The themes of the zuhdiyya canon are frequent in Arabic literature. One of the works based on them is the corpus of poems entitled Luzūm mā la yalzam by Abū l-‘Ala’ al-Ma‘arrī. It centres on the traditional principles of zuhd poetry but encompasses a wider range than the zuhdiyyāt of Abū l ‘Atāhiya. Unlike the latter, the Luzūmiyyāt are ‘learned poetry’ and include references and allusions to many facets of culture. They evolve an idiosyncratic moral code so that the meaning of zuhd is changed; it is an intellectual creed remote from the simple asceticism of the earlier model. The following quatrain provides a first illustration (Ma‘arrī, 1892, vol. I, p. 227):

1. iqni‘ bi-mā raḍiya l-taqiyyu H-nafsihī

2. wa-abāḥahu laka fi l-ḥayāti mubīḥū

3. mir‘ātu ‘aqlika in ra’;ayta bi-hā siwā

4. mā fī ḥijāka arathu wa-huwa qabīḥū

5. asnā fi‘dāika mā aradta bi-fi‘lihī

6. rashadam wa-khayru kalāmika l-tasbīḥū

7. inna l-ḥawāditha mā tazālu lahā mudan

8. ḥamalu l-nujūmi bi-ba‘ḍihinna dhabīḥū

Lines 1 and 3, referring to the actions of the addressee, propound the traditional maxims of piety (tuqā).The remaining two lines, however, penetrate the sphere of reflection and imagination in an altogether different manner.

The theme of the pious man's contentment with little, expressed in line 1, is familiar from text IV: