1923

The Message of the East

The second book informs the reader that Nature itself has started created in the deepest recesses of life a new type of human being and a new world for him – apparently the same as envisioned by the Poet in the previous book. Glimpses of this new world are offered in poems where Rumi, Goethe and other poets of East and West hold conversations in heavens – something that seemed remarkably unusual at that time but which has become an apt analogy for the kind of cultural exchanges that have been happening since then. Envisioning these changes in the near future, the poet has compiled this book as a loving response to the Divan of the German poet-philosopher Goethe composed almost a hundred years earlier. Historically, the book also marks the cut-off point where the "tutelage" of the West, accepted by the East in the nineteenth century, must come to an end. Europe, partially due to its conservatism and partially due to dilapidation of the life forces after the First World War (1914-18), is unlikely to grasp the significance of the brave new world while the East, especially the Muslim East, apparently seems to be naturally suitable for taking the lead since it has reawakened after a long slumber – just like Germany of a century before.

• Table of Contents
• Original Persian Text
• English Translation
• Biographical background