Eulogising Nature: A Sufi Perspective
By
Sumit Paul, New Age Islam
26 July
2022
Unlike
Qur'anic Ambiguity and Its Blatantly Violent, Anti-Humanity Verses, Mysticism
Is All About Love and Positivity
------
While
reading Islamic theology, mysticism and Persian poetry, I often wondered why on
earth did the conditioned Muslims only read Qur'an and Hadees when everything
was available to them in the form of mysticism.
There's not
a single aspect of human life that hasn't been mentioned by the Islamic
mystics. Moreover, unlike Qur'anic ambiguity and its blatantly violent,
anti-humanity verses, mysticism is all about love and positivity. No doubt,
Qur'an talks about greenery. The earth was parched but when the waters of mercy
graced the land, the earth became ' clothed in green' (Qur'an 22:63). Trees (Shajar
in Arabic) are mentioned minimum 26 times in Al-Furqan.
But the
way, mystics mentioned trees as metaphors for life, growth, evolution,
richness, enrichment, magnanimity, munificence, love, care and protection that
holy books haven't been able to delineate so beautifully.
Whenever I
read Mignon McLaughlin's famous lines, "Here's god from every tree/His
leafy fingers beckon me," I remember Rumi's original quote, "God
resides in nature/ With his leafy fingers he does nurture " (translated
from Persian by Lyon Shipman, 1888) or the famous poem written by George Pope
Morris: "Woodman, spare that tree/ Touch not a single bough/ In youth, it
protected me/ And I'll protect it now." This reminds me of Hafiz Shirazi's
"The tree protected me like a mother/ Now when it's old, I don't let the
woodman come hither ".....translated by Nicholson.
Here, I've
absolutely no intention to accuse the distinguished English poets of
plagiarism. My point is to emphasise the vision and great insights of the
Persian mystics who said the same things (about nature and tree/s) nearly a
millennium ago. This shows their stupendous greatness. It was Ghazni-born Hakim
Sanai who eulogised the nature's natural green colour in his book, Hadiqat
al Haqiqa and called it salubrious (Haraaiz in Dari, Afghan variant of
Persian, it became Hara in Hindustani).
The mystics
established Islam's metaphorical association with the colour green as the
geographically rough terrains of Arabia lacked greenery and green colour is
soothing to eyes. So, the green colour was extolled as Faam-e-Sukoot-O-Qaraar
(colour of satisfaction and happiness). Now every time a fanatic Muslim upholds
a Hara Parcham (a green flag as an upholder or 'saviour' of Islam), ask
him whether he knows the significance of green in Islam?
I remember,
when I was quite young and in love with a gorgeous and highly refined
Persian-speaking damsel in Iran, she once told me that trees were nature's
green tresses, quoting the great mystic Bayazid Bastami. Trees are indeed 'Qudrat
Ke Hare Kaakul'(to borrow Ahmed Nadeem Qasmi's phrase). To all Sufis, the
tree is an excellent metaphor for unity in diversity. The world is like a tree
and we humans are the half-ripe fruit upon it.
Such loving
and innovative treatment of nature can only come from the quills of highly
evolved mystics, esp. from Jalaluddin Rumi's magical pen when he wrote,
"Grass agrees to die and rise up again, so that it can receive a little of
the animal's enthusiasm." Marhaba! I'm on a higher plane.
----
A regular columnist for New Age Islam, Sumit Paul
is a researcher in comparative religions, with special reference to Islam. He
has contributed articles to world's premier publications in several languages
including Persian.
URL: https://newageislam.com/spiritual-meditations/nature-sufi-perspective/d/127570
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