The way you make love is the way God will be with you.

Silence is the language of God, all else is poor translation.

You were born with wings. Why prefer to crawl through life?

Your task is not to seek for love, but merely to seek and find all the barriers within yourself that you have built against it.

Everyone has been made for some particular work, and the desire for that work has been put in every heart.

It may be that the satisfaction I need depends on my going away, so that when I’ve gone and come back, I’ll find it at home.

Life

Birth: Jalāl ad-Dīn Muhammad (Rumi) was born on September 30, 1207 in Balkh, Khorasan (modern Afghanistan).

Realization: Mevlana Rumi around the age of 37 came in contact with a very spiritual figure known as Shams Tabriz. After meeting with Shams, Mevlana took a retreat from his daily life. He stopped teaching. He would spend days and night with Shams mediating upon the Eternal Truth not meeting his family and spiritual disciples for many days at length. After his meeting with Shams, Mevlana said this about Shams “Today I have seen the God I have worshipped all my life in human form”,  he said that Shams was no ordinary vagabond he looked, he was an educated and well off Chemist who had left his profession in search of the divine truth. Eventually, Shams disappeared but his effect on Mevlana Rumi had been that of a catalyst, Rumi was transformed. Mevlana went into a state of ecstasy after his separation from Shams.He did  not meet anyone for many days’, singing and dancing day and night, remembering the Divine Beloved. Poetry poured from his lips, which eventually was collected into collections such as the Mathnavi, Divan-e-Shams-i Tabrizi and Rubaiyaat. In Mevlana Rumi’s own words “I was the country’s sober ascetic, I used to teach from the pulpit – but destiny made me one of Thy hand clapping Lovers:” from the Divan.

He himself went out searching for Shams, he did not get him but he realized:  Why should I seek? I am the same as He. His essence speaks through me. I have been looking for myself!

Death: Jalāl ad-Dīn Muhammad (Rumi) died on December 17, 1273 in Konya Turkey.

Teaching Style: Rumi was able to verbalize  personal/spiritual growth and mysticism in a very forward and direct fashion. He believed passionately in the use of music, poetry and dancing 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.

Fame: The world of Rumi is the highest state of a human being — a fully evolved human. His life and transformation provide true testimony and proof that people of all religions and backgrounds can live together in peace and harmony. Rumi’s visions, words, and life teach us how to reach inner peace and happiness so we can finally stop the continual stream of hostility and hatred and achieve true global peace and harmony.

Legacy: Rumi has  had a great influence on literature throughout the centuries.
His teachings are one of the best introductions to the philosophy and practice of Sufism. Rumi’s work has been translated into many of the world’s languages including Russian, German, Urdu, Turkish, Arabic, French, Italian and Spanish, and is appearing in a growing number of formats including concerts, workshops, readings, dance performances and other artistic creations. Rumi’s love poems, has been sung in many language. Rumi is one of the most widely read poets in the world.

Teachings

The general theme of his thoughts, is essentially about the concept of unity and union with his beloved (the primal root) from which/whom he has been cut and fallen aloof, and his longing and desire for reunity.

He founded the order of the Mevlevi, the “whirling” dervishes, and created the “Sema”, their “turning”, sacred dance. In the Mevlevi tradition, Sema represents a mystical journey of spiritual ascent through mind and love to “Perfect.” 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, so as to love and to be of service to the whole of creation without discrimination against beliefs, races, classes and nations.

There are two kinds of intelligence: one acquired, as a child in school memorizes facts and concepts  from books and from what the teacher says,  collecting information in traditional way.

Another kind of intelligence is  one already completed and preserved inside you. A freshness in the center of the chest. It’s fluid, and it doesn’t move from outside to inside

Being closer and closer is the desire of the body. Don’t wish for union! There’s a closeness beyond that. Why would God want a second God?

Fall in love in such a way that it frees you from any connecting. Love is the soul’s  light, the taste of morning, no me, no we, no claim of being.

Who looks out with my eyes? What is the soul? I cannot stop asking. If I could taste one sip of an answer, I could break out of this prison for drunks. I didn’t come here of my own accord, and I can’t leave that way. Whoever brought me here will have to take me home.

We began as a mineral.  We emerged into plant life and into the animal state, and then into being human, and always we have forgotten our former states, except in early spring when we slightly recall being green again. That’s how a young person turns toward a teacher.  That’s how a baby leans toward the breast, without knowing the secret of its desire, yet turning instinctively.

Be grateful for whoever comes, because each has been sent as a guide from beyond.

View Comments