Original Ottoman Turkish Text

Metre: eleven-syllable syllabic metre

Gel hey hace bize ilmini satma
Hak mihman olduğu yeri bildin mi?
El ayıbın görüp günaha batma
Felek dolabında zarı bildin mi?
Evvel kapı şeriattır girerler
Tarikatta gonca güller dererler
Canlar menziline anda ererler
Acep menziline erebildin mi?
Şeriat dildedir tarikat canda
Gönül dost evinde mihmandır anda
Bunca velilerin mekânı kanda
Hakikat elinde seyri bildin mi?
Kul Hüseyn’im kemter nedir çaresi
Ne kadardır arşin kürsün arası
Uyumuşken yüreğimin yarası
Ey hace sızlattın sarabildin mi?

In English

1. Come, hey hoca, do not sell us your learning; do you know the place where God is a guest. Do not sink into sin by seeing another's fault; do you know the dice in fate's wheel.

2. The first door is the law, through it they enter; in the order they gather rosebuds. There the souls reach their stopping place; I wonder, could you reach your stopping place.

3. The law is on the tongue, the order in the soul; there the heart is a guest in the house of the Friend. Where is the dwelling of so many saints; do you know the journey in the hand of truth.

4. I, Kul Hüseyin, am a humble servant; what is the remedy, how far is it between the Throne and the Seat. While the wound of my heart was asleep, O hoca, you made it ache; could you bind it.

Literary and Historical Commentary

Structure of the Poem

The even-numbered lines of the four quatrains end, like an examiner's questions, on the redif "bildin mi" or "-ebildin mi" (do you know, could you): "yeri bildin mi, zarı bildin mi, erebildin mi, seyri bildin mi, sarabildin mi". Işık classes the text as a nasihatname and a güzelleme. The first and third lines rhyme with each other ("satma, batma", "girerler, dererler, ererler", "canda, anda, kanda", "çaresi, arası, yarası"). The metre is the eleven-syllable syllabic measure; the pen name (mahlas) "Kul Hüseyn'im" shows in the last stanza. The text was collected from Âşık Cafer Aydoğdu, Erdoğan Koç and Halil Sezgin. The article glosses "hace" as a man of religion with book learning, a hoca.

Meaning and Figures of Speech

Işık quotes the first quatrain of this deyiş when describing Kul Hüseyin's life and gives it as an example of the disputes with the ulema of the period. According to Işık, with these lines the poet says that the zealot does not know the truth that God is a guest in the heart of the perfected human being; he points out that the matters he himself is concerned with are a size too large for the other, and counsels him to try to understand before judging. "Do not sell your learning" is a warning against marketing knowledge learned from books like a commodity.

The second and third quatrains list the four gates of the Alevi-Bektashi path: the first door is the law, in the order rosebuds are gathered, the stopping place is reached, the journey in the hand of truth is known. The line "the law is on the tongue, the order in the soul" gives the difference between the two gates in a short formula: one remains in words, the other is lived from the soul. In the last quatrain the poet reproaches the hoca: he has made the sleeping wound of the heart ache, but can he bind it. This question recalls that criticism wounds when it springs from a judgement without understanding.

Bibliography

Online sources