlana from Satan's ass and change his mind, he wouldn't be swayed, and he constructed for me both in jest and in earnest so many jaw-breaking proofs based on logic and tradition and he brought in so many unanswerable arguments of heaven and earth that I was unavoidably left tongue-tied. Like it or not, I surrendered, but my heart wouldn't agree to leaving the last arrow in my quiver unused and I began quarreling, "You obviously haven't considered me worthy of the doorsill of your favors and you want to drive me away from your service. All right then, that's fine, but when we are already leaving the school, why do you want to immediately throw a collar on my neck and force me to take a wife too?" Letting out a laugh, he said, "A brawny young man like you wouldn't enjoy life without a woman. Now that you're preparing to enter the battlefield of life, it is better you take both the bitter and the sweet for, as they've said, bread without yeast falls flat." "You know better than I," said I, "that a man like the Lord Buddha fled from the hands of wife and children and turned to the desert, and a major prophet like the Lord Jesus never put up with a wife. Has some sin been visited on me to deserve such a punishment?" Mowlana again delivered one of his meaningful laughs and said, "Have you considered that the Lord Jesus would perhaps not have been crucified if he'd chosen a wife? Coming to the Lord Buddha, I'm ready right now to deposit with you a certified document saying that any time you measure up to the Lord Buddha's ankles, you're free to abandon your wife and children and head for the desert or forest." I saw that tangling with Mowlana would take the patience of His Highness the Elephant and thus my only relief would be in giving up and being silent. Little by little it had gotten dark. Khodadad was seated with the school servant, Karbala'i Qorban, on a bench in front of the shabestan on the other side of the school, intent in a heart-to-heart conversation while the fires in both their pipes kept flickering like fireflies. AIi Aqa called to Khodadad and said, "I want you to gallop home and personally supervise the preparation of a proper supper because tonight His Honor, Mowlana, will also eat with us at home." "I've made a bet with myself," said Mowlana, "that I won't set

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foot in your house before Javad Aqa's wedding night. Besides, I've instructed Karbala'i Qorban to put on the fire for us tonight a totally authentic casserole of mashed meat and rice with cumin to meet all standards. It would be better to bid our comrade, Khodadad Khan, to get busy with collecting the things in Javad Aqa's cell while you two put up for one more night with the bread and salt of the poor, which in fact will be the going-away noodle soup of Javad Aqa. After supper, you two brothers will take each others' hands and return happily and auspiciously to your home." " N o w that bets and promises are coming u p , " said AIi Aqa, "I have bet that I won't taste your bread and salt again unless you make a formal promise that after Javad Aqa's wedding, which you can be assured will be performed in your presence before this very month comes to an end, you will free yourself entirely of this school and this cell, despite all the attachment to it which I know you have, to honor and grace our humble cottage with your blessed arrival, and to consider what little we have as completely yours and to take my brother and me and all our kith and kin as your servants, slaves, and hired help beneath the wing of your affection and support and to cast your shadow over the heads of us crippled little chicks and to be our lord and master and our guide and guardian to be served and to be dearer to us than our life." In no way at all would Mowlana submit to this and he said, " O l d age isn't the time to hold sideshows. In this last part of life when I have one foot in the grave, it wouldn't please God that I be unfaithful to this cozy nook of a kindly cell which has honestly and cheerfully put up with me for a lifetime." But AIi Aqa was also not a person to give up so easily. I obviously cooperated with him and the two of us haggled so much, climbing up and down the ladder of insistence and importuning, that at last Mowlana threw in the sponge and agreed that he would be an over­ night guest for two nights a month, on the first and fifteenth, one night with me and one with AIi Aqa. After agreeing on that arrangement, Khodadad got busy collecting the things in my cell and at a signal from Mowlana, Karbala'i Qorban brought supper. Mowlana and AIi Aqa rolled up their sleeves and got down to business with absolute and total appetite. As for miserable me, I was quite gloomy and depressed over this untimely change in the face of my life. After two years of serene and tranquil happiness, comfort, and peace of mind with no guile or deceit, I saw myself at that hour as a gently reared child whose parents wanted to send him to school

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for the first time. Sitting there at the edge of the sofreh, with a big lump in my throat, I wanted to be alone so that I could go ahead and weep and wail and sob. Raising his head, Mowlana asked, "Why are you mourning? Why aren't you eating?" "How do you expect a bite to go down my throat?" I said. "You know very well that you've sent my life up in flames. I'd just settled myself down and was content to have escaped the persecuting hands of fate's archer. 4 1 was safe in a healthy corner of this school but now I see that it's all coming unraveled. If it were again possible to live in a house like this one here, a window of hope would still be open for me. Unfortunately, both you, sir, and my brother, who are presently my whole family and only sympathizers in this world, have joined hands to quite completely spill my blood and flay me like a slaughtered sheep. You aren't even satisfied with casting me out, like the prophet, Adam, was cast out, from this lovely shelter which has been paradise for me, but rather are so impatient that you want to eat my wedding sweets as soon as possible and next you'll settle me on the headache-filled bench of trade and commerce. I can see very well that in the wink of an eye, I'll be surrounded by a batch of children of assorted sizes, blind and scallheaded, and then almost immediately I'll be doing my accounts with the recording angels and never again will sweet water go down my throat, and I'll have to stretch out my feet toward the qebleh and pronounce the Qoran's 'Surely we belong to God and to Him we return.' " With an ironic, "Good, good!" in reproach, Mowlana began shaking his head and continued, "That's splendid! I'd imagined that after two years of contemplation and asceticism, you'd lost your fears and no longer were afraid of this world, which, deservedly or not, is called base, and of that two-legged species which formerly intimidated you, but now it seems that the brand which you'd imagined fate and fortune had stamped on your forehead is in fact valid and not to be washed away and disappear. Either that or, God forbid, you've basically come to like this painless retirement and laziness and you think you've actually arrived at health and happiness." "Dust in my mouth if I count myself as a mystic or ascetic!" I said. "But haven't our great mystics and ascetics generally all been hermits and celibates?" 4 The phrase about the archer alludes to a story by Sa'di in The Fragrance Garden where a cat goes to the king's palace and is hit by arrows of the king's men (Jz-c). For a translation of this story of the cat, which then decides to be content in the old woman's house it had originally come from, see Wickens 1974, p. 172.

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"Stop that talk, dear boy," he said. "Confirming the couplet: 11:212

If you're with everyone when you're without Me, you're with no one, And if you're with no one when you're with Me, you're with everyone, the true mystics are those anonymous and unnoted people by them­ selves in the midst of everyone and happy alone with their ideas. In the midst of the crowds and the hustle and bustle, their thoughts are elsewhere and their hearts in pawn to Another. In that world of sol­ itude with their Lord, they have secret roads which the mind of Bayazid Bestami wouldn't reach even in a hundred years. 5 When I was your age, I too thought as you do, until one day in a section of the bazaar here in Isfahan, I saw a dervish who recited two couplets which so impressed me that I have not forgotten a word of them over my lifetime and I want you to learn them too: Who is the guide whom I can call the pathfinder, Or the one consumed whom I can call the man of suffering? Whoever amidst distractions of a worldly nature Is with Him, I call a thousand men."

