Passages similar to: The Masnavi — Moses and Pharaoh. 1
Source passage
Sufi
The Masnavi
Moses and Pharaoh. 1 (111-120)
They are a proof of the beauty and grace of my beloved.' The other said, "I take not these for a proof, Though they may be a proof to common people." The Sunni said, "When genuine and base coin boast, Saying, 'Thou art false, I am good and genuine,' Fire is the test ultimately, When the two rivals are cast into the furnace." Accordingly both of them entered the furnace, Both leapt into the fiery flame; And the philosopher was burnt to ashes,
Lucas saith: I testify to posterity, and what I set forth is more lucid than are your words, that the Philosopher saith:* Burn the copper, burn the...
(67) Lucas saith: I testify to posterity, and what I set forth is more lucid than are your words, that the
Philosopher saith:* Burn the copper, burn the silver, burn the gold. HErmicanus veplies: Behold something more dark than ever!
The Turba answereth: Illumine, therefore, that which is dark. And he: As to that which he said—Burn, burn, burn, the diversity is only in the names, for they are one and the same thing. And they: Woe unto you! how shortly hast thou dealt with it! why art thou poisoned with jealousy! And he: Is it desirable that I should speak more clearly? And they: Doso. And he: I signify that to whiten is to burn, but to make red is life.t For the envious have multiplied many names that they might lead posterity astray, tu whom I testify that the definition of this Art is the liquefaction of the body and the separation of the soul from the body, seeing that copper, like a man, has a soul and a body. Therefore, it behoves you, O all ye Sons of the Doctrine, to destroy the body and extract the soul therefrom! Wherefore the
Philosophers said that the body does not penetrate the body, but that there is a subtle nature, which is the soul, and it is this which tinges and penetrates the body. In nature, therefore, there is a body and there is a soul.
The Turba answereth: Despite your desire to explain, you have put forth dark words. And he: I signify that the envious have narrated and said that the splendour of Saturn does not appear unless it perchance be dark when it ascends in the air, that Mercury is hidden by the rays of the Sun, that quicksilver vivifies the body O by its fiery strength, and thus the work isaccomplished. But Venus, when she becomes oriental, precedes the Sun.*
Then broken was their mutual support, And trembling each one turned himself to me, With others who had heard him by rebound. Wholly to me did the...
(5) Then broken was their mutual support, And trembling each one turned himself to me, With others who had heard him by rebound. Wholly to me did the good Master gather, Saying: "Say unto them whate'er thou wishest." And I began, since he would have it so: "So may your memory not steal away In the first world from out the minds of men, But so may it survive 'neath many suns, Say to me who ye are, and of what people; Let not your foul and loathsome punishment Make you afraid to show yourselves to me." "I of Arezzo was," one made reply, "And Albert of Siena had me burned; But what I died for does not bring me here. 'Tis true I said to him, speaking in jest, That I could rise by flight into the air, And he who had conceit, but little wit, Would have me show to him the art; and only Because no Daedalus I made him, made me Be burned by one who held him as his son. But unto the last Bolgia of the ten, For alchemy, which in the world I practised, Minos, who cannot err, has me condemned."