XIII-IV

1st Version

Let tis join hands to spread his love’s flame.
Leave the world whole and work not for fame.
Within the holy walls of the friend’s home,
Till tears flow blood, dance around his dome.¹

2nd Version

Let us join hands to dance in his flame,
Leave the world whole and dance for his name.
For a short while in the sweet beau’s lane,
We dance till the tears make the blood’s rain.²

1.         ‘The orientalist In Europe must understand the meaning of dance. It is a well known term used by all the past mystics and as well as by Iqbal. In mystic’s esoterics or arcane signs it means ‘frenzy’ in their beloved Prophet’s love. As such ‘raqs-i-tan’ (dance of booy) means dedication of one’s body for the cause of the Prophet and Allah).
Raqs-i.-jan’ means dance of soul. In the Preface of Pyam-iMashriq Iqbal has particularly paid his attention to this fact that all Western poets especially all German. poets are not prone to understand the real meaning of such mystic terms.

Thus they only give the figurative meanings of these words and terms, (to which we can say worldly meanings). As such they ignore the essence and take the metaphorical sense only. This is the second nature of all European poets including Fitz-Gerald and Goethe when they translate Rumi, Hafiz, Sa’adi, etc. in any European language.

*          Fitz Gerald (F. Jerald), born Edward Purcell—1809-83, English poet and translator of the Ruba-iyat Omar Khayam
**        Goe’the (Go’te), John Wolf Gang, Von (Yohan Volfai fon), l749-18l2, German Poet and Dramatist.

2.         To follow the true sense of this term (dancing) and the meanings given on prepage I give below the following verses of Iqbal from page 208 (last page) of Javed Namah where he is eulogizing Rumi, the great mystic poet.

Javed Namah
(4)        From his words thus you learn the body’s dance, From the soul’s dance but you turned aside glance.

(5)        The Body dance moves the whole globe’s dust,
            The soul’s dance moves the seven skies first.

(8)        To learn soul’s dance means a thing great,
            To burn other gods means a thing great.

(12)      You are to me a great solace though,
            The soul’s dance I wish you would once know.

OR

(12)      O’ the whole solace, of a restless heart,
            Could you ever learn the soul dancing art.

(13)      A hint of Prophet s faith then I would say,
            From my grave’s retreat for thee I would ptay.

These are the concluding lines of Javed Namah addressed to the whole young blood like the poets own son, Javed.