The Greek Poetry of Rumi

The Greek Poetry of Rumi

Πού είσαι συ, αφέντη μου (όμοια ευεργετικέ κι όμοια φεγγαροπρόσωπε)
Να είπω σαρακηνικά (πώς είμαι εγώ και πώς είσαι συ).
(Ω λαέ, ήρθαμε σε σας με την πρόθεση να θυσιαστούμε για την αγάπη σας)
(από τότε που σας είδαμε οι επιθυμίες μας έγιναν φανερές).
(Αν μου δώσεις ένα κρασί, εγώ θα χαρώ κι αν εσύ πάλι με βρίσεις, εγώ πάλι θα χαρώ.)
Αφέντη ό,τι θέλεις συ, θέλω και παρακαλώ.
(αν εμέθυσεν ο δούλος άκου εσύ τώρα λόγια κομματιασμένα.)
Βοήθησ' με κανάκι μου, σήμερα παρακαλώ.
...
Πού είσαι τσελεμπή, πού είσαι, έη πού 'σαι; αγαπώ σε.
(Όντας χωρίς υπόληψη, χωρίς υπερηφάνεια, την πνοή τώρα της καρδιάς μου αναζήτα.)


Where are you my master?
the dispenser of benevolence and the moon-faced charmer?
I will say in Sarrazin who I am and who you are.
I came to you, friend to be sacrificed for love,
and when I saw you my desires were magnified.
If you give me a glass of wine, I'll be happy.
and if you abuse me, I'll be happy.
My lord, what you desire I desire and I seek.
When I am drunk, listen to my babbling.
O Lord, help me in my chattering!
Where are you Chelabi
Where are you?
Where are you, dear? Where?
I have abandoned pride and principles, console my heart!

Αφέντης μας έν κι αγαπούμεν τον
κι απ' εκείνον έν καλή η ζωή μας.
Γιατί γύρισες, γιατί βρώμισες;
πε με τι έπαθες, πε με τι έχασες!
(Άι καρδιά μου, άι ψυχή μου!
άι το ετούτο μου, άι το εκείνο μου,
αχ σπίτι μου, αχ στέγη μου!
Αχ θησαυρέ μου, αχ χρυσοπηγή!)
Έλα καλέ μου, έλα σάχη μου·
χαρά δε δίδεις, δος μας άνεμο!
Που διψά πίνει, που πονεί λαλεί·
μηδέν τσάκωσες, καλέ, το γυαλί;


He is our Master and we love him
and because of Him our life is good.
Why have you come back, why did you get dirty?
Tell me what happened to you, tell me what you have lost!
(Oh my heart, oh my soul,
oh my this, oh my that,
ah, my house, ah my shelter!
Ah, my treasure, ah golden spring!)
Come my darling, come my shah,
you give no joy: give us the wind!
Who thirsts, drinks; who hurts, cries out;
darling, have you smashed the glass? 

Καλή τύχη απάνω σου, έη αφέντη τσελεμπή,
(μεσάνυχτα στ' όνομά μας την μεγαλοσύνη αναζητάς.)
(Με μαύρα ρούχα και ραβδί γυρίζω σαν) καλόγερος
(και με τουρμπάνι και κοντάρι ξένος γίνομαι άραβας.)
(Είσαι το κάθε τι που είμαι, εμίρη εσύ, εμέθυσες σκληρέ λιονταροπιάστη.)
(Όποια γλώσσα θέλεις μίλα, Χοσρόη, γλυκοχείλη.)
Ήρτε με η αγάπη σου, κάηκα παράταιρα·
(Είσαι του θεού το φως ή μήπως είσαι συ θεός, άγγελος ή προφήτης.)
Καλή μέρα λιγερέ, πώς <εί>στεν, καλά 'στεν;
Άς κλέβεις, τσελεμπή, έμπα έσω, έλα 'δώ.
(Ξεχάσου μια στιγμήν εσύ που έχεις γλυκειά την χάρη.)

Good luck be with you, oh Sir and Master
(at midnight in our name you seek greatness)
(With black clothes and a walking stick I wander like) a monk.
(And with a turban and a pole, I became a stranger, an Arab.)
(You are everything I am, my lord; you're drunk, tough lion-tamer.)
(Speak whatever language you want, sweet-lipped Khusrow.)
Your love has come to me, I am strangely burned.
(Are you God's light, or might you be a god, an angel, or a prophet?)
Good day, my slender one, how are you, are you well?
You can keep stealing, sir, get inside, come here.
(Forget yourself for a moment, you with such sweet grace.)

