The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam: Summary & Analysis
The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam presents an interesting challenge to any reader trying to sort through its heavy symbolism and not-so-obvious theme. Not only does the poem provide us with a compelling surface story, but a second look at the text can reveal a rich collection of seperate meanings hidden in the poem’s objective descriptions and sprawling narrative-which in the space of a few pages includes such disparate characters as the Moon, God, the Snake (and his traditional Christian neighborhood, Paradise), the “Balm of Life”, not to mention nearly every animal and sexual symbol the human mind can come up with.
Obviously, on one level, the poem can present itself in a fairly straightforward manner in the vein of CARPE DIEM. In the third stanza, theauthor writes, “‘Open then the Door!/ You know how little while we have to stay,/ And, once departed, may return no more.” There’s several refrains to this throughout the poem, first in the seventh stanza: “Come, fill the cup. . ./ The Bird of Time has but a little way/ To flutter-and the bird is on the Wing.” The entire ninth stanza describes the summer month “that brings the Rose” taking “Jamshyd and Kaikobad away”, and so forth and so on ad nauseum. Again, in the fifty-third stanza: “You gaze To-Day, while You are You-how then/ Tomorrow, You when shall be You no more?” The poet seems to be in an incredible hurry to get this life going before some cosmic deadline comes due, and more than willing to encourage any of the laiety he encounters in the course of the poem to do the same.
Another recurring motif throughout the poem is the time-honored act of downing a few drinks. It appears that either “Wine”, the “Cup” or “Bowl”, and the “Grape” touch every stanza in the poem; the narrator seems to be an alcoholic. In the fifty-sixth stanza he dismisses everything so he can get drunk, having divorced Reason and married the Daughter of the Vine in the previous stanza: “Of all that one should care to fathom, I/ Was never deep in anything but-Wine.” Later the narrator compares the Grape to an angel. It’s clear this person has something of an obsession.
But all of these seemingly transparent references to drinking beg for a deeper analysis. Writing a really great poem about blowing off the next day to get trashed does not get you into the literary canon. Of particular interest is the symbol of the “Cup” or “Bowl” (or even “Pot” at one point in the poem), and the “Wine” that the narrator seems to be drawing out of it on every occasion.
The “Cup”, in Western society, is nearly always synonymous with some sort of prize or contest. Besides the Cup being semi-obviously equated with the vagina and therefore a kind of sexual conquest in our society’s male-driven history, there is also the legend of the Holy Grail-The Cup of Life, which grants eternal life to anybody lucky enough to find it. There is a parable in the Bible about a woman who, having been married several times out of either lust or financial necessity, goes to the well for water and finds Jesus there, dispensing wisdom in his usual manner. As she gets water, Jesus tells her, “Whosoever drinks from that well will thirst again.” Whether or not this convinces the woman to renounce worldly pleasures and become a Christian is never made clear.
So what then is this “Cup” that the poet makes twenty-five references to throughout the poem (including “Vessel”,”Urn”,”Bowl”, and “Glass”)? It’s fairly easy to argue that the cup is a symbol for life and the act of living. It’s also a curse-no cup is bottomless, so it follows that:
a) you can’t enjoy the wine unless you drink it, but
b) the more you drink, the quicker it ends.
