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Aufsatz
Kulturwissenschaften

St.Mary's University, Halifax

90, Wendell Eisener

Jenny L. ©
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RUMI AND SEEKING THE FRIEND


Lee

Religious experience: Sufism and Islam, Rumi

October 4, 2016


Rumi, a Sufi scholar, is best represented by his poetry. The expansion of his ideas and beliefs aesthetically bring light into the conscience of his readers. He not only questions his own being, but his poetry continues to question the notion of our existence. My opinions of religion had changed when I read translations of his poetry.

Every piece has me in tears. I feel immensely connected to the morale of the poems I have read. The Sufis' ideology of a layered being inflates in my mind when I can read his poetry, not only for understanding what he is talking about but how emotionally charged the lines are.

Emotion overrides my senses, then comes logical understanding, and the result is beautiful poetry. His poetry seems as though the lines are layered themselves with unspoken understanding, to be interpreted is to uncover in yourself an omniscient perspective.

Poetry requires perceptional dissection. I am used to being exposed to the obvious perspective, factoring from the subject of the poem, the exposition and even the diction. Rumi's poetry is continually hard to grasp an appropriate perspective in which to view. To define what I found easy about reading his poetry would be admitting that I had to start fresh.

All of which I had learned in high school English was not enough substance to understand Rumi and his poetry. I find his work too personal to even ask who the poetic subject is but the poetic diction is too strong for me to ignore.

We’ve come in the presence of one,

Who was never apart from us.


(Barks, p.125)


Sufism accepts the confusion I have; Rumi's translated poetry bathes in ambiguity. I can understand these lines through a lens in which I compare the meaning of the poem to Rumi's Sufism. " .[T]he presence of one" is the sense of unity upheld in the Sufi beliefs; to be connected mind, body and soul.

We is collective and who is singular. Nothing is just one thing.

Is it about his own being or about a group of people? The poem can be viewed as an insight into Rumi himself. How his expansion of thought was not only carried out in the Sufi belief but as an individual. One is God and the who is the presence of God himself. These lines seem to be written as reassurance and portray the Sufi culture with its storytelling potential.

Applying the Sufi ideology, I open myself to viewing the poem like that as well; there is many layers of being.

Learning the religious sanction of Sufism was astoundingly eye-opening. Never before had I viewed a religion to be so free. I could not fathom that prayer, the act of praying and the state of belief in Sufi culture was dictating by the individual rather than cultural expectations.

To think so openly was acceptable which I found odd to observe in Rumi's time. Religion, in my mind, is more confusing than ever before yet more understood. I have always thought of religion as means of control, negatively connecting that religious people are brainwashed.

My knowledge of Sufism has obliterated that. My own perspective is changing and not only about the idea of religion but the reason people chose to believe. Brainwashing is a choice and the control is needed in the individual practicing Sufism to be their gauge, to how connected their beings are to God.

I found that the opinions I did harbor, did not match the ideologies of Sufism. That was a tipping point in myself, I questioned how much thought was my own. How influenced am I to the authoritative figures in my life? I know that I am but I cannot gauge how influenced.

I am discovering that I can see the influence and change what I see yet the daunting beauty of my age; I don't know what there is to see in myself. All the time, I observe my own judgement and realize how much I had taken from other sources such as parents, teachers and elderly people.

Poetry is a beautiful way to connect on a non-verbal level. I learned more about myself through poetic reflection than I did actually learning about Sufi religion. Emotional connection will always be stronger in myself than logical thought. Rumi and his beliefs, for how open-minded he seemed to be, gave me a comforted scare: belief does not have to restrict acceptance.

Rumi challenged his conscience and readers today continue to question what that opens up in themselves.


Reference

Rumi, Jalal al-Din. “Meadowsounds” In The Essential Rumi, 125. Translated by Coleman Barks, Moyne, Arberry, and Nicholson. New York: HarperCollins Publishers, 2004.


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