Centuries ago, the Sufis, particularly poets, and primarily Mevlana Jalaluddin Mohamed Rumi, offered a universal interpretation of Love, placing it as the original seed of creation, a hidden power bringing all the elements of the Created Beings together, and keeping the cycle of life “alive”.

 

Love does speak itself out, no matter how hard one tends to conceal it.

“A man in love, no matter what he says; The smell of love wafts love-ward from his mouth” (1)

But what is love? One of the most difficult questions asked to mankind.

Beyond any labeling, it is that which is said to be driven by inside imploring to unite with the Beloved and the core value of all goods and the dynamo keeping humans going; the Elixir of life!

Centuries ago, the Sufis, particularly poets, and primarily Mevlana Jalaluddin Mohamed Rumi, offered a universal interpretation of Love, placing it as the original seed of creation, a hidden power bringing all the elements of the Created Beings together, and keeping the cycle of life “alive”.

Mevlana Rumi invented the school of descriptive ecstasies, highlighting the mysteries of love for all seasons of all kinds, referring to it as the core seed of this mysterious human quality as the vigor feeding the cycle of life, the pursuit of Union with the Beloved and the ‘wholeness’ between the Lover and the Beloved that creates this experience.

Nonetheless, raw Love remains unclearly defined, with an inclination once towards pain, and another towards ecstasy- It’s the grief and the pleasure banded together- the madness and the utter wisdom that only such exceptionally element of heart is able to harness.

It’s the mystic urge to rejoin the spirit of divinity that guided Rumi to explore Love within his own self, leading to the most sophisticated, yet the most illuminating of all explanations of this tender human-inherent “force”- Love.

“Were it not for the ocean of pure love

What reason would I have to forge the heavens?” (2)

Romantic love? Mystic love?

Rumi started the unique language of earthly love, put in his prose and poetry, affected largely by the language of wine poetry, that portrays the transcendental mystic encounter, in which the worshipper’s presence fades within his spiritual being in a pursuit for reunion with the Divne.

For Rumi, Love is the “Astrolabe of the divine mysteries”  (3)

The revered Persian poet’s elucidation of Love is based on the linkage between the soul and heart, creating a strong rush for the need of the Light of Love, and it does include the type of worldly or Romantic Love. It’s the kind of love which happens to be deprived of any impacts associated with Culture, Heritage or even Cult or Religion.

Since humanity was first created, and over the centuries, life encountered lovers and lovers… Those who met and those whose destiny stood in their way..

Those who happily lived together, and those who decided to separate. Lovers who were courageous enough to confess their feelings, and those who kept it for themselves… Lovers who made one another happy, and others who were a reason for many misfortunes in each others’ lives… Lovers and lovers whom across the centuries set new gist for love and those who marked the changes which cultures and civilizations carve in …

It’s a persisting call we’re continuously poised for and never tend to stop, for it’s indeed intrinsic in our genes.

Rumi’s interpretation, which some mistakenly limit it o Mystic Love, is more of an enlightenment of the natural make up of Love, the raw of such type of emotion. His construal of this feeling is void of any inclination to any ambitions or end.

It’s the type of Love we all long for and seek out in many ways, each according to his own “Hawa”, the Arabic word for proclivity. Love has been and will continue to be valued .. promoted by religions- within certain boundaries and frames- and definitely celebrated by humans as the sweet taste of life keeping us going through the most challenging times.

Whatever rationalization offered remains narrow, for the true meaning and magnitude of Love is locked up in our hearts, hard to put in human language and too massive to contain in phrasal description.

But simply put; it is and shall always be the raw and magnificent beauty of the heart, the original seed which was planted in mankind to desire, populate as well as Transcend to reach Divine Wisdom and embrace Faith.

True love shall always remain that which sends warm vibes to the connected, that which is intense, accepting and unending.. That which, when confessed, cures.

It’s the Platonic, Familial, Divine, and Obscure Love. It’s a seed that’s planted in different gardens, reaping varying fruits, depending on the soil.

Footnotes:

(1) Masnavi 1: 2880-82

(2) Masnavi 1: 110

(3) Masnavi 5: 2739

Wassalaam

Maha Youssuf