He lived to know that “his fame spread from the sequestered village of Maʻarra to the utmost confines of the Arabic speaking world.” In the spring of 1055 AD he died, and was buried in a garden surrounding his home. Adh-Dhahabi states that there were present at his grave eighty poets, and that the Koran was read there two hundred times in a fortnight. Eighty poets in the small town of Maʻarra sounds incredible. But we must bear in mind that almost everyone who studies the Arabic grammar has also to study prosody and versification and thus become at least a rhymster. Even today, the death of a noted person among the Arabs, is always an occasion for the display of much eloquence and tears, both in prose and verse.

Abu al-ʻAlaʼ, beside being a poet and scholar of the first rank, was also one of the foremost thinkers of his age. Very little is said of his teachings, his characteristics, his many-sided intellect, in the biographies I have read. The fact that he was a liberal thinker, a trenchant writer—free, candid, downright, independent, skeptical withal—answers for the neglect on the part of Mohammedan doctors, who, when they do discuss him, try to conceal from the world what his poems unquestionably reveal. I am speaking, of course, of the neglect after his death. For during his lifetime he was much honored, as I have shown, and many distinguished travellers came especially to Maʻarra to see him. He was also often called upon to act as intercessor with the Emirs for the natives of his village.17

The larger collection of his poems, the Luzumiyat,18 was published in Cairo, in two volumes, by Azeez Zind, from an original MS. written in the twelfth century, under Abu al-ʻAla’s own title Luzum ma la Yalzam, or the Necessity of What Is Unnecessary. This title refers to the special system of rhyming which the poet adopted. And the poems, published in desultory fashion, were written, it seems, at different periods of his life, and are arranged according to his particular alphabetical system of rhyming. They bear no titles except, “And he also says, rhyming with so-and-so,” whatever the consonant and vowel may be. In his Preface to the Luzumiyat he says:

“It happened that I composed these poems during the past years, and in them I have always aimed at the truth. They are certainly free from the blandishments of exaggeration. And while some of them are written in glorification of God, who is above such glory, others are, as it were, a reminder to those who forget, a pinch to those who sleep, and a warning to the children of the earth against the wiles of the great world, where human rights and human gratitude are often strangled by the same hand of Fate.”

As for the translation of these chosen quatrains, let me say at the outset that it is almost impossible to adhere to the letter thereof and convey the meaning without being insipid, dull, and at times even ridiculous. There being no affinity between the Arabic and the English, their standards of art and beauty widely differ, and in the process of transformation the outer garment at times must necessarily be doffed. I have always adhered to the spirit, however, preserving the native imagery where it was not too clannish or grotesque. I have added nothing that was foreign to the ruling idea, nor have I omitted anything that was necessary to the completion of the general thought. One might get an idea of what is called a scholarly translation from the works of any of the Orientalists who have made a study of Abu al-ʻAlaʼ. The first English scholar to mention the poet, as far as I know, was J. D. Carlisle, who in his Specimens of Arabic Poetry, published in 1810, has paraphrased in verse a quatrain on Pride and Virtue. He also translated into Latin one of Abu al-ʻAla’s bold epigrams, fearing, I suppose, to publish it at that time in English.

The quatrains which are here published are culled from the three volumes of his poems, and they are arranged, as nearly as may be, in the logical order of their sequence of thought. They form a kind of eclogue, which the poet-philosopher delivers from his prison in Maʻarra.

Once, in Damascus, I visited, with some friends, a distinguished Sufi; and when the tea was being served, our host held forth on the subject of Abu al-ʻAla’s creed. He quoted from the Luzumiyat to show that the poet-philosopher of Maʻarra was a true Sufi, and of the highest order. “In his passionate hatred of the vile world and all the vile material manifestations of life,” quoth our host, “he was like a dervish dancing in sheer bewilderment; a holy man, indeed, melting in tears before the distorted image of Divinity. In his aloofness, as in the purity of his spirit, the ecstatic negations of Abu al-ʻAlaʼ can only be translated in terms of the Sufi’s creed. In his raptures, shathat, he was as distant as Ibn ul-Arabi; and in his bewilderment, heirat, he was as deeply intoxicated as Ibn ul-Fared. If others have symbolized the Divinity in wine, he symbolized it in Reason, which is the living oracle of the Soul; he has, in a word, embraced Divinity under the cover of a philosophy of extinction.” …

