M6:1268 — پیش رو آیینه بگرفت آن عجوز / تا بیاراید رخ و رخسار و پوز

Translation: That old woman held a mirror before herself / So that she might adorn her face, visage, and snout (pūz). Meaning: This verse begins a tale illustrating the futility of superficial adornment in masking decay. An old woman attempts to beautify her aged, wrinkled face for a wedding.

This verse opens a profound allegorical tale in the Masnavi, which Mawlana employs to convey a weighty truth about the quest for authenticity versus superficiality. The ʿajūz (old woman) here symbolizes a soul whose life has reached its autumn, yet remains preoccupied with adornment and the outward displays of the phenomenal world. She holds a mirror, not for introspection or to confront the reality of her condition, but to apply makeup and conceal the marks of old age.

As I have often emphasized, Mawlana masterfully uses words to unveil deeper layers of reality. Here, he employs the term pūz (snout or muzzle), which is sometimes used for animal mouths, lending a bitter irony to the scene, highlighting the aged and spent ugliness that she attempts to conceal. This ʿajūz wishes to ārāyidan (adorn herself), but can the rust of decay truly be removed with cosmetics?

The central point is this: the human ego, when intent on pretense and self-deception, operates in much the same way—it seeks to cover inner flaws and defects with deceptive outward appearances. She applies golgūneh (rouge), but her facial wrinkles remain visible. She then resorts to a more extreme measure: she turns to old Qurans, which were often adorned with gold. She peels off the gilded ʿashar (markers for every ten verses) and sticks them onto her face. This act not only reveals her utter desperation but also serves as a biting satire on those who exploit religion and sacred texts for mere external display, without grasping their true essence. Yet, these gold flakes, even when moistened with khadu (spittle), fail to adhere to her face and fall off when she covers herself. This demonstrates that any external, unauthentic embellishment, sooner or later, detaches itself from the decaying reality it attempts to mask.

The story does not end there. When all her ploys prove fruitless, the old woman curses Iblis. This projection of blame offers another lesson: when humans fail in their self-deception, instead of looking inward and correcting themselves, they shift the blame onto others. This tale, in essence, is an elegy for those souls who, instead of cultivating inner purity and self-refinement, are perpetually engaged in 'adorning their face, visage, and snout' for others, oblivious that the Divine marketplace accepts even a qalb (counterfeit good or an imperfect heart), but only on the condition of sincerity and genuine repentance, not through mere superficial embellishment and pretense.

Key takeaways

• External adornments can never truly conceal inner decay; truth invariably reveals itself.
• Self-deception through pretense is a futile path, leading only to failure and blame-shifting.
• Mawlana uses the 'old woman' and 'adornment' as symbols to critique the superficial and self-deceptive ego.
• The instrumentalization of sacred elements (gilding from the Quran) to mask flaws is doomed to fail.
• In contrast to human's futile efforts, divine mercy accepts and mends the qalb (both heart and counterfeit) with sincere intention.