خودی کی تربیت
خودی کی پرورش و تربیت پہ ہے موقوفکہ مشت خاک میں پیدا ہو آتش ہمہ سوزیہی ہے سر کلیمی ہر اک زمانے میںہوائے دشت و شعیب و شبانی شب و روز
English translation
If Self is bred with perfect care, such force and strength it can acquire that handful dust of man with case can set untruths and wrongs afire.
This is the mystery we ascribe to Moses in every age and clime; he tended the sheep in wilds and learnt from Shoaib to toil and mode sublime.
Translated by Syed Akbar Ali Shah
About this couplet
This is couplet 1 of 1 in “خودی کی تربیت” (Upbringing Of Selfhood) in the section Education and Upbringing, from Allama Muhammad Iqbal's Urdu book Zarb-e-Kalim (ضربِ کلیم), published in 1936.
Read it in the poem۱ / ۱