Now a different theme arises from the symbols the author is using. Is it really time to “Seize the Day” and drink it up while we have the chance? The sixty-third stanza uses another symbol to explain it: “One thing is certain and the rest is Lies/ The Flower that once has blown for ever dies.” Throughout the poem death is seen as being an empty cup (Stanza 72): “And that inverted Bowl they call the Sky,/ Whereunder crawling coop’d we live and die,” and in the fortieth stanza: “Do you devoutly do the like, till Heav’n/ To Earth invert you- like an empty Cup.” In the twenty-second stanza, “some we loved. . . Have drunk their Cup a Round or two. . . And one by one crept silently to rest.” The author seems to recognize that once the drinking’s over, so is life.
Later the author converses with several pots of different sizes (Stanzas 82-90). This highly metaphorical description of the philosophical “pots” giving their opinion on their “potter” (i.e. people talking about God) further emphasizes the idea that human souls are finite vessels that, once emptied, have served their use. In Stanza 89, a pot says, “My Clay with long Oblivion is gone dry:/ But fill me with the old familiar Juice,/ Methinks I might recover by and by.”
Which brings us to the question of that “Juice”. One could say that the “wine” that the poet praises for a hundred stanzas is kind of like Twinkies or chocolate eclair: a tasty treat for all occasions that should be downed whenever possible. But the poet has darker motivations in mind: (Stanza 43) “So when that Angel of the darker Drink/ At last shall find you by the river-brink,/ And, offering his Cup, invite your Soul/ Forth to your Lips to quaff-you shall not shrink.”
Is the “Wine” really temptation and hedonism? Or an escape of sorts? In the forty-fifth stanza, an ominous Sultan addresses “the realm of Death” and prepares his tent “for another Guest.” In the fifty-eighth stanza, an “Angel Shape” (whether or not it’s from the right side of the tracks we’re never told) brings the poet the Grape. And all the drinking in the poem occurs because (the seventy-fourth stanza says it best): “Drink! For you know not whence you came, nor why;/ Drink! For you know not why you go, nor where.”
It can’t just be coincidence that the “Wine” is always coupled with a more or less veiled religious reference throughout the poem. The sixth stanza: “David’s lips are lockt: but in divine/ High-piping Pehlevi, with ‘Wine! Wine! Wine!'”. The twelfth: “A Book of Verses underneath the Bough, A Jug of Wine. . . and Thou,/ Beside me singing in the Wilderness-/ Oh, Wilderness were Paradise now!” The poet could be seen as attacking people who put their faith in an abstract and invisible “God” as people who are merely drinking because they don’t know the answers and don’t want to worry about it. Comparing religion to wine or an “opiate of the masses” was pretty popular at the time, even though Marx had probably not yet achieved the popularity he would in the next century. “So, of course,” the poet says, “drink up!”. In the sixty-first stanza he mocks them: “Why, be this Juice the growth of God, who dare/ Blaspheme the twisted tendril as a Snare?/ A Blessing, we should use it, should we not?/ And, if a curse-why, then, Who set it there?” And it follows logically, then, why the poet had to divorce “Reason from my Bed,” in order to take “the Daughter of the Vine to Spouse.” in stanza 55.
So, then, we have a finite vessel; people who have divorced Reason fill it with a substance dispensed by Angels and Sultans that, once consumed, offers no other benefit and ends your life. By using basic and easily decipherable (but not obvious) symbolism, the poet has intentionally presented two interpretations of the same idea: life’s finite and ends soon. So we can seize the day and get drunk, but this drunkenness obscures the greater truth and ultimately provides only consolation and not answers. But then again, is that such a bad thing? If you want to be preached to, this poem will deliver a cynical sermon condemning those who seek out wine (religion?) for their answers. But if you just want to enjoy life, the poem delivers the easy-to-swallow message of forgetting about tomorrow and living for today. In a way, this poem is like one of those drawings that, when you turn it upside down, becomes something entirely different than what it was right side up. And the poet never really gives instructions on which way to hold it.

