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amiss’^35 finds an exact reprise in Ḥāfiẓ’s scorn for his ascetic’s penchant for fault-

finding.Maythesanctimoniousasceticberepaidinkindforhisfault-finding,Ḥāfiẓ

prays,supplicatingthatthe‘hotair’ofhisreligiouspronouncements–literally‘the

pallofhissighs’(dūd-iāhash)–befuddlehishyper-criticalvision:

OhLord,thisegotisticalascetic,whosesightsarealwaysfixedonother’s

flaws

Andfaults–Cloudthemirrorofhismindwiththevapourofhissighs!^36

Coleridge’sparaphraseof1Corinthians13:6–7inthiscontextspringstomind:

Awrongdonetotheethinkacat’seyespark

Thouwouldstnotsee,werenotthineownheartdark.

Thineownkeensenseofwrongthatthirstsforsin,

Fearthat–thesparkself-kindledfromwithin.^37

Ḥāfiẓ’s condemnation of fault-finding is not his own personal idiosyncrasy, but is

exactlyinlinewiththeteachingsofthePersianfutuwwattradition,wherethisvice

is consistently condemned by most of its foremost thinkers,^38 and also echoes a

numberofversesinRūmī’sMathnawīrevilingtheevilsofexposingtheflawsofone’s

neighbour(‘ayb-jū’ī).^39 ThekeyversethatbestencapsulatesḤāfiẓ’steachingonthe

viceoffault-findingis:

Isaidtothemasterofthetavern:‘Whichroadis

Theroadofsalvation?’Heliftedhiswineandsaid,

‘Notrevealingthefaultsofotherpeople.’^40

Here,Ḥāfiẓ’smasterofthetavern,symbolofthesupremespiritualguide,expounds
the doctrine that salvation lies in finding no fault and seeing no evil, a soterio-
logicalmessagetraceablebacktoahomilytoldbytheProphetontheevilsoffault-
finding.^41 The above verse was directly inspired by the Sufi teachings of Shaykh
Amīn al-Dīn Muḥammad Balyānī (668/1269–745/1344), the Master of the Kāzarūnī
Order–praised by Ḥāfiẓ as being one of the ‘five chief ornaments’ who flourished
during the reign of Shaykh Abū Isḥāq Īnjū (743/1342–753/1353).^42 In theMiftāḥal-
hidāyawamiṣbāḥal-‘ināya,Muḥammad,b.‘Uthmān’shagiographyofShaykhBalyānī,
wefindthefollowingepigramascribedtoAḥmadḤanbal,whichprovidesthegistof
the entire spiritual message of the verse: ‘Salvation has ten parts: all ten of these
consistinoverlookingthefaultsofothers.’^43
Ḥāfiẓ’s teachings about fault-finding in such verses were also influenced by the
homileticethicsof‘Aṭṭār.BecauseofitsrelevancetounderstandingthePersianSufi
background of Ḥāfiẓ’s anti-clericalism, the following lengthy passage from Taqī
Pūrnāmdāriyān’sfoundationalstudyofḤāfiẓherebearsquotation:

ḤāfiẓandtheReligionofLoveinClassicalPersianPoetry