STUDIES IN IQBAL’S LONGER POEMS
Kemal Habib
Longer poems are not new in Urdu literature. But Iqbal’s longer poems are certainly new experiments not only from the standpoint of style, but also from the point of view of diction and imagery. There is no doubt that Hali’s Mussadas, by itself a new experiment for its thematic novelty and naturalness of approach, set the central pattern for the celebrated long poems of Iqbal, ‘Shikwa’ and Jawab-e-Shikwa’ yet the art of longer poems with Iqbal reached its zenith in the later parts of Bang-e-Dara.
The poet here goes far beyond the pattern of Mussadas-e-Hali, and performs several feats of original experiments judged by the canons of poetic technique. Iqbal’s achievement is superb; possibilities of new rhythmic variations and pervasiveness are unfolded; consciousness moves between historical experience to heights of spiritual intuition and surges forth through new symbolism and aesthetic effects. For the purposes of this study, I will discuss some poems of Iqbal especially ‘Shama-aur-Shair’, ‘Khidr-e-Rah’ and ‘Tulu-e-Islam’. Whereas ‘Shama-aur-Shair’ and ‘Khidr-e-Rah’ are dialogues, ‘Tulu-e-Islam’ is not. But the structure of the verses is similar. Each ‘band’ or stanza has a verse interposed in between having a different ‘radeer (rhyming arrangement) and the theme for the next stanza is taken up. Such an arrangement provides a gradual transformation from one subject to another, so that each stanza becomes independent. In other words, these poems read like an elongated ‘Mussadas’, with its two-verse structure being replaced by a stanza of more than two verses. All these variations provide a very subtle effect to the poems of Iqbal. Another characteristic which Iqbal possesses and which he is very difficult to be excelled, is the lyrical effect produced in one stanza, rhetorical in the next, and pathetic in the succeeding stanza.
Written in 1912, Shama-aur-Shair is among the major poems of Iqbal. In ‘Shikwa’ and ‘Jawab-e-Shikwa’ Iqbal introduces the reader to the subject by gradually justifying his theme. In ‘Sham-aur-Shair’ the dialogue is direct. It is a symbolic poem. The poet or ‘shair’ is the symbol for the tradition-ridden poet who has not adapted himself to his times. There again Iqbal indirectly emphasizes the missionary zeal which should possess and guide a poet. That he should find no appreciation is the logical consequence of a shift from the traditional rhyming ‘numbers’ to another sort of poetry—one that should impart zeal and fervour to its hearer. For as orders change, so do the tastes.
ذوق می گفتم بہ شمع منزل ویران خویش
گیسوئے تو از پر پروانہ دارد شیانہ
در جہان مثل چراگ لالہ صھراستم
نے نصیب مھفلے، نہ قسمت کاشانہ
مدتے مانند تو من ہم نفس می سوختم
در طواف شعلہ ام بالے نہ زد پروانہ
می طپد صد جلوہ در جان امل فرسود من
برنمی خیزد ازیں محفل دل دیوانہ
از کجا ایں آتش عالم فروز اندوختی
کرمک بے مایہ را سوز کلیم آموختی
Shama or candle incorporates several symbols, which are allied to each- other, nevertheles: fervour, dedication, sorrow (here for our lost heritage); vigour; and truth. When therefore the poet bemoans his fate, ‘Shama’ or the Candle, replies:
مجھ کو جو سوز نفس دیتی ہے پیغام اجل
لب اسی موج نفس سے ہے نوا پیرا ترا
میںن تو جلتی ہوں کہ مضمر ہے مری فطرت میں سوز
تو فروزاں ہے کہ پروانوں کو ہو سودا ترا
“The fervour and pathos that bringeth death to me moveth thine pen and mouth. I burn because pathos inform my nature, tiut thou burnest so that the moths should flutter round thee.”
The candle, in the very first verse, comes out with the reply that it is the same life, however brief and shortlived be, that animates it and also supplies inspiration to the poet. The candle burns itself to extinction because it is intrinsically sad and is its very nature to burn for the sake of burning; the poet, on the other hand, panders his poetry to cater to the prospective patrons. Iqbal, through the symbol of the candle, produces several beautiful verses:
گریہ ساماں میں کہ میرے دل میں ہے طوفان اشک
شبنم افشاں تو کہ بزم گل میں ہو چرچا ترا
گل بداماں ہے مری سب کے لہوں سے میری صبح
ہے ترے امروز سے نا آشنا فردا ترا
سوچ تو دل میں لقب ساقی کا زیبا ہے تجھے
انجمن پیاسی ہے اور پیمانہ بے صہبا ترا
کعبہ پہلو میں ہے اور سودائی بتخانہ
کس قدر سوریدہ سے ہے شوق بے پروا ترا
“Tears well out because in my heart there is a tide of tears; thou cravest for the dew so that thou might be favoured by the flowers. My morn is adorned by the blood that I shed at night, while thine morrow knoweth not thine today. Reflect for a moment if thou deservest the title of ‘Saqi’ when the audience demandeth wine and thou has tnone in the cup. Thou hast ‘Kaaba’ in the heart, and yet thou seekest idol worship. How misplaced is thine careless passion.”
After remonstrating with the poet how improvident and patron-hungry he is, the candle finally tells the poet :
اب نوا پیرا ہے کیا؟ گلشن ہوا برہم ترا
بے مھل تیرا ترنم نغمہ بے موسم ترا
“Now that the garden is desolate, thou singest. How out of place is thy voice and how untimely thine words !”
With undertones of great sorrow that the audience which could give ear to his poetry is now no more and his rhymes are ineffective because they are not in step with the time, Iqbal attacks the senseless contemporary Muslims, oblivious of the past, present and future.
تحا جنہیں ذوق تماشا وہ تو رخصت ہو گءے
لے کے اب تو وعدہ دیدار عام آیا تو کیا
انجمن سے وہ پرانے شعلہ آشام اٹح گءے
ساقیا محفل میں تو آتش بجام آیا تو کیا
آہ جب لشن کی جمعیت پریشاں ہو گی
پھول کو باد بہاری کا پیام ایا تو کیا
اخر شب دید کے قابل تحی بسمل کی تڑپ
سبھدم کوی اگر بالائے بام آیا تو کیا
“Alas ! Those that loved life to the brim in all its splendour are gone, never to return. Now thou comes with a promise to unfold the traditions of Islam, but what boots thy promise? The tavern lieth emptied of those who frequented it and thrill ed all with the zest of life. O saqi, how that thou comest with the cup of wine, is it not too late? The garden is a waste, with its flowers and the plant faded. The Zephyr blew not then, will its breeze augur spring for the flowers? When the victim was gory, and on the verge of yielding up his ghost, no one heeded him, and slumber was dear to everyone. Now that he is past all consolation, all revival, all sympathy, what good doth it serve thine coming at the advent of dawn to see what hath happened.”
The last verse, for its pathos, suggestiveness, and appeal is one of the best ever written by Iqbal. He epitomises the history of the Muslim world in the earlier portion of the couplet. ‘Akhir-e,’ that is, the time when the evil of night was about to lift, the tremours and the convulsions of the wounded victim (bismil) would have moved all and sundry to tears were there anyone to see him. If therefore with the coming of the early dawn one comes with a salve; wilt the past callousness retrieve the dead? What boots us, therefore, if we cry over what has come to pass? The candle then bemoans the callousness, senselessness, and shortsightedness of the Muslim world which refuses to hear if it has cared to see, even if it has eyes to see, and to think, even if endowed with imagination:
پھول بے پروا ہیں، تو گرم نوا ہو یا نہ ہو
کارواں بے حس ہے، آواز درا ہو یا نہ ہو
واے ناکامی متاع کارواں جاتا رہا
کارواں کے دل سے احساس زیاں جاتا رہا
The flowers are dead to all feelings, however much thou might try to wake them through the warmth of thine emotions and the melody of thine poetry. The caravan too moveth on oblivious to the ringing of the bell that announceth its destination. Alas! the caravan knowth not its gain or loss, nor doth it harbour any goal, and moveth indiscriminately and insensibly forward and forward.”
The candle then alludes to the factors that might have contributed to the decline of Islam, specifically with reference to the Indo-Pakistan subcontinent: the blending of traditions within the fabric of faith; the apathy and otioseness of the contemporary Muslim countries to dedicate themselves to their own salvation; the narrowness of outlook; and the parochial attitudes taken by the constituent communities or countries.
