"Munojot" - Looking to Eternity

        Truly great artists do not have significant and insignificant works. All of them in some way reflect truth. Although Munojot is one of Alisher Navoi's shortest works it reveals how to be humble before God. While it was never published in USSR , it was published in Uzbekistan the first year of their independence in 1991.
         Munojot means 'address to Allah'. It is an entreaty for forgiveness of sins. In this work Navoi seems to be summing up his artistic and life experience as he addresses the Creator with the confession of contrite heart. We see what the great poet thought of his life and works in the presence of God. Navoi is not a man of useless regrets, but is a man who knows his place before Almighty God.
         Munojot is written in a reflective manner. The poet poignantly contrasts the bustle of life to the real feelings of human-beings. Incomplete reality (truth) worries the poet as he feels wearied by the unknown. And so he fixes his eyes on Allah.
         Munojot is a wonderful concoction of form and content. Here we see the mighty and yet delicate role of language. Navoi's language is one of somber thought and hard deliberation. Like music it was composed for the heart. Every word, every sound serves to disclose the author's emotional state. The epithets and metaphors of Navoi are addressed not only to Allah, but they also address its author. They convey the transparency of his spirit, his soul's state gained through much suffering, and the pain of his heart.
         Munojot is the result of the author's inner yearning, his great enthusiasm causes him to addresses future generations, and it is to them that Navoi gives his exhortation to behold the sacred "ego", the goal of spiritual perfection and the strengthing of will. He appeals to us to not undertake anything that might interfere with the peace of ours soul and contradict such sacred aims.

        Dr. Suima Ganieva

        Senior Professor
        Taskent Oriental University
        

PRESENTING
Alisher Navoi's

MUNOJOT

        In the name of Allah, the most gracious and merciful!

        Great and beautiful is your name, your kindness and mercy are worthy of worship. Your name is your wealth, generosity and mercy is your predestination. You are the treasure and all created by you is mystery. Your name is the focus of the best features of names. Hundred thousand praises and blessings to your grace and mercy! Gracious - it is you, merciful - it is also you, illustrious - it is also you.
         Praise [you] Allah, [you possess] such greatness and might that nobody possesses but only you, life without you is like aspersion and slander. Your kin is absolutely perpetual, your virtue is eternal being. All seen but you are ghosts of non-being. Moreover, they are nothing in existence. Your fame and good are all-embracing, there is no Allah except you, oh you, absolutely eternal being!         

GRATITUDE TO ALLAH

         Oh, my Allah, your spirit is the sublimity and might, stardoms [terrestrial] and celestial are at the mercy of you. There is no end to your beginning
and no end to your eternity. In the flower garden of time every blade of grass and every leaf are singing praises of you. And in the book of the Universe every letter and every page is thanking you for your good deeds.
         In the garden of your beauty there are eight paradise flower gardens similar to sweet-smelling basil; in the jail of your might there are seven neither worlds similar to one sight reducing everything to ashes. In the palace of your magnificence the blazing Sun is only a particle, in the world of your art the Heavens is only one picture. If you wish to create hundreds of such worlds it would be enough to exclaim "Appear!" If you wish to destroy thousands of things it would be enough for you only to think of "the dispersed ashes".
        You are indivisible, free from brother-in-arms and associates, you are lonely as you have neither father, no children. Every pearl of your knowledge is more pure than the diamonds of your stars, every tulip from the fields belonging to you are fierier than the blazing rays of the Sun. You are an incomparable and true witness of that - "there is nothing to be compared with him". You are connected [by the ties of kinship] with nobody, and the appropriate proof to this is that - "given the life to nobody, born by nobody". Whatever to be compared, you are incomparable to anybody. When being looked at attentively - it is you, [but probably] it is not you. The tongue of those praising you is damaged, those praising you are striken with their own clumsiness. And as they say themselves, "We cannot stop praising you". If those who crave for praising you cannot stop their praises they deserve forgiveness.

