Shah Bhittai - A Quest Poet of East

Shah Latif Bhittai (1689-1752) was a great celebrated Sufi saint poet and a spiritual guide. He had an exceptional spiritual insight, creativity, powerful expression. In his poetry he emphasized that the ills of 'inner self' of a person can only be cured through the selfless love and the spirit of sacrifice to fellow human beings. The crux of Latif's poetry is love combined with humility (without hypocrisy) which is the ethos of civilized human society. His stature is on par with the great poets of the world like Byron, Keats, Shelley, Neruda, Rilke, Rimbaud, Shakespeare etc. Shah's poetry has main features as fear of Allah and obedience to all his commandments, symbol of sympathy and; mercy for the suffering humanity, annihilation of ego, humility and self denial, dignity of human labor and human equality based on love and spirit of justice, decimation of ego and reformation of human society as a whole. He is a heroic figure belonging to all ages, all groups, all races and all classes of people.