سطوت توحید قائم جن نمازوں سے ہوئی
وہ نمازیں ہند میں نزر برہمن ہو گئیں
دہر میں عیش دوم آءیں کی پابندی سے ہے
موت کو زادیاں سامان شیون ہو گئیں
اڑتی پھرتی تھیں ہزاروں بلبلیں گلزار میں
دل میں کیا آئی کہ پابند نشیمن ہو گئیں
وست گردوں میں تھی ان کی تڑت نظارہ سوز
بجلیاں آسودہ دامان خرمن ہو گئیں
“The call that proclaimed the rule of one God from one come r of the world to another hath fallen a victim to inetia in the land of Ind. Time forgiveth not the violation of the eternal laws and the Muslim fell on evil days by the misuse of freedom, like a wave that hath no course and dasheth to and fro. Even the bulbul which chirped in the garden and made it a most plcasant place hath sought a roost, from which it cometh not. The call of the Muslim shook the sky to its foundations but the thunderbolts of its fervour have chosen to rest in fields and cracks no more.”
The last vcrse again brings out the spatial imagery of Iqbal in the context of Islam’s early history. The infinite vastness of Heaven is likened to the fervour that inflamed and inspired the faith of the pristine exponents of Islam. The outer atmosphere has been associated with the lightning. Lightning signifies restlessness in this verse, while usually it is associated with ill-luck. Ghalib says:
خوشی کیا کھیت پر میرے، اگر سو بار ابر آئے
سمجھتا ہوں کہ ڈھونڈے ہے ابحی سے برق خرمن کو
“What is hope? What is pleasure?—Verily a fool’s paradise. If I see the overcast sky that portends rain for the fields of my hopes, I am led to think that it is the bolt of thunder that will burn them to nothingness.”
‘Khirman’ or field symbolises man’s constant and sustained effort. If thercfore lightning strikes the field. the latter is burnt up. But Iqbal gives the symbol a very original twist by suggcsting that even the lightning has lost its fervour, and has sought comfortablc sancturies in the fields. In other words, the clement of fervour that provides fillip to a nation is absent. Iqbal, then, takes up the question of the influence of Westcrn thought and politics on the Muslim mind: he can detect rustling of clothes and ultimately the sleeper might wake up.
مژدہ اے پیمانہ ودار حجستان حجاز
بعد مدت کے ترے رندوں کو پھر آیا ہے ہوش
نقد خود داری بہائے بادہ اغیار تھی
پر دکاں تیری ہے لبریز صدائے نائے و نوش
پھر یہ غوغا ہے کہ لا ساقی شراب خانہ ساز
دل کے ہنگامے مئے مغرب نے کر ڈالے خموش
“O saqi that serveth the cup of wine brimming with the faith of Hijaz, I see that the inhabitants of the tavern are opening their eyes. The wine that hath sustained us was not the wine that we desired but that which we purchased from those that cxchanged our faith for their beverages. But now it seemeth that the wine shop that purveyeth the wine of thy faith is echoing with the call of the faithful. Methinks, I hear some echo of the old call of the faith, even though the wine of the West hath benumbed our senses.”
Actually the whole of this part of ‘Shama our Shair’ with its endings in sibilants (sh) provides a very melodious effect: the meterial effect is sustained and is never allowed to move beyond the required limits of the tempo that is to be maintained.
The verses that follows—there are seven of them—are Pan-Islamic in their content. Iqbal, again, comes to the thesis that he has adopted in ‘Wataniyyat,’ that Islam, as a code of life and conduct, demands independence from national frontiers: for one thing, these are contradictory to the very essence of Islam; and, secondly, Islam cannot emerge as a world force and defend itself unless the constituent nations professing Islam form an indivisible whole. From this thesis Iqbal never departed again, and it occurs very frequently in Bal-e-Jibreel, Darb-e-Kaleem, and in ‘Khidr-e-Rah’, and ‘Tulu-e-Islam’.
رہزن ہمت ہوا ذوق تن آسانی ترا
بحر تھا صحرا میں تو، گلشن میں مثل جو ہوا
اپنی اصلیت پہ قایم تحا، تو جمعیت بحی تھی
چھوڑ کر گل کو پریشاں کاروان بو ہوا
“Thine inertia has robbed thee of all valour and courage. Thou wast like an ocean in the wilderness which thou defied and overcame. Now thou art like a rivulet in a garden, a thing that adorneth but doth nothing else. When thou wast united, thou wast all powerful But thou art like one who hast left the flower and seeketh its scent here and there, knowing not where it is.”
This is, however, for the present. What of the future? Iqbal is confident of the glorious future if the Muslim is awakened to the dangers that surround him from all sides: if he reverts to the glorious heritage of Islam and sounds a clarion call to those who are not yet awake to its glory. Iqbal bubbles with hope and the verses become very lyrical:
آہ کس کی جستجو آوارہ رکھتی ہے تجھے
راہ تو، رہرو بھی تو، رہبر بھی تو، منزل بھی تو
دیکھ آ کر کوچہ چاک گریباں میں کبھی
قیس تو، لیلی بھی تو، سحرا بھی تو، محمل بھی تو
شعلہ بن کر پھونک دے خاشاک گیر اللہ کو
خوف باطل کیا؟ کہ ہے غار تگر باطل بھی تو
“O traveller, whom searcheth thou and harrieth the world with thy agonies? Knowest thou not that thou art the path, traveler, guide, and the goal, all in one? If thou ever examineth thyself, thou shalt discover that thou art Qais, his beloved, Laila, the wilderness, and the seat on the back of the camel. All this thou art and wast. Be like a flame and burn all this dross that hath covered thy faith. What feareth thou? Thou wrong? Surely thou canst kill the wrong with stroke of thy inherent righteousness.”
اب تلک شاید ہے جس پر کوہ فاراں کا سکوت
اے تغافل پیشہ تجھ کو یا وہ پیماں بھی ہے
تو ہی ناداں چند کلیوں پر قناعت کر گیا
ورنہ گلشن میں علاج تنگی داماں بھی تحا
“The mount of Faran is quiet and watcheth thee—it watcheth thee carefully to see whether thou recallest thine first covenant. A fool that thou art, for a few buds thou hast bartered away the garden resplendent in its beauty.”
Finally, the rise of Islam from ashes is predicted :
آسماں ہو ا سھر کے نور سے آئینہ پوش
اور ظلمت رات کی سیماب پا ہو جائے گی
اس قدر ہو گی ترنم آفریں باد بہار
نگہت خوابیدہ غنچے کی نوا ہو جائے گی
آنکھ جو کچھ دیکھتی ہے لب پہ آ سکتا نہیں
محو حیرت ہوں کہ دنیا کیا سے کیا ہو جائے گی
“One day the sky will shine with light, the light of faith, and the darkness of the night will diffuse away with mercurial celerity. The advent of the spring will bring with it its countless notes of joy, the the buds will waft thine scent that they lock now, and it will be that the buds will share with thee. What I see, I wish I could express: but, no, I cannot, for the wonders of the future defy the use of words that I seek.”
‘Shama aur Shair’ is also very important from another viewpoint, namely, the theme, the imagery empolyed, and the emphasis on the Pan-Islamic concept. For instance, when the poet describes the effect of ceaseless effort for the attainment of success, he employs the image of the wave which, when once it gains momentum, could bring about a revolution in the velocity of the river. Iqbal applies this image to the present-day Islamic world. He sees a storm that is bound to burst from the lull and quietness of the river which pervades it at the moment:
دیکھ لو گے سطوت رفتار دریا کا مآل
موج مضطر ہی اسے زنجیر پا ہو جائے گی
“Thou shalt see, my poet, what the wave that is gaining in momentum promiseth. This self-same wave one day will be like the human foot that will create a spate in the river which is flowing quietly and lulled to sleep.”
In ‘Khidr-e-Rah’ Iqbal writes:
تو نے دیکھا سطوت رفتار دریا کا عروج
موج مضطر کس طرح بنتی ہے اب زنجیر دیکھ
‘Thou hast seen the river of faith gaining in velocity. See now how the chain of events unfolds as these waves make a chain of events that will revolutionise faith.”
From the viewpoint of the sheer lyrical effect generated, ‘Shama aur Shair’ is one of the finest poems in Urdu literature. Another factor which confers an elfin-like delicate beauty on the poem is the lyrical key, the tempo of which has not been allowcd to go out of control. Even if the contemporary situation has been alluded to, it has bcen done very cleverly and the contemporary element does not produce a discordant effort.
