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Jalāl al-Dīn Muḥammad Rūmī (), or simply Rumi (30 September 1207 – 17 December 1273), was a 13th-century Persians poet, Hanafi faqih (jurist), Maturidi Kalam ( mutakallim),Ahmad, Imtiaz. "The Place of Rumi in Muslim Thought." Islamic Quarterly 24.3 (1980): 67. and Sufism Mysticism born during the Khwarazmian Empire.
Rumi's works are written in his mother tongue, Persian language. He occasionally used the Arabic language and single Turkish and Greek words in his verse. His Masnavi ( Mathnawi), composed in Konya, is considered one of the greatest poems of the Persian language.C.E. Bosworth, "Turkmen Expansion towards the west" in UNESCO History of Humanity, Volume IV, titled "From the Seventh to the Sixteenth Century", UNESCO Publishing / Routledge, p. 391: "While the Arabic language retained its primacy in such spheres as law, theology and science, the culture of the Seljuk court and secular literature within the sultanate became largely Persianized; this is seen in the early adoption of Persian epic names by the Seljuk rulers (Qubād, Kay Khusraw and so on) and in the use of Persian as a literary language (Turkmen must have been essentially a vehicle for everyday speech at this time). The process of Persianization accelerated in the 13th century with the presence in Konya of two of the most distinguished refugees fleeing before the Mongols, Bahā' al-Dīn Walad and his son Mawlānā Jalāl al-Dīn Rūmī, whose Mathnawī, composed in Konya, constitutes one of the crowning glories of classical Persian literature." Rumi's influence has transcended national borders and ethnic divisions: Persians, Afghans, Tajiks, Turkish people, Kurds, Greeks, Central Asian Muslims, as well as Muslims of the Indian subcontinent have greatly appreciated his spiritual legacy for the past seven centuries. His poetry influenced not only Persian literature, but also the literary traditions of the Ottoman Turkish, Chagatai, Pashto, Kurdish, Urdu, and Bengali language languages.
Rumi's works are widely read today in their original language across Greater Iran and the Persian-speaking world. His poems have subsequently been translated into many of the world's languages and transposed into various formats. Rumi has been described as the "most popular poet", is very popular in Turkey, Azerbaijan and South Asia, and has become the "best selling poet" in the United States.
According to the authoritative Rumi biographer Franklin Lewis of the University of Chicago, "the Anatolian peninsula which had belonged to the Byzantine, or eastern Roman empire, had only relatively recently been conquered by Muslims and even when it came to be controlled by Turkish Muslim rulers, it was still known to Arabs, Persians and Turks as the geographical area of Rum. As such, there are a number of historical personages born in or associated with Anatolia known as Rumi, a word borrowed from Persian literally meaning 'Roman,' in which context Roman refers to subjects of the Byzantine Empire or simply to people living in or things associated with Anatolia." He was also known as "Mullah of Rum" (ملای روم mullā-yi Rūm or ملای رومی mullā-yi Rūmī). "ملای روم" in Dehkhoda Dictionary
Rumi is widely known by the sobriquet Mawlānā/ MolānāH. Ritter, 1991, DJALĀL al-DĪN RŪMĪ, The Encyclopaedia of Islam (Volume II: C–G), 393. ( ) in Iran and popularly known as Mevlânâ in Turkey. Mawlānā (rtl=yes) is a term of Arabic origin, meaning "our master". The term مولوی Mawlawī/ Mowlavi (Persian) and Mevlevi (Turkish), also of Arabic origin, meaning "my master", is also frequently used for him.Jalāl al-Dīn Rūmī (Maulana), Ibrahim Gamard, Rumi and Islam: Selections from His Stories, Poems, and Discourses, Annotated & Explained, SkyLight Paths Publishing, 2004.