The Hidden Truths in Omar Khayyam’s Rubaiyat
This volume, presenting Paramahansa Yogananda's complete commentaries on theRubaiyat of Omar Khayyam, brings together the poetic and spiritual insights of three men of great renown, whose lives spanned a period of more than nine hundred years. The eleventh-century verses of Omar Khayyam, and their nineteenth-century translation by Edward FitzGerald, have long delighted readers. Yet the true meaning of the poem has been a subject of much debate. In his illuminating interpretation, Paramahansa Yogananda reveals—behind the enigmatic veil of metaphor—the mystical essence of this literary classic.
Paramahansa Yogananda's interpretation of the Rubaiyat was one aspect of a lifelong effort to awaken people of both East and West to a deeper awareness of the innate divinity latent in every human being. Like the enlightened sages of all spiritual traditions, Sri Yogananda perceived that underlying the doctrines and practices of the various religions is one Truth, one transcendent Reality. It was this universal outlook and breadth of vision that enabled him to elucidate the profound kinship between the teachings of India's ancient science of Yoga and the writings of one of the greatest and most misunderstood mystical poets of the Islamic world, Omar Khayyam.

More than just a commentary, this book presents a spiritual teaching for the conduct of life. Paramahansa Yogananda reveals that behind Omar Khayyam's outward imagery is hidden a profoundly beautiful understanding of the joy and sublime purpose of human existence.
“The Revelation of Omar Khayyam”
From Paramahansa Yogananda's introduction to “The Wine of the Mystic”:

“Long ago in India I met a hoary Persian poet who told me that the poetry of Persia often has two meanings, one inner and one outer. I remember the great satisfaction I derived from his explanations of the twofold significance of several Persian poems.

“One day as I was deeply concentrated on the pages of Omar Khayyam's Rubaiyat, I suddenly beheld the walls of its outer meanings crumble away, and the vast inner fortress of golden spiritual treasures stood open to my gaze. “Ever since, I have admired the beauty of the previously invisible castle of inner wisdom in the Rubaiyat. I have felt that this dream-castle of truth, which can be seen by any penetrating eye, would be a haven for many shelter-seeking souls invaded by enemy armies of ignorance….

“As I worked on the spiritual interpretation of the Rubaiyat, it took me into an endless labyrinth of truth, until I was rapturously lost in wonderment. The veiling of Khayyam's metaphysical and practical philosophy in these verses reminds me of ‘The Revelation of St. John the Divine.’ The Rubaiyat may rightly be called 'The Revelation of Omar Khayyam.’”

Excerpts from Paramahansa Yogananda's Wine of the Mystic

On meditation and God-communion...
Here with a Loaf of Bread beneath the Bough,
A Flask of Wine, a Book of Verse—and Thou Beside me singing in the Wilderness—
And Wilderness is Paradise enow.
“Sitting in the deep silence of meditation, with my mind concentrated on the cerebrospinal tree of life and spiritual consciousness, I rest in the shade of peace. Nourished by the life-giving ‘bread' of prana [life energy], I quaff the aged wine of divine intoxication brimming the cask of my soul. Unceasingly my heart recites the poetic inspirations of eternal divine love. In this wilderness of deepest innermost silence—whence all tumult of thronging desires has died away—I commune with Thee, my Supreme Beloved, the Singing Blessedness. Thou dost sweetly intone to me the all-desire-satisfying music of wisdom. Ah, wilderness, free from the clamor of material desires and passions! in this aloneness I am not lonely. In the solitude of my inner silence I have found the paradise of unending Joy.”

On inner peace and fulfillment...
The Worldly Hope men set their Hearts upon
Turns Ashes—or it prospers; and anon, Like Snow upon the Desert's dusty Face
Lighting a little Hour or two—is gone.
Only the ignorant man expects perfection and lasting fulfillment from this earth; and brokenhearted he enters the portals of the grave. The enlightened man, knowing the delusive nature of the world, does not build his hopes here. Remaining unmoved by earthly desires, the wise seek the lasting Reality; they enter the vastness of Eternal Fulfillment.
Ah, my Beloved, fill the Cup that clears
TO-DAY of past Regrets and future Fears— To-morrow? —Why, To-morrow I may be
Myself with Yesterday's Sev'n Thousand Years.
O my Soul! fill my consciousness with the ambrosia of bliss, flowing from the cask of ecstasy. Naught but that divine communion can dispel the haunting memories of past errors and the fear of future wrongs, with their yield of evil consequences.

