Rumi
Sufism inspired writings of Persian poet and mystic Jalal ad-Din Muhammad ar-Rumi; these writings express the longing of the soul for union with the divine.
Jalāl ad-Dīn Muhammad Rūmī - also known as Jalāl ad-Dīn Muhammad Balkhī, Mevlânâ/Mawlānā (مولانا, "our master"), Mevlevî/Mawlawī (مولوی, "my master") and more popularly simply as Rumi - was a 13th-century Persian poet, jurist, Islamic scholar, theologian and Sufi mystic who lived in Konya, a city of Ottoman Empire (Today's Turkey). His poems have been widely translated into many of the world's languages, and he has been described as the most popular poet and the best-selling poet in the United States.
His poetry has influenced Persian literature, but also Turkish, Ottoman Turkish, Azerbaijani, Punjabi, Hindi, and Urdu, as well as the literature of some other Turkic, Iranian, and Indo-Aryan languages including Chagatai, Pashto, and Bengali.
Due to quarrels between different dynasties in Khorāṣān, opposition to the Khwarizmid Shahs who were considered devious by his father, Bahā ud-Dīn Wālad or fear of the impending Mongol cataclysm, his father decided to migrate westwards, eventually settling in the Anatolian city Konya, where he lived most of his life, composed one of the crowning glories of Persian literature, and profoundly affected the culture of the area.
When his father died, Rumi, aged 25, inherited his position as the head of an Islamic school. One of Baha' ud-Din's students, Sayyed Burhan ud-Din Muhaqqiq Termazi, continued to train Rumi in the Shariah as well as the Tariqa, especially that of Rumi's father. For nine years, Rumi practised Sufism as a disciple of Burhan ud-Din until the latter died in 1240 or 1241. Rumi's public life then began: he became an Islamic Jurist, issuing fatwas and giving sermons in the mosques of Konya. He also served as a Molvi (Islamic teacher) and taught his adherents in the madrassa. 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 ascetic.
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. 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.
Rumi found another companion in Salaḥ ud-Din-e Zarkub, a goldsmith. After Salah ud-Din's death, Rumi's scribe and favourite student, Hussam-e Chalabi, assumed the role of Rumi's companion. Hussam implored Rumi to write more. Rumi spent the next 12 years of his life in Anatolia dictating the six volumes of this masterwork, the Masnavi, to Hussam.
In December 1273, Rumi fell ill and died on the 17th of December in Konya.
“We may know who we are or we may not. We may be Muslims, Jews or Christians but until our hearts become the mould for every heart we will see only our differences.”
“İnsan odur ki, başkasının incitişiyle incinmesin. Ve insan odur ki, incitilmeye müstahak olanı incitmesin...”
“Set your life on fire. Seek those who fan your flames”
“Beyond Islam and unbelief there is a desert plain. For us, there is a passion in the midst of that expanse. The knower who reaches there will prostrate, there is neither Islam nor unbelief, nor any 'where' in that place.”
“İstediğin bir şey olmuyorsa ya daha iyisi olacağı için ya da gerçekten de olmaması gerektiği için olmuyordur.”
“Be a helpful friend, and you will become a green tree with always new fruit, always deeper journeys into love.”
“Sorrow prepares you for joy. It violently sweeps everything out of your house, so that new joy can find space to enter. It shakes the yellow leaves from the bough of your heart, so that fresh, green leaves can grow in their place. It pulls up the rotten roots, so that new roots hidden beneath have room to grow. Whatever sorrow shakes from your heart, far better things will take their place.”
“Go back,go back to sleep.Yes, you are allowed.You who have no Love in your heart,you can go back to sleep.The power of Loveis exclusive to us,you can go back to sleep.I have been burntby the fire of Love.You who have no such yearning in your heart,go back to sleep.The path of Love,has seventy-two folds and countless facets.Your love and religionis all about deceit, control and hypocrisy,go back to sleep.I have torn to pieces my robe of speech,and have let go of the desire to converse.You who are not naked yet,you can go back to sleep.”
“Very little grows on jagged rock. Be ground. Be crumbled, so wildflowers will come up where you are.”
