Original Arabic Text

Metre: not stated in the source

هاتيك رسالته على وفق سؤل
من امعن فيها يتلقى بقبول

Hātīke risāletuhū ‘alā vefḳi sü’l
Men em‘ane fīhā yetelaḳḳā bi-ḳabūl

يستعظم من الّفها ثم يقول
يا خير رسالة ويا خير رسول

Yesta‘ẓimu men ellefehā s̱umme yeḳūl
Yā ḫayra risāletin ve yā ḫayra resūl

In English

1. Here is his treatise; it is just as one would wish. Whoever studies it closely receives it with acceptance.

2. He holds its author in high esteem, and then he says: O best of treatises, O best of messengers. (In the last line "risāle" means both a written work and a message that is sent, and "resūl" the messenger who brings the message.)

Literary and Historical Commentary

Structure of the Poem

This is an Arabic rubai (quatrain) of four lines. All four lines rhyme on the sound "-ūl": sü’l, ḳabūl, yeḳūl, resūl. The word "sü’l" (wish, request) in the first line does not fit this sound exactly; it may have been lengthened when read at the end of the line. The poem appears only in Hüseyin Hüsâmeddin Yasar's Amasya Tarihi (History of Amasya), in the entry on Müeyyedzâde under the heading "Rubâî", and is given in Arabic script. Hüsameddin does not translate the quatrain. The Latin-script reading under the original text and the English rendering are both ours. The metre is not stated in the source. The fourth line fits "Mef‘ūlü Mefā‘ilün Mefā‘īlü Fe‘al", one of the ahreb patterns used in quatrains; for the other lines no firm scansion has been given, because of uncertainties in the Arabic pronunciation and in the spelling of the edition.

The edition contains two misprints. The word "risāle" in the fourth line is printed "رساتة"; since the meaning, the rhyme scheme and the metre require the reading "رسالة", the text is given in that form. In the word "ellefehā" (he composed it) in the third line, the shadda (doubling sign) is placed over the letter fa instead of lam; this too has been corrected. The other words are as printed in the edition.

Meaning and Figures of Speech

The quatrain is a takriz, a short piece that praises a book and recommends it to its readers. The first couplet introduces the treatise: the work is whatever one could wish for, and whoever reads it with care accepts it. The second couplet describes the reader: the one who reads the work holds its author in high regard and voices his admiration. The praise is thus spoken not directly by the poet but by someone who has read the work.

The last line holds the real conceit of the quatrain. In Arabic "risāle" means both a written work and a message sent; "resūl", from the same root, is the messenger who brings the message. The reader praises the work as "the best of treatises" and its author as "the best of messengers". Because the two words come from the same root, the line contains the figure of iştikak (derivation), and with the two calls of "yā ḫayra" a repetition (tekrir). The phrase "ḫayru resūl" (best of messengers) also recalls an epithet used for the Prophet in Islamic tradition; raising the praise this high is an instance of the hyperbole common in such endorsements. This last interpretation is ours; Hüsameddin makes no comment on the quatrain.

Historical Context

Hüsameddin tells how the quatrain came to be written. One of the scholars of the age wrote a treatise and, while Hacı Hasanzâde and Müeyyedzâde were both kazasker (chief military judge), asked them to sign it, that is, to write a few lines approving it. Müeyyedzâde honoured the treatise with his own handwriting and wrote this Arabic quatrain on it. Hüsameddin gives neither the title of the treatise nor the name of its author.

According to Hüsameddin and the TDV Encyclopaedia of Islam, Müeyyedzâde became kazasker of Anatolia in Rebîülevvel 907 (September 1501), and four years later, when the kazasker of Rumelia, Hacı Hasanzâde Muhyiddin Mehmed Efendi, died, he succeeded him as kazasker of Rumelia; Hüsameddin places this death at the beginning of the year 911 (1505). Since the years in which the two scholars held the office at the same time fall within this span, the quatrain was most probably written between 1501 and 1505. Just before the quatrain, Hüsameddin notes that Müeyyedzâde was a poet able to compose in Arabic, Persian and Turkish. His Turkish and Persian poems are preserved in the biographical anthologies (tezkire); this quatrain is the only example of his Arabic poetry that this collection has been able to find. The texts of the Arabic kasides he presented to Selim and to Prince Korkut are not given in the anthologies.

Bibliography

Online sources