This, and more such from our Sufi host, to which the guests gently nodded understanding. One of them, a young poet and scholar, even added that most of the irreligious opinions that are found in the Luzumiyat were forced upon the poet by the rigorous system of rhyming he adopted. The rhyme, then, is responsible for the heresies of Abu al-ʻAlaʼ! Allah be praised! But this view of the matter was not new to me. I have heard it expressed by zealous Muslim scholars, who see in Abu al-ʻAlaʼ an adversary too strong to be allowed to enlist with the enemy. They will keep him, as one of the “Pillars of the Faith,” at any cost. Coming from them, therefore, this rhyme-begotten heresy theory is not surprising.

But I am surprised to find a European scholar like Professor Margoliouth giving countenance to such views; even repeating, to support his own argument,19 such drivel. For if the system of rhyme-ending imposes upon the poet his irreligious opinions, how can we account for them in his prose writings? How, for instance, explain his book Al-fusul wal Ghayat (The Chapters and the Purposes), a work in which he parodied the Koran itself, and which only needed, as he said, to bring it to the standard of the Book, “the polishing of four centuries of reading in the pulpit?” And how account for his Risalat ul-Ghufran (Epistle of Forgiveness), a most remarkable work both in form and conception?—a Divina Comedia in its cotyledonous state, as it were, only that Abu al-ʻAlaʼ does not seem to have relished the idea of visiting Jahannam. He must have felt that in his “three earthly prisons” he had had enough of it. So he visits the Jannat and there meets the pagan bards of Arabia lulling themselves in eternal bliss under the eternal shades of the sidr tree, writing and reading and discussing poetry. Now, to people the Muslim’s Paradise with heathen poets who have been forgiven—hence the title of the work—and received among the blest—is not this clear enough, bold enough, loud enough even for the deaf and the blind? “The idea,” says Professor Nicholson, speaking of The Epistle of Forgiveness,20 “is carried out with such ingenuity and in a spirit of audacious burlesque that reminds one of Lucien.”

This does not mean, however, that the work is essentially of a burlesque quality. Abu al-ʻAlaʼ had humor; but his earnest tone is never so little at an ebb as when he is in his happiest mood. I quote from The Epistle of Forgiveness:

“Sometimes you may find a man skilful in his trade,” says the Author, “perfect in sagacity and in the use of arguments, but when he comes to religion he is found obstinate, so does he follow in the old groove. Piety is implanted in human nature; it is deemed a sure refuge. To the growing child, that which falls from his elders’ lips is a lesson that abides with him all his life. Monks in their cloisters and devotees in their mosques accept their creed just as a story is handed down from him who tells it, without distinguishing between a true interpreter and a false. If one of these had found his kin among the Magians, or among the Sabians, he would have become nearly or quite like them.”

It does seem, too, that the strain of heterodoxy in Abu al-ʻAlaʼ is partly hereditary. His father, who was also a poet of some distinction, and his maternal uncle, were both noted for their liberal opinions in religious matters. And he himself, alluding in one of his poems to those who reproached him for not making the pilgrimage to Mecca, says that neither his father, nor his cousin, nor his uncle had pilgrimaged at all, and that he will not be denied forgiveness, if they are forgiven. And if they are not, he had as lief share their fate.

But aside from his prose writings, in which, do what we may, we can not explain away his supposed heresies, we find in the Luzumiyat themselves his dominant ideas on religion, for instance, being a superstition; wine, an unmitigated evil; virtue, its own reward; the cremation of the dead, a virtue; the slaughter or even the torture of animals a crime;21 doubt, a way to truth; reason, the only prophet and guide;—we find these ideas clothed in various images and expressed in varied forms, but unmistakable in whatever guise we find them. Here, for instance, is Professor Nicholson’s almost literal translation of a quatrain from the Luzumiyat:

Hanifs22 are stumbling, Christians gone astray,
Jews wildered, Magians far on error’s way:—
We mortals are composed of two great schools,
Enlightened knaves or else religious fools.

