[426] Qur’ān ii. 149.
[427] Qur’ān ii. 151.
[428] All Muslim poets speak of wounds as “flowers.”
[429] Qur’ān liii. 17. There is a pun here. The Arabic for “swerved” and the Persian for “a crow,” are identical in orthography,—zāg. Muhammed has been called by other Persian poets: “The nightingale of the garden of mà zāg;” which really means “swerved not,” but may be rendered: “we, the crows.”
[430] The “Limner” is, here, God, of course. He was intoxicated with love, not wine.
[431] Qur’ān ii. 88.
[432] These were the Christian Arabs of Nejrān. They sent an embassy to Muhammed at Medina. He proposed to them a trial by invocation of God’s curse on the liars, their wives, and children. He uttered it; they shrank, and accepted submission to him, on condition of paying tribute.
[433] The “canda draconis” was the “descending node,” one of the ecliptical points. The “forbidden fruit,” in Islām, is held to have been wheat.