Hafiz and the Religion of Love in Classical Persian Poetry

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Friend/Spirit and the self-separating, illusory ego, which was so sharply evoked in
line 5. This inner union of the heart-self and its divine Creator-Beloved Friend
alwaysremainsbewilderingand‘crazy’(dīvāna/hayrān)toourlimitedego-intellect.
Forourindividualintellectalone–inḤāfiẓ’salreadyclassicpoeticimageryforcon-
veying the foundationalḥadīthof the blinding Face of the divine Beloved and its
‘70,000veils’ofallcreatedmanifestation^7 –byitsverynaturecannotseebeyondthe
endlessveilsofcreatedphenomena,whichforitarealwayspsychic‘chains’ofdis-
tractionandtemptation.OnlytheHeart,whenitisproperlyfocusedor‘withdrawn’
intoitself(khalwa/gūsha-girift),canfollowthesubtlefragrancesofdivineattraction
–hereechoingthatperfumeddawn-breeze(nasīm)whichsoevocativelyopensthis
ghazal– back to the very Eye/Essence (‘ayn/ābrū) of the One ‘Heart-holder’ and
alwayspresentFriend.
Thusline6leaveseachreaderfaceddirectlywithoneessentialquestion:withthe
apparentchoicebetweenseeing–andliving–inperspective,inthatlovingaware-
ness of Heart and Spirit which is both real and always connected with the divine
Friend (every hair linked ‘by thousands of works’). Or else of disintegrating and
returningtothelonelyseparationoftheego-intellectandallthefamiliarsufferings
(the ‘thorns’ of the concluding line) inherent in its ‘nearer-world’ (dunyā) of tran-
sientmaterialentities,spaceandtime–allquiteliterallydestinedtothepervasive
ruins(kharābāt)ofline3.OrbetweenthedivineFriend,theBelovedHerself,andher
dark and endlessly veiling – but also fragrantly alluring! (mushkīn/mishkīn)–chain
of tresses. More honestly, of course, we rarely seem to have much effective choice
between these two alternatives, finding our conscious selves, from moment to
moment,apparentlyentrancedinoneofthesestatesortheother.
But Ḥāfiẓ’s final poignant ‘Where?’ here obviously does not mean that we have
simplyreturnedtotheinitialhelplessnessanddespairthatmarkedthebeginningof
the poem. For the poet has actually brought his readers a very long way at this
point, and his final two lines in fact are devoted to clarifying the realization and
deeper insight into the universal nature of each Heart’s individualpathandwork,
whichhasonlynowbecomepossible.Inshort,wearesimplyaskedtobegintorec-
ognizethatthe‘Path’ofthisquintessentiallyhumanWorkisnottheapparent,dra-
maticmotionfromonelowerspiritualpointtoanotherapparentlyhigherone,asin
the progression from line 1 here to line 5. Rather, that uniquely individual work,
and resulting path, always lies in theongoing dynamic processof spiritual learning
and growth that constantly takes our heart back and forth from one state and
momentary spiritual stopping-place (manzil, in line 1) to another. So that what we
first took as separation, loss and failure is in reality the essential precondition for
theongoinghumantaskofloving,ofthestrivinganddiscoveryoftheFriend.

Lines7–8:RecognizingtheFriend’sWork:RecapitulationandConclusion

Line 7 here, like the end of line 6, might at first appear like another simple and
poignant repetition of the spiritual dilemmas first raised in the opening verse;

ḤāfiẓandtheReligionofLoveinClassicalPersianPoetry