“The garden of the world has no limits, except in your mind.”
“Everyone has been made for some particular work and the desire for that work has been put in every heart.”
“Move outside the tangle of fear-thinking. Live in silence.”
“There are no edges to my loving now.”
“Don’t wait any longer.Dive in the ocean,Leave and let the sea be you.”
“What hurts you, blesses you. Darkness is your candle.”
“Anyone who knows me, should learn to know me again;For I am like the Moon,you will see me with new face everyday.”
“Break your pitcher against a rock. We don't need any longer to haul pieces of the ocean around.”
“Let silence take you to the core of life.”
“Be a lamp, or a lifeboat, or a ladder. Help someone's soul heal. Walk out of your house like a shepherd.”
“Suddenly the drunken sweetheart appeared out of my door.She drank a cup of ruby wine and sat by my side.Seeing and holding the lockets of her hairMy face became all eyes, and my eyes all hands.”
“if i can only recount the story of my life right out of my body flames will grow”
“When the rose is gone and the garden fadedyou will no longer hear the nightingale's song.The Beloved is all; the lover just a veil. The Beloved is living; the lover a dead thing.If love withholds its strengthening care,the lover is left like a bird without care,the lover is left like a bird without wings.How will I be awake and awareif the light of the Beloved is absent?Love wills that this Word be brought forth.”
“At the end of my life, with just one breath left, if you come, I’ll sit up and sing.”
“God turns you from one feeling to another and teaches by means of opposites so that you will have two wings to fly, not one”
“In the house of lovers, the music never stops, the walls are made of songs & the floor dances”
“When one sense perceives the hidden, the invisible world becomes apparent to the whole.”
“The fault is in the one who blames. Spirit sees nothing to criticize.”
“Let the beauty of what you love be what you do.”
“I cannot sleep in your presenceIn your absence, tears prevent meyou watch me my belovedon each sleepiness night andOnly you see the difference”
“Look past your thoughts, so you maydrink the pure nectar of This Moment.”
“Everything in the universe is a pitcher brimming with wisdom and beauty.”
“When you lose all sense of self the bonds of a thousands chains will vanish.Lose yourself completely, return to the root of the root of your own soul.”
“Shine like the whole universe is yours.”
“Hardship may dishearten at first, but every hardship passes away. All despair is followed by hope; all darkness is followed by sunshine.”
“I want your sun to reach my raindrops, so your heat can raise my soul upward like a cloud.”
“Love is a river. Drink from it.”
“This is how I would die into the love I have for you: As pieces of cloud dissolve in sunlight.”
“Study me as much as you like, you will not know me, for I differ in a hundred ways from what you see me to be. Put yourself behind my eyes and see me as I see myself, for I have chosen to dwell in a place you cannot see.”
“Your magnificence has made me a wonder. Your charm has taught me the way of love.”
“Wherever you are, and whatever you do, be in love.”
“If you desire healing,let yourself fall illlet yourself fall ill.”
“Judge the moth by the beauty of the candle”
“When you go through a hard period,When everything seems to oppose you,... When you feel you cannot even bear one more minute,NEVER GIVE UP!Because it is the time and place that the course will divert!”
“The only lasting beauty is the beauty of the heart”
“The middle path is the way to wisdom”
“Everyone is so afraid of death, but the real sufis just laugh: nothing tyrannizes their hearts. What strikes the oyster shell does not damage the pearl”
“You were born with potential. You were born with goodness and trust. You were born with ideals and dreams. You were born with greatness. You were born with wings. You are not meant for crawling, so don't. You have wings. Learn to use them and fly.”
“Work on your strong qualitiesand become resplendent like the ruby.Practice self-denial and accept difficulty.Always see infinite life in letting the self die.Your stoniness will decrease; your ruby nature will grow.The signs of self-existence will leave your body,and ecstasy will take you over.”
“Why am I seeking? I am the same as he. His essence speaks through me. I have been looking for myself”
“Dancing is not just getting up painlessly, like a leaf blown on the wind; dancing is when you tear your heart out and rise out of your body to hang suspended between the worlds.”