Shri Nathji and Omar Khayyam

Shri Nathji would often refer to the verses of the Persian poet, Omar Khayyam. He would sometimes read the verses of Omar Khayyam, in the solitude of the winter evenings at Mussoorie. He would have his own interpretation of Khayyam, which was quite different from the conventional interpretation of the English translator, Edward Fitzgerald.

According to Shri Nathji, Khayyam was not an agnostic or a hedonist as Fitzgerald had made him out to be. Rather, he was a genuine seeker after truth. The wine he spoke of was a spiritual feeling, a divine intoxication experienced only through communication with God.

Several different authors and philosophers have given different versions of what they thought Khayyam really stood for. But Shri Nathji’s version must have been the most accurate, because he was, amongst other things, the Creator of Khayyam.

Perhaps, Khayyam died too early. What a thrill would have run through his heart to have seen the God he was addressing in his poetry, reading his poetry in human form, in the twentieth century. His prayers, supplications and queries had finally reached God.

Shri Nathji would sometimes quote Omar Khayyam’s verse in Persian:

"Aamad saihare nidaa za maikhaanaye maa

Ki ai rinde kharaabaatiye deewaanaye maa

Barkhez ke pur kunem paimaanaa zamai

Zaan pesh ke pur kunand paimaanaye maa."

Early in the morning from within the tavern, came a cry,

’O thou, ever-wandering, lover, mine,

Arise, that I might fill thy cup with wine!

Ere my cup of life be filled, let me fill thine.

Shri Nathji’s interpretation of this verse was a spiritual one. The voice from within the tavern was the voice of the Perfect Master, calling out to his loved one, his devotee, who often erred and wandered but never left the lane of God. The wine the Perfect Master had, was the bliss of a divine ecstasy–the bliss of God-realisation. And his cry was:

"O man! Let me fill the cup of your heart

with the wine of divine intoxication, before

the cup of my life is filled, and I must be gone!"

Shri Nathji was fond of narrating the following verse of Khayyam to his devotees to illustrate the importance of reverence on the spiritual path:

"Abreeke mai maraa shikasti rabbi

Bar man dare aish raa babasti rabbi

Bar khaak barekhti mai naab maraa

Khaakam ba dahan magar to masti rabbi."

O God, thou hast broken my cup of wine,

And shut the door of intoxication upon me,

Thou hast thrown this precious wine on dust,

And the dust is in my mouth!–but wert thou intoxicated Thyself, O God!

According to Shri Nathji, Khayyam was referring to a spiritual state. God dashed to pieces his hopes of realising Him; he stopped him in his progress, and scattered the spiritual bliss he had been experiencing into the dust of his body. This was the complaint of a seeker after truth to God: wert thou intoxicated Thyself to have done such a thing? It was an impudent rebuke to God, and Khayyam never forgave himself for the impertinence.

It was a verse that was to cause infinite agony to the soul of Khayyam. He would not forgive himself. He – a mere poet! And he had dared say to God that He was drunk! Khayyam became a man in despair, like a lost soul seeking shelter. His face turned an ashen grey, and his body trembled and shriveled with fear. Tears streamed from his eyes. The agony of repentance tore at his soul.

Shri Nathji had frequently warned seekers after truth to proceed on the spiritual path with care. "The moods of Emperors are unpredictable," he would say, "sometimes a salute may offend them, and an insult please them! A devotee of God must be ever humble before that Supreme Power, ever repentant for follies and impertinence, real or imagined."

"Never say you have not done wrong," said Shri Nathji, "for that would be a great wrong in itself! Before God, one can only say ‘Bhalaaji’, or ‘Bhoolaji’ i.e.– ‘Thou art right’, or ‘I have erred’.

Shri Nathji added:

"Your devotion must be so perfect as to agree with everything that your Master says. If your Master calls day night, then you must not contradict him, but rather agree with him and say, ‘Oh, what beautiful stars are in the skies, what a beautiful moon!" Shri Nathji quoted another verse that Khayyam wrote to cover the folly of the first:

"Naa kardaa gunaah dar jahaan keesth bago

Vaankas ke gunaah na kard choon zeesth bago

Man bad kunamoh to bad makaafaat dahi

Pas farke miyaane mano to cheesth bago."

Who is there in the world that hath not sinned?

And how has he lived – he, who has not sinned?

If I do wrong, and thou dost answer likewise,

What difference then, between thou and me?"

There was only one way left to God – and that was to forgive Khayyam. And it is said, that the light of God came back to the poet. There was the verse that Khayyam wrote, of a potter thumping clay, and the clay saying:

"Gently brother, gently, pray!" It was

Khayyam’s description of man being

buffeted by the hands of Fate.