Through meditation one can experience a stable, silent inner peace that can be a permanently soothing background for all harmonious or trialsome activities demanded by life's responsibilities....A lump of sand cannot withstand the erosive effect of the ocean's waves; an individual who lacks imperturbable inner peace cannot remain tranquil during mental conflict. But as a diamond remains unchanged no matter how many waves swirl around it, so also a peace-crystallized individual remains radiantly serene even when trials beset him from all sides. Out of the changeful waters of life, let us salvage through meditation the diamond of unchangeable soul-consciousness, which sparkles with the everlasting joy of Spirit.

On the spiritual quest... 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.”
The seed of wisdom is given by the guru or master of Self-realization; but the soil, or receptivity, and the cultivation of that seed must be supplied by the devotee....Self-discipline is not self-torture; it is the way to organize and concentrate the unruly forces of the mind on those specific habits of living that can bring us true happiness. By doggedly following the methods of self-discipline we can rid ourselves of restlessness, bad habits, and misery-producing desires, and become truly happy. When we are weak, restless, and mentally unstable, we remain earthbound, like water. But when we become spiritualized by self-discipline and deep meditation, we soar like the wind in the omnipresence of our true soul nature.

On transcending the law of karma...
'Tis all a Chequer-board of Nights and Days
Where Destiny with Men for Pieces plays: Hither and thither moves, and mates, and slays,
And one by one back in the Closet lays.
As a checkerboard consists of alternate white and dark squares on which chessmen representing rulers and their underlings are moved about, so does the rotating earth with its alternating days and nights form a grand checkerboard on which are played the lives of human chessmen....Men are moved from one state or condition to another throughout their lives, and are often thwarted in purpose, unable to carry out their plans. Finally, their existences are cut short by the transition called death….

When destiny maneuvers the game of your life through advances, stalemates, and retreats, it should be remembered that these effects are from causes you yourself have created in past lives. You should neither curse fate for your sorrows nor hail luck as the progenitor of your good fortune, but recognize your own hand in the turning of events in your life. If you are unhappy with your self-created destiny, remind yourself that God has given you the power of free choice to change that fate. Protracted efforts at right action produce gradual benefits; but if in addition you unite your will with God's wisdom through deep meditation, you will know instantly the real meaning of freedom. Instead of letting time and fate rule our destiny, crushing out the vivacity of one incarnation after another, why not let God immortalize us with His celestial touch? No longer, then, will we need to creep into the lap of afterlife to rest. Being with God, we will be Eternal Life Itself, never again to be enslaved by limitations behind the prison walls of past, present, and future.

On the meaning of the cosmic drama... Ah, Love! could thou and I with Fate conspire
To grasp this sorry Scheme of Things entire, Would not we shatter it to bits—and then
Re-mould it nearer to the Heart's Desire!
Thus does every being at times wish he could play the role of Creator and make this world more to his heart's desire. This longing for unalloyed happiness springs from the core of the soul in which is secreted the divinely inherent perfection and everlasting bliss of one's true being.

The world is a divine enigma—evil mixed with good, sorrow with joy, death with life….We should not rack our brains nor become disbelievers in a divine scheme in creation if we cannot understand all the paradoxical dramas of good and evil, of happiness and sorrow, of rich and poor, of health and sickness, of intelligence and stupidity, of peace and wars, of kindness and cruelty in nature. A successful play has suspense, captivates the interest, bewilders or puzzles, and ends with a satisfying dramatic flourish….Similarly, God will in time suddenly lift the veil for every ascending soul, disclosing the final part of the Cosmic Drama, long concealed behind the many acts of tragedies and comedies, to reveal its mighty, noble end.

On the love of God...
Said one—“Folks of a surly Tapster tell,
And daub his Visage with the Smoke of Hell; They talk of some strict Testing of us—Pish!
He's a Good Fellow, and 'twill all be well.”
There are people who depict their Creator as one who imperiously tests man with the smoke of ignorance and the fire of punishment, and who judges man's actions with heartless scrutiny. They thus distort the true concept of God as a loving, compassionate Heavenly Father into a false image of one who is a strict, unsparing, and vengeful tyrant. But devotees who commune with God know it is foolish to think of Him otherwise than as the Compassionate Being who is the infinite receptacle of all love and goodness. As God, the Father of the Universe, is good, all things must end well with His children; they and all creation are moving to a glorious climax and reunion in Him.