And here is the same idea, done in a large picture. The translation, literal too, is mine:

’Tis strange that Kusrah and his people wash
Their faces in the staling of the kine;
And that the Christians say, Almighty God
Was tortured, mocked, and crucified in fine:
And that the Jews should picture Him as one
Who loves the odor of a roasting chine;
And stranger still that Muslims travel far
To kiss a black stone said to be divine:—
Almighty God! will all the human race
Stray blindly from the Truth’s most sacred shrine?23

The East still remains the battleground of the creeds. And the Europeans, though they shook off their fetters of moral and spiritual slavery, would keep us in ours to facilitate the conquests of European commence. Thus the terrible Dragon, which is fed by the foreign missionary and the native priest, by the theologians and the ulama, and which still preys upon the heart and mind of Orient nations, is as active today as it was ten centuries ago. Let those consider this, who think Von Kremer exaggerated when he said, “Abu al-ʻAlaʼ is a poet many centuries ahead of his time.”

Before closing, I wish to call attention to a question which, though unimportant in itself, is nevertheless worthy of the consideration of all admirers of Arabic and Persian literature. I refer to the similarity of thought which exists between Omar Khayyam and Abu al-ʻAlaʼ. The former, I have reason to believe, was an imitator or a disciple of the latter. The birth of the first poet and the death of the second are not very far apart: they both occurred about the middle of the eleventh century. The English reading public here and abroad has already formed its opinion of Khayyam. Let it not, therefore, be supposed that in making this claim I aim to shake or undermine its great faith. My desire is to confirm, not to weaken—to expand, not contract—the Oriental influence on the Occidental mind.

Whoever will take the trouble, however, to read Omar Khayyam in conjunction with what is here translated of Abu al-ʻAlaʼ, can not fail to see the striking similarity in thought and image of certain phases of the creed or the lack of creed of both poets.24 To be sure, the skepticism and pessimism of Omar are to a great extent imported from Maʻarra. But the Arab philosopher in his religious opinions is far more outspoken than the Persian tentmaker. I do not say that Omar was a plagiarist; but I say this: just as Voltaire, for instance, acquired most of his liberal and skeptical views from Hobbes, Locke and Bayle, so did Omar acquire his from Abu al-ʻAlaʼ. In my notes to these quatrains I have quoted in comparison from both the Fitzgerald and the Herron-Allen versions of the Persian poet; and with so much or so little said, I leave the matter in the hands of the reader, who, upon a careful examination, will doubtless bear me out as to this point.

The Luzumiyat

I25

The sable wings of Night pursuing day
Across the opalescent hills, display
The wondrous star-gems which the fiery suns
Are scattering upon their fiery way.

II

O my Companion, Night is passing fair,
Fairer than aught the dawn and sundown wear;
And fairer, too, than all the gilded days
Of blond Illusion and its golden snare.

III26

Hark, in the minarets muazzens call
The evening hour that in the interval
Of darkness Ahmad might remembered be—
Remembered of the Darkness be they all.

IV27

And hear the others who with cymbals try
To stay the feet of every passer-by:
The market-men along the darkling lane
Are crying up their wares.—Oh! let them cry.

V

Mohammed or Messiah! Hear thou me,
The truth entire nor here nor there can be;
How should our God who made the sun and moon
Give all his light to One, I cannot see.

VI

Come, let us with the naked Night now rest
And read in Allah’s Book the sonnet best:
The Pleiads—ah, the Moon from them departs—
She draws her veil and hastens toward the west.

VII28

The Pleiads follow; and our Ethiop Queen,
Emerging from behind her starry screen,
Will steep her tresses in the saffron dye
Of dawn, and vanish in the morning sheen.

VIII

The secret of the day and night is in
The constellations, which forever spin
Around each other in the comet-dust;—
The comet-dust and humankind are kin.

IX

But whether of dust or fire or foam, the glaive
Of Allah cleaves the planet and the wave
Of this mysterious Heaven-Sea of life,
And lo! we have the Cradle of the Grave.

X

The Grave and Cradle, the untiring twain,
Who in the markets of this narrow lane
Bordered of darkness, ever give and take
In equal measure—what’s the loss or gain?

XI