Leyli Anwar: Attar seeks human’s spiritual awakening
The 17th NatChat streamed a live interview with Lely Anwar, a university professor and translator of the Conference of Birds (into French). The session was moderated by Dr Abdolmahdi Mostakin, head of the Culture department of the Iranian National Commission for UNESCO. In hits session, Dr. Anwar spoke about the practicality of Attar’s thoughts for today’s world and said: “Attar seeks to awaken us from neglect.”
In response to the question that what teachings Attar can have for today’s world, she said: “Attar says that if we read his poem only for pleasure, we will not realize the depth of his thinking and spiritual experience. Attar himself has followed a spiritual path (seven valleys), but in spite of all the difficulties, he has returned to inform others.”
Dr. Anwar continued: “Birds, like all human beings, have a desire in themselves, which is the first valley. But they are looking for a creature to be their king. By this story, Attar teaches us that we all have a memory of our real homeland and beautiful creature. But because the soul has entered the body, it has forgotten its memories.”
She said: “In order to better understand Attar’s thoughts, it is good to study Attar’s Conference of the Birds and his lyric poems together. In all of Attar’s works, it is stated that the first step is to understand what is hidden in our hearts, and that the beauties of this world are valuable in order to make us aware of the beauties of the hereafter.”
According to Dr. Anwar, from Attar’s point of view, love is concerned with what is truth and what is not truth. In other words, love is not concerned with being good or bad.
She added: “The fact that Masnavi is written in six books is that Rumi never allowed himself to write the seventh book, because the seventh valley is the valley of poverty and wealth, and Rumi believed that he did not deserve to be in the seventh valley.”
At the end of the session, Dr. Anwar recited parts of the Conference of the Birds related to the story of Prophet Yusuf and said: “in this story, Attar seeks to show all kinds of human weaknesses and represents Prophet Yusuf as a symbol of human soul.”
