Original Persian Text
هر عقد که در بزم تعیّن بینم
انجام، سر آغاز تباین بینم
آیا که کند سود درین داد و ستاد
بازار جهان جمله تغابن بینم
Reading in Latin letters made for this page:
Her ʿaḳd ki der bezm-i teʿayyün bînem
Encâm-ı ser-âġâz-ı tebâyün bînem
Âyâ ki koned sûd derîn dâd u sitâd
Bâzâr-ı cihân cümle teġâbün bînem
In English
1. Every bond I see in the gathering of determinate beings, I see its end as the beginning of a parting.
2. Who, I wonder, makes a profit in this giving and taking? I see the whole market of the world as mutual loss.
Literary and Historical Commentary
The old comparison of the world to a market is rebuilt in this Persian quatrain in the language of philosophy. "Ta'ayyün" in Sufism is the absolute being's taking on determinate forms, becoming limited beings; "bezm-i ta'ayyün", the gathering of these determinate beings, is the world itself. Every bond made there, every "akd", means both a friendship and a contract of sale, and the end of each is the beginning of a parting.
In the second couplet the market image opens out: the world is a "dâd u sitâd", a place of giving and taking. The poet asks who makes a profit in this trading and gives his answer in a single word: "teğâbün", mutual loss. This word appears in the Qur'an as one of the names of the Day of Judgement (al-Taghâbun 64:9); on that day it will become plain who has been the loser. Without naming this verse, the quatrain sees the whole market of the world as a loss and turns the language of trade into the language of transience.
Bibliography
- Havva Tok Yıldız, Merzifonlu İbrâhîm Cûdî Dîvânı (İnceleme-Metin-Sözlük) [1b-43a], Master's thesis, Ondokuz Mayıs University, Samsun 2017, p. None (poem no. 97; manuscript fol. ). http://libra.omu.edu.tr/tezler/116853.pdf
Online sources
