Shannon Evans World Civilization Recitation

The Questions by Jalaloddin Rumi

Sufism is a sector of Islam that uses the concept of divine unification. Instead of waiting

until the afterlife to try and talk to God, they do many selfless things in their lifetime to try to

connect with him. The lifestyle of a Sufi seems challenging, as they have to try and stop any

actions that will benefit themselves. They work only towards one goal, to try and be in the

presence of the divine through purifying themselves of all bad traits, and thoughts. The

Questions by Jalaloddin Rumi is a mystical poem that shows the Sufi’s spirituality, and

perspectives.

The first stanza of the poem just says how the following stanzas will be a story. The first

sentence in the second stanza “God’s presence is there in front of me, a fir on the left a lovely

stream on the right.” represents two divinities. The two images contrast each other, but are in fact

one another. Fire is water, and water is fire. This relationship is there to confuse anyone who

isn’t connected with God. Stanza 2, line 11 says most people do not go towards the fire, because

they are afraid of it but by going in the stream, they end up in the fire anyway because it was the

opposite of what appeared. Lines 4-15 (The 2nd stanza) are tied together to show the fire, and

stream are opposites.

Then in Stanza 3, line 16 it begins to be more confusing to the decision makers. The fire

tells the truth, it says”I am not fire, I am a fountainhead .Come to me and don’t mind the sparks.

If you are a friend of God fire is your water.” The people might not believe the fire because it is

appearance looks exactly like flames, so only believers in God would trust the fire to say it is not.
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It then goes on to say how they should wish to be moths because moths are drawn to light, so if

they had moth senses they would be drawn to the fire. The second point of the 3 rd stanza starts

with line 28 it describes a trick a magician can perform, turning rice into worms, or providing a

floor full of scorpions where there were none before. The author says in line 32 that the

Magician’s magic is nothing in comparison to God’s. Human beings are foolish to compare their

powers to God.

Sufi’s believe God will always be able to defeat man and it’s as simple as that. They

believe by being close to God he will give them a second of wisdom, to make the right choice

between the fire and water.