The Masnavi, Book One (Oxford World's Classics)

The Lion, the Wolf, and the Fox
189

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To teach, this truthful speech comes to your tongue
Or else to its own course it could have clung;
It smoothly travels, so one wouldn’t know,
To gardens 
under which the rivers 
flow.*
That place to my soul, God, won’t you disclose
3105
Where speech without a word is born and grows,
So that the pure soul headlong then will race
To non-existence’s vast open space!
A wide and vast realm of magni
ficence
From which this false world gains its sustenance.
Tighter than non-existence is thought’s realm,
That’s why it causes griefs that overwhelm.
Temporal existence is more cramped than thought,
That’s why the moon shrinks almost to a dot;
The sensual world’s more cramped than this as well,
3110
It is the most restrictive prison cell.
What makes it narrow? Multiplicity:
Our senses drag us to plurality.
Unity’s not what senses can perceive ––
If that’s your goal, then this realm you must leave;
Though ‘B’ and ‘e’ formed it, ‘
Be!’
* was one act––
The meaning was still pure and kept intact.
Let’s now return, though this is incomplete,
To see what fate that old wolf had to meet.
The lion teaches a lesson to the wolf who had shown
disrespect in his division
That lion pulled apart the old wolf’s head
3115
To leave its wretched dualism dead ––
So we took vengeance on them,
* to be brief,
When they were not e
ffaced near their own chief––
Then, to the fox the lion turned to say,
‘Divide this food up for us straight away!’
The fox replied, ‘This fat ox seems just right
To be your breakfast, king –– you have such might;
And so the goat should be preserved till lunch ––
Something, victorious king, for you to munch;
The Lion, the Wolf, and the Fox
190

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Your supper’s then the hare that’s left behind ––
3120
An evening snack, king, since you are so kind.’
He said, ‘Fox, justice is what you display,
Who taught you how to share the spoils this way?
Where did you learn this, excellent dear friend?’
‘From witnessing the wolf’s most tragic end!’
The lion said, ‘You gambled all for me
So you can go and take with you all three!
Since you’ve behaved entirely for my sake,
If I harm you that would be my mistake.
I’m yours, and all the prey can be your prize,
3125
Step on the seventh heaven as you rise!
You took heed from that base wolf that I slew,
So, fox, you’re now a lion in my view!’
The wise take heed from deaths of friends, so they
Can sidestep tribulation in their way.
The fox gave thanks that he had been asked last,
After the wolf’s test had already passed:
‘If he had summoned me here 
first and said,
“Divide this up!” How could I then have 
fled!’
Praise be to God who made us too appear
3130
After our predecessors have been here,
To hear of punishments that He’d decreed
To those of them who failed then to take heed,
So trials of past wolves may cause alarm
And like the fox we may escape from harm.
That’s why the Prophet spoke so truthfully
When calling us ‘
the blest community’.
Look at the dead wolves’ bones and fur, and then
Consider this a warning, worthy men!
Existence and pretence the wise forget
3135
On learning what the Aad and Pharaoh met,
If not their fates for other men one day
Will be a warning not to go astray.
The Lion, the Wolf, and the Fox
191

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Noah threatens his people, ‘Don’t argue with me, for you’ll be
disobeying God by doing this, you abandoned men!’
‘Stubborn fools, I am not I,’ Noah said,
‘Through God I live, through my own soul I’m dead:
I’ve died to human senses like the night
So God is now my hearing, food, and sight.
Since I’m not I, this breath’s from Him as well,
He who himself breathes is an in
fidel!’
A lion’s in the fox’s form you see ––
3140
Don’t walk up to him so audaciously!
If you’re not fooled by how he looks outside
You might then hear the lion’s roar inside.
If Noah never had God’s light within
How could he then have caused their world to spin?
A thousand lions in one frame of clay ––
He was a 
fire, the world a stack of hay,
And since the stack did not give its tithe-share
A
flame to burn the stack he lit in there.
Whoever like the wolf should dare to speak
3145
Before the hidden lion has a cheek ––
Just like the wolf he’ll be gulped with one bite,
‘
We took revenge,’
* the lion will recite;
The lion’s blows will thus make him succumb,
The one who’s bold before him must be dumb!
If only just his body was attacked
So that his faith and heart could stay intact.
On reaching here, my strength has sapped away
So how can I reveal such truths today?
Think of your stomach as a worthless thing,
3150
In front of Him don’t try such bargaining!
Submit in front of Him your ‘I’ and ‘we’ ––
Give it to Him, for it’s His property!
On this path, once you are a poor fakir
The lion and his prey are yours –– it’s clear!
The Lion, the Wolf, and the Fox
192

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That’s all because He’s pure and glorious
And has no need for what’s super
fluous;
So all the prey and every grace that’s found
Straight to the servants of this King are bound ––
He made all things, though He has no desire,
3155
Those who see this feel joy and may rise higher!
He made the two worlds, everything you see,
But still what use to Him is property!
So guard your hearts from every evil thought
When near Him, so to shame you won’t be brought:
He can detect your thoughts and inner soul
Like hair which 
floats on milk inside your bowl;
The one whose breast from images is clean
Becomes a mirror too for what’s unseen:
Without the need to think he reads your mind ––
3160
A mirror for believers
* of this kind;
If he should test us, he would soon 
find out
Who’s
filled with certainty and who with doubt:
His soul’s the touchstone for the coins we hold,
So he sees what’s a heart and what’s false gold.