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Quickly taking a pencil and notebook from my pocket, I jotted down these couplets and then said, "You are my spiritual father and I'll blindly obey whatever you command but secretly I detest women and children and wealth and property and connections and conver­ sation and discussions and socializing and visiting with people. I fear that if your holy spirit and divine grace don't aid and assist me, sir, I won't be able to cope with this load which you want to put on my shoulders." "If you're a Muslim," said Mowlana, "you know very well that our Prophet is the best example in this matter, for he never turned away from accepting a wife. Or, if you're partial to the faith and customs of our ancestors, didn't the Lord Zoroaster say, 'The man who marries is superior to the man without a wife and the man who has a house is superior to the man who does not have a house and the man who has sons is superior to the man who does not have sons and the man who has property is superior to the man who has noth­ ing.' So quit that talk and take heart and for the present, don't forget 5 The "secret road" draws on a hemistich of Attar's allegory of the soul's progress toward God, The Language of the Birds: "I have a secret road toward Him," (man rahi dozdideh ddram su-ye u) Qz-c).

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about this dish of meat and vegetables with Omani lemon for which your heart is longing." To be brief, it was about midnight when Mowlana, with a skullcap on his head, escorted my brother and me to the school's gate and entrusted us to God after hearty kisses and a blessing. The wedding party took place exactly ten days later. I was lucky and a girl from acquaintances of the Mirza family of the Crossroad of Ali-qoli Aqa became my lot. Though you'll surely take it as an exaggeration, I'd say she was perfect in every respect. Mowlana read the marriage vows himself and we were joined hand in hand on the first evening after that. 6 As soon as I was left alone with the new bride and sought to talk with her and ask her how she felt, she blushed and said in a trembling voice with head modestly bent, "Since you retired from the world two years ago and news of it echoed through the city, I asked the Lord every day and night after prayers and devotions to let fortune one day befriend me and give me the honor of serving you. At this hour when I see my prayers answered, I give thanks to God and assure you that I will not only be your wife and sympathizer but also your maid and attendant and servant and helper, praying for you to the brink of the grave and the last breath. My greatest desire is to provide the means for your comfort and peace of mind, and that's enough for me." Briefly, it wasn't long until she had completely charmed me by the strength of her love and wisdom and sweetness, and things got to the point where the only thing left was to be in love with my own wife! Eight or nine days later was the first of the month and we were awaiting Mowlana, following our agreement with him. We had arranged a small, cozy room for him according to his wishes in a corner of our courtyard garden. The furnishings consisted only of a carpet, bedding, a brazier with two china teapots, one for tea and the other for hot water, a water jug, and a hookah and its accoutrements. We also had wanted to put a mirror in the niche, but he'd said, "I'm not so eager for a visit with my beauty, but it would be nice if you put a vase of flowers on the ledge. Then I can enjoy looking at them when I wake up and at night I can smell them and dream of the gardens in paradise." When an hour was still left before sunset, I couldn't stand it and 6 The "marriage vows" (sigheh-ye aqd) are the religio-legal part of the marriage and are perhaps more like a betrothal ceremony in that the bride and groom do not begin living together afterward but have a period in which to become acquainted. The marriage party later is a more social occasion; it includes the ceremony of joining hands and it is after this that the marriage is consummated. For this marriage ofJavad Aqa, however, both the vows and joining of hands take place the same day.

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hurried to the School of the Four Gardens to bring Mowlana as quickly as possible. He was busy with scissors in hand in a clump of leaves and flowers at the foot of his cell's porch. Answering my greetings, he said, " 'The color of the face shows the secret of the mind.' Con­ gratulations on your marriage! From your looks, it's clear that your partridge is singing." "It must be confessed," I said, "that fortune hasn't been contrary so far and there's even room left for thanks." "Yes," he said, "women are a strange species. They drive the wise man crazy and make the crazy man wise. If you are again struck with the desire to be the Lord Buddha and want to head toward the mountains and desert, let me know so that I can be the armor-bearer for the Lord Buddha of Isfahan." "God willing, you haven't forgotten," I said, "that tonight you're going to be a guest of yours truly? I came ahead of time so that we could set off early." "Be assured," he said, "that although the dkhond and mullah spe­ cies may forget God, it doesn't forget its stomach. My stomach's all worked up for tonight and we'll set out just as soon as this bouquet for the new bride is ready." After fixing the bouquet, he went to his cell and came out with a needle and thread in one hand and his usual aba in the other and said, "While you smoke one cigarette, I'll patch up this aba of mine—I don't know how it got ripped—in the wink of an eye and after that we'll set out immediately." "In these two years that I've been your companion and associate, sir," I said, "your biggest hobby has been fiddling around with that aba. Sometimes it got soaked and you dried it, or it got torn and you mended it or it got worn and you patched it. When you returned from a walk or wandering in the desert, you shook off the dust and dirt. Sometimes when it was moth-eaten, you sat hunched up like a tailor and darned over the holes with the tip of a needle and a world of patience and forbearance. You nursed it in season and out. You'd hang it on the line and air it and hardly a day passed that you didn't gently flick off the dust from it at the edge of the porch or that you didn't clean the mud and dirt from it with a fingernail tip. How often I've seen you fondle it as a mother would fondle her favorite child! If it had been used for a while without a rest, your heart seemed to bleed for it. You'd look it up and down compassionately and turn it back and forth with total kindness and gentleness and fold it some­ times twice and sometimes four times and make a place for it inside the chest in the corner of your cell. To make it short, I've been

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jealous for some time of that aba which always has been and still is the object of your care and concern. I can't hide from you that I can't bear to look at it again!" Letting out a laugh, he said, "What things I hear! But you should know that my affection for this aba is not without cause or reason. Like many of our ancient things which the hand of circumstances and our needs over thousands of years have brought into being, the aba is used for a thousand of our tasks and whether at home or abroad and whether in happiness or grief, it treats thousands of our pains. In summer it keeps off dust and dirt and in winter it keeps off snow and rain. It's a cover to throw underneath or on top. When you want to sleep, it can be a coverlet or a sheet and a cushion or pillow and it can act as a quilt or a mattress and often it acts as both quilt and mattress. It keeps man from the evil of flies and bees by day and from the sting of mosquitoes and scorpions and snakes and ants by night. You spread it out and it's a sofreh. Throw it under foot and it's a rug and pull it over the rug and it's a rug cover. We drape it over a bowl of ice on hot summer days so that the ice doesn't melt and we use it instead of a mosquito net on summer nights up on the roof. It's really a most perfect version of all outerwear, for however untidy a man's general appearance and however old and dirty his clothes, as soon as he has a respectable aba on his shoulder, he's honored everywhere. Pull it over your knees and it's a blanket; hang it in front of the door and it's a curtain; draw it across the middle of a porch or balcony and it makes a partition. It's a lungi when you take a dip and a bath towel afterward. So long as it's on your shoulders or mine, it's called an aba or redd and it's the object of all kinds of respect, but just as soon as it falls on the back of a donkey, mule, or mare, its name is changed and it becomes a horse blanket or saddle pad. If you've bought dried legumes or charcoal and haven't a sack or saddle bag, you tie the sleeve holes closed with some heavy twine or thong and pour in your merchandise, and use it as a big bag or gunny sack. Tie it around your waist and it's a sash or wrap it around your head and it's a turban. If you don't want to be recognized, pull it over your head, and as soon as you do want to be recognized, pull it down. If you're in good spirits, you toss it over one shoulder, and if you want to show someone respect, you politely bring your hands out of its sleeves. Now if we meet your people with daggers and broadswords who brawl and battle, in a twinkling it's wrapped around your wrist as a shield. In the height of the heat, you can pull the abd over your head and be assured that the sun won't make you dizzy, and in the worst of winter, you can hunch up under the aba and not

