Birthday of Sufi Mystic Mevlana Jalaladdin Rumi

30^th September is the birthday of Mevlana Jalaladdin Rumi a great Sufi Master born 700 years ago in Persia. He is most famous for his technique Sufi Whirling that is practised by his followers to attain to the Ultimate. Rumi’s influence spans Iran, Turkey, Greece and Muslims in Central & Southern Asia. Rumi is also regarded as a great poet, his poems widely translated into many languages.

Osho talks about Rumi’s poetry – Rumi has spoken only beautiful words. He is one of the most significant poets who are also mystics. That is a rare combination; there are millions of poets in the world and there are a few mystics in the world, but a man who is both is very rare to find. Rumi is a very rare flower. He is as great a poet as he is a mystic. Hence, his poetry is not just poetry, not just a beautiful arrangement of words. It contains immense meaning and points towards the ultimate truth.

It is not entertainment, it is enlightenment.

On Rumi’s experience of Enlightenment, Osho says Rumi became enlightened after 36 hours of continuous whirling. Through whirling, Rumi became absolutely clear about his center. That was his experience of the ultimate. Then his whole life he was not doing anything but teaching whirling to people. It is a simple method, the simplest method, but it may suit you or it may not.

When Rumi was asked how he found the Whirling method since no scripture described it as a meditation, Rumi is reported to have said, “Just by looking at children! I tried it myself and I was amazed because the more you twirl, the faster you go, soon you become aware that something deep inside you is absolutely still and unmoving. The whole body is moving and the faster it moves; the more is the contrast between the unmoving and the moving. And the unmoving consciousness within is my soul. That is the center of the cyclone.”

Osho relates an anecdote from the life of Rumi. One day Rumi took his disciples to see a farm where the owners were trying to dig a well. The farmers had dug 8 holes and were working on the 9^th. After digging to a certain depth and not finding water, they used to abandon the hole and move to the next. Osho says Rumi wanted to show his disciples how impatience is idiotic. Had these people put all the energy into digging a single hole, they were bound to find water. He was telling his disciples – put your total energy, your total trust arrowed towards one goal. When the Master is with you, who has travelled the path, up and down many times, don’t feel dejected or impatient, don’t start new projects again and again. That way nobody has ever been able to find anything.

BELOVED OSHO,

CAN YOU PLEASE COMMENT ON THIS BEAUTIFUL POEM BY RUMI WHICH I LOVE SO MUCH: “OUTSIDE, THE FREEZING DESERT NIGHT. THIS OTHER NIGHT INSIDE GROWS WARM, KINDLING. LET THE LANDSCAPE BE COVERED WITH THORNY CRUST. WE HAVE A SOFT GARDEN IN HERE. THE CONTINENTS BLASTED, CITIES AND LITTLE TOWNS, EVERYTHING BECOMES A SCORCHED BLACKENED BALL. THE NEWS WE HEAR IS FULL OF GRIEF FOR THAT FUTURE. BUT THE REAL NEWS INSIDE HERE IS THERE’S NO NEWS AT ALL.”

Devaprem, the poem by Mevlana Jalaluddin Rumi is beautiful, as always. He has spoken only beautiful words. He is one of the most significant poets who are also mystics. That is a rare combination; there are millions of poets in the world and there are a few mystics in the world, but a man who is both is very rare to find. Rumi is a very rare flower. He is as great a poet as he is a mystic. Hence, his poetry is not just poetry, not just a beautiful arrangement of words. It contains immense meaning and points towards the ultimate truth. It is not entertainment, it is enlightenment. He is saying, OUTSIDE, THE FREEZING DESERT NIGHT. THIS OTHER NIGHT INSIDE GROWS WARM, KINDLING. The outside is not the real space for you to be. Outside, you are a foreigner: inside, you are at home. Outside, it is a freezing desert night. Inside, it is warm, kindling, cozy. But very few are fortunate enough to move from the outside to the inside. They have completely forgotten that they have a home within themselves; they are searching for it but they are searching in the wrong place. They search for their whole lives but always outside; they never stop for a moment and look inwards.

LET THE LANDSCAPE BE COVERED WITH THORNY CRUST. WE HAVE A SOFT GARDEN IN HERE. Don’t be worried about what happens on the outside. Inside, there is always a garden ready to welcome you. 

