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