PRAISING THE PROPHET

        As it runs, when "Adam yet was the water and the earth. I (Muhammad) had already been the prophet". Logically, (according to the dictum).         "Gratitude to the whole world and the last prophet", he is the follower and the last (of the prophets) friend of Allah, that is Muhammad, Allah's envoy, and Allah, bless his (name), and let it be peace over him! The objective of creating a hundred and twenty thousand prophets is he. He is the cause of creating eighteen thousand worlds. On the throne of prophecy he is the crown (and is dominating) over the happy crowd. He is the only one who is honoured with ascension (into the Heavens) among all the prophets and envoys of Allah. From the beginning to the end, always and in everything, everywhere everybody wants his protection. (His) support is the horse. Burak - the fast horse, living in the clouds, and Gabriel pointing to the right way is his lightning-like messenger. The night of ascent is his lodging place, "I am with Allah (not looking at) for ever" - is his wealth. "Let peace and good deeds of Allah condescend to him, to pious members of his family and to his honest associates".

        Address to Allah . Oh my Allah, you are the best among the magnanimous, when I am a sinner.
        Oh, my Allah, you are the best among [all] the merciful, when I am an unfortunate creature.
        Oh, my Allah, though my lot is sin and disobedience, I have nobody but you.
        Oh, my Allah, I did not exist but you have created me, I was a baby and you raised me into the rank of the great, but with the wind of evil passions you have broken the tree of my piousness and with the attack of sinful [actions] you have driven away my peace.
        Oh, my Allah, I am very absent-minded due to my bad temper, but I have no repentance in my whimsical wishes, and I have no hope for being rescued from these troubles.
        Oh, my Allah, everything that is unworthy in myself does not allow me to renounce my own "ego" and grasp the hem of the pious men because of shame for being sinful myself.
        Oh, my Allah, if you reject the one who has been serving you for years, nobody would dare to protect, and if you admit the one who has been disobedient to you for centuries, nobody would perceive this sacrament.
        Oh, my Allah, did Adam vouchsafed himself with the altar without your will, could it become possible to devil's tricks?
        Oh, my Allah, you predetermine both lust and dissipation, piety and devotion, then why do you condemn weak people for their voices?
        Oh, my Allah, I need your grace as I have many sins, I deserve your generosity as my mistakes and faults are numerous.
        Oh, my Allah, if I tell my troubles to anybody and he will reject me, then I will address to you, but if you reject me, then what shall I do and whom apply to?!
        Oh, my Allah, if on my way, to you I find my ashes, then it will turn to be the balsam for my eyes, and the clod will be the elixir; out of you the gold resembles black dust having no value at all.
        Oh, my Allah, though I suffer much from not being sinless, but if you become my consoler what else should I grieve for?!
        Oh, my Allah, root out from my heart, the chains of my proclivity for wealth, and with the candle of piousness light up the road to you in the darkness.
        Oh, my Allah, on this long road and in the valley of troubles bless me, and if I stumble overcoming them support me with your patronage.
        Oh, my Allah, bar me from the devil on this way, if this enemy reaches me what could remain of my piousness, do not deprive me of your support!
        Oh, my Allah, grant my abstinence so that it could subdue my insidious lust, grant my devotion and that ill-meaning devil would be thrown down at its feet.
        Oh, my Allah, I am in the dream of unconcern - wake me up, I am under the intoxication of ignorance - sober me.
        Oh, my Allah, bring this vigil to penetration, and this soberness to clarity.
        Oh, my Allah, wily devil is my enemy and the endless passion is the ruler of my [destiny] and, woe is me! if you do not parry this disastrous danger.
        Oh, my Allah, though my temper is iniquitous, but my aspirations are pure, though the fear is overpowering me I nevertheless do not lose the hope.
        Oh, my Allah, my nature plunges me in shame but when I recollect your mercy, the hope inspires me with life.
        Oh, my Allah, you are unable to bear anybody malice, and I am unable to bear good. You are good and I am bad. Everybody has his own features: if the thorns [of the roses] are prickling they are burnt. But in spring the roses are welcome.
        Oh, my Allah, dust can hide everything from view, but the Sun will light up the world [with its rays].
        Oh, my Allah, everything being created is predetermined by you, sois there any reason for the doer to take (any) pains?
        Oh, my Allah, if that what has been predetermined by you comes true who will dare set his race against it?!
        Oh, my Allah, as far as I am a sinner I beg you to show me the way of gospel; as far as I have reached the infernal fire grant my hope for your mercy.
        Oh, my Allah, do not deprive me of the hope for your mercy, and when you grant your mercy on the people at large then do not forget about me.
        Oh, my Allah, if you do not admit sincere praying then it will take the shape of dog's courting, and if you are not lenient, then the rags [of a dervish] would turn into an asscloth.
        Oh, my Allah, I wish to sing the praises to you but I am thrown down by the passions, I wish to pray for you but I am consumed with love and insanity.
        Oh, my Allah, I am drunk with lust and carried away with ambition and pretence. These vices turn me into devil's servant.
        Oh, my Allah, you have made me crazy [fall in love] with beautiful peris, you turned my heart into a butterfly flying towards the candle of fair face [of the beauty]. This is the way you used to disgrace me and to make me the talk of the town.
        Oh, my Allah, the intrigues [of the beauties] turned the curled locks into the chains on my neck, and their moles made my heart their prisoner. If it is the way you determined my fate, then what is left for me to do?
        Oh, my Allah, the light of beauty from the candle comes from you, the butterfly's soul burning comes also from you.
        Oh, my Allah, the country of my heart is devastated by the army of black lashes, and the house of my patience is destroyed by perfidy of the rose-like faces.
        Oh, my Allah, when you cast [your glance] at frolic disobedient girls, the because of their fuss you inspire my troubled heart with harassment.
        Oh, my Allah, there is no peace for us because of this fuss and I am not free in my sufferings. Their fascination has been created by you and you inspired fascination to my troubled heart.
        Oh, my Allah, you grant somebody's beauty and charm, but you pour its salt on the wounds of my heart.
        Oh, my Allah, if the arrows of some lashes could me made poisoned by you, then with their thorns you prick my wounded breast.
        Oh, my Allah, the rose-like face you turned into the delight [of your soul] and you again made the night-ingale's singing [the soul] tearing. In my heart you put on the fire of love to a rose-like girl and deprived me of peace and patience, the same you have done to the butterfly and to the nightingale.
        Oh, my Allah, while I was enjoying the feast of loveable sufferings an avalanche of calamities destroyed my house of devotion and piousness. [ During that feast] I did not take the wine and did not treat anybody to it, I have sipped from more than one poisoned cup.
        Oh, my Allah, when I was stamping [my heart] with the thud of separation, then in the margins of my belief and Islam I was burning warehouses.
        Oh, my Allah, if accounting for passion I was running everywhere with open head and bare-footed, I have shown to the people that I was nasty from top to toe.
        Oh, my Allah, if accounting fo love I have thrown stones into my heart, then with these stones I have broken the vessel of my honour and conscience.
        Oh, my Allah, from time to time I let the children hit my head with stones, and even opened my heart to my friend's stings of reproaches.
        Oh, my Allah, what dark shadow of turmoil could cover the face of my health, whatever adversities could fall upon me, humiliated as I am!
        Oh, my Allah, my youth has passed in hardness and bitterness of such kind that it will not be surprising if in my senility I will subject myself to execution hundred times.
        Oh, my Allah, today I decided to refuse everybody but I know well enough that I cannot renounce my own " ego".
        Oh, my Allah, you have thrown me into such troubles then save me; and you subjected me to such trial, then help me!
        Oh, my Allah, what benefit you get from that a slave [ of yours].It's me, is repenting ,you grand my penitence as you are that who takes repentance, and you are that who is addressed with it.
        Oh, my Allah, the pray that I do not perform until the people start it is a pretence, and the robe used for such praying is the robe off my body.
        Oh, my Allah, if you grant my piousness then save me from a lie, if you show me the way to serving you then save me from sins.
        Oh, my Allah, if a pray brings to ambition then do not permit it to my heart; and if the idle life leads to entreaty of forgiveness then do not reject it coming from my mouth.
        Oh, my Allah, protect me from discussions with the ignorant and do not let me want the wealth of the contemptible.
        Oh, my Allah, keep me off serving the ungrateful and spare me the importunity of the grateful.
        Oh, my Allah, you console me with the pain of your love and with raptures lighting my eyes up with the abundance of tears of repentance.
        Oh, my Allah, let my tongue [endlessly] repeat my thanks to your boundless good deeds and let my heart be gratefully praising you and praying.
        Oh, my Allah, grand my pen with the gift of praising you and make the heart of people like all I have written.
        Oh, my Allah, do not let my spirit acquire arrogance and do not let me notice the deficiency of all that is useful to the people.
        Oh, my Allah, direct my thoughts towards the indigent and light my eyes up with your kindness coming from under the feet of the distressed.
        Oh, my Allah let Shah* of Islam be always over the Moslems and let your shadow always fall upon your slaves so that I could pray for both Shah and beggars.