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Solving the Problem

worry that the blizzard wind and cold will take off your ears and nose. It's a tent for hunters and a sail for the boats of residents of riverbanks and seashores and occasionally it's a net to catch fish. Ped­ dlers in the mosques and schools and squares spread their abas on the ground as display stands on which to arrange their hodgepodge of sundry trifles and trinkets. Its services to travelers and pilgrims are beyond the bounds of possible description and explanation; it can, for example, perfectly replace a strainer for draining rice or act as an umbrella in the face of the sun or if necessary it can work as a nose bag. In short, it serves on a thousand occasions as a dressing gown and handkerchief and carpetbag and wrapping cloth and a hundred other things, and one can claim with equity and justice that among all the utensils, tools, and instruments of life, none is more demo­ cratic and more comforting to the poor than the aba and no person or thing has better served our people. Hafez of Shiraz has said: I had a cloak and it concealed a hundred faults of mine; The cloak was pawned for wine and musicians while the zonndr remained, 7

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since the aba is among the things one can in time of need pledge with grocers and the like. Like nature's gifts of water, air, and sun, the aba doesn't recognize differences and is equally effective for Turk and Tajik, Arab and Kurd, and Lor and Afghan, and it doesn't discrim­ inate at all between master and servant or khan and mirza or sheykh and youth or sayyid and layman. Despite all the toil and trouble we cause, this faithful friend and loyal, unpaid, and undemanding ser­ vant never consents to do less than serve us willingly from the hour of our birth when it's thrown over our cradle or hammock until the brink of the grave when it's pulled over our coffin. Even when a cloak is emptied of its owner, among nomadic tribes it becomes a black patch on a tribal tent and in the village and the country, it's stuffed full of straw and brush and some wood is passed through the sleeves and it's set up in the fields and gardens as an ugly and fright­ ening scarecrow. In the households of the poor and needy, who everywhere in the world are dropping off babies and producing progeny like factories fast at work, it becomes the swaddling clothes of infants and if its owner is a man without means, stripped down to nothing and absolutely destitute like me, it becomes his shroud, going with him into the earth. With that description, I hope that you will no longer envy this kind aba and will pray in unison with me 7 The zonnar is a belt, often just a cord, worn around the waist by eastern Christians, distinguishing them from Muslims.

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that God will not bring the day when we Iranians are left without it, for just as being without a chddor causes unchasteness in our ladies, being without an aba will cause our disorganization and disgrace." The aba was ready before long and we set out with the bouquet of flowers in hand. Along the way, I said, "Now that I've become a docile and obedient child, I want you to give me instructions for arranging and organizing my personal life." He stopped walking, and fixing his eyes on mine as was his wont, he said in astonishment, "I don't understand what you mean!" "I mean," said I, "that you, sir, with all your wisdom and experience in the affairs of life, must surely advocate rules and principles in matters of eating and sleeping and social relationships and that kind of thing which would be extraordinarily useful for me to know." Handing me a mocking smile tinged with irritation, he said, "Young man, do you dislike the free life so that you want to restrict it with childish bonds and invented rules and regulations? If you want to listen to my opinions about matters of living, then I'll tell you. If, like most people, you eat the bread of another and he has authority over you, you should still try within your powers to be free and not dependent, but if fortune smiles on you and you are free and independent, work then as long as it pleases you and don't be deceived by those always and forever unemployed who say that man has been created for work. You should know that man has been created for living and not for working. Also, work is of two kinds. One is for gaining a livelihood and obtaining food and drink and it's generally deadening and has no point or purpose except providing sustenance and filling the stomach with food and drink. The second is a source of mental diversion and it exercises taste, intelligence, and discriminative powers. It is the means of operation for the faculties of thought and reason and the fountainhead of all branches of civilization and progress and welfare of the human race. Lucky is the man who can during his life gradually decrease the first kind of work and increase to the best of his abilities his share of the second, though it often happens that this second kind of work is what people view as useless. At the same time, you should realize that if our sages have praised poverty, their intent was not for people to be hungry and to sponge and beg; rather, they wanted to say that one should not be possessed by property and wealth but must be the master of it. The real meaning of poverty is having hearts empty of greed and desire, not having empty hands. Besides that, hurrah for being free! It means you eat every time you get hungry and as much as will satisfy you but not so much that you can't eat ever again. You sleep any time you're

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Solving the Problem

sleepy and for as long as you please. Don't deprive yourself of the God-given favors of nature, such as music and song and pipe and hookah tobacco and prime meats and the juice of the grape, for so doing would show ingratitude for the Nourisher's favors. The an­ cients have said 'If you don't want to be disgraced, blend with the crowd,' but I suspect that if reason requires copying the majority in ordinary affairs of life, then in matters out of the ordinary, that is, in religion and faith and creed and the most prudent course of con­ duct, it requires actions contrary to the general public's. Don't forget that in this world and especially in this country, people are generally more unfortunate than malicious. If you can't make yourself like foolish and ignorant individuals, you should at least pity their condition and be the enemy and ill-wisher only of those who are inherently evil and dirty and malevolent with the characteristics of the wolf and the nature of the scorpion. As soon as your livelihood is assured, don't be so much in thrall to accumulation of money, for that brings ad­ versity. Never forget that no one in this world has yet become needy through generosity, and no one has been rid of needs through stin­ giness. I imagine that if you practice this advice, you won't regret it, but if in fact being free and unconstrained is really repugnant to you and you're wild about having principles and rules and regulations and you want to trade the cottage of your heart for army barracks and put a guard named codes and regulations and provisos in front of your heart and reason to check the free passage of love and ardor and joy and enthusiasm and pleasure and to make your whole existence a garrison in which all work is a consequence of order and decree and based on commands and prohibitions, it would be sufficient for you to follow two rules. First, don't deviate from temperance and moderation in anything or any matter and, second, insofar as you can, don't cause harm to come to anyone. Even the first rule has exceptions, and if occasionally there's some misstep and you some­ times set foot outside the circle of moderation and take some risk under the rubric o f ' O n e time is not a thousand,' it doesn't matter. But you should consider the second rule as admitting absolutely no exceptions, and under no pretext and with no plea or excuse should you ever intentionally harm or injure anyone. It is indisputable that despite all this, you will be much hurt by others, but don't take that seriously. Realize that the law of the world is generally that when you do good to someone, you have to expect evil, but try not to be overly hurt by that sort of thing, which is as natural as opium being bitter and salt being saline and wolves being savage, and then the fame and shame and the praise and blame and the acceptance and

