Tell The Death To Wait Awhile, I Still Have To Learn Something New Before I Die

By Sumit Paul, New Age Islam 1 July 2023 Kaho Maut Se Ke Woh Zara Intazaar Kare Seekhna Hai Kuchh Naya Abhi Bhi Mujhe -Nasir Kazmi (Please tell death to wait awhile/ I've still to learn something new before I die) Socrates was in prison awaiting his execution. One day he heard a fellow prisoner singing a difficult lyric by the poet, Stesichoros. Socrates begged the man to teach him the lyric. " Why? " asked the singer. " So that I can die knowing one more thing," was the great man's reply. Disciple: Why learn something new one week before you die? Master: For exactly the same reason that you'd learn something new fifty years before you die. "Ergon Meut Menda Bill Noft Ecza" (One learns something new every minute till he dies). This Turkish adage inspired Kamal Ataturk Pasha, the architect of modern Turkey. Learning is an eternal passion. Dying Agha Shahid Ali was perfecting the Ghazal format in English. By the way, this brilliant poet and professor who taught English at Chicago University, introduced Ghazal to English poetry and worked on sonnet and its seamless entry into Urdu poetry. He knew that he would soon bid adieu to the world (he died of brain cancer at the age of 52), yet nothing could dampen his enthusiasm for learning something new. He bettered his own translations of Faiz's Naqsh-e-Fariyadi (Rebel's Silhouette: Selected Poems by Faiz Ahmad Faiz, 1992) as he believed that a translator gained greater grasp of a language with every passing hour! What a thought! Lesser mortals would simply give up and wait for death to take them away. But people like Agha Shahid Ali would refuse to be kayoed by it. A fortnight before his death, the redoubtable Dr Edward W Said was trying a difficult tune of Chopin on his violin, while it was meant to be played on a piano. But the great man mastered it! He also undertook a fresh assignment to ameliorate The Seven Odes of Pre-Islamic Arabia as Arabic was his mother tongue. He was born in Jerusalem, Mandatory Palestine. Napoleon Bonaparte started taking lessons in English from the jailor Dean Carnet despite knowing that his days were numbered at St. Helena where he was incarcerated by the English. Danish Khairabadi aptly said: Kuchh Naya Kar Guzarne Ki Chaah Jaanib-e-Maut Se Hata Deti Hai Nigaah (The zeal to do something new, distracts our attention from death). This must be the spirit! An overwhelming desire to do or accomplish something new, mitigates the fear and apprehension of impending end. ---- A regular columnist for New Age Islam, Sumit Paul is a researcher in comparative religions, with special reference to Islam. He has contributed articles to the world's premier publications in several languages including Persian. URL: https://newageislam.com/spiritual-meditations/death-learn-die/d/130111 New Age Islam, Islam Online, Islamic Website, African Muslim News, Arab World News, South Asia News, Indian Muslim News, World Muslim News, Women in Islam, Islamic Feminism, Arab Women, Women In Arab, Islamophobia in America, Muslim Women in West, Islam Women and Feminism