re: Religion: Christian Missionaries and Indians (Massoud Malek, US; ex-Iran)

Massoud Malek writes:

“Regardless of color, creed, and shape of our face,
We are all members of one family: The Human Race,
If one member ails and you do not offer a solace,
In the Family of Man, you do not deserve a place.”

The above poem by Sa’adi, which is taught in elementary schools in
Iran, is engraved at the entrance of the United Nations headquarters
in New York.

Iranian kids don’t study the Bible but they all memorize the following
poem by Ferdowsi:

Crush not even a tiny ant carrying a grain of wheat,
For she has a life, and her dear life is sweet.

Robert Whealey wrote on 25 May: “The Koran is rather simple compared
to the Bible ¡­. My conversations with Muslim students about the
scientific method have usually broken down into name calling¡­.
Iranian students still come to the US, France, Germany or Britain to
study, if they can get there.”

Wow! Once Iranian students get there, they don’t need to read the
simple Koran, and since they are not sophisticated enough, they don’t
even attempt to open the Bible. Their conversations with their History
professors never break down into name calling. Instead they escape
into the world of imagination from the brutal realities of life by
reading beautiful Persian poetry.

Since the beginning of 21st century, Persian poet and philosopher
Molana Jalaleddin Rumi has appeared as the most popular poet
worldwide. His works, which have been partly translated to English,
attracted attention of numerous thinkers and artists.

Goethe was acquainted with Iranian Literature and time and again he
talked about seven great Persian poets, “Hafez, Sa’adi, Molana,
Firdowsi, Nizami, Anvari, and Jami.” He even prepared a short
biography of these seven Iranian poets. The encounter of Goethe with
Hafez’s ghazals became so inspiring to Goethe, that he produced his
own “West-Ostlicher Divan” (Oriental Divan). He wrote:

Suddenly I came face to face with the celestial perfume of the East
and invigorating breeze of Eternity that was being blown from the
plains and the wastelands of Persia, and I came to know an
extraordinary man whose personality completely fascinated me. ¡­ His
verses are miracle of human taste and refinement and a regenerating
source of perfection and beauty as well as philosophy and Erfan¡­ If I
do not immediately start composing poetry, I will not be able to bear
the amazing influence of this extraordinary personality who has
suddenly entered into my life. . . O, Hafez, how can anyone boast to
be thy equal?

Nietzsche’s concern with Persia is well reflected in his choice of
‘Zarathustra’ as the prophet of his philosophy and inscribing his name
on his main and most popular work, *Thus Spoke Zarathustra*. Hafez
represented Nietzsche a prime example of ecstatic wisdom. There is
even a short poem in Nietzsche’s Collected Works, entitled *Hafez:
Questions of a Water Drinker*.

In a posthumously published fragment, Nietzsche deplores a lost
historical opportunity: “It was much more fortunate if Persians became
masters of the Greeks, than the very Romans.” In this note Nietzsche
reveals, once his radical opposition to the Greek metaphysical
thought, as developed by Socrates and Plato, which later, by supremacy
of the Greek culture inside the Roman Empire, became dominant and then
integrated into Christianity. While, in his view, the dominance of the
positive outlooks of the Persians toward worldly life and time would
have prevented the prevalence of such a sinister event in human
history.

For the Nietzsche, see: http://www.iranica.com/articles/supp4/Nietzsche.html

Hafez’s style is intensely felicitous and musical, but also simple,
subtle and fluid, which makes for difficulty in translation and
appreciation. Despite innumerable 19th century efforts, classical
Persian poetry in general (except Omar Khayyam) has not been
adequately translated into English. A good translation will need
superlative verse skills and a deep understanding of Persian and
Islamic cultures.

P.S. Bartolom¨¦ de las Casas missed the opportunity of being a great
liberator by not reading Sa’adi or Ferdowsi’s poems.

JE comments: I thank Massoud Malek for this eloquent and impassioned
defense of Persia’s cultural achievements. I’m not sure that Las
Casas would have been permitted to read the poetry of Sa’adi or
Ferdowsi, however. Spain was not noted for its multi-cultural
tolerance in the 16th century, and LC himself would have had to be
careful about arousing suspicion: he supposedly came from a family of
“conversos.”

– For information about the World Association of International Studies
(WAIS), and its online publication, the World Affairs Report, read its
homepage by simply double-clicking on: http://wais.stanford.edu/

John Eipper, Editor-in-Chief, Adrian College, MI 49221 USA