ʻThe socially vulnerableʼ in Ilāhī-nāmah-yi ʻAṭṭār-i Nīshābūrī

SASAKI Ayano

In ʻAṭṭār’s mathnavī works, especially in Ilāhī-nāmah (The Book of God), various social characters are seen as symbols for seekers of the truth, and sometimes even in the form of Insān-i kāmil (a Perfect Man). Regarding to the story space and stories, they bear specific responsibility to advance the goals of ʻAṭṭār’s metanarratives. The author has taken note of this point well during these several years while she had been translating Ilāhī-nāmah into Japanese that the poet has an affectionate look at the wicked or lowly persons, weak ones, even negative characters in his age like old women, female servants, sodomies, beggars, criminals and accused, religious minorities, impure animals and even objects of no material value like clay and burnt off, and he uses them to explain his human and mystical intentions. ʻAṭṭār put these kinds of characters and animals who are relatively weak, or insignificant things in front of the important characters of the community or strong animals or valuable items in order to show us their higher value unlike the real, outside world.

This article tries to prove that the above-mentioned ʻAṭṭār's view of compromise and tolerance will be explained clearly with reference to the evidences of phrases in the poetry, especially with attention to classification of society in his age, in order to take even a small step in the way of recognizing this prominent poet.