Rumi's above verses are macaronic with (Persian) and Arabic (which Rumi calls "Saracen" in Greek). Rumi's verses and Greek & English translations are courtesy of the Thesaurus Linguae Graecae. (TLG) is a research center at the University of California, Irvine.

For an in-depth research paper on Greek poems of Rumi and his son, please visit Greek Verses of Rumi & Sultan Walad

Ποιήματα απο τον Ρουμί


"In Rumi's major work , Dīwān-e Kabīr (Great Work) or Diwan-e Shams-e Tabrizi (The Works of Shams of Tabriz; دیوان شمس تبریزی named in honor of Rumi's master Shams, besides approximately 35000 Persian couplets and 2000 Persian quatrains, it contains 90 Ghazals and 19 quatrains in Arabic, a couple of dozen or so couplets in Turkish (mainly macaronic poems of mixed Persian and Turkish), and 14 couplets in Greek(all of them in three macaronic poems of Greek-Persian)."

The Greek Poetry of Jalaluddin Rumi
http://www.khamush.com

Medieval Sufi masters where Islamic scholars who were well versed with the Koran and the Hadith and frequently quoted from these sources in their speech and writing. They were also imbued with early Islamic mysticism. Nevertheless, they were attacked by orthodox ulemas, accused of heresy and blasphemy, and even subjected to persecution and execution. This was perhaps due to alien ethnic origins of Sufism, with emphasis on love, harmony, and some elements of pantheism versus the rigidity of other orthodox Muslims. Arguments about the roots of Sufism in ancient Indo-Iranian religions (Zoroastrian/Vedanta) are well recorded are not relevant to the present discourse. On the other hand, the Greek influence, which came much later, is attested by Greek poetry of Rumi and his son, Sultan Valad. As the Sufi orders developed, they deviated in many ways from the early Islamic mysticism. Sufi doctrine grew in several stages, enriched by contacts with Gnosticism, Neoplatonism, and even Buddhism. They were also influenced by Greek philosophy, especially the works of Aristotle, which reached them through Islamic philosophers like Avicenna (d. 1037) and Averroes (d. 1198).

When Rumi and his movement were established in Konya, the city was still under the influence of Christianity, and the Greek language was common among communities around the city. Thus the Sufis could not avoid being influenced by the Greek culture and philosophy that were promoted by the Christians. The English orientalist, F.W. Haslucke, describes these situations and states that in a mosque in Konya, that was formerly the St.Amphilochius church, was a tomb that was beloved to be that of Plato and the Muslims in the city had reverence for it and even some considered Plato a prophet*. There are also indications that both the Sufi masters and Saljuq monarchs encourages harmony and friendship between the Sufis and Christians. Much later when the Ottoman Sultans ordered the persecution and massacre of Armenias, Sufis sheltered and saved the lives of some of them. Under these circumstances, we can assume that Rumi and his son knew Greek and wrote the so-called Greek poems. Both Rumi and his son Sultan Valad wrote their poetry and prose primarily in Persian but there are occasional writings, in the orders of frequency, in Arabic, Turkish, and Greek. The Greek verses are mixed with Persian and Arabic lines and Turkish words, and they are written in the Persian/Arabic alphabet! Sultan Valad has more Greek verses, as attested by the following count of the poems in his Rabab Nama.

* Persian: 7,745
Turkish: (Ottoman): 157
Arabic: 35
Greek: 22

The following is a translation of a poem by Rumi in Greek (Ghazal 2264). An earlier literal French translation of these poems with a few misreading and lacunae has been published. The Turkish scholar Abdulbaki Golpinarli has translated these poems into Turkish with the aid of a Greek scholar, Mir Miroghli.The original poems are longer, with most of the lines in Persian. For example Ode 2264 consists of 18 couplets in the Foruzanfar edition of Rumi's Divan of Shams. I am recording here the Greek lines and lines counting Greek phases. According to Miroghli, the Greek language used is that of the common folk in Anatolia at the time of Rumi.

Were are you my master?
The dispenser of benevolence And the moon-faced charmer?
I will say in Sarrazin who I am and who you are.
I came to you, friend
To be sacrificed for love,
And when I saw you
My desires were magnified.
If you give me a glass of wine, I'll be happy.
And if you abuse me, I'll be happy.
My lord, what you desire I desire and I seek.
When I am drunk, listen to my babbling.
O Lord, help me in my chattering!
Where are you Chelabi
Where are you?
Where are you, dear?
Where?
I have abandoned pride and principles,
console my heart!