Discover How Hafiz’s Spiritual Life
and Vision Can Enlighten Your Own
Hafiz is known throughout the world as
Persia’s greatest poet, with sales of his poems in Iran
today only surpassed by those of the Qur’an itself. His
probing and joyful verse speaks to people from all backgrounds
who long to taste and feel divine love and experience harmony
with all living things.
This beautiful sampling of Hafiz’s
works captures his deep spiritual understanding, offering a
glimpse into the vision that has inspired people around the
world for centuries. Considered by his contemporaries as an
oracle and often referred to as "Tongue of the
Hidden" and "Interpreter of Secrets," Hafiz
followed Sufism’s inner path on a quest to discover the
hidden meaning of the universe, and shares his experiences and
desire for union with the Divine in symbolic language that
borders on magical.
Infused with the spirit of love and joy,
this unique collection offers insight into Haiz’s
spiritual philosophy and carefree mysticism that addresses the
earthly beauty, pain, ecstasy, and longing that define human
nature, and the divine adoration that promises to set the
spirit free.
"Ambiguity is a major characteristic
of Persian poetry, and Hafiz was one of the greatest masters of
this artistic quality: each reader tends to see his or her own
experiences reflected in the poems. As a result, it is usually
unclear whether in a given verse he means actual wine or
spiritual wine, a male or a female beloved, a human beloved or
God, and so forth…. But after reading the same images
over and over in ever-changing contexts, one gradually leaves
behind the ordinary material world and enters into a realm in
which everything symbolizes the beautiful qualities of the
beloved, who ultimately is God and the source of
Love."
—from the Preface by Ibrahim Gamard,
annotator and translator, Rumi and Islam: Selections from His
Stories, Poems, and Discourses—Annotated & Explained
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Hafiz is the
most beloved poet of Persia. He was a Sufi master and prolific
writer who was thought to have written an estimated five
thousand poems before his death in 1389. His Divan (collected
works) is the second most widely read book in Iran, the first
being the Qur’an. His work was brought to the West and
translated by such admirers as Goethe and Ralph Waldo Emerson.
Gertrude Bell (1868–1926)
was an adventurer, scholar, linguist, and British intelligence
officer. Bell’s courageous travels in the Islamic world
of the Middle East in the late nineteenth century offered some
of the first Western understandings of the culture and people
of the lands of modern-day Iraq and Iran. Her translations of
the poems of Hafiz are still considered by many scholars to be
the most faithful of any in the English language.
