A Treasury of Rumi Guidance on the Path of Wisdom and Unity

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A Treasury of Rumi Guidance on the Path of Wisdom and Unity

There are many sides to Jalal al-Din Rumi – scholar, preacher, saint, mystic, love poet, didactic poet, and spiritual master – but the version of him that became ‘the best-selling poet in North America’ lacks authenticity.

This new anthology of Rumi’s teachings is freshly translated and supplemented with commentaries, and also includes selected texts in Persian. The aim is to bring readers closer to his work's true, traditional meaning – and to the man himself as a great Islamic scholar, teacher and saint.

Besides illustrating the traditional basis of Rumi’s teachings, this Treasury displays his unique genius as one of the world’s greatest religious writers, whose voice speaks as clearly and compellingly today as in the 7th/13th century.

Everyone has, in their view, become my close friend but they have not sought out the secrets within me.’ Rumi

Other Tittles Included in the Treasury Series

A Treasury of Hadith: A Commentary on Nawawi's Selection of Prophetic Traditions
A Treasury of Sacred Maxims: A Commentary on Legal Principles
A Treasury of Rumi Guidance on the Path of Wisdom and Unity
A Treasury of Ghazali
A Treasury of Ibn Taymiyyah

About the Authors

About Dr. Muhammad Isa Waley

Dr. Muhammad Isa Waley is an editor, researcher, and translator. He worked for 45 years as curator of Persian and Turkish manuscripts and books, first at the British Museum and then at the British Library. His main research specializations are the verse and prose literature of Islamic spirituality, and Islamic manuscripts. The subject of his Ph.D. thesis was the Divan or lyric poems of Jalal al-Din Rumi. Dr Waley is a regular contributor to theMawlana Rumi Reviewand a member of its Editorial Board. His published translations include Al-Arba‘in (Chihil Kalima) of ‘Abd al-Rahman Jami, and Mawlid al-Barzanji: a Paean on the Blessed Prophet’s Birth..

Muhammad Isa Waley: Dr. Muhammad Isa Waley is Lead Curator for Persian and Turkish Collections at the British Library, London. His main research specialisations are the palaeography, codicology, illumination and cataloguing of Islamic manuscripts; and the classical verse and prose literature of Islamic spirituality.

Among the numerous works edited by Dr. Waley are Islamic Codicology: an Introduction to the Study of Manuscripts in Arabic Script; the English translation of Tafsir al-Jalalayn; several works by Sheikh Muhammad Mutawalli al-Sha’rawi; the Integrated Encyclopedia of Qur’an; and the Kitab al-Adhkar of Imam al-Nawawi.

About Mawlana Jalal al-Din al-Rumi

Mawlana Jalal al-Din al-Rumi (d. 672 h.) was a recognized scholar of the Hanafi school, as were his father, son, and grandson, all being jurists of the highest caliber, as well as an Imam of the science of self-purification (ihsan).

In his compendium of Hanafi scholars, Abu’l Wafa’ al-Qurshi (d. 696 h.) introduces him as someone “knowledgeable of the [Hanafi] school, possessing vast understanding of juridical matters, thoroughly knowledgeable of juridical differences and other types of sciences.” [Jawahir al-Mudiyya]

Similarly, Ibn Qutlubugha (d. 879 h.), the great Hanafi jurist, stated in his Taj al-Tarajim after mentioning Mawlana Rumi’s lineage back to our liege=lord Abu Bakr (Allah be well pleased with him) that “he was knowledgeable of the legal schools, differences of opinion, and various types of sciences… and he composed many lines of poetry.”

On account of his mastery of the Islamic sciences, he was given the duty of teaching after the death of his father in the city of Konya (in modern day Turkey). He continued the task of instructing students in the outward sciences until his meeting with Shams al-Tabriz.

Perhaps more noteworthy than all of the above are the biographical notices on his son, Baha’ al-Din Ahmad, who was described in Ibn Hajar `Asqalani’s Durar al-Kamina as, “one of the Imams of the Hanafi Masters, brilliant, ascetic, pious, a jurist, scholar of legal methodology (usul), and grammarian…” and by al-Qurshi in his Jawahir as an “Imam… who followed his father in leaving the world behind.”

The reason why these notices on his son are significant is because he was one of the standard-bearers of his father, both in the outward and inward sciences. This is so much so that the foundations of the Mevlevi order are often stated to have been laid by Baha’ al-Din Ahmad and he, like his father, composed an array of Persian poetry.

All of this goes to show that Mawlana Jalal al-Din was nothing but an orthodox Sunni scholar who not only mastered the outward sciences but actualized the inward as well. May Allah be well-pleaed with him and those who followed him.