Page 70 - 47176

58 THE TARJUMAX AL-ASHWAQ (iV, V)

‘ The darkness of niglit,’ i.e. the veil of the Unseen let
down the curtains of gross corporeal existence, which is the
night of this animal organism, throwing a shroud over the
spiritual subtleties and noble sciences which it enshrines.
These, however, are not to be reached except by journeying
through bodily actions a’nd sensual thoughts, and whilst
a man is thus occupied the Divine wisdom goes away from
his heart, so that on his return he finds her irone and follows
her with his a.spiration.
4. ‘ Speeding arrows’ : he describes this celestial form as
shooting his heart, wherever it turns, with the arrows of her
glances, as God said, ‘ Wheresoever ye turn-, there is the fiur
of A llah’ (Kor. ii, 109).
5. ‘ She displayed her front-teeth,’ etc., i.e. this lover found
his whole being illuminated, for ‘ God is the light of the
heaveiis and the earth’ (Kor. xxiv, 35), and the Propliet
also said in his prayer, ‘ O God, put a light into my ear and
into my eye,’ and after mentioning the different members of
his body he concluded, ‘ and make the whole of irie one
light,’ viz. by the manifestation of Thy essence. Such a
manifestation is compared to a flash of lightning on account
of its not continuing. The author says that he did not
know whether his being was illuminated by the manifestation
proceeding from this Divine wisdom, which smiled upon him,
or by a sin»ultaneous manifestation of the Divine Essence.
C. ‘ She said,’ etc., i.e. let him not seek me from without
and let it satisfy him that I have descended into his heart,
at every moment.
so that he beholds me in his e.ssence and tlu’ough his essence

1. My longing sought the Upland and my affliction the
Lowland, so that I Avas between Najd and Tilulma.
2. They are two contraries which cannot meet: hence my
disunion will never be repaired.
3. What am I to do ? What shall I dexise ? Guide me
O my censor, do not affriglit me with blame !