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approbation and the friendship and enmity, all of which are groundless, will be as one in your eyes. Beyond that, try to reach a point and live in a way that people notice your work and behavior and actions and conversations as little as possible." After those words, Mowlana snapped his thumb and forefinger together and said, "That's the path of life for you; You know the rest that you should do." That night my new bride cooked a casserole of rice with a layer of meat at the bottom of the pot. It tasted especially good to my brother and he didn't stop complimenting it. I thought it would be unfair for me to stand in the way ofjustice and I said, "The mother of the bride should not commend her own daughter and I should not express my opinions here either, but I would like to see what Mowlana says." While seated with ewer and basin, busy rinsing his hands and mouth, Mowlana said, "Except for one fault, I'd say it's a match for a heavenly repast." AIi Aqa and I were both left flabbergasted and asked with surprise, "So please tell us what fault it has!" 11:223 Emptying the water from his mouth into the basin, Mowlana said, "Its fault is that it wasn't the product of your own labors. Although they've always said that the guest is at the mercy of the host, if you are even a bit interested in my contentment and peace of mind, I beg that any food you give me on nights hereafter when I'm your guest, though it be dry bread, be the product of your labors and money which you yourselves have earned. Then the bread I eat will be lawful and my prayers on your behalf will be answered more quickly." On first hearing these words, we were shocked, but at length we promised that we would earnestly strive from that hour on to secure the means for completely satisfying the love-inspired thoughts of our true master and spiritual father. We three sat up half that night too and talked about every subject. In the midst of the conversation, Mowlana sighed and said, "You don't know how glad I am to see you two brothers happy amidst your kith and kin! Although I know that good friends are like the phoenix and the philosophers' stone, I'm nevertheless also eager for you to find two or three real friends and pass this brief span of life nicely and comfortably." "You know very well," said AIi Aqa, "that I've eaten whatever I've had with friends until now; however, I haven't at this hour one loving friend whose words and thoughts are not just on filling his stomach and melting butter on his porridge."

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Solving the Problem

Mowlana replied, "But haven't you heard the advice of the poet, Sa'eb: Don't be in the position of testing friends too often, Or you'll become, Sa'eb, a stranger, forlorn and friendless. 11:224

I didn't mean that one should necessarily find friends without flaw or fault; rather, I intended that you not remain alone, but get to know several clean and decent young men of understanding and good taste, because life has no spice without friends and companions. Every time you see someone with a nice disposition and pleasant attitude whose good qualities outweigh his faults, take advantage of his pres­ ence. I don't say to choose service to the wine seller or the ascetic; Be prompt in the service of whichever makes you happy! And similarly, another poet has said, Cling to the skirts of any heart agitated By the nightingale's song, for that is the one with some awareness."

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"And if you don't find good and suitable friends, be friends with yourselves. I've heard that in Europe, people with elegance and taste put flower pots on their windowsills if the house doesn't have a courtyard or garden, and they enjoy themselves tending those. You should also try to arrange in a corner of your heart and soul, hidden from outsiders' eyes, a pretty little garden in which you plant some rare and precious flowers on which no one's eyes should fall. Make arranging and trimming them in your spare time a pleasure in your life and a joy to your heart with its longings and desires." Slowly leaving Mowlana with the teapot and tea and cinnamon and hookah and other tiny trifles, we said good night and went to our own rooms to sleep. It was a while after midnight when I happened to wake up and see Mowlana's lamp still lit. I woke my wife, showed her the rays of light, and said, "See that lamp? That's the lamp of prosperity and good fortune which has been lit in our house!" And closing my eyes again, I went into sweet sleep. Right in those first two or three sessions, Mowlana so won the hearts of everyone in the house that he became deeply loved by each and all and he made them his fervent disciples. Men and women, young and old including the help and servants, all rejoiced on nights when he was to come, awaiting his arrival quite impatiently and counting the minutes until they heard the sound at the door and

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could go whooping and hollering in a group to greet him. For the little girls, he had plenty of stories each sweeter than the other, during which the traditional storyteller's phrase, "And then, dear life of my heart," occurred repeatedly and it's no secret that AIi AqS and I also listened with all pleasure. With little boys, he organized a hundred kinds of games, such as those on swings and seesaws, batting the ball and other ball games, playing leapfrog and tipcat and the game with our belts rolled as whips and hopscotch and hide-and-seek and prisoner's base and guessing "how many pounds of beans" and playing forts-and-arrows and hasteh-hulu.8 Bareheaded and barefooted, he pushed and shoved and raced around the garden and courtyard, yelling and catching the tipcat peg and shouting zu and giving and taking piggyback rides so that the mouths of us grownups watered unabashedly.9 For the women, he took omens and brought the problemsolving dried fruit and nuts and revealed their fortunes.10 For the servants, who generally were villagers and far away from near and dear, he wrote letters with appropriate amorous poetry, such as: I have the gemstone of a ring; it's thine first. I have a hundred customers; in my heart, thou art first. I've never forgotten the day when one of the young housemaids from Na'in protested on hearing this poem, saying, "What's-his-name and I have never used 'thou' to each other! I ask you to write, I have the gemstone of a ring; it's yours first. I have a hundred customers; in my heart, you are first." To the extent of his ability, he regularly gave tips to the servants, and since they were commonly sick or unwell, like most citizens of this country, he also brought some drugs and medicines each time. 8 The game of forts-and-arrows is played by putting some balls or nuts in a circle and trying to knock out as many as possible by throwing a wooden ball at them from a certain distance (Jz-c). The game o{ hasteh-hulu is one in which a player tries to guess the number of pits, usually peach or apricot, in the fist of another player. 9 The term, zu, refers to a shout of "zoooooooooo" which players make without taking a breath while running at full speed. The winner is the one who lasts the longest Oz-c). 10 The particular method of taking omens (fil gerefian) uses a book, usually a volume of Hafez; it has already been referred to in Volume I, Part I, where Jamalzadeh's family makes its decision to leave Isfahan. A question is posed, the phrases, " O Master Hafez of Shiraz, for the sake of the rock candy which you praise, tell me the prophecy truthfully" (ey khajeh hafez-e shiraz, be-haqq-e an shakheh nahati keh be-an minazi, fil-e ma-ra rast be-gu) are recited, the volume is opened at random, and the passage to which it is opened is then interpreted (Jz-c). The problem-solving dried fruit-and-nut mixture is a mixture of fruit and nuts (a/if) which is cleaned while a story is being told. When the story is over, the people eating the mixture are supposed to get what they wished for.

". . . one of the young housemaids from Na'in protested . . . "

The Absent Who's Present Φ 277 In sum, Mowlana's name didn't leave their tongues from one half of the month to the next, and he had found in our house a group of the sincerest of well-wishers.