‘Shama aur Shair° then supplies the pattern for the succeeding poems by Iqbal. The pattern has the following super-structure: invocation to the past traditions of Islam; reverence to traditions; problems which beset the contemporary Islamic world; and the beacon light that is there, albeit very dimly, to lead to the glorious future in which Islam is bound to find its plenary fulfilment. Iqbal clearly and unmistakably refers to the influence that the early Islamic history has exercised on ‘Muslim’ (June 1912):
گوشش آواز سرود رفتہ کا جویا ترا
اور دل ہنگامہ حاضر سے بے پروا ترا
ہم نشیں سملم ہوں میں، توحید کا حامل ہوں میں
اس صداقت پر ازل سے شاہد عادل ہوں میں
کب ڈرا سکتا ہے غم کا عارضی منظر مجھے
ہے بھروسا اپنی ملت کے مقدر پر مجھے
یاس کے عنصر سے ہے آزاد میرا روزگار
فتح کامل کی خبر دیتا ہے جوش کار زار
“My ear seeketh the voice that echoed in the sea, land, and wilderness. I am a Muslim and a believer in God, and God hath attested to this in His eternal message. The temporary scene frightens me not, because I am brimming with the confidence of my millat’ s greatness. My life is free from any taint of pcssimism, and our fervour proclaimeth our ultimate victory.”
“Huzur-e-Risalat-Maab Main’ (The August Presence of the Prophet of Islam) bubbles with the faith, spontaneous love and affection that Iqbal feels towards the Holy Prophet (may peace be on him). Iqbal’s earlier lack of rcstraint has now been tempered into a steel-like faith. Reverence is the first essential of faith. Iqbal does not visualize a direct dialogue between himself and the Prophet of Islam (peace on him) but projects himself as the exponent of the Islamic precepts after leaving the earthly abode.
گراں جو مجھ پہ یہ ہنگامہ زمانہ ہوا
جہاں سے باندھ کے رخت سفر روانہ ہوا
قیود شام و سحر میں بسر تو کی لیکن
نظام کہنہ عالم سے آشنا نہ ہوا
فرشتے بزم رسالت میں لے گئے مجھ کو
حضور آیہ رھمت میں لے گئے مجھ کو
“When the tide of time bcgan to oppress me, I departed from this earthly abode and left for the eternal. Having spent my life in the midst of the flux of the day and night, I at last was taken to a place where everything is eternal. The angel; took me before the Prophet of Islam, whose boundless mercy had sustained me during my mortal existence.”
The Prophet of Islam (peace be on him) asks the poet what his achievement during his brief life-time was:
نکل کے باگ جہاں سے برنگ بو آیا
ہمارے واسطے کیا تحفہ لے کے تو آیا؟
“Thou hast come, O poet, out of the garden of life as the scent departeth from the flower. What hast thou brought for us?”
The poet’s answer is that, while man is engaged in an unsuccessful effort for tranquility, he cannot obtain it; nor could the poet find any fidelity in the world of selfish men and women; but he has brought one gift, the martyrdom of the Muslim soldiers who defended Tripoli against the Italian forces.
جھلکتی ہے تری امت کی آبرو اس میں
طرا بلس کے شہیدوں کا ہے لہو اس میں
“This war showeth that thine faithful servants still cherish the covenant that they made with thce and the blood of the martyrs of Tripolitania attesteth to it.”
Iqbal’s poems in the third part of Bang-e-Dara show a marked tendency towards convergence on what might be regarded as the central theme: the Islamic nationhood. Thus, in his later poems, Iqbal is moving away gradually and almost irrevocably from the domestic to the cosmic, from the local to the international. Examples are provided by the poems regarding the death of Haji from Bokhara; in his poem on the dialogue between the Prophet of Islam (peace be on him) and himself; in his poem ‘Shafakhana-e-Hijaz’ (Hospital for Hijaz), in the moving poem on Fatima, who died while supplying water to the soldiers; and in his major poems. This is in marked contrast to his contemporaries, in which of course only Maulana Zafar Ali Khan could be counted as a sharer of his vision, but then Zafar Ali Khan’s approach, even though earnest, somehow strikes a journalistic touch.
In his three-verse poem, ‘Saqi’ (The Cup Bearer), Iqbal again expounds his theme of re-awakening and imparts a new touch to the symbol of ‘saqi’ which in ghazal is associated with wine:
نشہ پلا کے گرانا تو سب کو آتا ہے
مزا تو جے ہے کہ گرتوں کو تھام لے ساقی
جو بادہ کش تھے پرانے وہ اڑھتے جاتے ہیں
کہیں سے آب بقائے دوام لے ساقی
کٹی ہے رات تو ہنگامہ گستری میں تری
سحر قریب ہے اللہ کا نام لے ساقی
“Every cup bearer knoweth how to grip the drinker into intoxication; but verily how brave would that saqi be whose message is to steady those that are drunk. The old guard of thine tavern, O saqi, is departing, could thou but possibly secure the water of eternal life! Thou, O saqi, halt spent a riotous night; the night is departing; be thou awake, and take Allah’s name.”
Here Iqbal has committed a solecism; ‘nasha’ has been used as a common noun, meaning an intoxicant, whereas actually it is an abstract noun, and literally means intoxication. In ordinary speech, however, the world ‘nasha’ is used to denote an intoxicant; but neither etymologically nor from the literary viewpoint is it correct to use the word in the sense conveyed by common speech. Be that as it may, the poem provides another touch to the concept of ‘Saqi’; here the cup-bearer is being invoked to serve a cup of wine which is not the cup that cheers, but the cup that would put the fire of faith and fealty in the drinker. The cup-bearer has wasted a good deal of time, as it is: now that the dawn heralding the advent of a new era that would dispel the spell of slumber is at hand, let the cup bearer also join others in praying to God for the bestowal of His boundless grace on Muslims.
‘Navaid-e-Subah’ (The Advent of the Morn) is a 9-stanza poem, that employs the imagery of nature but in the later-day style. In the first verse, the East has been brought into the image not only because sun rises from the east but also because it is the cradel of Islam; dawn has also been employed symbolically, because it dispels slumber (in the wider context, from the minds of the millions of slumber-laden Muslims):
آتی ہے مشرق سے جب ہنامہ در دامن سحر
منزل ہستی سے کر جاتی ہے خاموشی سفر
“When the morn arrives on its chariot wheels from the East, the quietness of life departs, leaving the world aglow with life.”
The third verse has been exquisitely turned out:
چہچہاے ہیں پرندے پا کے پیغام ھیات
باندھتے ہیں پھول بحی گلشن میں احرام حیات
“The birds, when revived by the message that life bringeth, chirp and sing. The flowers also bow down in respect before God who hath endowed them with beauty and life.”
Birds chirp and sing when it is the morning time; the flowers also bloom and shine when the sun falls on them. The blooming of flowers has been associated in the image with the ‘ahram’ of life, that is, the flowers also gunflect as if offering there respects to the ‘Kaaba’ of life with the advent of morning. ‘Ahram-e-hayat’ is a new simile coined by Iqbal, and is in keeping with the religious touch given in the verse that follows:
مسلم خوابیدہ اڑھ ہنگامہ آرا تو بھی ہو
وہ چمک اٹھا افق گرم تماشا تو بھی ہو
“O slumbering Muslim, be thou awake. The horizon is all aglow with the songs of life of which thou be a part.”
Iqbal invokes the Muslim world to rise and to share in the joy of the morning, and to demand its rightful share in the hustle and bustle of the day. In another poem, ‘Id per Shair Likhne Ki Farmaish ke Jawab main’ (The poet’s Reply to the request to write a Poem on the occasion of Id), however, a despondent touch is apparent; but obviously this was a temporary phenomenon:
پیام عیش و مسرت ہمیں سناتا ہے
ہلال عید ہاری ہنسی اڑاتا ہے
“How the yon crescent moon mocketh and flouteth at us— that moon which should have heralded the days of joy and love.”
The mood in this poem is quite different from that of ‘Hilal-e-Id’ (the Id Moon) where the Id moon is regarded as a source of inspiration and guidance for Muslims. In this poem, on the other hand, the poet looks at the moon with a feeling of wistfulness, since the inspiration which it should have provided to the Muslim world, comes to naught.
The domination of this feeling of despondency and dejection must have been of a temporary nature, as the next poem, ‘Fatima bint Abdullah’, is dedicated to the memory of Fatima, who was killed while serving water to the soldiers in the battle of Tripolitania in North Africa.