Read more in Wine of the Mystic: The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayam a Spiritual Interpretation by Paramahansa Yogananda

Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám Summary
Summary (Critical Survey of Literature for Students) * print Print * document PDF * list Cite * link Link
Although Edward FitzGerald was a friend of such writers as Alfred, Lord Tennyson, and Thomas Carlyle, FitzGerald himself published few works. His principal one was a translation of the rubáiyát (quatrains) of a twelfth century Persian mathematician-astronomer, Omar Khayyám. Barely noticed when it first appeared in 1859, the work became popular on both sides of the Atlantic soon after Dante Gabriel Rossetti found a copy of the book and urged his friends to read it. A second edition appeared nine years after the first, expanded from 75 quatrains to 110. FitzGerald continued to make changes in a third and fourth edition, finally reducing the work to 101 quatrains.
It is widely acknowledged that the poem is much more than a translation. FitzGerald freely adapted the original quatrains, adding many of his own images and giving disconnected stanzas a unity of theme, tone, and style. He stayed with the four-line stanza of the original Rubáiyát, rhyming on all but the third line, though in a few instances all four lines rhyme. The result, known as the Rubáiyát stanza, employs an iambic pentameter line (ten syllables, five of them accented) and is crafted so that the third line, FitzGerald explained, “seems to lift and suspend the Wave that falls over the last.” The final line usually gives the quatrain an epigrammatic force. FitzGerald also combined parts of some quatrains and arranged the whole collection into what he called “something of an Eclogue,” a poem with a rustic setting that uses dialogue or soliloquy. He also gave the poem a framework appropriate to its astronomer author, opening at dawn and ending at nightfall on the same day, when the moon rises and the narrator, who identifies himself along the way as “old Khayyám,” is no more.
The poem begins not only at the break of a new day but also on New Year’s Day, which occurred in Khayyám’s time at the vernal equinox, the beginning of spring. This season provides the poet with useful symbols—the grape, the rose, the nightingale, and the verdant garden—and the spring setting inspires the poet to ponder the mystery of creation, life’s brevity, the futility of trying to understand life’s purpose, and the wisdom of enjoying life while it lasts.
As the sun drives out the night, the poet bids his companion to rise and accompany him. This companion is addressed later as “Love” and is the famous “thou” whom the poet finds “enow” (enough) in the wilderness along with a book of verses and a loaf of bread. She acts as a foil to the poet’s meditations on their journey through the day, and this artful device gives the impression that the poet is addressing the reader as a familiar person. The narrator’s voice becomes the principal unifying element in the poem. By the eleventh stanza (in the first edition), the personal element is established, and one cannot resist the poet’s invitation to “come with old Khayyám.”
Eager to begin the day, the poet says he might hear a voice within the tavern chiding the drowsy ones for tarrying outside. He sees others waiting impatiently to enter the tavern, impatient because time is wasting and, when they are dead, they shall not return. The tavern, which symbolizes for the poet the world at large, is a place where one’s cup is filled with the “Wine of Life,” and one had better hurry to drink it, for the wine keeps draining away slowly. If the rose dies, others will take its place, the companion answers, implying that spring renews life, but the poet makes it clear that the rose symbolizes people who will be gone forever.
Put such thoughts away, old Khayyám urges, and go with him to the garden, where the names of kings and slaves are forgotten, where one can see, in the natural setting, images that teach how to enjoy the brief stay on earth. There, all the poet sees reminds him that life is short; everyone becomes dust and never returns. One is therefore well advised to live today and not worry about yesterday or tomorrow. In this verdant setting, the poet is reminded of the cyclic nature of life. Spring renews the earth, but the rose and the hyacinth are nurtured by the buried bodies of those who have come and gone. No one is exempt, not the...
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