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CHAPTER 4 rr,, ., , Λ „rt

The Absent Who s

11:228

Two months and fifteen days had now passed as described and again

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my brother and I and tiie rest of Present the household were all sitting there, awaiting the moment of Mowla­ na's arrival. The sound of the evening call to prayer arose gradually and there was still no news of Mowlana. I said to AIi Aqa, "I'd better go and see why he's late. I fear some misfortune may have befallen him, God forbid!" "What are you talking about?" he said. "Mow­ lana's not a fancy foreign watch to be here on the dot. He must have been detained somewhere, but he'll come soon." A sound arose at the door during this discussion and the servant came and said, "Karbala'i Qorban, the servant from the School of the Four Gardens, has brought an envelope from Mowlana." Very worried, we opened it. He had written, "This morning a message arrived from the dervish Sobhan asking me to come as quickly as possible so that perhaps again in this last part of life, we might be lucky enough to go roaming about the world again for a bit and see what's going on. I am therefore leaving and entrusting you and your households, young and old, to God. I wanted very much to kiss your faces once again but because I don't like the emotion that gets the upper hand at farewells, I apologize now for my shortcomings and hope that, at the Nourisher's will, we will see each other another time in this world. Since I had no chance to sort and collect my things, I have entrusted my room key to Karbala'i Qorban to take to you. The petty trifles I have are worth nothing, but they corre­ 1 spond to the green leaf of the dervish's present. If there is a book or something else you are fond of, I beg you to keep it as a reminder of me and then please take the trouble to donate what is left to Kar­ bala'i Qorban and thank him once more on my behalf." AU of us fell on poor Karbala'i Qorban, "What's this that Mow­ lana's written? He says he's left!" "Yes," he said, "a dusty young caravaneer who'd clearly come from some distant place brought 1

"The green leaf is the dervish's present" is the first half of a couplet which beggars recite when offering a green leaf to passers-by. The couplet continues, "What (else) should he do? The poor have nothing more" (ceh konad bi-ηανά naddrad bish) (Jz-c).

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Φ Solving the Problem

Mowlana an envelope before noon. Shortly afterward, he also brought a mule and Mowlana left riding on it and taking a quilt and ewer. He gave me this envelope and key, bidding me to deliver them just at the evening call for prayer." Hearing that, the whole group became unbelievably disappointed and glum. The children immediately began to weep and wail and I won't hide from you that I too would have let go and wept if I hadn't been too embarrassed to do that in front of the servants and help. I looked and saw that Ah Aqa's face had gone pale and he stood there frozen and unmoving, like a man struck dumb. At first I thought of trying to get two swift horses and somehow or other riding post­ haste with Khodadad to wherever Mowlana was and not allowing him to go, but I immediately realized that he wasn't someone whose 11:229 thoughts and ideas could so easily be changed when his mind was settled on something, and therefore the tears welled up in my eyes and a lump caught at the base of my throat and in utmost depression I went with Karbala'i Qorban toward the school. Putting in the key, we opened the lock on Mowlana's door and entered. A strange mood took hold of me. A fingerwidth of ashes had settled on the fire, which had not yet gone completely out, and as soon as the door opened and the fresh air entered, it raised the ashes and scattered them in all directions like wind falling over the snow. The hookah smoke still curled in the corners of the room like the fog and mist clinging to the valleys and halfway up the mountain. We couldn't believe that the cell was ownerless. Poor Karbala'i Qorban was also very moved and said from time to time in his thick Isfahani accent, " H o w can it be!" thus expressing his own amazement about the event that had taken place. "Karbala'i Qorban," I said, "Mowlana especially ordered me to thank you and he wrote that all that he has, meaning whatever's in this cell, belongs to you personally and you are authorized to use it any way you like." He shook his head and said, "What an amazing man he was! May God give him long life! I wish for his health more than anything else." "The object now," I said, "is to clear up these things so that my mind can be at rest on this at least." Scratching his head and beard a couple of times with the tip of his fingernail and casting a glance around at the things, he said, "There's just this mattress left from the bedding and I, well, why hide it from 11:230 you, my mattress has been in shreds for a while now and I've put up with only a quilt. If you'd let me take the mattress, my bed would

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be perfect and every time I sleep on it, I'll pray for the life and honor of Mowlana and you, sir." "That's great!" I said. "Now the business of the mattress is cleared up, but what ought to be done about the rest of the things?" "My heart tells me," he said, "that Mowlana will eventually return one day. As for me, I think we shouldn't touch these things at all for so long as it's possible. You can be sure that when Mowlana returns some day, he'll be very happy to see his room and its things as they were. If it's permitted, I'll also drop in now and then to keep the dust from settling on things and to keep the moths from getting into them." "You are truly a man with gratitude," I said, "and Mowlana's salt is lawful for you. Your idea is quite proper, and if sometime you should happen to need any help from me, you know the way to our house. You'll always be most welcome." Then giving him a good tip, I locked the door back up, entrusted the key to him, and returned home alone like a little lost child. From that day on, every time I was distressed or had some grief or sorrow, I'd go straight to the school, take the key from Karbala'i Qorban, open the door of Mowlana's cell, and sit for a while alone by myself in a corner of the room with the memory of past days of happiness. I'd smoke a cigarette or two, and generally when I went out, it was as if a load had been lifted from my shoulders and I forgot the grief and sorrow of time. Spring and summer gradually passed, and in early autumn, I was caught by that unsporting malaria which seems to have been created in the Almighty's workshop exclusively for us people of these remote regions. I had just about set out on the road to Takhteh-pulad but apparently even death was repelled by me and since my appointed hour had not yet arrived, my fever subsided one day without preamble and then broke completely. My weakness and lack of energy changed to strength and health and the doctor gave me permission to get out of bed and walk around by stages outdoors. It was perhaps my second time out of the house when I again set out on the road to the school and somehow or other got myself there. As soon as I entered, my eyes fell directly on Mowlana's cell. I saw that the oiled paper of the door had completely peeled off and fallen on the porch floor, and without a lock or latch, the door was open to the elements. Amazed, I entered the room. It was completely empty and not even a match had been left in it. So much dust and dirt and so many leaves and ashes had collected on all sides that it

