8/7/2019 Rehman Baba

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ABDUR-RAHMAN is one of the most popular, and probably the best known, of all the Afghan poets.His effusions are of a religious or moral character, and chiefly on the subject of divine love, being,

like the poetical compositions of all Muslim poets, tinged with the mysticisms of Sufism, alreadydescribed in the Introductory Remarks; but there is a fiery energy in his style, and a naturalsimplicity, which will be vainly sought for amongst the more flowery and bombastic poetry of thePersians.

Rahman belonged to the Ghoriah Khel clan or sub-division, of the Mohmand tribe of the Afghans,

and dwelt in the village of Hazar-Khani in the tapah or district of the Mohmands, one of the fivedivisions of the province of Peshawar. He was a man of considerable learning, but lived the life of aDarwesh, absorbed in religious contemplation, and separated from the world, with which, and with

its people, he held no greater intercourse than necessity and the means of subsistence demanded.He is said to have been passionately fond of hearing religious songs, accompanied by some musical

instrument, which the Chasti sect of Muslims appears to have a great partiality for. After a time,when the gift of poesy was bestowed upon him, he became a strict recluse, and was generally found

by his friends in tears. Indeed, he is said to have been in the habit of weeping so much, as in courseof time to have produced wounds on both his cheeks. His strict retirement, however, gave

opportunity to a number of envious Mullas to belive him; and they began to circulate reports to theeffect, that Rahman had turned atheist or heretic, since he never left his dwelling, and had evengiven up worshipping at the mosque along with the congregation-a matter strictly enjoined on allorthodox Muslims. At length, by the advice and assistance of some of the priesthood, more liberal

and less bigoted than his enemies, he contrived to escape from their hands, by agreeing, for thefuture, to attend the place of public worship, and to pray and perform his other religious duties,

along with the members of the congregation. He thus, whether agreeable to himself or not, wasobliged in some measure to mix with the world.

Rahman appears to have been in the habit of giving the copies of his poems, as he composed them,from time to time, to his particular friends, which they, unknown to each other, took care to collectand preserve, for the express purpose of making a collection of them after the authors death. Thisthey accordingly carried out, and it was not until Rahmans decease that these facts became known.

It then appeared also, that some of these pseudo friends had, to increase the bulk of their owncollection of the poets odes, mixed up a quantity of their own trashy compositions with Rahmans,and had added, or rather forged, his name to them in the last couplets. In this manner two of thesecollections of odes were made, and were styled Rahmans first and second. Fortunately for his

reputation, these forgeries were discovered in time, by some of the dearest of the poets friends,who recognised or remembered the particular poems of his composition; and they accordingly

rejected the chaff retaining the wheat only, in the shape of his Diwan, or alphabetical collection ofodes, as it has come down to the present day. Still, considerable differences exist in many copies,

some odes having a line more or a line less, whilst some again contain odes that are entirely

wanting in others. This caused me considerable trouble when preparing several of them for insertionin my Selections in the Afghan Language ; but it was attended with a proportionate degree ofadvantage, having altogether compared some sixty different copies of the poets works, of various

dates, some of which were written shortly after Rabmans death, when his friends had succeeded incollecting the poems in a single volume.

By some accounts, the poet would appear to have been a co-temporary of the warrior-poet,Khushhal Khan; and it has been stated, that on two or three occasions they held poeticaldisputations together. This, however, cannot be true; for it seems that although Rabman was livingtowards the latter part of that brave chieftains life, yet he was a mere youth, and was, more

correctly speaking, a cotemporary of Afzal Khans the grandson and successor of Khushhal and theauthor of that rare, excellent, and extensive Afghan history, entitled Tarikh-i-Murassae, and othervaluable works. A proof of the incorrectness of this statement is, that the tragical end of Gul Khanand Jamal Khan, which Ralunau and the poet ijamId also have devoted a long poem to took place in

the year of the Hijrah 1123 (A. D. 1711), twenty-five years after the death of Khushal. Another, andstill stronger proof against the statement of poetical disputations having taken place between them,is the fact of Rahmans retired life, and his humble position, as compared with that of Khushhal thechief of a powerful tribe, and as good a poet as himself.

Some descendants of Rahman, on his daughters side, dwell at present in the little hamlet of Deh-i-Bahadur (the Hamlet of the Brave), in the Mohmand district; but the descendants on the side of hisonly son have long been extinct.The poets tomb may still, be seen in the graveyard of his native village.