The Whirling Dervish - wanderer, worshiper, lover of leaving.

Rumi, also known as Mawlana, was a 13th century Muslim poet, scholar, theologian and Sufi mystic. A Persian native speaker from Balkh, he traveled as a young boy with his family to the Seljuk Sultanate in today’s Anatolia (Turkey) where he spent most of his life. He was buried in Konya.

My recent travel to Konya was inspiring. I traveled from Antalya by bus and crossed the Taurus mountains. The Winter climate is mild in Antalya region with around 12-18 degrees Celsius.

However, the mountains are covered with snow.

Konya with Rumi’s shrine in the heart of the city is very well preserved. The old mosques, narrow streets, konak houses, little shops in the bazaar are vitnesses of a great Sufi master who became famous far beyond Persia and Turkey where his poems are still a source of mystic inspiration.

Rumi inherited the position of his father who was a famous scholar.

Shams-e Tabrizi whom Rumi met had a major impact on him and changed his life. Rumi became an ascetic and his poems became the foundation of a new spiritual path. The Mevlevi order was founded in 1273 by Rumi’s followers after his death. The sufis are also known as whirling dervishes.

Rumi’s Mesnevi is a compilation of poems of love, eternity and purity.

========

Come, come, whoever you are. Wanderer, worshiper, lover of leaving. It doesn't matter. Ours is not a caravan of despair. come, even if you have broken your vows a thousand times. Come, yet again , come , come.

========

The moon has become a dancer
at this festival of love.
This dance of light,

This sacred blessing,
This divine love,
beckons us
to a world beyond
only lovers can see
with their eyes of fiery passion.

They are the chosen ones
who have surrendered.
Once they were particles of light
now they are the radiant sun.

They have left behind
the world of deceitful games.
They are the privileged lovers
who create a new world
with their eyes of fiery passion.