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Solving the Problem

obviously had not come into contact with a human foot or seen the fact of broom or water for quite a while. I hurriedly took myself to Karbala'i Qorban's room to check up on the situation. Instead of our Karbala'i Qorban, an extremely long and lanky, turbanned man whom I'd never seen or met was sitting there, busy soaking hookah tobacco. "I want to talk with Karbala'i Qorban," I said. Without raising his eyes from the bowl of tobacco, he said, "May Karbala'i Qorban's unused years be yours!" "What are you saying?" I said. "Why are you making jokes?" "Dying is the only thing that isn't for joking about," he said. "We all die and Kar­ bala'i Qorban died t o o . " "I was with him two months ago in this very school," I said. " H e was in perfectly good health and hadn't a flaw or defect in his constitution at all." "He got pneumonia and breathed his last breath in this very room exactly thirty-four days ago today," he said. "I've taken his place for the time being. If there's any request, please make it." "Why has Molla Abd-ol-hadi's cell fallen into this plight?" I asked. "What's happened to its things?" "Since Karbala'i Qorban had himself said that the things in that room had been bestowed to him," he said, "they were auctioned off when he died. The money from them went to meet the expenses of his shroud and burial." Hearing this news made me weak in the knees. I sat there a while and as soon as I felt in myself a spark of life and strength and energy anew, I took myself to Mowlana's cell for a pilgrimage and a fare­ well. I stood there for a time like a mourner, my back to the wall and my arms on the niches. I remember my lips moving, consciously or not, and I recited from the Qoran, "Surely we are God's and unto Him we return." I saw it was gradually getting dark but I could scarcely move myself. Somehow or other, I circumambulated the room and the back storage room one more time, and when I wanted to go out, something resembling a book, lying there in a niche and covered with dust, suddenly came under my eyes. I picked it up without thinking and went out of the room. The courtyard of the school still hadn't gotten dark and how sur­ prised I was when I saw that what I had in my hand wasn't a book but rather that fragment in nastaliq script with the quatrain of Khayyam quoted earlier:

11:233

I saw a rend seated on the frosty ground, With neither atheism nor Islam and neither the world nor religion,

The Absent Who's Present

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Neither Truth of God nor reality and neither Shari'a nor certainty. Who in these two worlds would have the courage for that? Counting this event as one of the miracles of the absent, I brought the fragment straight home and hung it with my own hands in that very room which had become known as Mowlana's and which is known even yet by that name. Sometimes now when my heart longs for my dear Mowlana, I secretly take myself away from the rest of the household into that room and, like the lover who delights in looking at pictures of his beloved, I become engrossed in looking at that fragment and remembering that great and noble individual whom those verses seem to describe. Forgetting the world and whatever's in it, I find a happiness and bliss to which there is no path for anyone save an adept in bliss. *

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When Javad Aqa's speech reached this point, his eyes closed like someone voyaging in the world of imagination. A smile telling a story of worlds other than this mud-and-brick world of ours formed in the corners of his lips. Then opening his eyes very slowly and paying no attention to me or anything else, he said as if talking to himself, "Alas that such a lovely friend and magnificent guide slipped away from me! Please believe that I'll grieve for him as long as I live. The best days of my life were surely those I passed in that great man's service and I truly enjoyed to the fullest my life and being alive. Whatever I've said to describe Mowlana has been inadequate. From our first meeting, I found him so good-natured and pleasantspoken and friendly and cheerful and witty and versatile on the one hand and so wise and dignified and firm and grave on the other that I became his loving follower with not one but a hundred hearts, so to speak, and I devoted myself to sincerely serving him." "As I became more familiar with his moods, I discovered in him every day new qualities and characteristics which continually increased my attachment and devotion to him. Although he didn't mind teasing me sometimes and needling me and making fun of me as a haji's boy, he nevertheless carried his jokes and raillery out so skillfully that not only did I not take offense but rather I felt it was extremely healthy for my character and I enjoyed it immensely." "Despite his age, he was more lively than most young people nowadays, and for all his bittersweet experiences over the course of his tumultuous life, never did I see him on the verge of becoming an old man with no gusto or discernment or an acrimonious and aged

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sourpuss who, in the name of experience, quenches the zeal and enthusiasm of youth with the cold water of fraudulent and false advice. "This man who, if necessary, went dauntlessly into the lion's mouth and grappled with the leopard was meek and mild and gentle in the company of God's people and was so pure-minded, benevolent, and good-natured that I sometimes seriously thought that he might be an angel who'd come forth in turban, cloak, and beard, and an imitation human face." "Although he was really a sea of learning, knowledge, and talent, he often sat for long hours with common and illiterate people and even with pretentious young people still learning the alphabet, engaged in exchanging confidences and talking and laughing and listening to their conversations with total delight and replying coherently to their disconnected phrases." "In the course of the two years that I was intimately associated with this man, I saw that he was outwardly free of antipathies and inwardly free of biases. It gradually dawned on me that he himself hadn't made anything in the world a habit, and over time I even noticed that he counted the avoidance of habits as itself a kind of slavery and habit, saying that the highest of all renunciations was the renunciation of renunciations and that the real free man was the man free of every bond, including bondlessness." "He took affairs of this world lightly and easily for himself and was not even much concerned about the next. In the matter of a livelihood, he quite masterfully mixed contentment with restraint and made himself at peace. Even in the matter of the hereafter, he'd totally cast aside the multicolored loops of hope and fear and hung his hands on the loop of faith in God." "Comprehending the true world of isolation and solitude, of being with no one in the midst of being with all, he neither fled from mobs and multitudes nor feared being an outsider, single and without a family." "When I remember those deeds and words, all well-coined and polished, how often I long that my powers of memory would help me to compile a collection of short sayings of his and to write, if only in summary, an account of his deeds so that over the years it would, like The Rose Garden and The Fragrance Garden, became a model of conduct for people of this city and even of this country and it would remain as a memorial to a guide in life." "I remember that an dkhond at the school asked him one day, 'Whom do you copy?' 'You yourself know that copying the dead is forbidden in the Shari'a,' he said, 'and following the religious order, I even

The Absent Who's Present

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consider copying the ways of the living as unlawful.' But as soon as he saw the dkhond's astonishment, he changed his line and said, Ί was joking. I was copying such and such a theological authority.' When that worthless dkhond had disappeared from view, I asked, 'Were you actually copying that person whose name you mentioned?' One of his meaningful smiles formed in the corners of his lips and he said, 'I'd imagined that an Isfahani boy like you was shrewder than that! Don't you know that publicizing immorality is due to ignorance?' "Although he was the most simple of men, for those who had eyes to see, his deeds were amazing, his conversation amazing, his behavior amazing, his moods and spirits amazing, his piety and de­ votion amazing, his silence amazing, his statements amazing, and most amazing of all was that despite this, he not only appeared to be the simplest of men but he in fact was. In these stinking and corrupt surroundings where words and deeds are all false and forged and dishonest and deceitful and two-faced and tricked up from end to end, the simplicity of Mowlana was in contrast a guileless and un­ affected simplicity without pose or pretense and without a jot of duplicity or artificiality." "This celibate man of one thin qabd, who actually had no one on earth and no star in the seven heavens, had reached in the abstruse art of living that stage of expertise which must undoubtedly be called the art of arts and the science of sciences. With no ostentation or tasteless and insipid affectations but with the gentle calm of a drop of pure water running ever so gently beneath a flower petal, he had without dissimulation bravely turned his back on both worlds. Freeing himself from avowals and denials, he had stepped higher than the level of certainty and doubt, and without the slightest heed to kingly realms or pious asceticism, he had reached a stage where: Erasing letters from pages of the world, He was not of the living and not of the dead." "I repeatedly heard him call himself the richest of the rich, saying, Ί only want what I need, and when I have what I need, why shouldn't I consider myself the richest?' Truly, he neither owned nor was owned and was in bondage and servitude to nothing. Whenever he wanted to commend someone, he said, 'He was afraid of people and found comfort with God,' and as I knew him better, I saw that he was being completely sincere about this. His body was frail and looked as if it could be knocked over by a puff of wind, but with his brief morning exercises, he kept his muscles so firm and strong that I