Greater Balkh was at that time a major centre of Persian cultureLewis, Rumi: Past and Present, East and West: The life, Teaching and poetry of Jalal Al-Din Rumi, Oneworld Publication Limited, 2008 p. 9: "How is that a Persian boy born almost eight hundred years ago in Khorasan, the northeastern province of greater Iran, in a region that we identify today as Central Asia, but was considered in those days as part of the greater Persian cultural sphere, wound up in central Anatolia on the receding edge of the Byzantine cultural sphere" and Sufism had developed there for several centuries. The most important influences upon Rumi, besides his father, were the Persian poets Attar and Sanai.Jafri, Maqsood, The gleam of wisdom, Sigma Press, 2003. p. 238: "Rumi has influenced a large number of writers while on the other hand he himself was under the great influence of Sanai and Attar. Rumi expresses his appreciation: "Attar was the spirit, Sanai his eyes twain, And in time thereafter, Came we in their train"Arberry, A. J., Sufism: An Account of the Mystics of Islam, Courier Dover Publications, November 9, 2001. p. 141. and mentions in another poem: "Attar has traversed the seven cities of Love, We are still at the turn of one street".Nasr, Seyyed Hossein, The Garden of Truth: The Vision and Promise of Sufism, Islam's Mystical Tradition, HarperCollins, 2 September 2008. p. 130: "Attar has traversed the seven cities of Love, We are still at the turn of one street!" His father was also connected to the spiritual lineage of Najm al-Din Kubra.
Rumi lived most of his life under the PersianateGrousset, Rene, The Empire of the Steppes: A History of Central Asia, (Rutgers University Press, 2002), 157; "...the Seljuk court at Konya adopted Persian as its official language".Aḥmad of Niǧde's "al-Walad al-Shafīq" and the Seljuk Past, A.C.S. Peacock, Anatolian Studies, Vol. 54, (2004), 97; With the growth of Seljuk power in Rum, a more highly developed Muslim cultural life, based on the Persianate culture of the Great Seljuk court, was able to take root in AnatoliaFindley, Carter Vaughn, The Turks in World History, Oxford University Press, 11 November 2004. p. 72: Meanwhile, amid the migratory swarm that Turkified Anatolia, the dispersion of learned men from the Persian-speaking east paradoxically made the Seljuks court at Konya a new center for Persian court culture, as exemplified by the great mystical poet Jelaleddin Rumi (1207–1273). Seljuk dynasty Sultanate of Rum, where he produced his worksColeman Barks, Rumi: The Book of Love: Poems of Ecstasy and Longing, HarperCollins, 2005, p. xxv, . and died in 1273AD. He was buried in Konya, and his shrine became a place of pilgrimage.Note: Rumi's shrine is now known as the "Mevlâna Museum" in Turkey. Upon his death, his followers and his son Sultan Walad founded the Mevlevi Order, also known as the Order of the Whirling Dervishes, famous for the Sufi dance known as the Sama ceremony. He was laid to rest beside his father, and over his remains a shrine was erected. A Hagiography account of him is described in Shams ud-Din Ahmad Aflāki's Manāqib ul-Ārifīn (written between 1318 and 1353). This biography needs to be treated with care as it contains both legends and facts about Rumi.Lewis, Rumi: Past and Present, East and West, Oneworld Publications, 2000. For example, Professor Franklin Lewis of the University of Chicago, author of the most complete biography on Rumi, has separate sections for the hagiographical biography of Rumi and the actual biography about him.
