Hafiz and the Religion of Love in Classical Persian Poetry

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securityenoughtomakefellowshipsaccursed.Muchuponthisriddlerunsthe
wisdom of the world. This news is old enough, yet it is every day’s news.’^182
Furthermore,ifconquestsofprovinces,bequestsofpatronsandboonsofprincesbe
allputtooneside,Ḥāfiẓ’splaintinthispoemissituatedsquarelywithintheSufilit-
erarygenrededicatedtoexpoundingthetoposofthe‘unhappydecayoftruePiety
andtheImmoralitiesoftheAgewelivein’,^183 identicaltohighlysimilarsentiments
expressedtwocenturiesearlierby‘AṭṭārinhisMemoiroftheSaints,forinstance.^184
Theentireghazalisthusbestunderstood,Ithink,asacomplaintagainstthegeneral
decadenceofthetimes,inexactlythesameveinasW.B.Yeats’stanza:

Allneighbourlycontentandeasytalkaregone,

Butthereisnogoodcomplaining,formoney’srantison.

Hethat’smountingupmustonhisneighbourmount,

AndweandalltheMusesarethingsofnoaccount.^185

OneofthemainpatronsofḤāfiẓwasAbūIsḥāq’smultimillionairevizier‘Imād
al-Dīn Ḥasan (‘Ḥajjī’) Qiwām al-Dīn (d. 754/1353), whose extravagant convivial
gatheringsandgenerositythepoetcelebrated.‘Thegreenseaofheavenandthe
shipofthecrescentmoon’areall‘drownedinthebeneficenceofḤajjīQawām’,sang
Ḥāfiẓinoneverse.^186 AlthoughthehistorianMīrkhwanddefinitivelyconfirmsthat
ḤajjīQawāmwas‘theobjectofpraise(mamdūḥ)ofḤāfiẓShīrāzī’,^187 acloseexami-
nationofthemainqaṣīdathathedevotedtothisvizier^188 revealsthatthemain
purposeoftheodelieselsewhere.Outofits40verses,only12(vv.11–21,37,40)
concernthevizier;therestupbraidthepoet’sancientfoe:thephariseticalascetic
(v.8),orarededicatedtohisusualbacchanalian,pastoralanderoticthemes.One
verse(30)featuresḤāfiẓ’spersonalinterpretationofḤallāj’sdrunkenapotheositic
utterance:‘IamGod’–Anā’l-Ḥaqq.Anydiscerningcriticcanthusviewthevizier’s
person as merely a stained glass window through which Ḥāfiẓ’s own poetico-
mysticalteachingsirradiated.Thisseemstobethegistofhisboastattheendofthe
poem(vv.36–7):

ManytherearewhoareḤāfiẓ,whopreservetheholybook

Butnonelikemetheworldthroughwhocancollect

TheminutiaeofphilosophywiththeQur’ān’stext.

Withallthispraiseofminebestowedonyou

Ipraythatlifestretchoutathousandyearsforyou,

Thoughforthelikesofyousuchrarewaresdoseemcheap.^189

AlthoughthereisnodoubtbutthatḤāfiẓregardedAbūIsḥāq’sreignfondlyand

mourneditspassingwithpoigency,^190 otherthanafewstrayallusionsinhisverse,

thereisnoevidencethatourpoetwasinanywayformally‘attached’asacourtier

toAbūIsḥāq’scourt.^191

ḤāfiẓandtheReligionofLoveinClassicalPersianPoetry