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repeatedly saw him cut apples and quinces in half easily with a blow of two fingers." "For a while, I didn't rightly know whether he was actually dis­ tinctive among our species of two-legged animals or whether he just seemed that way to me because of my strong devotion and attach­ ment to him, but a day did come when it was indisputably proved to me that he differed fundamentally from other men. It was then that I fixed my eyes on his beloved face and like a person reciting a prayer from his heart, I said to myself, Greed and desire are in no element of him, The unrestricted light, alive from love of God, Man's spirit but Gabriel's meaning, Freed from anger and desire, from noise and din, Freed from austerities, from abstinence and battle, As if he were himself not born of man." "Since he was always smiling and in good humor, one day I asked him, 'Has God made no grief or sorrow in your heart, sir?' 'Al­ though the world and life don't mean a straw to me,' he said, Ί have some commitment to conciliation and consent. Misfortune for me is only when I see a tyrant oppressing the downtrodden and I'm not strong enough to beat the daylights out of him and rub his nose in the dirt.' " "Even today, although I have for years been deprived of his pres­ ence, any time my thoughts turn toward him, a deep ocean without turmoil materializes before my eyes and I see a boundless sea without clamor and in memory of my dear and great Mowlana, that calming sky for that tossing storm, and the one for whom the Lord will be a support and refuge in all places and in every situation, I utter these couplets: The sheykh, free from harassment and conflict, Hid his moonlike face in the quilt; Happy with death and blissfully happy with eternity, Free from praise and blame of high or low."

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As you may recall, I said in the beginning of this story that Javad Aqa and I had flipped a coin in the cool underground room of his house to decide which of us would tell his adventure first and the toss went to him. CONCLUSION

Conclusion

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When he had reached this point in his adventures, he called the servant and said, "Have our dinner brought!" After eating a match­ less dinner which only Isfahan's matrons of incomparable taste can manage to prepare, he settled down and said, " N o w then, it's your turn to tell your adventures." " M y friend," I said, "I've been a stray dog roaming about the world, yet like a blind and deaf man, my eyes have seen nothing and my ears have heard nothing. My bag is quite empty and no adventure I've had would ever begin to measure up to this rare one of yours, which was a lesson in wisdom from one end to the other. I suspect it would be in your best interests to cross me off and not to damage my reputation or go collecting the means for your own discomfort." "You old Isfahani," he said, "I won't buy that talk! You can't pull a fast one on me with treacly talk! You promised to tell me your ad­ ventures whole and complete and I won't let up on you until you do." As there was no other way out, I said, "The time is short by now today and also you must have gotten somewhat tired from talking so that you wouldn't enjoy my story or have the patience to hear it. But if again tomorrow the same spread is prepared here as today, I give my word that even if the door is barred, I'll get myself here by gutter holes and drainpipes and then, for as long as you want, I'll talk my head off while you lend your ear for lots of fond talk." With that promise, we kissed each other like brothers once more and parted, but just as soon as I stepped into the house, I was handed a telegraph from the director of the department where I have now been employed for fourteen years. He'd written that I should im­ mediately get to Geneva as fast as possible. Without even saying goodbye to Javad Aqa and other friends, I turned this ass's head toward Tehran the next morning, and after stopping there a day, I hurried to Enzeli on the Caspian Sea. Bidding farewell to my home­ land, I once more set out for Europe, catching a Russian boat about to leave. Now years have passed and since the coming of the war I've been completely uninformed about friends and family and Javad Aqa and his brother, AIi Aqa, and I know nothing of what's happened to Mowlana. But from time to time my thoughts and imagination fly toward Isfahan, and I ask the Lord to be their friend and companion in every situation and in all places. How often I sigh for those morn­ ings when sleepy-eyed like a tired-out mule whose miller has gone to sleep, I availed myself of this tempting world and enjoyed life in

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a corner of Isfahan, the image of paradise! With the memory of those days, I say with total longing: Happy the day, O Lord, when I make my home in Isfahan, And make my pen flow fluent with water of its Zayendeh River. And now in this latter part of life, the only desire I have is to be buried in the same place where I was delivered onto this earth half a century ago, and after passing through a life full of ups and downs, to lay my head for the final sleep in the hospitable lap of Takhtehpulad in the neighborhood of the Zayandeh River and to close my eyes on this existence full of dalliance and flirtation and weariness and vexation. Completed: Geneva, May-June, A.D. 1944.

Translator's Postscript

Soon after submitting a proposal for this translation to the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH), I wrote to Jamalzadeh and described the goals of the NEH translation program, explained why I thought this work would fit those goals, and asked his permission to publish the final translation. Jamalzadeh replied promptly, not only agreeing to publication of a translation by someone then unknown to him but also generously offering his help and encouragement. The correspondence continued during the proposal's review by NEH and during the translation process after its acceptance. As drafts of chapters were completed, they were sent, usually with questions added, to Jamalzadeh for his comments. Again, he replied generously, not only answering questions and correcting errors but also adding comments and asides of which only a small portion are reflected in the footnotes. A sample of Jamalzadeh's comments will perhaps help expand the reader's picture of the author. His interest in Hafez, whose couplets have often been cited in this translation, led to a series of articles on the poet which were published in the Persian periodical Armaghdn; he hopes to complete these articles and publish them in book form. In addition to enjoying the classical Persian writers, he is fond of popular stories; "The Thief and the Judge," referred to in this translation, is a favorite of his. He hopes to one day write and publish a version in Persian; details of his French version suggest to me that it would poke fun at the religio-legal establishment and the credulous peasantry in a manner gently reminiscent of "The Hell of Fanaticism." He repeatedly expressed his hatred of fanaticism and particularly thanked me for translating the episode of his boyhood when he saw the two alleged Babis burned alive. Commenting on a line in his father's treatise, "The True Dream," where Aqa Najafi speaks of "Those oppressors, those government people," Jamalzadeh explained that Aqa Najafi is trying to disassociate himself from the government, since a true mullah would consider all people in government 287

