EASTERN HERITAGE
By H. D. GRAVES LAW
AWORLD War, with the artificial•and rigorous limits it imposes on travel, accentuates the importance of such contacts as escape those harsh barriers. It even gives a spur, and an urgency, to meet- ings which in times of peace might not have been thought of. So this war, from the effects and repercussions of which neither India a nor Persia has by any means escaped, has brought these two neigh- bours together in a common search for the foundations of peace and the study of matters of mutual interest which, though remote from the strategic and political problems of the immediate present, are of the utmost value for the future.
A cultural mission has lately reached India from Persia, in response to an invitation from the Government of India, with the object of restoring and refreshing the centuries-old contact between those two great countries of the Middle East. The members of this mission have been well chosen by the Persian Government, and will com- mand the highest respect in India because of their attainments and established reputation as distinguished men of letters—all three of them having contributed generously to the modern poetry of Persia. All Asghar Hikmat, the leader of the party, is, in addition, well versed in the public affairs of his country, having been at different times Minister of Education, Minister of Justice, and Minister of Com- merce and Industry. He is, therefore, eminently fitted to bring to his present task not only a wide culture, but an appreciation of the many ways, such as agriculture, farming and technical science, in which Persia can benefit from the great progress India has made in these directions. The discussion of educational developments in India will particularly interest Mr. Hikmat, and be of value to the Persian Government, which has just embarked on a ten-year plan of nation-wide education. In return, by a kind of Lease-Lend arrangement, India will be able to renew a contact with the living thought of the country from which she has, in the past, derived such immense spiritual inspiration.
This relationship and the emotions it inspires are not confined to the Moslems of India. True, it is from the Moslems of India (many scores of thousands of them) that the orders of mysticism named after Persian saints claim allegiance;- and the use of Persian as the Court language (until little more than too years ago) was con- fined to the Moslem dynasties in India. But the Great Masters of classical Persian literature may almost be said to belong to all India, particularly Saadi and Iraqui, who visited India from Persia ; the mission has already noted with satisfaction the large numbers of Hindu and Sikh students in Lahore who are studying the Persian language (some of them winning prizes in competition with their Moslem fellow-students) ; and it was a great Hindu leader, Sir Tej liahadur Sapru, who only a few years ago, in his foreword to Dr. Mohammed Ishaq's authoritative volumes on contemporary Persian writers, expressed the great need that is felt in India now for closer cIntact with the Persia of today, and for a greater awareness of what Persia is thinking and saying. That need is all the greater now
hen, as All Asghar Hikmat remarked in a recent speech at Aligarh, the only salvation for mankind from the evils of aggression and hatred lies in ever increasing goodwill, harmony and close under- standing between neighbouring countries.
The members of the Persian Cultural Mission are not all new- comers to India. Pur Dawood, Professor of Literature at the Tehrag University, and a student of ancient Iranian law, has spent a year at the Rabindranath Tagore College in Bengal. But they will see much apart from the purely cultural which will interest them profoundly in the course of their journey to the chief cultural centres of India. They will learn much and profit much ; they will give much in ex- change. They will find in India, especially among Moslems, for whom a knowledge of the Persian masterpieces is the very foundation of culture, very large numbers in all classes and ranks of society who are as deeply versed in the literary traditions of Persia as Persians themselves. They have already remarked that India is even richer than Persia in Persian manuscripts. Their hosts, on the other hand, have had the opportunity of hearing Pur Dawood and Yasimi reading their own poetical works in that incomparable language which is to the whole of the Middle East what Latin was to mediaeval Europe. Had it been possible for them to include Bankipur in their pro- gramme they would have seen there, in the Khuda Bakhsh Library, one of the most famous collections of Persian manuscripts in the world.
The members of the mission will, in fact, find themselves in no strange land. Temporal, political, boundaries they have had to cross. But for Persians and Indians there is no spiritual boundary. There can be nothing but gain to both sides from this intercourse. Already the hope has been expressed that the visit is only the fore- runner of other such visits in both directions. This country, which has such intimate ties with Persia as well as with India, looks on sympathetically, and applauds the vision and enterprise which has made the visit possible at a time of such grave preoccupation for both countries. We cannot, too, avoid expressing the earnest hope that we also may, in the near future, share in the experience that is India's today. We know far too little of what is going on in the mind of Persia. There is a great awakening in that country, a movement of thought and idea in many minds in a land which has always been notable for fertility of expression and literary genius. A Persian Mission of Culture to this country would indeed—when such a venture could be undertaken—prove of very great advantage to all those in England who are interested in the development and growing self-consciousness of the Middle East.
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