RUMI – A DIVINE POET

Rumi’s story entails how a ‘charming, wealth noble, genius theologian, law profession and brilliant scholar’ in his thirties transformed from a bookish scholar to a seeker of universal love and truth.

Rich family heritage

Jalalud’din Muhammad Rumi’s (1207-1273 A.D.) born in a scholarly family of Balkh, present day Afghanistan, was related to the family that had links to courts, theologians and mystics.  On the one hand his parents were related to the court of the Khwarazmshah, and on the other, his family was linked to Rashidun Caliph, Abu Bakr. His father Bahaud’din, a student of Najm al Din Kubra, was a man of great learning and piety, an eloquent speaker and distinguished professor.  Unfortunately not content with the philosophers and rationalist of the day Bahaud’din seems to have indulged in political diatribes, which forced the family to leave Balkan. Another theory for their relocation is that Bahaud’din predicted the Mongol invasion.    

On the travels

On the road to Anatolia, Rumi encountered one of the most famous mystic Persian poets Farid al Din Attar, in the city of Nishapur. Attar immediately recognized Rumi’s spiritual eminence and gave the boy his ‘Asrarnama,’ a book about the entanglement of the soul in the material world. From there, Bahaud’din’s entourage set out for Bagdad meeting many scholars and Sufis on the way. After that, the family visited Mecca, Medina and Damascus, all the time Bahaud’din kept looking for a town in which he could settle in a madrasah and teach his disciples who had accompanied him along his travels. From Damascus the family moved to Aleppo and then to Malatya where they settled for four years. From there they settled in Laranda, present day Karama, south of Konya, in present day Turkey. At Laranda Rumi married Gawhar Khatun who in 1226, gave birth to his first son, Sultan Walad. Leaving Rumi and the family Bahaud’din in 1228 shifted to Konya where he worked in a madrasah until 1230 when he died.     

After his father’s death

Rumi was not only Bahaud’din’s son but also his student, and was acquainted with other Kubrawi Sufis. So after Bahaud’din’s death Rumi counted on Burhan al Din Mubaqqiq, Bahaud’din’s student, for his training. It was Mubaqqiq who persuaded Rumi to embark on a quest and immerse in the type of studies, experiences and teachings that had distinguished his father. So Rumi travelled and met other Sufi mystics, at that time Anatolia was the coming together of communities and lot of give and take was taking place among diverse groups. Rumi was already a teacher and theologian when in 1244 he came across a wandering dervish named Shamsud’din of Tabriz, the meeting proved to be the turning point of his life.

His legacy

Rumi and Tabriz stayed together for a total of two years, on two separate instances, but the meeting had an everlasting effect on his work. After Tabriz left the second time, some say murdered, Rumi fell in a state of grief and out of that pain he poured out nearly 70,000 verses of poetry. These poems are collected into two books ‘Diwan e Shams e Tabrizi’ and ‘Masnavi.’ The first book is a collection of ghazals named in honour of Tabrizi; the poems are arranged to the rhyming schemes. The other book is a collection of six volumes of poetry, in which the poems are intended to explain the various facet of spiritual life. It is believed that Rumi started Masnavi at the suggestion of his then companion, Husan al Din Chalabin.       

Trial by fire

Rumi’s serene inner state and mystical sensibilities were cultivated in large parts as a means of defense against the transience, loss and terror he endured during his childhood, no doubt helped him in becoming literature’s greatest mystical poet. He was buried besides his father in Konya.