We do not learn the name of Baha al-Din's mother in the sources, only that he referred to her as "Māmi" (colloquial Persian for Māma),Lewis, Rumi: Past and Present, East and West, Oneworld Publications, 2008 (revised edition). p. 44: "Baha al-Din’s father, Hosayn, had been a religious scholar with a bent for asceticism, occupied like his own father before him, Ahmad, with the family profession of preacher (khatib). Of the four canonical schools of Sunni Islam, the family adhered to the relatively liberal Hanafi fiqh. Hosayn-e Khatibi enjoyed such renown in his youth—so says Aflaki with characteristic exaggeration—that Razi al-Din Nayshapuri and other famous scholars came to study with him (Af 9; for the legend about Baha al-Din, see below, "The Mythical Baha al-Din"). Another report indicates that Baha al-Din's grandfather, Ahmad al-Khatibi, was born to Ferdows Khatun, a daughter of the reputed Hanafite jurist and author Shams al-A’emma Abu Bakr of Sarakhs, who died circa 1088 (Af 75; FB 6 n.4; Mei 74 n. 17). This is far from implausible and, if true, would tend to suggest that Ahmad al-Khatabi had studied under Shams al-A’emma. Prior to that the family could supposedly trace its roots back to Isfahan. We do not learn the name of Baha al-Din's mother in the sources, only that he referred to her as "Mama" (Mami), and that she lived to the 1200s." (p. 44) and that she was a simple woman who lived to the 1200s. The mother of Rumi was Mu'mina Khātūn. The profession of the family for several generations was that of Islamic preachers of the relatively liberal Hanafi Maturidi school, and this family tradition was continued by Rumi (see his Fihi Ma Fih and Seven Sermons) and Sultan Walad (see Ma'rif Waladi for examples of his everyday sermons and lectures).
When the Mongols invaded Central Asia sometime between 1215 and 1220, Baha ud-Din Walad, with his whole family and a group of disciples, set out westwards. According to hagiographical account which is not agreed upon by all Rumi scholars, Rumi encountered one of the most famous mystic Persian poets, Attar, in the Iranian city of Nishapur, located in the province of Khorāsān. Attar immediately recognized Rumi's spiritual eminence. He saw the father walking ahead of the son and said, "Here comes a sea followed by an ocean." Attar gave the boy his Asrārnāma, a book about the entanglement of the soul in the material world. This meeting had a deep impact on the eighteen-year-old Rumi and later on became the inspiration for his works.
From Nishapur, Walad and his entourage set out for Baghdad, meeting many of the scholars and Sufis of the city. From Baghdad they went to Hejaz and performed the Hajj at Mecca. The migrating caravan then passed through Damascus, Malatya, Erzincan, Sivas, Kayseri and Nigde. They finally settled in Karaman for seven years; Rumi's mother and brother both died there. In 1225, Rumi married Gowhar Khatun in Karaman. They had two sons: Sultan Walad and Ala-eddin Chalabi. When his wife died, Rumi married again and had a son, Amir Alim Chalabi, and a daughter, Malakeh Khatun.
On 1 May 1228, most likely as a result of the insistent invitation of Kayqubad I, ruler of Anatolia, Baha' ud-Din came and finally settled in Konya in Anatolia within the westernmost territories of the Seljuk Sultanate of Rûm.
During this period, Rumi also travelled to Damascus and is said to have spent four years there.
It was his meeting with the dervish Shams-e Tabrizi on 15 November 1244 that completely changed his life. From an accomplished teacher and jurist, Rumi was transformed into an Asceticism. Sufi mysticism places great emphasis on the master-disciple relationship, in which the younger disciple studies under an older master. It is essential to engage in discipleship to reach fana, the highest level of spiritual development in Sufism.
Shams had travelled throughout the Middle East searching and praying for someone who could "endure my company". A voice said to him: "What will you give in return?" Shams replied, "My head!" The voice then said, "The one you seek is Jalal ud-Din of Konya."
On the night of 5 December 1248, as Rumi and Shams were talking, Shams was called to the back door. He went out, never to be seen again. There are many theories as to Shams's disappearance. The most popular are that Rumi's youngest son killed him, that he was killed for blasphemy, or that Shams, a known wanderer, simply chose to move on.
For more than a month, Rumi refused to believe the rumors of Shams's death and waited for his return. After forty days, Rumi accepted that he was dead and began dressing in black to signal his mourning. Rumi's love for, and his bereavement at the death of, Shams found their expression in an outpouring of lyric poems, Divan-e Shams-e Tabrizi. He himself went out searching for Shams and journeyed again to Damascus. There, he realised:
Hussam implored Rumi to write more. Rumi spent the next twelve years of his life in Anatolia dictating the six volumes of this masterwork, the Masnavi, to Hussam.