ہے کوئی ہنگامہ تیری تربت خاموش میں
پل رہی ہے ایک قوم تازہ اس آغوش میں
بے خبر ہوں گرچہ ان کی وست مقصد سے میں
آفرینش دیکحتا ہوں انکی اس مرقد سے میں
“Thine grave, O Fatima, hideth some riotous upheaval: nay it presageth the birth of a new nation. I am a humble poet, am not yet alive to the scope of that upheaval, but I can sense its birth in the darkness of thy grave.”
‘Ghulam Qadir Rohila’ is a slightly longer historical poem. The perspective that Iqbal sets in the poem is quite similar to that in other poems but has been converted into a historical incident. Ghulam Qadir Rohila was a general who imprisoned the Mughal emperor, Shah Alam, and blinded him, in return for the latter’s assistance to the Marathas and to the disgrace meted out to Rohila ladies after the battle between the Mughal and Rohila forces. Later on, of course, he was captured and killed; but the incident in itself reflects the canker of degeneration that had been eating away the sinews of the Mughal empire. The poem describes briefly a scene in the harem of Shah Alam. Rohila orders the inmates of the harem to dance before him—which greatly militated against the reverence in which the Mughal princes and princesses were held. The women of the harem obey his order, and Rohila pretends sleep. He then tells the inmates that he wanted to see for himself if any woman in the harem prided herself on the blood of Amir Taimur flowing through her veins, and dared to kill him. None did, and therefore self-respect and dignity which the house of Taimur had maintained for centuries had departed. The poem has quite a few beautiful verses:
بجھائے خواب کے پانی نے اختر اس کی آنکھوں کے
نظر شرما گئی ظالم کی درد انگیز منظر سے
پھر اٹھا اور تیموری ھرم سے یوں لگا کہنے
شکایت چاہے تم کو نہ کچح اپنے مقدر سے
مرا مسند پہ سو جانا ناوت تھی تکلف تھا
کہ غفلت دور ہے شان صف آرایان لشکر سے
یہ مقصد تحا مرا اس سے کوئی تیمور کی بیٹی
مجے غافل سمجھ کر مار ڈالے اپنے خنجر سے
مگر یہ راز آخر کھل گیا سارے زمانے پر
جمیت نام ہے جس کا گئی تیمور کے گھر سے
“The film of sleep at last began to prevail over the eyes of Ghulam Qadir, whose vision cowered before the drama that he himself had staged. He got up and addressed the Taimuri harem thus: You should not curse your fate. I feigned sleep, because we warriors keep sleep at arm’s length. What I wished to find out was whether any one from amongst you could dare to kill me while I was asleep. But no, of course not. I and the world now know that the Taimuri self-respect is gone for ever.”
Walida Marhooma Ki Yad Main’ (In the Memory of My late Mother) is a memorable elegy. The poem is a reflection on life and death, and ultimately concludes that resignation is the only answer to such personal calamities:
زرہ زرہ دہر کا زندانی تقدیر ہے
پردہ مجمبوری و بیچارگی تدبیر ہے
آسماں مجبور ہے شمس و قمر مجبور ہیں
انجمن سیماب پا رفتار پر مجبور ہیں
“Each particle that obeyeth the law of time mirroreth the inexorable hand of fate, and what we call tadbir is in reality a covering for helplessness. The whole cosmos obeyeth the laws of fate which moveth the stars.”
The rest of the third part comprises poems like ‘Shakespeare,’ ‘Bilal,’ ‘Phool’ (flower), and ‘Jang-e-Yarmuk Ka Waqaya’ (An Incident in the battle of Yarmuk), etc. We now come to two of the most important poems by Iqbal ‘Khidr-e-Rah’ and ‘Tulu-e-Islam’.
Iqbal, in Bang-e-Dara, is primarily a lyrical rather than a narrative poet. He has so many ideas, such a vast storehouse of images and metrical variations at his disposal, that perhaps, even if he seriously tried to do so, he could not turn out good narrative poetry, good in the sense that, while it would be excellent in parts, there would be a preponderance of thoughts over events—and thus a hiatus between the form and the content of the poem. In the poems, ‘Siddiq’ and ‘An Incident from the Battle of Yarmuk,’ and others, the stress is not on the narration of the incident itself but on the poet’s reflections and thoughts on these incidents. ‘Khidr-e-Rah’ is perhaps a narrative poem, directed at the progress of the self; Islam and the concept of state; capital and labor; Pan-Islamism, and the future of Islam in the light of the contemporary situation.
‘Khidre-e-Rah’ is not a very long poem by any means and yet it does seem to be long, because of the variation introduced into the poem by the dialogue between the poet and that globe-trotting prophet, Khidr; the division of Khidr’s reply into sub-headings; and as suggested earlier, by the division of the poem into stanzas having verses in varying numbers. No other poem in Bang-e-Dara contains an equal number of direct and metaphorical allusions. In this sense the poem does evoke the atmosphere of the Paradise Lost
‘Khidr-e-Rah’ has an epic grandeur, and the allusions are reminiscent of Milton’s scholarship. When Iqbal refers to Sura Al-eImran in the Holy Quran while describing Khidr, he condenses the description of the incidents mentioned there:
کشتی مسکین و جان پاک و دیوار یتیم
علم موسی بھی ہے تیرے سامنے حیرت فروش
Again, in invoking the Islamic heritage, Iqbal alludes to incidents in the life history of Prophet Moses:
خون اسرائیل آ جاتا ہے آخر جوش میں
توڑ دیتا ہے کوئی موسی طلسم سامری
On the subject of capital and labour, Iqbal goes back to the oris: gins of the Ismailities:
ساحر الموط نے تجھ کو دیا بگ ھشیش
اور تو اے بے خبر سمجھا اسے شاخ نبات
“Hasan bin Sabbah, the magician of Almut, gave thee a druthat deprived thee of thy senses. But thou thinkest that it is verily the houri that would give thee heavenly pleasures and enjoyments.” Both Milton and Iqbal are attempting very difficult tasks. Milton employs his unrivalled scholarship in dramatization of an incident through classical images. Thus the rape of Proserpine by Dis and search for the former by her mother, Ceres or Demeter, has been used to emphasise in a suggestive manner the temptation of Eve by Satan. Symbolically also, the image serves a dual purpose: if it caused Ceres all that to seek Proserpine through the world, Eve’s slip and Adam’s surrender to it also has caused equal agony to mankind to redeem itself from the Original Sin.
In parts, therefore, ‘Khidr-e-Rah’ is an epic poem. If the purpose of an epic poem is to poetize the birth pangs of a nation, its traditions, and its emergence, etc., then, even if Iqbal has not adhered to the accepted epic patterns—like justification for the theme,’mythos’ or plot, and the conventional employment of antagonistic characters, etc.—the grandeur of an epic does, however, assert itself. The dialogue is not directly plunged into; instead, the poet describes the theme that oppresses his mind and then gradually introduces the character of Khidr.
One thing must again be emphasised. even at the cost of repetition. Iqbal was an intuitive poet but no mortal can vouch for the correctness of his intuition. Iqbal considered his duty to place the problems of the contemporary world before his readers suggestively aid not thoroughly. He confronts them with the Islam that is actually practised in contradistinction to its precepts. He leaves the reader to draw his own conclusions. If Iqbal was mistaken in his high hopese the blame lies more on the shoulders of Muslims than on Iqbal. Iqbal’s innocence at times is uitrafidian and he did invest certain incidents with a significance that they did not really deserve. A ray of hope was provided to Iqbal by the Turkish victory at Cilicia in October 1920, and the withdrawal of the Allied forces from Turkey in 1922. But Iqbal later became a spectator to the chain of events that succeeded the Mudania Armistice, and was finally convinced that what he equated with Islamic Renaissance was actually a national renaissance. But Iqbal was not the only person who ultimately encountered disillusionment; the whole Khilafat Movement, sponsored by the Ali brothers, has become a mere matter of academic interest to our genaration, because the ideals which it interpreted on behalf of the Turks were not shared by the latter themselves. And. since, in the last analysis, it was the the Turks themselves that counted most, the movement could not have been but be a brief chapter in the present day history. It must, however, be emphasised that it speaks to the boundless credit of Iqbal that he retained his optimistic outlook for the resurgence of Islam even after his disappointment. In this attitude he has employed that quality of humanistic approach that runs throughout his poetry; he panders at our shortcomings, but never lashes at us; even, when weakness of character transgresses the bounds of limit, he admonishes us not rhetorically but by taking us to the heritage which has been ours and will for ever be. When Josh addresses the youth of the Indo-Pakistan subcontinent on the question of the language and our intellectual slavery:
یوں تمہاری منہ سے آی ہے فرنگی کی ذباں
خوف ہے گونگا نہ ہو جائے کہیں ہندوستان
“When I hear your thoughts in a foreign language (English), I am really led to wonder whether India would go dumb some day.” the poet wishes to convey his argument for national revival through verse but the verse has, in turn, assumed the from of a versified speech. A comparison with ‘Khitab ba Naujawanan-e-Islam’ would clearly show the difference in the mode of approach adopted by both the poets. This is not to compare the merits of the two poets but to emphasise the tendencies in Iqbal’s poetry in comparison with those of his contemporaries. Iqbal maintains a quiet tempo, which even if wisful, is nevertheless devastatingly humanistic— all the more so, because Iqbal the poet saw far ahead of the exigencies of the contemporary setting and gave his verses a lyrical, agonised quality that no poet had ever before or has since then brought into Urdu poetry.
