JALALUD'DIN RUMI, THE THIRTEENTH-CENTURY Persian
lawyer-divine and Sufi, widely considered literature's
greatest mystical poets, understood very well the
uncontrollable and idiosyncratic impact of poetry. Yet one
wonders if even he, for all his intuitive grasp of
language, humanity and the cosmos foresaw the deep and
diverse influence his own work would have on readers
throughout the world seven centuries after his death-or the
myriad meanings enthusiasts would draw from his sprawling
and contradictory poems. In the Islamic world today, Rumi
is read for much the same reasons he was revered during his
life: for his excellence as a poet; for his rare ability to
empathize with humans, animals and plants; for his personal
refinement; and, above all else, for his flawless moral
center and ability to direct others towards good conduct
and union with Allah.
Rumi’s poetry also has been read in the West for centuries
and there have been informed references to him in the work
of Ralph Waldo Emerson and Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel
and many other eminent writers. But in recent years the
popularity of his work in the West has increased to a
surprising extent: according to the Christian Science
Monitor, Rumi ranked as America's best-selling poet in
1997. His biography, or at least the highlights of his
difficult but victorious life, should prove as inspiring as
his poetry to his diverse and growing readership.
The key events of Rumi's life-or those that appear to have
shaped his poetry to a great extent-seem to have been his
insecure childhood spent with his family roaming between
countries at the time of the Mongol invasion; his close
relationship with his father, the mystic Baha al-Din; his
great popularity as an Islamic professor; and his unusually
intense spiritual and emotional love for the dervish Shams
al-Din of Tabriz.
In his work, Rumi tells us over and over that he is
attempting to put into language the nature and significance
of the invisible universe, a task he freely admits can only
be achieved in part. In "The Story of Solomon and the
Hoopoe," Rumi writes: "Do thou hear the name of every thing
from the knower? Hear the inmost meaning of the mystery of
He That Taught the Names. With us, the name of every thing
is its outward appearance, with the Creator, the name of
every thing is its inward reality."
The best explanation for Rumi's popularity may simply be
that he was a very wonderful poet-uniquely capable of
transcending "outward appearances" and conjuring up the
mystical "inward reality," yet entirely realistic and
modest about the limitations of his words-and there are
very few such writers in the world. It also must be
remembered that the Mathnawi, Rumi's longest work, is a
Persian classic and by itself would ensure his literary
immortality.
As for Western readers, there is another important reason
for Rumi's surprisingly strong appeal today: his ability to
evoke ecstasy from the plain facts of nature and everyday
life. One often gets the sense that merely to draw breath,
or catch sight of another creature, are immensely
pleasurable events. Many of Rumi's poems convey feelings of
great joy in being able to play any sort of role at all in
the natural order. And such confident expressions of
belonging and pleasure are too rare in the technologically
sophisticated, but socially fragmented modern world.
Consider this translation of a section of the Mathnawi, by
Jonathan Star:
My soul wants to fly away when your presence calls it so
sweetly.
My soul wants to take flight, when you whisper, "Arise."
A fish wants to dive from dry land into the ocean, when it
hears the drum beating "Return."
A Sufi, shimmering with light, wants to dance like a
sunbeam when darkness summons him.
(http://poetseers.org)
