Original Ottoman Turkish Text

Metre: Fā‘ilātün Fā‘ilātün Fā‘ilātün Fā‘ilün

İy cemālüñ tābişinden nūr-ı cennet muḳtebes
V’ey celālüñ sūzişinden nār-ı dūzaḫ bir ḳabes
Ḳudretüñ ṣaḥrāsınuñ kim püştesidür kūh-ı Ḳāf
Raḥmetüñ deryāsınuñ kim ḳaṭresi Nīl ü Aras
Nice irişsün feżā-yı künhüñe güncişk-i ‘aḳl
Ol feżāda görinür sīmurġ bir ednā meges
Varamaz çābük-süvār-ı ‘aḳl ṣun‘uñ rāhına
Her ne deñlü olsa altında anuñ çābük-feres
Açamaz evc-i feżā-yı ḳudretüñde bāl ü per
Murġ-ı evhām u ḫayāl olur giriftār-ı ḳafes
Ḳudretüñ rāhında oldı kārbān-ı ‘aḳl kem
Gūş-ı cāne andan irmez hīç āvāz-ı ceres
Reh-rev-i inkār olur efkār iremez menzile
Ḳudretüñ ṣaḥrāsına pāyān bulımaz hīç-kes
Bu durur ben bildügüm ġāyet de bilmezlik ider
‘İlmüñi ma‘lūm idinmek eyleye her kim heves
Gül gibi gül-zār-ı ‘ālem ḫurrem olmazdı eger
İtmeseydi terbiyet luṭfuñ nesīmi bir nefes
Her ne cān kim cām-ı ‘ışḳuñdan senüñ ser-mest ola
Kelb-i nefs-i ẓālim aña olımaz hergiz ‘ases
Ger ide mihr-i ‘aṭāñ u āb-ı luṭfuñ terbiyet
Tāze vü ter ḳırmızı güller bitüre ḫār u ḫas
İltimāsı ‘ālemüñ der-gāh-ı luṭfuñdan durur
İy ki elṭāf-ı laṭīfüñ ins ü cāne mültemes
Sen şu sulṭānsın dilerseñ ḳullaruñuñ her zemān
Eñ kemin idüp eḫaṣṣ eñ ḫāṣın eylersin eḫas
Süfre-i luṭfuñdan oldı sīr mecmū‘-ı nüfūs
Buldı Ādem dāne andan hem Ḫalīlu’llāh ‘ades
Sen şu Bāḳī’sin ki hergiz saña olmaz fevḳ ü taḫt
Sen şu sulṭānsın ki hergiz saña yoḳdur pīş ü pes
Çün degüldür aña lāyıḳ ḥamd-i maḳdūr-ı beşer
‘Aczüñi ‘arż itmek iy Fażlī hemānā ola bes
Çekse elmās-ı süḫandan tīġ hergiz bulmaya
Fetḥ-i milk-i ḥamdın anuñ hīçbir kes sözi kes

In English

1. O God, from the radiance of whose beauty the light of paradise is borrowed, and of the burning of whose majesty the fire of hell is but a spark.

2. Mount Kaf is a hillock in the desert of Your power, the Nile and the Aras a drop of the sea of Your mercy. (Mount Kaf is the legendary mountain believed to encircle the world.)

3. How should the sparrow of reason reach the expanse of comprehending Your essence? In that expanse even the Simurgh appears as the meanest fly. (The Simurgh is the great legendary bird believed to live on Mount Kaf.)

4. The nimble rider of reason, however nimble the horse beneath him, cannot reach the road of Your creation.

5. The bird of fancy and imagination cannot spread its wings at the summit of the expanse of Your power; it becomes a prisoner of the cage.

6. The caravan of reason was lost on the road of Your power; not even the sound of its bell reaches the ear of the soul.

7. Thoughts become travellers on the road of denial and cannot reach the station; no one finds the end of the desert of Your power.

8. This is what I know: whoever longs to count Your knowledge as something known commits the utmost ignorance.

9. Had the breeze of Your grace not nurtured it for even a breath, the rose garden of the world would not have bloomed and rejoiced like a rose.

10. Over every soul drunk from the cup of Your love, the dog of the tyrannical self can never stand watch.

11. Were the sun of Your bounty and the water of Your grace to nurture them, even thorns and rubbish would put forth fresh red roses.

12. All the world's desire is from the gate of Your grace; O God, whose subtle kindnesses are sought by men and souls.

13. You are such a sultan that, if You will, You make the lowest of Your servants the most elect at any moment, and the most elect the lowest.

