Original Ottoman Turkish Text
Metre: eleven-syllable syllabic metre
Kerem Allah Ali cümlenin canı
Bir kimsenin aslı zatı pak ister
Murtaza Mustafa şefaat kanı
Gerçeğin kelamı sözü Hak ister
Hakk’ı bilen doğru gider şahına
Talip pire pir sultana çağıra
Ses işitmez işmar ister sağıra
Haber basıp anlamaya sak ister
Saklar bu cihanı duygulu gezer
Üslupla usulle saygılı gezer
Mahlûk şu cihanda uykulu gezer
Gönlü sultan kabiliyet pak ister
Paki dinden tuttuğumuz tapuyu
Muhammed Ali’den açtık kapıyı
Bir gönül’e iki yapmam yapıyı
İkisi sığamaz teke tek ister
Kul Hüseyin’im gezsen nice bin tekke
Aşk etti doluyu nüş eder sakka
Sendedir Kâbe’yi Beytullah tekke
Kutuplar kelamı yeke yek ister
In English
1. Ali, honoured by God, is the soul of all; a person's root and essence must be pure. Murtaza and Mustafa are the mine of intercession; the word and speech of the true one must be the Truth.
2. Whoever knows God goes straight to his Shah; the seeker calls to the pir, the pir to the sultan. The deaf man does not hear a sound, he needs a sign of the brow and eye; to understand the news one must be awake.
3. He keeps this world hidden and goes about with feeling; he goes about with manner, with method, with respect. The people go about this world asleep; the sultan of the heart requires a pure capacity.
4. With the title deed we hold from the pure faith we opened the door through Muhammad and Ali. I do not raise two buildings in one heart; two cannot fit, the heart requires one alone.
5. I am Kul Hüseyin; though you wander through many thousand lodges, love offers the cup and the water-carrier drinks. The Kaaba, God's House, the lodge are in you; the word of the poles requires being one.
Literary and Historical Commentary
Structure of the Poem
Every quatrain of the nefes rests on the redif "ister" (requires): in the first quatrain lines two and four end "pak ister, Hak ister" (requires purity, requires the Truth), and the last lines of the later quatrains close on "sak ister, pak ister, tek ister, yek ister". In the first three lines the rhyme runs: "şahına, çağıra, sağıra", "gezer, gezer, gezer", "tapuyu, kapıyı, yapıyı", "tekke, sakka, tekke". Işık classes the five quatrains, in the eleven-syllable syllabic metre, as a nefes. In the last stanza the pen name (mahlas) takes the form "Kul Hüseyin'im". The text was collected from the account of Erdoğan Koç; Işık also cites pages 191-192 of Ali Cem Akbulut's book and glosses "işmar" as signalling with the brow and eye.
Meaning and Figures of Speech
The nefes describes the order of teaching on the Alevi-Bektashi path. The seeker is bound to the pir, the pir to the sultan; whoever knows God goes straight to his Shah. In the second quatrain the deaf man who does not hear a sound and needs a sign is a likeness expressing that the knowledge of the path is passed on not to everyone by speech but to those fit for it by signs; being "sak", awake, is the condition for understanding this knowledge. The third quatrain compares the sage with ordinary people: the sage goes about with method and respect, with feeling; the people wander through the world asleep.
The fourth quatrain expresses the idea of unity through a building likeness ordinary people would understand: two buildings cannot fit in one heart, the heart must be given to a single love. The last quatrain sets wandering through many thousand lodges against the thought that the Kaaba, God's House and the lodge are in the person himself. Işık writes that Kul Hüseyin gave people important counsel towards understanding themselves with words such as "you seek the qibla, the qibla is in you"; this quatrain is another expression of the same thought.
Bibliography
- Caner Işık, "Gaziler Ovacığı'ndan Bir Eren; Kul Hüseyin'in Hayatı ve Deyişleri", Alevilik Araştırmaları Dergisi, no. 6, 2013, pp. 67-124 (deyiş no. 15, p. 84; comment pp. 74-75). https://isamveri.org/pdfdrg/D04118/2013_6/2013_6_ISIKC.pdf
- Ali Cem Akbulut, Gazilerovacığı Âşıkları, İstanbul: KaraMavi Yayınları, 2010, pp. 191-192 (as cited in Işık 2013).
Online sources
