Ferdowsi, answered from the texts and cited to the page.
I am a Muslim, born in the faith of the Prophet and of ʿAli, and in it I will die; the book is a Muslim's history of the kings who came before Islam, and I tell it with reverence and with grief, and neither cancels the other. The old kings did not worship fire as the clerics charge; they turned toward it as the faithful turn toward Mecca, and the God they thanked was the one God.
You can hear it in the letter Yazdegerd wrote to the marchlords of Ṭus: he begins by praising the Judge "from whom are fortune, strength, and excellence, Grace, triumph, throne, and diadem of kingship," and says that from the ant's foot to the eagle's plume all creatures "draw no breath unless by His command." That is not the speech of an idolater.1
It is a king who knows whose hand holds the crown. As for the Arabs, look at where the bitter lines stand and who speaks them. They belong to the paladin Rostam, son of Hormozd, who sees in the stars the end of the Sasanian house. He bids the keepers of the young king watch over him by night and day, for he is "the Sásánians' memorial," and no one "will behold that House again." He foresees the pulpit facing the throne, and Abu Bakr and ʿUmar become household words, and the toils of the kings lost.2
Then comes the long lament: no throne, no crown, no golden boot, a worthless slave for king, men robbing one another, sire against son, and "a mongrel race—Íránian, Turkman, Arab" talking gibberish.2 These are the words of a defeated man in the hour of defeat. The book gives every loser his grief, as it gave Esfandiyār his and Siyāvash his. Yazdegerd, too, in his own letter, recalls that Nushirvān once dreamed of "a hundred thousand Arabs—raging camels with bits snapped," seeking how to cross the Arwand to ruin the fields of Iran.3
A king dreams it, a general reads it in the sky, and I set it down. Do not make of this a quarrel against a people. The poem's enemies are injustice and pride, and they wear every face: Żaḥḥāk was an Arab prince, and Afrāsiyāb's Turanians fight with valour I have praised. Look at what the book honours in its own heroes. When Farud, Siyāvash's son, meets Bahrām on the mountain, he is of Turanian mother and Iranian father, and the whole host's grief is that he was killed.4
When Gudarz answers Ṭus about Kay Khosrow, he says that even if the prince is on his mother's side from Tur, "the grandson of the Shah must still prove just." Justice, Grace, and a good name decide a man in this poem, not his people.5 So the book is none of the three taken alone. It is a Muslim's memory of Iran, kept in Persian, mourning the fall of a throne whose last king died in flight, and it asks the reader to be a Fereydun in justice, not a hater of anyone.
The poet is a Muslim, born in the faith of the Prophet and ʿAli and resolved to die in it, and he tells the history of the Iranian kings who came before Islam as a history of worshippers of the one God, for whom fire was a direction of prayer and not a god. He grieves for the throne of Iran when it falls and puts that grief, and contempt for the conquerors, in the mouths of the Persians who lost it.
He keeps the Persian tongue pure of Arabic as far as it will go, because the book is the memory of Iran in its own words.67
From whom are fortune, strength, and excellence, Grace, triumph, throne, and diadem of kingship. From foot of ant to soaring eagle's plume... and draw no breath unless by His command.The Shahnama, Vol. IX
When pulpit fronteth throne, And when Abu Bakr and 'Umar shall be As household words, our long toils will be lost... A mongrel race—Íránian, Turkman, Arab— Will come to be and talk in gibberish.The Shahnama, Vol. IX
A hundred thousand Arabs—raging camels with bits snapped—seeking how to cross the Arwand, And bring destruction on our fields and fells.The Shahnama, Vol. IX
Bahram perceived: 'He cometh from Kubad Through Siyawush,' then blessed him, did obeisance, And scaled the lofty steep.The Shahnama, Vol. III
If on his mother's side he is from Tur The grandson of the Shah must still prove just.The Shahnama, Vol. II
IO How the present Book was begun Mine ardent heart turned, when Dakiki fell, Spontaneously toward the Iranian throne; " If I can get the book I will retell," I said, " the tales in language of mine own." 'i 10 THE SHAHNAMA OF PIRDA USt I asked of persons more than I can say, For I was fearful as time passed away That life would not suffice, but that I too Should leave the work for other hands to do.The Shahnama, Vol. I
May this sweet country of Írán Be in prosperity! Whenas the world Is straitened to the king hold treasure, life, And person of small worth, for of that race So famed and honoured there is no one left Save that exalted one. Watch over him By day and night till I have fought the Arabs.The Shahnama, Vol. IX
The most politically charged question about the poem since the nineteenth century; nationalist and anti-nationalist readings both quote lines that the poem gives to characters, and some of which the critical edition doubts.