14. All living beings have eaten their fill at the table of Your grace; Adam found the grain of wheat there, and Abraham, the Friend of God, the lentil.

15. You are such an Eternal One, that is, a being without end, that for You there is no above and below; such a sultan that for You there is no before and behind.

16. Since praise within the power of man is not worthy of Him, Fazlî, it is enough for you to confess your helplessness.

17. Even if one drew a sword from the diamond of speech, no one could conquer the realm of His praise; cut short your words. (In the line the sound "kes" is used both for "anyone" and for "cut".)

Literary and Historical Commentary

Structure of the Poem

The poem is a kaside (qasida) of seventeen couplets (beyit). The metre is the "fā‘ilātün fā‘ilātün fā‘ilātün fā‘ilün" pattern of the remel family; the rhyme is the sound "-es": muḳtebes, ḳabes, Aras, meges, feres, ḳafes, ceres, hīç-kes and the same sound in the following couplets. This rhyme, rare in Turkish, required the poet to draw on a wide range of Arabic and Persian words. The pen name (mahlas) appears in couplet 16. The kaside belongs to the tevhid genre, which expresses the unity and greatness of God; divans traditionally open with a tevhid, and Mustafa Özkat too begins the divan he compiled with this kaside. To whom and when the poem was presented is not known; as a religious kaside it was not presented to a particular person.

The poem is found in two miscellanies: without a title in no. 314 of the Âşir Efendi collection of the Süleymaniye Library (fol. 82b), and with the title "Ḳaṣīde-i Fażlī fi't-tevḥīd" in no. 1966 of the Revan collection of the Topkapı Palace Museum Library (fol. 137a). There are small differences between the copies; for example, "fevḳ ü taḫt" (above and below) and "pīş ü pes" (before and behind) in couplet 15 have changed places in the Süleymaniye copy, and instead of "‘ilmüñi" in couplet 8 the Revan copy reads "ẕātuñı".

Meaning and Figures of Speech

Özkat notes that in this tevhid Fazlî expresses the greatness of the Creator with all His attributes. The first half of the kaside is built on the idea that reason is incapable of grasping the essence of God. The poet conveys this through a series of images of journeys and birds: reason is a sparrow, and in God's expanse even the Simurgh is as small as a fly; reason is a rider who, however nimble his horse, cannot reach the road of creation; the bird of fancy and imagination falls into a cage; the caravan of reason is lost and not even its bell is heard. This is a chain of similes working one idea through a succession of different comparisons. The conclusion is stated in the eighth couplet: whoever thinks he knows God's knowledge commits the greatest ignorance.

The first couplet opens with apostrophe (nida), and Özkat gives it as an example of this figure: God, addressed with "İy... v'ey...", is the being from whose beauty the light of paradise and from whose majesty the fire of hell are taken. An antithesis is built between "cemāl" (beauty) and "celāl" (majesty), and between "nūr-ı cennet" and "nār-ı dūzaḫ". In the second couplet Mount Kaf, the Nile and the Aras are made small to show the greatness of power and mercy; Özkat quotes this couplet as an example from the poet's tevhid. In couplet 13 there is a pun (cinas) between "eḫaṣṣ" (most elect) and "eḫas" (lowest). In couplet 14 the wheat that Adam ate in paradise and the lentil associated with Abraham are named as the blessings of God's table of grace. In the expressions "hīçbir kes" and "sözi kes" in the last couplet, the same sound is used in two different senses, and the kaside closes with a pun.

Bibliography

  • Mustafa Özkat, Kara Fazlî'nin Hayatı, Eserleri, Edebî Kişiliği ve Dîvânı (İnceleme-Tenkitli Metin), MA thesis, Marmara University Institute of Turkic Studies, Istanbul 2005, pp. 128-129, kaside no. 1 (Süleymaniye Library, Âşir Efendi 314, fol. 82b; Topkapı Palace Museum Library, Revan 1966, fol. 137a); also p. 48 (on the kasides), p. 74 (religious poems) and p. 86 (figures of speech), https://katalog.marmara.edu.tr/veriler/yordambt/cokluortam/5E/T0051713.pdf.
  • Hasan Aksoy, "Kara Fazlî", TDV İslâm Ansiklopedisi, vol. 24, Istanbul 2001, pp. 360-361, https://islamansiklopedisi.org.tr/kara-fazli.

Online sources