A digression of this kind was necessary in order to understand ‘Khidr-e-Rah’ and ‘Tulu-e-Islam’. These poems are supremely important as Iqbal’s concepts which he develops further appear in *Khidr-e-Rah’ and are carried over through ‘Tulu-e-Islam’ on to Bal-e-Jibreel ‘Zarb-e-Kaleem and Armughan-e-Hejaz.
‘Khidr-e-Rah’ is the description of the poet’s reflections in the natural setting. The river by the side of which the whole scene is set may be the river Ravi or may not be; the poet, in any case, assigns it a symbolic significance, as he visualizes the brewing of a storm in the lull that precedes it. The verses are one of the finest by Iqbal.
ساحل دریا پہ میں کھڑا اک رات تھا محو نظر
گوشہ دل میں چھپائے اک جہان اضطراب
شب سکوں افزا، ہوا آسودہ، دریا نرم سیر
تھی نظر حیراں کہ یہ دریا ہے یا تصویر آب
جیسے گہوارے میں سو جاتا ہے طفل شیر خوار
موج مضطر تھی کہیں گہرائیوں میں مست خواب
رات کے افسوں سے طائر آشیانوں میں اسیر
انجمن کو ضو گرفتار طلسم ماہتاب
دیکھتا کیا ہوں کہ وہ پیک جہاں پیما خضر
جس کی پیری میں ہے مانند سحر رن شاب
کہ رہا ہے مجھ سے اے جویائے اسرار ازل
چشم دل وا ہو و ہے تقدیر عالم بے حجاب
“One night I was deliberating by the bank of the river with my heart brimming with sorrow and anxiety. I wished someone could share my emotions. The night wore an air of deathly quietness, and the river was flowing so peacefully and rythmically that one wondered whether it was a :teal river or the static picture of a river. The waves that inundate the banks, that change the course of rivers, and the history of the land, reposed like a child that had been lulled. Stars themselves, even though bigger than moon, could not release themselves from the spell of its effulgence. And, lo! all at once, out of nothing, appeareth an old man, the wandering prophet, Khidr, with a mien that glowed with kindness and who was so hoary with the burden of years that youth to him was like the morn when one would think for one moment that it would not yield to darkness. Scarcely had I been roused from my brown study when I heard him speak: Thou, who seekest the eternal truth and verity, hear with thine ears, see with thine eyes, and I shall unfold the eternal verities of the universe to thee.”
The poet was naturally intrigued, and asks the globe-trotting prophet, Khidr, about the doubts and fears that oppress his mind:
اے تری شم جہاں بیں پر وہ طوفاں آشکار
جن کے ہنگامے ابھی سوتے ہیں دریا میں خموش
کشی مسکین و جان پاک و دیوار یتیم
علم موسی بھی ہے تیرے سامنے حیرت فروش
چھور کر آبادیاں رہتا ہے تو صحرا نورد
زندگی تیری ہے بے روز و شب و فردا و دوش
زندگی کا راز کیا ہے؟ سلطنت کیا چیز ہے؟
اور یہ سرمایہ و محنت میں ہے کیسا خروش
ہو رہا ہے ایشا کا خرقہ دیرینہ چاک
نوجواں اقوام نو دولت کے ہیں پیرایہ پوش
گرچہ اسکندر رہا محروم آب زندگی
فطرت اسکندری اب تک ہے گرم نائو و نوش
بیچتا ہے ہاشمی ناموس دین مصطفی
خاک و خون میں مل رہا ہے ترکمان سخت کوش
آگ ہے اولاد ابراہیم ہے نمرود ہے
کیا کسی کو پھر کسی کا امتحاں مقصود ہے؟
“Thine eyes have witnessed millenia and millenia of tumults, an . old orders changing to new; thine foresight even Moses for once failed to understand and stood aghast when thou bored a hole in the boat of the poor man, who had no other source of income; when thou killest an innocent boy; when thou straightened the wall of the house under which the treasure of the orphan boy was buried. Who can dare scale thine achievements ? Thou shun-nest the world, liveth out of and yet in it ; thy life hath no today or tomorrow. Tell me what is life, what is this conflict between capital and labour. The old garb of Asia is tearing apace: its young generations are blindly treading the path of the newly-rich nations of Europe. Although Alexander the Great did not drink the cup of eternal life, he hath bequeathed the mental makeup of the conqueror to the succeeding generations and nations. The Hashamite dynasty is pandering the traditions of the Prophet of Islam (peace be on him) to its own ends, while the poor Turkoman, who did so much for Islam, is reeling in blood and pinnioned helplessly. Is this the fate that should befall a race like mine? Abraham dared the fire for his creator’s sake: his offspring built the faith anew; he was tested when Nimrod released his fury against him and when God, in His infinite mercy, saved Abraham (peace on him), and put down the fire. We have faced all this albeit much more; and yet my religion hath fallen on evil days. What have we done to deserve God’s wrath?”
Khidr’s reply comprises five parts: wander lust (sehranawardi), life, state, capital and labour, and the Islamic world.
In the first part dealing with the zest for wandering, Iqbal expounds his idea of ijtihad through exquisite images, all of which are very suggestive. Iqbal does not usually intrude in his poems to flash his own views directly. But he did believe that degeneracy engenders or rather catalyses the growth of the canker which Iqbal equates with the lack of dynamism or mental and physical apathy. A Muslim is answerable to his Creator not only for his piety and observance of the canons of Islam, but also for the amount of effort that he has put in to improve himself, his co-religionists and fellow men. All this demands a ceaseless spurt of effort during his life-time, and this spurt should not be directed so much inwardly as outwardly.
The next stanza, Zindagi (or Life), is quoted very often, but, all told, there is nothing very remarkable about it but for a verse or two, especially.
برتر از اندیشہ سود و زیاں ہے زندگی
ہے کبھی جاں اور کبھی تسلیم جان ہے زندگی
تو سے پیمانہ امروز و فردا سے نہ ناپ
جاوداں پیہم دواں ہردم جوان ہے زندگی
“Measure not life with lucre or loss; it transcends both. Life is not in living alone; death, when welcomed for a right cause, is also life—and indeed greater than life. Can life be seen with the coming morn and the setting sunset? Nay, it is ever flowing and ever young.”
The merit of the stanza is lost in part, because the poet introduces the theme of the development of self; what else he should have done is of little moment. Writing about life in itself is a very difficult task, and the progress and evolution of self can only be a part of it. The first verse has a reference to the martyrdom of Husain (peace on him) at Karbala and to the concept of jihad which becomes imperative under certain circumstances, such as in the defence of faith.
The stanza that follows deals with the concept of state. I personally hold the stanza in the highest esteem; its measured cadences, stresses at the right places, controlled rhythm, syncopation, and the haunting music, places it not only among the best verse by Iqbal but among the finest in the world literature. Iqbal has composed tense, brief verses; and each line demands volumes upon volumes of expositions.