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as oppressors and would avoid accepting their invitations and eating with them. Thus consistent with his published works, the corre­ spondence with Jamalzadeh revealed a man interested in both classical literature and folk culture, a man with moral convictions anxious to expose the fanaticism that can lurk in Islam but believing that its leaders can, and should, fight the tyrannies entrenched for centuries in the Iranian government. The correspondence also contained more personal touches: amaze­ ment at the courage of Mir Fendereski in flouting convention; fears of the falakeh he encountered in childhood; and disagreements with certain Sufi sentiments of Rumi's which are quoted by Mowlana in this book. He also expressed his admiration for Shah Soltan-hoseyn, whom he chose in a survey by the Persian journal Sokhan as his favorite Persian king because Shah Soltan-hoseyn preferred books and the college to armies and war. Jamalzadeh also expressed irrita­ tion at his own old age, which had made him forget the sources of some verse quotations. This correspondence was begun at a time when the Pahlavi rule seemed secure to most western eyes. Jamalzadeh's relations with that regime fluctuated. He was for some time in good standing and was even asked to serve as minister of labor, but he refused. With the publication of The Character of Us Iranians (Kholqiyat-e Md Iraniyan) in A. D. 1966, he fell into disfavor. The book was banned, confis­ cated, and destroyed. The passports of both Jamalzadeh and his wife were taken from them, causing them considerable difficulties. Only after three years were their passports returned; the offending book had not been republished as of 1981; copies of it are available in some American libraries. Toward the end of the Pahlavi regime, Jamalza­ deh was again in favor with the authorities and was offered an hon­ orary doctorate with the robe to be presented by the king and queen in person. He declined the honor, sending a doctor's certificate saying he was not well. The degree and robe were brought to him in Ge­ neva; the robe remains unworn and the title unused. When the Pahlavi regime was overthrown and an Islamic republic established, Jamalzadeh's letters to me from Geneva at first cheered the overthrow of the dictatorship and the placing of control over Iran's destiny in the hands of its own people rather than those of outside powers. As press reports of religious persecution came out of Iran, his letters expressed horror at these stories of fanaticism, which recalled scenes from his boyhood in Iran, particularly in cases where Bahais were the victims. Whether for his criticisms of these

Translator's Postscript

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289

actions or for some other reason, the Islamic republic temporarily revoked his passport and that of his wife in December 1980. Jamalzadeh has continued to live in Geneva since he retired from the International Labor Organization on January 24, 1956. In the spring of 1981, he and his wife, born Marguerite Eggert, a Berliner who took Iranian citizenship when they married, celebrated their fiftieth wedding anniversary there. His wife speaks Persian, as well as French, English, and German; she has traveled with her husband on some of his trips to Iran. Their apartment at 78 Florissant, which I visited in late April 1980, is filled almost to overflowing with Jamalzadeh's papers and the books which reflect his eclectic tastes. Their warm and gracious hospitality to me surely exemplifies that which Jamal­ zadeh considers a Persian characteristic. Jamalzadeh has continued to write extensively since his retirement. In addition to translations, he published during the 1970s two shortstory collections, Short Stories for Children with Beards (Qessehhd-ye Kutdh baraye Bachchehhd-ye Rish-ddr) and Our Story Came to an End (Qesseh-ye Md be-sar Rasid), as well as a study of women in Iranian culture (Tasvir-e Zan dar Farhang-e Irani) and numerous articles. In the spring of 1980, at the age of eighty-five or, using his choice of the Islamic calendar, ninety, he was busy writing his annual article on the Persian writer, Hedayat, who died in April 1951; this article would also be concerned with Jean-Paul Sartre, who had just died. He told me about a proposed collection of stories about Muslim saints, and he laughed at himself for having said his previous book would be his last. The stories he was going to include were not, he said, those obviously fictitious stories such as that of the saint who said a thousand prayers a night, a clearly impossible task at even the rate of one per minute, but rather stories that could in fact be true. Jamalzadeh is a storyteller in person as on paper. I listened to one story after another of his past and present life, mixed with comments on current and historical events, digressions into folk tales, and quo­ tations of appropriate Persian couplets, told with feeling and a twin­ kle in his eye. His style in conversation was so similar to his style in writing that only with a tape recording could I identify the differ­ ences between his oral account of a childhood incident and the same incident as printed in the Persian original of this book. He also told me of his early encounters with dialect differences in his brief child­ hood period in Tehran after leaving Isfahan and before leaving the country. He had quickly learned that the Tehranis use a in a number of places where the Isfahanis use e, and he was making the appropri­ ate correction one day when talking with some children about the

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swallows flying around the school. The children laughed at him, even though he insisted he was pronouncing the word for "swallow" in Tehrani fashion. Only later did he learn that the Isfahani word for "swallow" is completely unrelated to the Tehrani word. It is perhaps incidents of this sort that stimulated his interest in the spoken lan­ guage and its regional variations in Persian-speaking Iran. Jamalzadeh's interest in Iran is not only literary, linguistic, and historical; he also has been concerned with the problems of poverty in his country. The former queen once sent a cabinet head personally to ask Jamalzadeh to write some children's stories. He replied that the children in his country were too poor for books and needed bread; he suggested that she go to see one poor section of Tehran in partic­ ular. She did in fact go there and orders were subsequently given for some new housing for the poor. Jamalzadeh himself was hoping to make some contribution through the sales of reprintings of all his books, a major undertaking initiated by faculty at the University of Tehran. Two-thirds of the proceeds were to go to the poor, both students and the needy more generally, and the remaining third to public libraries for books. A few of his books had already been printed with this agreement on the first page when the revolution came and the work was stopped. In both correspondence and conversation, the subject of relations between Iran and the United States came up a number of times. Jamalzadeh expressed his concern over the failure of Americans who had been working with, and even in, Iran to acquire more than a superficial knowledge of the country. One of his stories, "Shurabad," included in the collection, Asman ο Risman, was intended to illustrate some of the resulting waste of time and money spent with the best of intentions. It is not only the lack of grass-roots knowledge of Iran but also the reluctance to see the necessity for it that Jamal­ zadeh feels has led to many basic misunderstandings between Iranians and foreigners, particularly Americans. Both Jamalzadeh and I sincerely hope that this translation of his two volumes into English will contribute to the reader's better un­ derstanding of traditional life in Islamic Iran.

Quarters and Neighborhoods: A Dardasht B Jubareh C New Quarter D Bidabad E Thousand Acres F Julfa G Farahabad H Ahmadabad I Behind the Rampart J Crossroad of Ali-qoli Aqa

Slreeis and Cemeteries: K Avenue of the Four Gardens L Takhteh-pulad

Bridges: h Thirty-three Arches i Khaju

Buildings: a School of the Four Gardens b King's Square c King's Mosque d Sheykh Lotfollah Mosque e AIi Qapu f Qeysariyeh g Imam's Door Mosque

Road to: 1 Tehran 2 Najafabad 3 Shiraz 4 Yazd

N O T E : Isfah an has undergone a number o f changes during the twentieth century. This map is intended to show the approximate locations o f areas o f the city ca. 1900 on a street plan which a visitor to Isfahan would have encountered in the 1970s; the scale is not precise.

Glossary

This glossary is divided into two parts, the first of proper nouns, mostly literary, religious, and historical, and the second of common nouns provided either as a convenience to the reader or to indicate some specialized meaning. Not included in the glossary are place names with an added i, such as Tehrani or Isfahani for a person or thing from Tehran or Isfahan, respectively. Most of the spelling in this translation tries to approximate modern Persian pronunciation; exceptions have been made where the context calls for a more Arabicized form or where a word is already more familiar in English with some alternate spelling. These exceptions lead to some inconsistencies of the sort which area specialists may already have encountered in other works on Iran. Diacritics have been avoided except for vowel length. The Persian long vowels,