In December 1273, Rumi fell ill; he predicted his own death and composed the well-known ghazal, which begins with the verse:
Rumi died on 17 December 1273 in Konya. His death was mourned by the diverse community of Konya, with local Christians and Jews joining the crowd that converged to bid farewell as his body was carried through the city. Rumi's body was interred beside that of his father, and a splendid shrine, the "Green Tomb" (Turkish language: Yeşil Türbe, ; today the Mevlana Museum), was erected over his place of burial. His epitaph reads:
Georgian princess and Seljuq queen Gurju Khatun was a close friend of Rumi. She was the one who sponsored the construction of Mevlana Museum in Konya. The 13th-century Mevlana Museum, with its mosque, dance hall, schools and living quarters for dervishes, remains a destination of pilgrimage to this day, and is probably the most popular pilgrimage site to be regularly visited by adherents of every major religion.
In the interpretation attributed to Shams, the first part of the verse commands the humanity to seek knowledge of tawhid (oneness of God), while the second instructs them to negate their own existence. In Rumi's terms, tawhid is lived most fully through love, with the connection being made explicit in his verse that describes love as "that flame which, when it blazes up, burns away everything except the Everlasting Beloved."
Rumi's longing and desire to attain this ideal is evident in the following poem from his book the Masnavi:
The Masnavi weaves fables, scenes from everyday life, Qur'anic revelations and exegesis, and metaphysics into a vast and intricate tapestry.
Rumi believed passionately in the use of music, poetry and dance as a path for reaching God. For Rumi, music helped devotees to focus their whole being on the divine and to do this so intensely that the soul was both destroyed and resurrected. It was from these ideas that the practice of Sufi whirling developed into a ritual form. His teachings became the base for the order of the Mevlevi, which his son Sultan Walad organised. Rumi encouraged Sama, listening to music and turning or doing the sacred dance. In the Mevlevi tradition, samāʿ represents a mystical journey of spiritual ascent through mind and love to the Perfect One. In this journey, the seeker symbolically turns towards the truth, grows through love, abandons the ego, finds the truth and arrives at the Perfect. The seeker then returns from this spiritual journey, with greater maturity, to love and to be of service to the whole of creation without discrimination with regard to beliefs, races, classes and nations.
In other verses in the Masnavi, Rumi describes in detail the universal message of love:
Rumi's favourite musical instrument was the ney (reed flute).
(Khawaja Abdul Hamid Irfani, "The Sayings of Rumi and Iqbal", Bazm-e-Rumi, 1976.)
Teachings
Like other mystic and Sufi poets of Persian literature, Rumi's poetry speaks of love which infuses the world. Rumi's teachings also express the tenets summarized in the Quranic verse which Shams-e Tabrizi cited as the essence of prophetic guidance: "Know that ‘There is no god but He,’ and ask forgiveness for your sin" (Q. 47:19).
Major works
Rumi's poetry is often divided into various categories: the quatrains ( rubayāt) and odes ( ghazal) of the Divan, the six books of the Masnavi. The prose works are divided into The Discourses, The Letters, and the Seven Sermons.
Poetic works
The prophets of Islam, according to Rumi, constitute the highest point of spiritual development and are the closest to God. Throughout Rumi's writings, Muhammad is the most perfect example of all previous prophets.Demmrich, Sarah, and Ulrich Riegel, eds. Western and Eastern perspectives on religion and religiosity. Vol. 14. Waxmann Verlag, 2020. p. 52
Despite Rumi's explicit adherence to Islam, there are traces of religious pluralism throughout his work. Although Rumi acknowledges religious discrepancies, the core of all religions is the same. The disagreement between religions does not lie in the core of these religions, but in doctrinal differences. Accordingly, Rumi criticizes Christianity for "overloading the image of God with superfluous structures and complications".Demmrich, Sarah, and Ulrich Riegel, eds. Western and Eastern perspectives on religion and religiosity. Vol. 14. Waxmann Verlag, 2020. p. 53 Yet, Rumi declares that "the lamps are different, but the Light is the same; it comes from beyond".Demmrich, Sarah, and Ulrich Riegel, eds. Western and Eastern perspectives on religion and religiosity. Vol. 14. Waxmann Verlag, 2020. p. 55 Shibli Nomani, in his work Sawanih Maulana Rum, argued that Rumi should not be seen solely as a mystical poet but also as a serious theologian.