آ بتائوں تجھ کو رمز آیہ ان الملوک
سلطنت اقوام عالم کی ہے اک جادو گری
خواب سے بیدار ہوتا ہے زرا محکوم اگر
پھر سلا دیتی ہے اس کو ھکمراں کی ساحری
جادوئے محمود کی تاثیر سے چشم ایاز
دیکتی ہے حلقہ گردن میں ساز دلبری
خون اسرائیل ا جاتا ہے آخر جوش میں
توڑ دیتا ہے کوءی موسی طلسم سامری
سروری زیبا فقط اس زات بہیتما کو ہے
حکمراں ہے اک وہی بباقی بتان اذری
از غلامی فطرت آزاد را رسو مکن
ا تراشی خواجہ از برہمن کافر تری
ہے وہی ساز کہن مگرب کا جمہوری نطام
جس کے پردے میں نہیں غیر از نوائے قیصری
دیو استبداد جمہوری قبا میں پاے کوب
تو سمجھا ہے یہ آزادی کی ہے نیلم پری
مجلس آئین و اصلاھ و رعایات حقوق
طب مغر میں مزے میٹھے، اثر خواب آوری
گرمئی فتار اعضائے مجالس الاماں
یہ بھی اک سرمایہ داروں کی ہے جنگ زر گری
اس سراب رنگ و بو کو گلستاں سمجھا ہے تو
آہ اے ناداں قفس کو آشیاں سمجھتا ہے تو
“See for thyself what is written loud and clear in thine Holy Book about state. Dost thou doubt that state and oppression are sisters to each other these days! Powerful nations of today are scheming Machiavilli-like for overwhelming the smaller countries. A subject race wilt always be subject, if it surrendereth to the charmingly cruel cunning of the oppressor. Hast thou forgotten that Ayaz saw melody in the discordant and arrogant attitude of Mahmud, the King of Ghazni? Remember that a time cometh when a Moses (peace be on him) breaketh the spell which the unspeakably profance rites performed at the instance of Samari hath cast on the minds of the Israelites. A despot thinketh he alone deserveth revence; the rest are like the idols of Azar, to see but not to speak; to move, but not to act; and to suffer, but not to protest. What charm hath nominal fredom, if the hand of the oppressor be still behind it. What booteth this new era, if the spirit of the despotic Caeser is not dead. Darest thou ever tune thy lyre? Tune it, and thou wilt hear the Caesarean command, arrogant, conceited, and callous. In thy time there hast appeared a new system of oppression for the people on behalf of the people. Beware! The old trick is being played by the same coterie, the same clique. As long as thou shalt go on making others thy leader, thou shalt be worse than the most degenerate idolater. Thinkest thou this a beautiful vision? No, my son, it is Circe—to charm thee for the time being and then to decimate you. Talkest thou of constitution, proportional representation, fundamental rights—yes, my son, the West bath done well by replenishing thy cellar with sweet wines that charm thy palate and• put thy intellect to deep slumber. All these fiery speeches, activities, world conferences—what presage they, my son? The same perennial conflict between capital and labour, between the despot and the oppressed, between the haves and have-nots. Thinkest thou this mirage to be a garden for thine pleasures? No, my son, it is a dungeon, a dungeon where cruel chains will oppress thee.”
The verses are political in nature and yet Iqbal has varied the rhyme and the, strees in each verse so artistically that the whole stanza produces a haunting lyrical effect. Nothing that will be written from a historical perspective in verse will .be able to surpass Iqbal’s achievement in this stanza.
The first verse. of course, takes us to the Quranic concept of State: ‘(Holy Quran, xxvii. 34), Kings, on entering into a city, raze it to dust.’ It found its nearest fulfilment after the death of the Prophet of Islam (peace on him) during the Caliphate of Omar (peace on him), when each individual was a state unto himself and the state an individual unto itself ; fair and equitable distribution of the treasury ; and the executive council, Majlis-e-Shora. But then our traditions fell on worse times; despotism made those heavenly day’s a matter of memory. Time and again, there were revolts,: and time and again they were suppressed. In the third verse an allusion has been made about Mahmud of Ghazni and Ayaz, his faithful sycophant and vazir. Even if a halter is cast round, his neck the eyes of Mahmud would exercise such a spell on him that he would think that he has a tyre round his neck instead of the halter, from which he would hear tunes that he thinks are exquisite but which free men would regard with contempt. But at times a Moses-like figure would emerge and turn the cycle of history, as Moses did with the temple of Semiramis and the worship of the golden ram which the sub-tribe of the Isrealitses’ Samari, had built during the prophet’s absence. It will also be seen that Iqbal has provided a very original twist to the image of Samari, which in the Persian literature, is associated with the charm that the beloved exercises over the lover. Another significance is that, since the tribe belonged to Israel, Iqbal emphasises that each civilization has inherent in it the twin forces of opperession and justice, which occur and recur. In the fifth verse the image is masterly. Idols are carved out in the image of man: they possess all his external organs. And yet they cannot see, walk, speak, or hear. A slavish intellect is like that of an idol, exquisitely turned out as if by Azur but slavish nonetheless. From the fifth and the sixth verses start lqbal’s reflections on the Western influence on Islam. We hear a music that puts us to sleep, that keeps on haunting and guiding us. But where? Tor-wards the precipice, of course: for we have lost all that our forefathers left to us; and are adopting new ways that have been forced on us and which we never really will successfully adopt. Is, then, extinction far off? It is in this light that Iqbal’s views should be seen and not to be taken to mean that fundamental rights, the right to exercise franchise, freedom of speech and other issues, are not suited to us. Iqbal is reflecting on the cycles of history; and it would therefore be unfair on our part to expect that he should expound his ideas as if he were establishing a proposition. He most emphatically is not doing that, if anything else. Another remarkable facet of the stanza is that the radeef (rhyme) at the end has adjectives and nouns that allude to aspects which militate against man’s decent concepts. The combination of liquids and hard words has been so dexterously achieved that Urdu literature has at last produced verses which campare with Khwaja Hafiz Shirazi’s melodious ghazals in their rhythm, suggestiveness, and beauty.
Thus ends Iqbal’s most exquisite and perfect stanza in ‘Khidr-e-Rah.’ In the next stanza about capital and labour It is actually not the problem that has been highlighted but is again an exhortation to the Muslims to be equal to the task that destiny has chosen for them. However, it clearly shows Iqbal’s abhorence for capitalism and cartels:
دست دولت آفریں کو مزد یوں ملتی رہی
اہل ثروت جیسے دیتے ہیں غریبوں کو زکات
“Alas, for the poor labourer. He tilts the field but shares it not. He runs the factory, sweats himself to death; he carries on his broad shoulders the structure of the society and yet protests not. And, yet what does he get? He get his returns from the master, as if the rich were distributing their unused wealth to feed him.”
Iqbal’s attitude towards labour and capitalism has raised several odd criticisms. Many ‘critics have referred to Iqbal’s apparent apathy towards feudalism, for instance. One really wonders whether feudalism is not the worst form of capitalism, and must poor Iqbal have written a full and comprehensive exigesis on what he should or should not have written. Was Shakespeare duty bound to protest at the execution of the Earl of Essex by Elizabeth Regina or to raise his voice in protest against the controversial policies of Lord Burleigh when he advised the execution of Mary, Queen of Scots? Even if Iqbal is considered as a political poet which he most emphatically is not, has Europe’s greatest poet, Shakespeare, been really so indifferent to his own environmental milieu, and not voiced his ideas through the medium of the drama? Iqbal shares with Shakespeare, the sonneteer, the mental agonies that they both suffered, but lqbal has transported his mental agonies to the Muslim nation and thrilled it in numbers that those who physically and actually heard them must have been a fortunate few.
In the second part of the stanza under discussion Iqbal brings about the theme of ‘Saltanat’ :
نغمہ پیداری جمہور ہے سامان عیش
قصہ خوا آور اسکندر و جم کب تلک
توڑ الیں فطرت انسان نے زنجیریں تمام
دوری جنت کو روتی چشم آدم کب تلک
“All this talk of republicanism, progress, resurgence, and rights is chimerical; it is, my son, the legends of Alexander and Jamshed, to imprison your intellect. Man, my son, has never accepted any chains; no sooner do you put manacles on his hands, than he breakes them. Did Adam spend his life time crying only? Did he not perform his daily and appointed tasks?”
The last stanza of the peom, ‘Dunya-e-Islam’ (The World of Islam) has a very contemporary setting:
کیا سناتا ہے مجے ترک و عرب کی دستاں
مجھ سے کچھ پنہاں نہیں اسلمیوں کا سوز ساز
لے گئے تثلیث کے فرزند میراچ خلیل
خشت بنیاد کلیسا بن گئی خاک حجاز
ہو گئی رسوا زمانے میں کلاہ لالہ رانگ
جو سراپا ناز تے ہیں آج مجبور نیاز
حکمت مغرب سے ملت کی یہ کیفیت ہوئی
ٹکڑے ٹکڑے جس طرب سونے کو کر دیا ہے گاز
ہو گیا مانند آب ارزاں مسلماں کا لہو
مضطرب ہے تو کہ تیرا دل نہیں دانائے راز
“You narrate to me the legendary deeds of the Arab and the Turk. What is hidden from my eyes—these eyes that have witnessed the glory of Islam, its truth, and its decline? You are the true inheritor of prophet Abraham through his son, Ishmael; but, lo! the West, the upholder of Trinity, has usurped your heritage. How are the mighty fallen! Once the Turkish fez inspired awe throughout Europe and Asia; and what now? The same cap mocks at us. The West has eaten into your vitals as the jeweller would use his scissors to cut gold into pieces. You ask because the secret is hidden from your eyes. Do you not know that the blood of Muslims flows like wine?” The poet’s heart is laden with sadness ; and yet he sees hope—hoping and expecting that the tide of adversity will ultimately lead the Muslim out of it.
The second part of the stanza concludes with the future vision of Islam. It is remarkable like the conclusion of ‘Shama our Shair.”
کھول کر آنکھیں مرے آئینہ گفتار میں
آنے والے دور کی دھندلی سی اک تصویر دیکھ
آزمودہ فتنہ ہے ایک اور بھی گردوں کے پاس
سامنے تقدیر کے رسوائی تدبیر دیکھ
کھول کر آنکھیں مرے آئینہ گفتار میں
آنے والے دور کی دھندلی سی اک تصویر دیکھ
آزمودہ فتنہ ہے ایک اور بھی گردوں کے پاس
سامنے تقدیر کے رسوائی تدبیر دیکھ
“My son, what I see and do now will be the reflection of the morrow. Open up your eyes, and see what the future shows; see that Heaven hides another storm; and that storm shall defeat the schemes that the other nations are patching against you and establish what has been ordained for your nation by Destiny.”
‘Khidr-e-Rah’ also reminds one of Dante’s Divine Comedy. Dante’s love for Beatrice, the doubts and fears which overtake the poet in the first canto (where he visualizes himself to be in a dark overgrown forest) and the appearance of Virgil as the guide, through whose aid the poet’s vision is illuminated. The imaginative fight of Dante does provide a parallel with ‘Khidr-e-Rah’. Here Iqbal is also feeling equally oppressed and wants to find the answers to his doubts, fears, and hopes. Khidr, the ever wandering prophet, who has witnessed millenia and millenia of human history, who has wandered all over the world as a spectator (and therefore is in it and yet out of it) and who led the prophet Moses to wonder at his uncanny foresight to which Iqbal has referred in the introductory verses—the self-same Moses who led the believers from wilderness to the land of milk and honey and who was blessed with a fleeting visiong of God that overawed him. Iqbal thus must have chosen the character of Khidr from these viewpoints. Khidr’s character in the poem might thus be regarded as a symbolic guide, particularly suited to the ideas that the poet wishes to convey, because he has seen the various historic cycles since the down of civilization.
‘Tulu-e-Islam’ is actually a continuation of the last stanza of ‘Khidr-e-Rah’. The very first verses are a more lyrical expression of the ideas contained in the concluding stanza of ‘Khidr-e-Rah’.
دلیل صبح روشن ہے ستاروں کی تنک تابی
افق سے آفتاب اھرا، گیا دور گرداں کوابی
عروق مردہ مشرق میں کون زندگی دوڑا
سمجھ سکتے نہیں اس راز کو سینا و فارابی
مسلماں کر مسلماں کر دیا طوفان مغرب نے
طلاطم ہائے دریا ہی سے ہے گوہر کی سیرابی
تڑپ صحن میں چمن میں آشیاں میں شاخساروں میں
جدا پارے سے ہو سکتی نہیں تقدیر سیمابی
“Now that the twinkling of the stars is diminishing, now that the rays of the sun are coming from the heaven in which they had hidden themselves at night, the coming of the dawn is heralded. Lo! the sun has now begun to emerge; and we cannot sleep any more, you and I, my friend. Likwewise, the emaciated East is fast recovering and its veins are getting a fresher, newer infusion of blood. How could Sina and Farabi, the philosophers, understand this phenomenon of regeneration which Destiny is conferring on the Muslim people? As the flood inundates the fields, so has the storm in the West provided fertile soil for the teeming millions of the East. Just as the lashes of the waves produce a bigger pearl, this storm in the West presages the birth of a pearl — the pearl of Islamic Regeneration. Now that our fulfilment is at hand, tarry not, my brothers. Cry in the garden; ‘carry your voice near and far. You are like mercurial beings; can mercury be ever static?”
Iqbal thus emyloys the images which have occured in his early poetry as well— the advent of the dawn, the ups and downs in the river, and garden as an expression of activity. But all these images have been chiselled to suit the new mood of Iqbal which is based on hope, and which he felt was justified in the light of the contemporary happenings. World War I, Iqbal believes, would lead each Western power to cancel the other out; and the various articles, contained in the Treaty of Versailles, Iqbal felt, would lead to further bickerings among them. Bolshevik Russia was also emerging and was fast becoming a factor to reckon with. Could therefore the Muslim world not be visualized as a third force to counterbalance the capitalistic Europe and Communism? Iqbal further transcended beyond the present to a future when the Arab Muslim states and Turkey would soon realize that their irredentist attitudes would spell their own ruin, and that ultimately they would eke out some formula to knit the fabric of Islam more closely:
کتاب ملت بیضا کی پحر شیرازہ بندی ہے
یہ شاخ ہاشمی کرنے کو ہے پھر برگ و ر پیدا
اگر عثمانیوں پر کوہ غم ٹوٹا تو کیا غم ہے
کہ خون صد ہزار انجم سے ہوتی ہے سحر پیدا
ہزاروں سال نرگساپنی بے نوری پہ روتی ہے
بری مشکل سے ہوا ہے چمن میں دیدہ ور پیدا
نوا پیرا ہو اے بلبل کہ ہو تیرے ترنم سے
کبوتر کے تن نازک میں شاہیں کا جگر پیدا
“The tears of our suffering, brethern, will not have been vain; no, through their fervour, zeal, and pathos, they will cause a flood that will tear away the present barriers. The river of Prophet Ibrahim’s progeny will produce pearls that will dazzle the eyes. The lessons of our precepts lie scattered here and there; the time has come when they will be made into one harmonious whole. The garden that will come out from the ashes of the Hashmite dust will burgeon forth flowers and plants whose beauty will make the people wonder. If the Othmanli Turks have experienced a tumultous upheaval of destiny, no matter; is the morn not produced by the tears of the thousands of stars, which have to hide themselves from our eyes to produce it? In a world, my brother, where we live there are thousands of men and women who have eyes but their eyes do not illuminate; then one day, lo! appears one whose eyes peer into the secrets of Good and Evil, Heaven and Earth, and he informs his vision to others around him. Sing bulbul, sing—and inspire the timid pigeon with the spirit of the hawk.”
Iqbal ..s now using the images from Persian poetry more often. ‘Nargis’ or narcissus symbolises the eye, and the fourth verse blends this idea with that of Islamic resurgence in a beautiful image. How many of us see but observe; hear but memorize; read, but grasp—and those who observe, grasp, and memorize the lesson of the past, can bring about a revolution in the scope of our intellectual flight. A person who combines these qualities has been called ‘didawar’ (one who sees properly) by Iqbal. Iqbal has used the image of the narcissus very exquisitely and delicately. These images have come to possess a halo of sacredness in the hands of masters like Hafiz, Saadi, and Khusru and Iqbal saw in the fitness of things that these images should be applied to the lofty theme that he has in view. A very close compeer in this respect which one might recall is Milton—an aspect that has already been discussed; they both have drawn on classical sources ; but, while in Milton’s poetry, they are derived from Greek and Latin sources, in Iqbal’s poetry they are essentially Arabic and Persian.
The next stanza is hauntingly lyrical:
خدائے لم یزل کادست قدر تو زباں تو ہے
یقیں پیدا کر اے غافل کہ مغلوب گماں تو ہے
پرے ہے چرخ نیلی فام سے منزل مسلماں کی
ستارے جس کی گرد راہ ہوں وہ کارواں تو ہے
یہ نکتہ سرگزشت ملت بیضا سے ہے پیدا
کہ اقوام زمین ایشا کا پاسبان تو ہے
سبق پھر پڑھ صداقت کا عدالت کا شجاعت کا
لیا جائے گا تجھ سے کام دنیا کی امامت کا
“You are the language of God, who has no time and space. Where are you? In the kingdom of superstition, my brethren. The vision of the Muslim traverses beyond the sky; and believe me, the stars light your path, because they have been created for you. When the Chosen of God (Prophet of Islam peace be on him) departed from the earth, what did he take to the Creator? It was Islam that he took with himself my brethren. The history of Islam shows beyond doubt that the viceregency for the defence of Asia rests on your shoulders, O my brothers. Let us then delve deep again into our past and learn the long lost traditions of Truth, Justice, and Courage, and surely we shall then have equipped ourselves for leading the world on to the path of righteousness.”