Shri Nathji would say:

"Afsos Khayyam mar gayaa, varnaa main

usse bataataa ke kumhaar matti ko torrne ke

liye naheen thhapkaar rahaa, balki ussko

sundar shakl dene ke liye!”

“It is said that Khayyam died before this,

otherwise I would have told him that the

potter was thumping the clay, not to destroy

it, but to mould a beautiful shape out of it!

“This hope must remain with man. The hand of God appears to be harsh and heavy, but it is, in fact, the hand of an artist seeking to bring perfection to his art!"

Shri Nathji had also said:

“Agar aapko jyotishi kaihtaa hai ke kal kaa

din aap par bhaari hogaa, to fikar kyon karte

hain? Abhi to kal aur aaj men raat baaki hai!

“If the astrologer tells you that tomorrow is

going to be a bad day for you, then why

worry? There is still the night left between

tomorrow and today!”

The Persian poet, Omar Khayyam, had written:

The moving finger writes, and having writ, moves on

Nor all thy piety nor wit Shall lure it back to cancel half a line Nor all thy tears wash out a word of it. But the moving finger was the finger of God, who was not only All Powerful but also All Merciful. If he were sufficiently moved by the prayers and supplications of anyone He could alter what he had written and write it afresh.

This was the message of Shri Nathji. While Omar Khayyam, was a mere human who was speculating on the Divine Will, Shri Nathji was the One who had the pen in his hands.

Shri Nathji often recited the words of Omar Khayyam, in Persian:

"Aamad saihare nidaa za maikhaanaye maa

Ki ai rinde kharaabaatiye deevaanaye maa

Barkhez ke pur kunem paimaana za mai

Zaan pesh ke pur kunand paimaanaye maa."

Early in the morning I heard a voice within the Tavern cry,

O thou sinful seeker, thou who art my lover,

Arise! Let me fill thy cup with wine,

Ere my cup of life be filled!

When a man came to Shri Nathji and said: " Sir, if we have to suffer as a consequence of our Karmas–the actions performed by us, what can God do for us? The suffering that we have to endure is then the Will of God in accordance with His Laws."

Shri Nathji said: " Have you seen a potter beat a lump of clay into the shape of a vessel? He beats the clay with one hand, while he places the other hand inside the vessel to soften the impact of the blows. Even if man must undergo suffering, the Hand of God comes to give him comfort from within. Either you will be released from the suffering or you will be given strength to bear it!

"Omar Khayyam, the famous Persian poet, was greatly distressed upon seeing the scene of the potter thumping the clay. And he wondered why the potter was so harsh on the clay. It was sad that Khayyam died before I came on the scene, or else I would have told him: 'The potter is thumping the clay not to break it, but rather to make a beautiful shape out of it!'

Shri Nathji had said that there was just a silence–the silence of the ages; which was why the Advent of the Avatar had become so important. Otherwise the world would have turned to Omar Khayyam's verse in despair; those who received no consolation from an invisible God would have said:

"And that inverted bowl we call the sky,

Wherein crawling coopt we live and die

Lift not thy hands to it for help –

For it rolls impotently on as thou and I!"

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Omar Khayyám (18 May 1048 – 4 December 1131) was a Persian polymath, philosopher, mathematician, astronomer and poet. He also wrote treatises on mechanics, geography, mineralogy, music, and Islamic theology.

Born in Nishapur, Iran at a young age he moved to Samarkand(Uzbekistan) and obtained his education there. Afterwards he moved to Bukhara and became established as one of the major mathematicians and astronomers of the medieval period. He is the author of one of the most important treatises on algebra written before modern times, the Treatise on Demonstration of Problems of Algebra, which includes a geometric method for solving cubic equations by intersecting a hyperbola with a circle. He contributed to a calendar reform.

His significance as a philosopher and teacher, and his few remaining philosophical works, have not received the same attention as his scientific and poetic writings. Persians referred to him as “the philosopher of the world”. Many sources have testified that he taught for decades the philosophy of Avicenna in Nishapur where Khayyám was born and buried and where his mausoleum today remains a masterpiece of Iranian architecture visited by many people every year.

Outside Iran and Persian speaking countries, Khayyám has had an impact on literature and societies through the translation of his works and popularization by other scholars. The greatest such impact was in English-speaking countries; the English scholar Thomas Hyde (1636–1703) was the first non-Persian to study him. The most influential of all was Edward FitzGerald (1809–83), who made Khayyám the most famous poet of the East in the West through his celebrated translation and adaptations of Khayyám's rather small number of quatrains in the Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam.

Omar Khayyám died in 1131 and is buried in the Khayyam Garden at the mausoleum of Imamzadeh Mahruq in Nishapur. In 1963 the mausoleum of Omar Khayyam was constructed on the site by architect Hooshang Seyhoun, the photo of which is given here.