[101] In Persian, empty promises and boastings are also called “wind.” Hence, the poet suggests ablution to cleanse from such;—mental ablution.
[102] “Syntheism” is the correct rendering of the “shirk” of Islām. “Polytheism” is very incorrect. Dualists (Magians) and Trinitarians (Christians) are Syntheists, but they are not polytheists in a correct sense.
[103] An allusion to the idea that a pearl is a raindrop caught and nourished by an oyster.
[104] “The Illiterate Prophet,” or, rather, “the Gentile Prophet,” reputed barbarous and illiterate by the Jews and Christians, is one of Muhammed’s highest titles.
[105] The original here uses the simile of a certain “cunning bird,” known also as the “Truth-calling bird,” that hangs by a claw and calls all night: haqq! haqq! (Truth! Truth!).
[106] Such is an eastern myth. Poets call the planet Venus the “Harpist of the Spheres.”
[107] In Qur’ān ii. 32, God commands the angels to fall down in adoration to Adam, when first created. Iblīs, Satan, alone refused, through pride and envy.
[108] In Qur’ān iv. 124, Abraham is called the Chosen Friend of God; and in xxi. 69, the story is mentioned of his being saved from the fire into which he was cast by Nimrod.
[109] The Fountain of Life, or Water of Life, is imagined to take its rise in a land of darkness beyond the limits of the inhabited earth.
[110] In the original I have not found it possible to feel sure where the break should be made from the remonstrance to the poet’s reflections. Much of what precedes seems addressed to God; but Eastern hyperbole is wide.