Hafiz and the Religion of Love in Classical Persian Poetry

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Preacher (wā‘iẓ), Sufi Shaykh (shaykh), Judge (qāḍī) and the Lawyer or Jurist (faqīh).
But the most reviled and villainous personality, the nightmare obsession of the
whole of Ḥāfiẓ’sDīvān, is the Ascetic (zāhid), who exemplifies the Muslim Pharisee
parexcellence.Thezāhidin England and New England from the sixteenth century
down to the early eighteenth century was called a ‘Puritan’, ‘Precisian’ or
‘Formalist’, and in popular parlance today the newspapers normally dub him an
‘extremist’ or ‘religious fundamentalist’.^6 Ḥāfiẓ refers altogether 36 times in his
Dīvānto this Puritanzāhid.In each instance his tone of one of parody or sarcasm,
voicing reproach, contempt, disdain or scorn.^7 At the same time, his strictures
againstasceticismandtheasceticphilistinementalityarenotwaveslappingatthe
shores of hedonism. On the contrary, an ascetic eschewing of worldly materialism
permeatesḤāfiẓ’spoetry.Asceticrenunciation(zuhd)asaspiritualidealstillheldits
placeinhisthought,asitdidamongSufipoetswhomheoftenemulated.^8
Ḥāfiẓ’s criticism of asceticism is directed at the lifeless formalism and the desic-
catedlovelesspietyofitsheartless‘Muslim’practitioners.Exactlyliketheideologi-
cally committed clerics of Saudi Arabia or the hardline ayatollahs devoted to the
mint, anise and cummin (Matthew 23:23) of thesharī‘a-oriented religion of the
IslamicRepublicofIran,Ḥāfiẓ’sPharisee-ascetic,beinginsensibletoEros,professes
a philistine ignorance of the paradoxes of erotic spirituality and the passions of
apophatic theology. The ascetics’ loveless nature had been a proverbial theme in
PersianpoetryfromthetimeofSanā’ī(d.525/1131)atleast,^9 butḤāfiẓ’santinomian
verse seems single-mindedly dedicated to exposing the lack of practice of these
puritans(whethertheybetheshaykh,zāhid,faqīh,qāḍīorwā‘iẓ);indeed,theirlackof
knowledgeofAmor.Inoneplace,Ḥāfiẓtauntstheascetic:

Puritan!Ifonceourwitnessofdivinebeautyinearthly

Form^10 displayherselftoyou,you’dneveryearnagain

Foranythingelsebutforwineandwomen.^11

Elsewhere,hestigmatizeshisprudishness:

ThesignofthemanofGodisbeingalover.

Keepthissecrettoyourself–sinceIseenosuchsign

Inanyoftheseshaykhsinthistown!^12

Benighted in matters erotic, in his gravity the ascetic takes pride. The narrow-
minded and vain nature of Ḥāfiẓ’s pretentious puritan bears comparison with
Angelo,theover-strictdeputyofthestateinShakespeare’sMeasureforMeasure,the
characterofwhichisdescribedasbeing‘likeagoodthingbeingoftenread,grown
sere and tedious’.^13 A century later in English literature we again encounter this
same archetypalzāhid, in the characters of Formalist and Hypocrisy inPilgrim’s
Progressby John Bunyan (1628–88).These two ‘gentlemen’, who were ‘born in the
land of Vain-glory’, are reproached by Christian (hero of Bunyan’s allegory) for

ḤāfiẓandtheReligionofLoveinClassicalPersianPoetry