Khayyám's poetic work has eclipsed his fame as a mathematician and scientist.
He is believed to have written about a thousand four-line verses or quatrains (rubaai's). In the English-speaking world, he was introduced through the
Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám which are rather free-wheeling English translations by Edward FitzGerald (1809-1883).
Other translations of parts of the rubáiyát (
rubáiyát meaning "quatrains") exist, but FitzGerald's are the most well known. Translations exist in languages other than English.
Ironically, FitzGerald's translations reintroduced Khayyám to Iranians "who had long ignored the Neishapouri poet." A 1934 book by one of Iran's most prominent writers, Sadeq Hedayat,
Songs of Khayyam, (Taranehha-ye Khayyam) is said to have "shaped the way a generation of Iranians viewed" the poet.
Khayyám's personal beliefs are not known with certainty, but much is discernible from his poetic oeuvre.
Poetry
And, as the Cock crew, those who stood before The Tavern shouted - "Open then the Door!You know how little time we have to stay, And once departed, may return no more."
Alike for those who for TO-DAY prepare, And that after a TO-MORROW stare,A Muezzin from the Tower of Darkness cries "Fools! your reward is neither Here nor There!"
Why, all the Saints and Sages who discuss'd Of the Two Worlds so learnedly, are thrustLike foolish Prophets forth; their Words to Scorn Are scatter'd, and their mouths are stopt with Dust.
Oh, come with old Khayyam, and leave the Wise To talk; one thing is certain, that Life flies;One thing is certain, and the Rest is Lies; The Flower that once has blown for ever dies.
Myself when young did eagerly frequent Doctor and Saint, and heard great ArgumentAbout it and about: but evermore Came out of the same Door as in I went.
With them the Seed of Wisdom did I sow, And with my own hand labour'd it to grow:And this was all the Harvest that I reap'd - "I came like Water, and like Wind I go."
Into this Universe, and why not knowing, Nor whence, like Water willy-nilly flowing:And out of it, as Wind along the Waste, I know not whither, willy-nilly blowing.
The Moving Finger writes; and, having writ, Moves on: nor all thy Piety nor WitShall lure it back to cancel half a Line, Nor all thy Tears wash out a Word of it.
And that inverted Bowl we call The Sky, Whereunder crawling coop't we live and die,Lift not thy hands to It for help - for It Rolls impotently on as Thou or I.
Views on religion
In his own writings, Khayyám rejects strict religious structure and a literalist conception of the afterlife.
There have been widely divergent views on Khayyám. According to Seyyed Hossein Nasr no other Iranian writer/scholar is viewed in such extremely differing ways. At one end of the spectrum there are night clubs named after Khayyám and he is seen as an agnostic hedonist. On the other end of the spectrum, he is seen as a mystical Sufi poet influenced by platonic traditions.
Robertson (1914) believes that Khayyám was not devout and had no sympathy for popular religion, but the verse: "Enjoy wine and women and don't be afraid, God has compassion," suggests that he wasn't an atheist. He further believes that it is almost certain that Khayyám objected to the notion that every particular event and phenomenon was the result of divine intervention. Nor did he believe in an afterlife with a Judgment Day or rewards and punishments. Instead, he supported the view that laws of nature explained all phenomena of observed life. One hostile orthodox account of him shows him as "versed in all the wisdom of the Greeks" and as insistent that studying science on Greek lines is necessary.. Roberston (1914) further opines that Khayyám came into conflict with religious officials several times, and had to explain his views on Islam on multiple occasions; there is even one story about a treacherous pupil who tried to bring him into public odium. He then wrote that Khayyám "performed pilgrimages not from piety but from fear" of his contemporaries who divined his unbelief.
The following two quatrains are representative of numerous others that serve to reject many tenets of religious dogma:
[[Image:Khayam21.jpg|thumb|right|
O cleric, we are more active than you,even so drunk, we are more attentive than you,You drink the blood of men, we drink the blood of grapes [wine],Be fair, which one of us is more bloodthirsty?]]
- ???? ??? ? ???? ???? ??? ???
- ?? ??? ??? ??? ????? ??? ???
- ??? ????? ??? ???? ????? ???
- ????? ?? ?????? ?? ???? ??? ???
which translates in FitzGerald's work as:
- And if the Wine you drink, the Lip you press,
- End in the Nothing all Things end in ... Yes ...
- Then fancy while Thou art, Thou art but what
- Thou shalt be ... Nothing ... Thou shalt not be less.
A more literal translation could read:Wake! For the Sun, who scatter'd into flight
- The Stars before him from the Field of Night,
- Drives Night along with them from Heav'n, and strikes
- The Sultan's Turret with a Shaft of Light.
- Before the phantom of False morning died,
- Methought a Voice within the Tavern cried,
- "When all the Temple is prepared within,
- Why nods the drowsy Worshipper outside?"
- And, as the Cock crew, those who stood before
- The Tavern shouted--"Open then the Door!
- You know how little while we have to stay,
- And, once departed, may return no more."
