Me and Rumi: The Autobiography of Shems-i-Tabrizi

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Me and Rumi

The Autobiography of Shems-i Tabrizi

Introduced, Translated, and Annotated by William Chittick

Preface by Annemarie Schimmel

Fons Vitae FORTHCOMING MARCH 2004

"Imagine that you could go somewhere each morning, say to a corner of

the sugar merchants' caravanserai, and hear Shams Tabriz talk about

the veiling of the heart, the nature of exertion, or how to move

beyond the agitated state of question and answer. This book gives

entry into that astonishing presence. Go there for an hour a day,

however long it takes. Then read Rumi's poetry and feel their opening

Friendship in you. Bless William Chittick."

- Coleman Barks

The astounding autobiography of the man who transformed Rumi from a

learned religious teacher into the world’s greatest poet of mystical

love.

"William Chittick’s masterful translation of the Maqalat of Shamsi

Tabrizi moves Rumi’s beloved mentor from the shadows into the light,

and restores Shams to the central position of prominence that he so

richly deserves. This work immediately joins the indispensable short

list of scholarly works on Rumi and his community. Highly recommended

for all scholars and students of Sufism, Islamic Philosophy, Persian

literature, and of course for all the legions of Rumi fans."

–Annemarie Schimmel

Now that Rumi has become one of the best-selling poets in North

America, interest in his life and times has increased dramatically.

Practically every collection of his poetry provides a thumbnail

biography, highlighting his encounter with Shams-i Tabrizi, the

wandering mystic who became Rumi’s beloved companion. Rumi had been

a sober scholar, teaching law and theology to a small circle of

students, but the coming of Shams turned him into a devotee of music,

dance, and poetry. Three years after Shams’s appearance out of

nowhere, he abruptly vanished, never to be seen again. It was Rumi’s

longing for the lost Shams that transformed him into one of the

world’s greatest poets. Rumi immortalized Shams’s name by constantly

celebrating him in his poetry as the embodiment of the divine

beloved.

Very little is known about the historical Shams—indeed, some have even

doubted that he was a real person. Everyone interested in Rumi’s

poetry has been curious about him, and beginning with Rumi’s own son

and other hagiographers, a great deal of legend was built up. Over

the centuries Shams became a trope of Persian, Turkish, and Urdu

literatures. Modern scholarship has made little headway in

explaining who Shams was or how he was able to play such a decisive

role in Rumi’s life, though a good number of theories have been

advanced.

Me and Rumi represents a true milestone in the study of

this enigmatic figure. It makes available for the first time in any

European language first-hand accounts of Shams that have never been

studied by Western scholars. When Rumi and Shams sat and talked, one

or more members of the circle took notes. These were never put into

final form, but they were preserved and sometimes copied by later

generations, ending up in various libraries scattered around Turkey.

Fifteen years ago an Iranian scholar completed the long process of

collating and editing the manuscripts. The book that he published,

called Maqalat-i Shams-i Tabrizi, “The Discourses of Shams-i

Tabrizi”, provides us with an extraordinary picture of an

awe-inspiring personality.

In Me and Rumi William C. Chittick has translated about

two-thirds of the Discourses into English and arranged them in a

manner that clarifies their meaning and context. He provides notes

and a glossary, which will go a long way toward helping readers

decipher the more obscure passages. The net result is an exciting

and readable book that brings Shams to life. For the first time in

Western sources we are given access to him without the intermediary

of Rumi and the myth-makers. Shams appears as raucous and sober,

outspoken and subtle, harsh and gentle, learned and irreverent, and

above all as an embodiment of the living presence of God. The book

destroys the stereotypes that have been set up by the secondary

literature, and it gives access to a far more fascinating and vivid

personality than we have any right to expect from what hagiographers

and scholars have written.