His depth of his spiritual vision extended beyond narrow sectarian concerns. One quatrain reads:
According to the Quran, Muhammad is a mercy sent by God. In regards to this, Rumi states:
"The Light of Muhammad does not abandon a Zoroastrian or Jew in the world. May the shade of his good fortune shine upon everyone! He brings all of those who are led astray into the Way out of the desert."
Rumi, however, asserts the supremacy of Islam by stating:
"The Light of Muhammad has become a thousand branches (of knowledge), a thousand, so that both this world and the next have been seized from end to end. If Muhammad rips the veil open from a single such branch, thousands of monks and priests will tear the string of false belief from around their waists."
Many of Rumi's poems suggest the importance of outward religious observance and the primacy of the Qur'an.
Rumi states:
I am the servant of the Qur'an as long as I have life. I am the dust on the path of Muhammad, the Chosen one. If anyone quotes anything except this from my sayings, I am quit of him and outraged by these words.
Rumi also states:
On the first page of the Masnavi, Rumi states:
"Hadha kitâbu 'l- mathnawîy wa huwa uSûlu uSûli uSûli 'd-dîn wa kashshâfu 'l-qur'ân."
"This is the book of the Masnavi, and it is the roots of the roots of the roots of the (Islamic) Religion and it is the Explainer of the Qur'ân."
Hadi Sabzavari, one of Iran's most important 19th-century philosophers, makes the following connection between the Masnavi and Islam, in the introduction to his philosophical commentary on the book:
It is a commentary on the versified exegesis of and its occult mystery, since all of it all is, as you will see, an elucidation of the clear verses of, a clarification of prophetic utterances, a glimmer of the light of the luminous Qur’ān, and burning embers irradiating their rays from its shining lamp. As respects to hunting through the treasure-trove of the Qur’ān, one can find in it the all the ancient philosophical wisdom; it the is all entirely eloquent philosophy. In truth, the pearly verse of the poem combines the Canon Law of Islam (sharia) with the Sufi Path (tariqa) and the Divine Reality (haqiqa); the author's Rūmī achievement belongs to God in his bringing together of the Law (sharīʿa), the Path, and the Truth in a way that includes critical intellect, profound thought, a brilliant natural temperament, and integrity of character that is endowed with power, insight, inspiration, and illumination.
Seyyed Hossein Nasr states:
One of the greatest living authorities on Rûmî in Persia today, Hâdî Hâ'irî, has shown in an unpublished work that some 6,000 verses of the Dîwân and the Mathnawî are practically direct translations of Qur'ânic verses into Persian poetry.Nasr, Seyyed Hossein, "Rumi and the Sufi Tradition," in Chelkowski (ed.), The Scholar and the Saint, p. 183
Rumi states in his Dīwān:
The Sufi is hanging on to Muhammad, like Abu Bakr.Quoted in Ibrahim Gamard, Rumi and Islam: Selections from His Stories, Poems, and Discourses — Annotated and Explained, p. 171.
Rumi's poetry forms the basis of much classical Iranian and Afghan music. Contemporary classical interpretations of his poetry are made by Muhammad Reza Shajarian, Shahram Nazeri, Davood Azad (the three from Iran) and Ustad Mohammad Hashem Cheshti (Afghanistan).