Wake! For the Sun, who scatter'd into flightThe Stars before him from the Field of Night,Drives Night along with them from Heav'n, and strikesThe Sultan's Turret with a Shaft of Light.
Before the phantom of False morning died,Methought a Voice within the Tavern cried,"When all the Temple is prepared within,Why nods the drowsy Worshipper outside?"
And, as the Cock crew, those who stood beforeThe Tavern shouted--"Open then the Door!You know how little while we have to stay,And, once departed, may return no more."
- If with wine you are drunk be happy,
- If seated with a moon-faced (beautiful), be happy,
- Since the end purpose of the universe is nothing-ness;
- Hence picture your nothing-ness, then while you are, be happy!
?????? ? ??? ???????? ?? ????
- ????? ???? ???????? ?? ????
- ?? ???? ??? ? ????? ?? ?? ????
- ??? ??? ?????? ???????? ?? ????
which FitzGerald has boldy interpreted as:
- Why, all the Saints and Sages who discuss’d
- Of the Two Worlds so learnedly ... are thrust
- Like foolish Prophets forth; their Words to Scorn
- Are scatter’d, and their Mouths are stopt with Dust.
A literal translation, in an ironic echo of "all is vanity", could read:
- Those who have gone forth, thou cup-bearer,
- Have fallen upon the dust of pride, thou cup-bearer,
- Drink wine and hear from me the truth:
- (Hot) air is all that they have said, thou cup-bearer.
- Now the New Year reviving old Desires,
- The thoughtful Soul to Solitude retires,
- Where the White Hand Of Moses on the Bough
- Puts out, and Jesus from the Ground suspires
But some specialists, like Seyyed Hossein Nasr who looks at the available philosophical works of Khayyám, maintain that it is really reductive to just look at the poems (which are sometimes doubtful) to establish his personal views about God or religion; in fact, he even wrote a treatise entitled "al-Khutbat al-gharrå?" (The Splendid Sermon) on the praise of God, where he holds orthodox views, agreeing with Avicenna on Divine Unity. In fact, this treatise is not an exception, and S.H. Nasr gives an example where he identified himself as a Sufi, after criticizing different methods of knowing God, preferring the intuition over the rational (opting for the so-called "kashf", or unveiling, method):
"... Fourth, the Sufis, who do not seek knowledge by ratiocination or discursive thinking, but by purgation of their inner being and the purifying of their dispositions. They cleanse the rational soul of the impurities of nature and bodily form, until it becomes pure substance. When it then comes face to face with the spiritual world, the forms of that world become truly reflected in it, without any doubt or ambiguity.
This is the best of all ways, because it is known to the servant of God that there is no reflection better than the Divine Presence and in that state there are no obstacles or veils in between. Whatever man lacks is due to the impurity of his nature. If the veil be lifted and the screen andobstacle removed, the truth of things as they are will become manifest and known. And the Master of creatures [the Prophet Muhammad]...upon whom be peace...indicated this when he said: “Truly, during the days of your existence, inspirations come from God. Do you not want to follow them?” Tell unto reasoners that, for the lovers of God, intuition is guide, not discursive thought."—‘Umar Khayyåm
The same author goes on by giving other philosophical writings which are totally compatible with the religion of Islam, as the "al-Risålah fil-wujud" (Treatise on Being), written in Arabic, which begin with Quranic verses and asserting that all things come from God, and there is an order in these things. In another work, "Risålah jawåban li-thalåth maså?il" (Treatise of Responseto Three Questions), he gives a response to question on, for instance, the becoming of the soul post-mortem. S.H. Nasr even gives some poetry where he is perfectly in favor of Islamic orthodoxy, but expressing mystical views (God's goodness, the ephemerical state of this life, ...):
- Thou hast said that Thou wilt torment me,
- But I shall fear not such a warning.
- For where Thou art, there can be no torment,
- And where Thou art not, how can such a place exist?
- The rotating wheel of heaven within which we wonder,
- Is an imaginal lamp of which we have knowledge by similitude.
- The sun is the candle and the world the lamp,
- We are like forms revolving within it.
- A drop of water falls in an ocean wide,
- A grain of dust becomes with earth allied;
- What doth thy coming, going here denote?
- A fly appeared a while, then invisible he became.
Considering misunderstandings about Khayyám in the West and elsewhere, S.H. Nasr concludes by saying that if a correct study of the authentic rubaiyat is done, but along with the philosophical works, or even the spiritual biography entitled
Sayr wa sulak (Spiritual Wayfaring), we can no longer view the man as a simple hedonistic wine-lover, or even an early skeptic, but a profound mystical thinker and scientist whose works are more important than some verses. C.H.A. Bjerregaard earlier summarised the situation:
"The writings of Omar Khayyam are good specimens of Sufism but are not valued in the West as they ought to be, and the mass of the people know him only through the poems of Edward Fitzgerald which is unfortunate. It is unfortunate because Fitzgerald is not faithful to his master and model, and at times he lays words upon the tongue of the Sufi which are blasphemous. Such outrageous language is that of the eighty-first quatrain for instance. Fitzgerald is doubly guilty because he was more of a Sufi than he was willing to admit. "