THE CONTINENTS BLASTED, CITIES AND LITTLE TOWNS, EVERYTHING BECOMES A SCORCHED, BLACKENED BALL. THE NEWS WE HEAR IS FULL OF GRIEF FOR THAT FUTURE.

These words of Rumi are more significant, meaningful, today, than they were when he wrote them. He wrote them seven hundred years ago, but today it is not only a symbolic thing, it is going to become the reality.

 THE CONTINENTS BLASTED, CITIES AND LITTLE TOWNS, EVERYTHING BECOMES A SCORCHED BLACKENED BALL. THE NEWS WE HEAR IS FULL OF GRIEF FOR THAT FUTURE. BUT THE REAL NEWS INSIDE HERE IS THERE’S NO NEWS AT ALL.

This last sentence depends on an ancient saying which says: No news is good news. I was born in a very small village where the postman used to come only once a week. And people were afraid that he may be bringing a letter for them; they were happy when they found that there was no letter. Once in a while, there was a telegram for someone. Just the rumor that somebody had received a telegram was such a shock in the whole village that everybody would gather there — and only one man was educated enough to read. Everybody was afraid: A telegram? That means some bad news. Otherwise, why should you waste money on a telegram? I learned from my very childhood that no news is good news. People were happy when they received no news from their relatives, from their friends or from anybody. That meant everything was going well.

Rumi is saying: THE NEWS WE HEAR IS FULL OF GRIEF FOR THE FUTURE. BUT THE REAL NEWS INSIDE, IS THERE’S NO NEWS AT ALL.

Everything is silent and everything is as beautiful, peaceful, blissful as it has always been. There is no change at all; hence, there is no news. Inside it is an eternal ecstasy, forever and forever. I will repeat again that these lines may become true in your lifetime. Before that happens, you must reach within yourself where no news has ever happened, where everything is eternally the same, where the spring never comes and goes but always remains; where flowers have been from the very beginning — if there was any beginning — and are going to remain to the very end, if there is going to be any end. In fact, there is no beginning and no end, and the garden is lush, green, and full of flowers. Before the outside world is destroyed by your politicians, enter into your inner world. That’s the only safety left, the only shelter against nuclear weapons, against global suicide, against all these idiots who have so much power to destroy. You can at least save yourself. I was hopeful, but as the days have passed and I have become more and more acquainted with the stupidity of man… I still hope but just out of old habit; really my heart has accepted the fact that only a few people can be saved. The whole of humanity is determined to destroy itself.

And these are the people… if you tell them how they can be saved, they will crucify you. They will stone you to death. Going around the world, I still laugh, but there is a subtle sadness in it. I still dance with you but it is no longer with the same enthusiasm as it was ten years ago. It seems that the higher powers of consciousness are helpless against the lower and ugly powers of politicians. The higher is always fragile, like a roseflower; you can destroy it with a stone. That does not mean that the stone becomes higher than the roseflower; it simply means the stone is unconscious of what it is doing.

The crowds are unconscious of what they are doing, and the politicians belong to the crowd. They are their representatives. And when blind people are leading other blind people, it is almost impossible to wake them up; because the question is not only that they are asleep — they are blind too. There is not time enough to cure their eyes. There is time enough to wake them but not enough time to cure their eyes. So now I have confined myself completely to my own people. That is my world, because I know those who are with me may be asleep, but they are not blind. They can be awakened.

Source:

Listen to complete discourse at mentioned below link.

Discourse Series: The Hidden Splendor Chapter #7

Chapter title: Preparing for the last world war

15 March 1987 pm in Chuang Tzu Auditorium

References:

Osho has spoken on Sufi Masters and Mystics Al-Hillaj-Mansoor, Dadu, Farid, Junnaid, Rabiya Al Adabiya, Jalaladdin Rumi, Sarmad and many more in His discourses. Some of these can be referred to in the following books/discourses:

1. Be Still and Know
2. Come Come Yet Again Come
3. The Hidden Splendour
4. Beyond Enlightenment
5. The New Dawn
6. The Sword and The Lotus
7. The Wild Geese and The Water
8. And the Flowers Showered
9. Get Out of Your Own Way
10. The Razor’s Edge
11. The Revolution
12. Socrates Poisoned Again After 25 Centuries
13. The Secret