Shah Abdul Latif (1690-1752) was a genius whose contribution to human thought and poetry has left an abiding legacy. The most significant aspect of his poetry is his mystical thought which he expressed mostly through the symbolism of women characters — Sasui, Sohni, Momal, Lila, Noori and Sorath. Of all these women, who are presented as heroines, Sasui dominates about one-fourth of his poetry.
The folk-tale of Sasui for Shah Latif is a multiple allegory wherein she represents a very strong female character embodying almost all human virtues— patience, trust, truthfulness, sincerity, unflinching faith, unabated love to pursue the ideal and even to sacrifice her life to achieve the goal.
Her only weak point as pointed out by the poet is an initial relapse of sleep which affords her to lose her beloved husband Punhun, who is forcibly taken away by his brothers.
Sasui in general is a metaphor of a salik or traveller on the mystical path. It is well nigh impossible to understand or properly appreciate the varied aspects of her characters in the whole story without keeping in mind the perennial Sufi tradition, which the 18th-century Sindh inherited from Shah Latif.
From the time immemorial, the position of woman in human society has continually changed with civilization. In the wake of Renaissance movement, humanism as a system of thought flourished in West, which laid great emphasis on reason as compared to religion in solving human problems. Similarly, feminism, as an off-shoot of humanism, came to the forefront in the past century.
It was, however, during the Middle ages that the great sages like Ibn ul’Arabi (d. 1240) and Rumi (d. 1273) in view of their mystical experience and enlightenment conceptualised the woman as a special creation so as to warrant deferential treatment for her in the society.
Woman is a ray of God: she is not the earthly beloved.
She is creative! You might say she is not created.
(Masnavi I-173 1)
But any further discussion on the position of woman in Sufism would be incomplete without referring to a great woman mystic of her time, Rabia Basri (d. 801). The Sufi literature abounds in her biographic details as well as hagiographic material about her doctrine of the divine love. First of all she appears to be a towering personality among her contemporaries so much so that great sufi like Ibrahim bin Adham, Sufiyan Al-Suri and Dhul-Nun Misri not only respected her views, but also sought her counselling on spiritual matters.
The Rabia Basri’s conception of love, as concluded by a modern woman scholar (Margaret Smith, d.1928), suggests that such a relation between a saint and his Lord leaves no room for the distinction of sex.
The Tazkirat-ul-Aaulia by Fariduddin Attar (d.1230), the most famous account of sufi saints and sages, also immortalizes the image of Rabia and her teachings.
Rabia Basri set a paradigm of pure love to God— love which is not for the sake of Jannat or due to the fear of Dozakh . Since the times of Rabia, the conception of love as propounded by her, has been generally accepted as a cherished ideal of the Sufi tradition, almost without any exception.
And the 18th-century Sindh where Shah Latif lived was very much a part of that grand Sufi tradition of Islamic world. Even if there had been no other source for him, the Masnavi of Rumi being a unique magnum opus of Sufi thought and practice was more than sufficient to provide an impulse to Shah Latif’s thought process. This has been confirmed from the biographic sources of his life.
In this perspective the conception of love with Shah Latif is essentially the same as that of Rumi, who was no doubt the greatest mystic poet of Islam (Nicholson, 1950).
In the poetry of Shah Latif, Sasui is the best example of ceaseless human quest which she undertakes against all kinds of difficulties, and it is no lesser than an odyssey on her part, specially being a woman. Sasui deserves all credit for her singular pursuit in traversing the tedious and hazardous mountainous paths, which proves a labyrinth for her and where she encounters many threats to life. But the brave woman continues her march till death.
Although Shah Latif is fully aware of the generally perceived frailty of woman and her inherent physical weaknesses, he does not consider this factor any kind of impediment. All the challenges whether of society or of nature, however formidable they are, but nothing deters Sasui from overcoming these obstacles.
Shah Latif’s Sasui belies the traditional concept of woman whereby she appears to represent ‘frailty thy name is woman’ in the words of Shakespeare. On one hand she challenges the death to follow her and on the other defeats the very death. Even when Izrael comes to her at the time of death, she considers him an emissary of her beloved. And when Sasui is visited by Munkar and Nakeer in the grave, she surprisingly enquires from them about Punhum and whether they know about the caravan of Punhum.
From the viewpoint of woman psyche too, Shah Latif has portrayed her emotions and feelings, aspirations and desires at its best.
Mother, card not for me the cotton ball,
Throw away the spinning wheel, put aside the spindles of yarn.
The one for whom I spun has left for Ketch.
(Sur Ma’zuri, Translated by Khamisani)
Appreciating the inmost desire of Sasui and full justification of her claim on love, Shah Latif urges her to proceed even to face desolation on the plea that love cannot be a one-sided affair.
For her beloved, let Sasui go in wilderness.
Those who are thirsty, water is thirsty for them.
Whence comes the element of reciprocity in love? The Sufis are unanimous that it is a divine love, of which every other love in the universe is a manifestation. Rumi is the great exponent of this doctrine of love, and there is little doubt that Shah Latif seems inspired by this very analogy which in the words of Rumi is exactly as under:
If the thirsty look for water around,
The water also looks for them
(Masnavi-I-2130)
As pointed out earlier, Shah Latif has portrayed Sasui as the salik or wayfarer on the Sufi path and in order to enable her to attain a union with God, she has to pass through various stations (Maqamat) and encounter several states (Ehwal).
Neither here nor there, she matters at all.
Material acquisitions vetted not in her favour,
Only spiritual state brought her near the beloved.
It is instructive to compare these lines with this verse of Rabia which has fortunately survived:
I have fled from the world and all that is within it.
My hope is for union with Thyself;
For that is the goal of my desire
The extraordinary similarity of ideas should not sound strange for it is the universality of mystical experience which has known no bounds of time and space.
Rabia Basri was a prototype of this love, and the Sufis all over the ages wittingly or unwittingly have kept her ideal in their minds. In case of Sasui, which also personifies Shah Latif, the poet pursues the same supreme ideal of love. There is also a visible approximation of Sasui to Rabia in so far as asceticism, sincerity, humility, poverty, trust and faithfulness constitute her character.
After Sasui,the next most important woman character in the poetry of Shah Latif is that of Sohni. As the story goes, she is married to Dam, but her original love was Mehar. Even after marriage she is unable to forget her love and in order to meet him she swims across a river during the odd hours of night. The climax of the story is when she is finally drowns into the river.
Shah Latif has pre-eminently employed this allegory from a Sufis’ point of view when he explicitly used the technical term Talib or seeker for Sohni.
A question is often raised whether there can be any justification on the part of Sohni for her faithless behaviour. Modern interpreters might try to justify it in the name of woman rights, especially when she is forcibly married. But in the eyes of Latif, it cannot be a justification. It is interesting to note that in one of the verses Shah Latif advises Sohni to strictly follow the Sahriat or the Islamic legal code.
This advice is but a supreme illustration of Shah Latif’s adherence to the perennial Sufi tradition of Islam, and it is therefore only rational to interpret him in accordance with the basic principles of the Sufi doctrine.