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Table of Contents

Translator’s Introduction

1. My Years Without Mawlana

Childhood

My Teaching Career

My Travels

Teachers and Shaykhs I have Met

2. My Path to God

The Profit and Loss of Study

Philosophy

Following Muhammad

The Religion of Old Women

The Guidance of the Shaykh

Avoiding Caprice

The Companion of the Heart

The Saints

My Interpretations of Scripture

3. My Time with Mawlana

Our Encounter

My Spiritual Mastery

Mawlana’s Exalted Station

Our Companionship

My Instructions to the Circle

My Critics

My Harshness with Friends

My Return from Aleppo

Notes to the Passages

Index of Passages

Index and Glossary of Proper Names

Index and Glossary of Terminology

William C. Chittick was born in Milford, Connecticut. He

finished his B.A. in the United States and then went to Iran, where

he completed a Ph.D. in Persian literature at Tehran University in

1974. He taught comparative religion for five years at Aryamehr

Technical University in Tehran, and left Iran just before the

revolution. For three years he was assistant editor of the

Encyclopaedia Iranica at Columbia University, and from 1983 he has

taught religious studies at Stony Brook University. He is author and

translator of twenty-five books and one hundred articles on Sufism,

Shi’ism, and Islamic thought in general. His more recent titles

include The Self-Disclosure of God: Principles of Ibn al-`Arabî’s

Cosmology (State University of New York Press, 1998) and The Heart of

Islamic Philosophy (Oxford University Press, 2001).

Relevant Previous Publications

The Sufi Path of Love: The Spiritual Teachings of Rumi. State

University of New York Press. 0-87395-724-5, 1983.

The Sufi Path of Knowledge: Ibn al-'Arabî's Metaphysics of

Imagination. State University of New York Press. 0-88706-884-7.

1989.

Sufism: A Short Introduction. Oneworld. 1-85168-211-2. 2000.

Some words from Annemarie Schimmel:

When you go to Konya to visit Maulana Rumi’s mausoleum, “the Green

Dome” you must not forget to pay a visit to the memorial of Shams-i

Tabrizi as well, for “otherwise, Shams will be angry with you!” as

the pious people in the city will tell you. Shams, Rumi’s inspiring

genius, representative of Divine Grandeur and the jalal-side of the

Creator-who was he? Most readers of Maulana Rumi’s verse have asked

this question, and different are the answers. We, who devoted a large

part of our life to Maulana, the most wonderful mystical poet in the

world (not only in the Islamic world) have sometimes tried to

understand the difficult and at times apparently incomprehensible

Maqalat-i Shams, a work that was edited critically only recently. But

whenever we began to study it, we could barely find our way through

the difficulties of the style, of the allusions to unknown facts and

persons, and the strangely confused text and gave up. In the certain

way similar in difficulty to the Maarif of Maulana’s father Baha-i

Valad, the Maqalat-i Shams seemed to evade our grasp, and again

comparable to the just mentioned work, it contains highly surprising

statements, expressions that shock the uninitiated reader and also

those who see in him only the representative of love and sweet though

painful longing. Shams takes the listener or, now, the reader to

another experience- and his words should be carefully studied by

those who equate mystical love with softening. As Maulana says in the

beginning chapter of the Mathnavi speaking of the Sun:

The Sun who illuminates the entire world

should it draw closer, everything will burn

We are extremely grateful to William Chittick for placing before us

his translation of the Maqalat, not in its original rather chaotic

form but well arranged so that the reader enjoys the fascinating

though sometimes shocking remarks of Shams that immediately go to

heart. I think that Professor Chittick, with only his deep knowledge

of Sufism and his long experience in relating complicated Sufi texts

was able to undertake this work, and we are extremely grateful that

he opened a door long closed so that we come somewhat closer to the

mysteries of the relation between Shams and Rumi. The relation that

gave the world the most wonderful poetry, poetry in honor of the Sun

that nourishes and at the same time burns the heart.

-Annemarie Schimmel

http://www.fonsvitae.com

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