Pashtun Proverbs - ENMITY
Were a Pathan not a good hater and an unscrupulous partisan, he would fail in two very marked Pathan characteristics. Though all cannot afford the luxury of having a blood feud, still, two cousins, being necessarily rivals, are always 'at enmity, for a house not divided against itself is a thing unknown.
1. A cousin's tooth breaks on a cousin's. [Cousins are generally rivals and enemies.]
2. Though your enemy be a rope of reeds, call him a serpent. [That is, do not despise an enemy, be he never so contemptible.]
3. "Who has fallen from the top of a high mountain recovers ; "who has fallen from the heart's anguish recovers not.
4. A stone will not become soft, nor an enemy a friend.
5. While he is little, play with him"; when grown, up, he is a cousin, fight with him. [Father and son often quarrel, the latter wishing the former to give him his share of the inheritance. The story goes, that Khushal Khan Khatak, when in confinement in Hindustan, was offered his liberty by the Emperor Aurangzeb, on a ransom of three thousand rupees, but refused it, saying that, though he would have paid the amount willingly a few years before, his son Bahram was now grown up and conspiring against him. He then repeated the above proverb to the Emperor.
6. If there were none, then all nine are my sons ; if there was one, one even is bad. [The play of words here, as elsewhere, is lost in the translation. The meaning is, that if a man is not at enmity with you, he is as your son.]
7. Speak good words to an enemy very softly ; gradually destroy him root and branch. [This is the precept which still guides Pathans in working out revenge, or destroying an enemy. The Italians say, " Wait time and place to act thy revenge, for it is never well done in a hurry." ]
8. The master's food is being cooked, and the slave-girl's back aches (from spite). [That is, the base cannot bear seeing others enjoy what they themselves do not share in. ]
9. Kill a snake of course through an enemy. [If he kill it, you have one enemy the less ; if the snake kill him, all the better for you. The Spaniards say, " Draw the snake from its hole by another man's hand." ]
10. A Pathan's enmity is like a dung-fire. [That is, it smoulders and burns for a long time, and is not easily quenched. The Italians say, "Revenge of one hundred years old hath still its sucking teeth."]
11. When a family becomes at variance, its whole crops become black oats. [Black oats appear as a weed on poor land intermixed with the wheat and barley.]
12. When the one profits, the other's house is ruined. [This is a common saying amongst Bannuchis and Wazirs, neither of whom can bear seeing a neighbour prosperous. ]
13. Whose son and brother have been murdered, who has restrained his hand ? [Among Pathans the avenging of blood is regarded as a sacred duty, or, as the Italians put it, "A morsel for God." Every family of note has its blood feud, and every individual in it knows the exact number of members of the hostile faimily who have to be killed before the account, which may have been running for generations, can be balanced, and a reconciliation attempted. Sometimes a nominal settlement is effected by the payment of blood-money, or so many young girls for each murdered man, whose account has not been closed by an equivalent murder.
14. An enemy is a thorn in the quilt. [The quilt is the only covering used in bed. An enemy, like a thorn in it, must be got rid of. ]
15. The fellowship of thieves is sweet, but quarrels ensue on division of the plunder.
16. Enmity with outsiders disappears, but not with One's relations.
17. He (an enemy) will say sweet words to you, and lead you into a pit.
18. When two fall out, a third gains by it. [So we say, " Two dogs fight for a bone, and the third runs away with it." ]
19. The shelter of a tamarisk is (equal to) that of a mountain for a man who fears not God. [The idea is, what restrains a man from sin is the fear of God. Once that restraint is -gone, the Godless man can go on in his wickedness with little fear of detection and punishment from his fellow-man.]
20. When the village becomes two, it is good for backbiters.
21. Lending is the seed of enmity. [So we say, " lie that doth lend doth lose a friend," and the French, "Who lends to friends loses both." ]
22. The family, in which there is an informer, becomes scattered. [The nearest approach to this, which occurs to me, is, " It is an ill bird that soils its own nest." ]
23. That man will be your bane who enters not into your thoughts. [An enemy springs up against a man from a quarter where he least expected one.
24. Keep a cousin poor, but use him.
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