In the above verses Iqbal’s poetry again revolves round the spatial imagery of sky, sun, stars, and the universe. This imagery he usually introduces into poetry in order to emphasise the infinitude, vastness, and the eternal verities of the Islamic faith. This point is rather important, because in his later poems, he carries this approach further.
From the precepts which the Muslims are duty-bound to observe Iqbal moves again to take up the threads from which he goes on to spin the fabric of Pan-Islamism:
یہی مقصود فطرت ہے یہی رمز مسلمانی
اخوت کی جہانگیری محبت کی فراوانی
بتان رنگ و بو کو توڑ کر ملت میں گم ہو جا
نہ ایرانی رہے باقی نہ افغانی نہ تورانی
میان شاخساراں صحت مرغ چمن کب تک
رے بازو میں ہے پرواز شاہین قہستانی
گماں آباد ہستی میں یقیں مرد مسلماں کا
بیاباں کی شب تاریک میں قندیل رہبانی
مٹایا قیصر و کسرے کے استبداد کو جس نے
وہ کیا تھا؟ روز حیدر فقر بوزر صدق سلمانی
ہوءے احرار ملت جادہ پیما کس تجمل سے
تماشائی شگاف در سے ہیں صدیوں کے زندانی
ثبات زندگی ایمان محکم سے ہے دنیا میں
کہ المانی سے بھی پائندہ تر نکلا ہے تورانی
“It was ordained that we, my brethern, should observe no limits in our profession of love towards each other. Break then the idols that you have carved of nationalism, racial superiority, and supercilliousness towards the less fortunate of your brothers. Let there be no Turani (non-Irani, that is), Afghani, or Irani. Do you, my brothers, like to remain in the garden, and chirrup from one branch to the other, when you have dormant within you the vigour and the flight of the hawk, whose flight defies height ! In the world beset with superstitions and false notions, the Muslim acts like a beacon light which would lead us, my brothers, from wilderness to the path of righteousness. Who liberated mankind from the world of the Sassanids and despots? It was nothing but the valour of Ali (peace on him), piety of Bu Zar (peace on him), and the faith of Salman Farsi (peace on him). Our forefathers had a very narrow terrain to cross; but they did cross it, and mankind wonders to this day how they did it, and with what courage and patience they achieved it. In the mortal world, what, my brethern, is eternal? Nothing except faith—it is but this faith which has proved that the West is mortal, and the East is not.”
In the last verse the poet compares the decline of Germany after the Great War and Turkey’s emergence from the ashes of the moribund Ottoman empire. I have already suggested that Iqbal was very impatient all along to see one such sign, and he interpreted the significance of the Turkish victory against the Greek and British forces as a sign for the resurgence of Islam.
The stanza that succeeds is more or less on the lines of the memorable stanza on “Saltanat” in ‘Khidr-e-Rah’, but is equally lyrical, and, with the exception of a verse or two, less thought-provoking:
غلامی میں نہ کام آتی ہیں شمشیریں نہ تدبیریں
جو ہو ذوق یقیں پیدا تو کٹ جاتی ہیں زنجیریں
کوئی اندازہ کر سکتا ہے اس کے زور بازو کا
نگاہ مرد مومن سے بدل جاتی ہیں تقدیریں
ولایت، پادشاہی، علم اشیا کی جہانگیری
یہ سب کیا ہیں؟ فقط اک نکتہ ایماں کی تفسیریں
براہیمی نظر پیدا مگر مشکل سے ہوتی ہے
ہوس چھپ چھپ کے سینوں میں بنا لیتی ہے تصویریں
تمیز بندہ و آقا فساد آدمیت ہے
حذر اے چیرہ دستاں سخت ہیں فطرت کی تعزیریں
حقیقت ایک ہے ہر شے کی خاکی ہو کہ نوری ہو
لہو خورشید کا ٹپکے اگر زرے کا دل چیریں
یقین محکم عمل پیہم محبت فاتح عالم
جہاد زندگانی میں ہیں یہ مردو کی شمشیریں
“When man’s intellect has become slavish, he cannot wield his sword, nor can he plan; it is only through sheer faith and will power that he can achieve his liberation. My brethern, have you tested the faithful? Even his eyes can put destiny on to a different path. What are wealth, economic self-sufficiency, independence, my brethern? They will follow naturally if we have the wealth of faith. If there be no perceptive intellect among us, it is because most of us cannot transcend the mist that selfishness has created in the inmost reaches of our heart. This division between a ruler-man and a subject-man is at the root of all conflicts. Beware, 0 despots, nature does not spare easily and you will have to answer for your misdeeds. Everything in the cosmos is the creation of God, and therefore has the same reality. Does not the particle reflect the ray of the sun? Let us, then, 0 brethren, enrich ourselves with faith, action, and universal brotherhood—for these are the weapons the faithful wield in the struggle for life.”
Iqbal is progressively gaining in poetic stature, and has come out with new words like ‘ashya ki Jahangiri’ (rule over the commodities of life), ‘Jahad-e-Zindagani’ (struggle in life), which add to the effect of his verses, even though they might not have to say much otherwise. In the sixth verse, however, Iqbal seems to have been under the sway of the philosophy of Shaikh Muhiuddin Ibn Arabi, who, in his philosophy, associated such manifestation as the particle-sun, drop-river, etc. But Iqbal later on repudiated this view, and adopted the orthodox Muslim view with regard to the personality of God.
In the succeeding stanza Iqbal—for the first time in a poem of this sort—adds a very contemporary colour to the poem:
عقابی شان سے جھپٹے تھے جو بے بال و پر نکلے
ستارے شام کے خون شفق میں ڈوب کر نکلے
ہوءئے مدفون دریا زیر دریا تیرنے والے
طمانچے موج کے کھاتے تھے جو بن کر گہر نکلے
غبار رہگزر ہیں، کیمیا پر ناز تھا جن کو
جبین خاک پر رکھتے ت جو بنکر گہر نکلے
حرم رسوا پوا پیر حرم کی کم نگاہی سے
جوانان تتاری کس قدر صاحب نظر نکلے
“See how the nation that rushed out with the force of an eagle had really no substance in it. And lo! there is another nation that is like a star that has imbibed the colour of the sunset. Those that harried the seas with their submarine equipment have, by the irony of fate, succumbed to the force of the sea; but those that floated like a jetsam have become pearls Who hears of Germany with its chemical industry? But those that had nothing except prayers before Almighty God are now a force to recknon with. Mecca’s fair name has been sullied by the short-sighted attitude of the Sharif of Mecca; and the Turkish youth has done well to display his power of foresight.”
The high hopes reposed by Iqbal in Turkey for the symbolic resurgence of Islam was, however, misplaced. The conflict between Enver Pasha and Mustapha Kamal Pasha and the country’s pronounced orientation towards nationalism dispelled any hope that a Pan-Islamist would have pinned on it. It is, perhaps, this aspect which detracts from the beauty of ‘‘Tulu-e-Islam’. From this standpoint, ‘Khidr-e-Rah’, ‘Shikwa’ and Jawab-e-Shikwa’ and ‘Shama our Shair’ are better poems. A poem like °Tulu-e-Islam’ brings out the best in Iqbal—his lyrical outbursts and magnificent imagery—and the worst in him—his misplaced ultra-fidian fidelity to signs that really portended other tendencies altogether—as Iqbal sets out in the following verses :
نظر کو خیرہ کرتی ہے چمک تہذیب حاضر کی
یہ صناعی مگر جھوٹے نگوں کی ریزہ کاری ہے
پھر اٹھی ایشا کے دل سے چنگاری حبت کی
زمیں جولانگہ اطلس قبایان تتاری ہے
“Our eyes, my brethren, are dazed by the impact of the Western achievements, but they are like the false gems . . . . Again, from the heart of Asia has appeared the cinders that will set fire to the hearts of the faithful. Again shall North Africa become the battle-field and will recall the overwhelming tide of the Tartars throughout the continent.”
The last stanza ends again in much the same way as in ‘Khidr-eRah’ but the verses are in Persion:
بیا سساقی نوائے مرغزار از شاخسار آمد
بہار آمد، نگار آمد، نگار امد، قرار آمد
“Let the saqi be ready with his cup; for in the fields and gardens, one can hear the birds singing their joyous songs. The spring has come and with it beauty. Rest thou too; for the final moment hath come.”
