THE CONFERENCE OF THE BIRDS pdf download

THE CONFERENCE OF THE BIRDS

THE CONFERENCE OF THE BIRDS

Farid ud-Din Attar, also known as Attar of Nishapur, wrote a Persian poem called The Conference of Birds. 

Sulayman (Solomon) and Dwd (David) are reported to have been taught the language, or speech, of the birds (maniq al-ayr), according to the Qur’an, verse 27:16. 

Attar’s death, like his existence, is shrouded in mystery. 

He is known to have lived and died a horrible death in the massacre inflicted on the city of Nishapur by Genghis Khan and the Mongol army in 1221, when he was seventy years old.

From the book 

In the beginning he gilded the stars, so that at night the heavens might play tric-trac. 

With diverse properties he endowed the net of the body, and he has put dust on the tail of the bird of the soul. 

He made the Ocean liquid as a sign of bondage, and the mountain tops are capped with ice for fear of him. 

He dried up the bed of the sea and from its stones brought forth rubies, and from its blood, musk. 

To the mountains he has given peaks for a dagger, and valleys for a belt; so that they lift up their heads in pride. 

Sometimes he makes clusters of roses spring from the face of the fire; 

Sometimes he throws bridges across the face of the waters. 

He caused a mosquito to sting Nimrod his enemy who thereby suffered for four hundred years. 

In his wisdom he caused the spider to spin his web to protect the highest of men. 

He squeezed the waist of the ant so that it resembled a hair, and he made it a companion of Solomon; 

He gave it the black robes of the Abbasides and a garment of unwoven brocade worthy of the peacock. 

When he saw that the carpet of nature was defective he pieced it together fittingly. 

He stained the sword with the colour of the tulip; and from vapour made a bed of water-lilies.