Sunday, December 17, 2017 was the 844th anniversary of the death of Jalal ad-Din Muhammad Rumi, known to most people in the west as Rumi. I missed the opportunity to celebrate the 800th anniversary of his birth in 2006.
Why should I fear? When was I less by dying?
Rumi was so many things in life. For me, saying Rumi is a poet is like saying Mount Everest is a hill. I believe one day students in the west will study Rumi’s poetry the way Shakespeare is studied today. But I consider Rumi to be much more than a poet. I consider him to be one of the few who attained to what the New Message from God calls Knowledge. Knowledge is the deeper spiritual intelligence that God has placed in each person. Rumi is someone who accomplished what I am trying to accomplish in my study of the book Steps to Knowledge. It may take some work.
Why should I fear? When was I less by dying? The particular translation I am sharing is by the British scholar Arthur John Arberry (1905-1969). He was one of the first scholars to translate Rumi into English. I consider this translation to be direct and to the point. There is so much that could be said about this poem. I have nothing to say that is better than silence.
I died as a mineral and became a plant,
I died as plant and rose to animal,
I died as animal and I was Man.
Why should I fear? When was I less by dying?
Yet once more I shall die as Man, to soar
With angels blest; but even from angelhood
I must pass on: all except God doth perish.
When I have sacrificed my angel-soul,
I shall become what no mind e’er conceived.
Oh, let me not exist! for Non-existence
Proclaims in organ tones, ‘To Him we shall return.’
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