According to tradition, Rumi was himself a notable musician who played the rebab, although his favourite instrument was the ney or reed flute. The music accompanying the samāʿ consists of settings of poems from the Maṭnawī and Dīwān-e Kabīr, or of Sultan Walad's poems. The Mawlawīyah was a well-established Sufi order in the Ottoman Empire, and many of the members of the order served in various official positions of the Caliphate. The centre for the Mevlevi was in Konya. There is also a Mewlewī monastery (درگاه, dargāh) in Istanbul near the Galata Tower in which the samāʿ is performed and accessible to the public. The Mewlewī order issues an invitation to people of all backgrounds:
During Ottoman times, the Mevlevi produced a number of notable poets and musicians, including Sheikh Ghalib, Ismail Rusuhi Dede of Ankara, Esrar Dede, Halet Efendi, and Gavsi Dede, who are all buried at the Galata Mewlewī Khāna (Turkish: Mevlevi-Hane) in Istanbul. Music, especially that of the ney, plays an important part in the Mevlevi.
With the foundation of the modern, secular Republic of Turkey, Mustafa Kemal Atatürk removed religion from the sphere of public policy and restricted it exclusively to that of personal morals, behaviour and faith. On 13 December 1925, a law was passed closing all the Khanqah (dervish lodges) and zāwiyas (chief dervish lodges), and the centres of veneration to which visits ( ziyārat) were made. Istanbul alone had more than 250 tekkes as well as small centres for gatherings of various fraternities; this law dissolved the Sufi Orders, prohibited the use of mystical names, titles and costumes pertaining to their titles, impounded the Orders' assets, and banned their ceremonies and meetings. The law also provided penalties for those who tried to re-establish the Orders. Two years later, in 1927, the Mausoleum of Mevlâna in Konya was allowed to reopen as a Museum.Mango, Andrew, Atatürk: The Biography of the Founder of Modern Turkey, (2002), .
In the 1950s, the Turkish government began allowing the Whirling Dervishes to perform once a year in Konya. The Mewlānā festival is held over two weeks in December; its culmination is on 17 December, the Urs of Mewlānā (anniversary of Rumi's death), called Šab-e Arūs () (Persian meaning "nuptial night"), the night of Rumi's union with God. In 1974, the Whirling Dervishes were permitted to travel to the West for the first time. In 2005, UNESCO proclaimed "The Mevlevi Order Sama Ceremony" of Turkey as one of the Masterpieces of the Oral and Intangible Heritage of Humanity. The Mevlevi Sema Ceremony UNESCO.
Rumi and his mausoleum were depicted on the reverse of the 5000 Turkish lira banknotes of 1981–1994.Banknote Museum: 7. Emission Group—Five Thousand Turkish Lira— I. Series , II. Series & III. Series. Retrieved 20 April 2009.
At the proposal of the Permanent Delegations of Afghanistan, Iran, and Turkey, and as approved by its executive board and General Conference in conformity with its mission of "constructing in the minds of men the defences of peace", UNESCO was associated with the celebration, in 2007, of the eight hundredth anniversary of Rumi's birth. The commemoration at UNESCO itself took place on 6 September 2007; UNESCO issued a medal in Rumi's name in the hope that it would prove an encouragement to those who are engaged in research on and dissemination of Rumi's ideas and ideals, which would, in turn, enhance the diffusion of the ideals of UNESCO.
On 30 September 2007, Iranian school bells were rung throughout the country in honour of Mewlana. Also in that year, Iran held a Rumi Week from 26 October to 2 November. An international ceremony and conference were held in Tehran; the event was opened by the Iranian president and the chairman of the Iranian parliament. Scholars from twenty-nine countries attended the events, and 450 articles were presented at the conference. Iranian musician Shahram Nazeri was awarded the Légion d'honneur and Iran's House of Music Award in 2007 for his renowned works on Rumi masterpieces. Iran Daily — Arts & Culture — 10/03/06 2007 was declared as the "International Rumi Year" by UNESCO.
Also on 30 September 2007, Turkey celebrated Rumi's eight-hundredth birthday with a giant Whirling Dervish ritual performance of the samāʿ, which was televised using forty-eight cameras and broadcast live in eight countries. Ertugrul Gunay, of the Ministry of Culture and Tourism, stated, "Three hundred dervishes are scheduled to take part in this ritual, making it the largest performance of sema in history."
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