Original Ottoman Turkish Text

Metre: eight-syllable syllabic metre

İnsan azdı daha azar
İllallahi ve sabirin
Düşmeye kuyular kazar
İllallahi ve sabirin
Edep kalktı hayâ kalktı
İnsan birbirinden bıktı
Şeririn yüzüne çıktı
İllallahi ve sabirin
Edep dedikleri perde
Oda kalmadı her yerde
Kaldık bozda boz dumanda
İllallahi ve sabirin
Sabır muratlar verici
Gayet keskindir kılıcı
Hem bilici hem görücü
İllallahi ve sabirin
Hüseyin’im serden geçti
Kaçamadan virdi şaştı
Mahlûk birbirine düştü
İllallahi ve sabirin

In English

1. Man has run wild and will run wilder; he digs pits for others to fall in. İllallahi ve sabirin.

2. Manners have gone, modesty has gone; people have grown weary of one another; the wicked has come to the surface. İllallahi ve sabirin.

3. The curtain they call manners no longer remains anywhere; we are left in the grey steppe, in grey smoke. İllallahi ve sabirin.

4. Patience grants wishes; its sword is very sharp; God both knows and sees. İllallahi ve sabirin.

5. My Hüseyin has given up his head; unable to flee, his litany faltered; the people have fallen upon one another. İllallahi ve sabirin.

Literary and Historical Commentary

Structure of the Poem

The refrain looks like a popular form of an Arabic phrase: each of the five quatrains ends "İllallahi ve sabirin", and in the first quatrain the words also appear in the second line. "Sabirin" means those who are patient and recalls the Qur'anic phrase "God is with those who are patient"; the source does not make this connection, it is our own reading. In the first three lines the rhyme runs: "azar, kazar", "kalktı, bıktı, çıktı", "perde, yerde, dumanda", "verici, kılıcı, görücü", "geçti, şaştı, düştü". The lines have eight syllables; Işık counts the text as a nefes. In the last quatrain the poet says only "Hüseyin'im" (his pen name, or mahlas). The text was collected from Halil Sezgin.

Meaning and Figures of Speech

The poem draws a picture of a corrupt age and counsels patience against it. Man has run wild and will run wilder; people dig pits for one another, manners and modesty have gone, they have grown weary of one another, the wicked has come to the surface. The image of "the curtain they call manners" in the third quatrain sees manners as a veil that protects the relations between people; when that curtain is lifted man loses his way in the grey smoke of the steppe. Edep, manners, is among the basic concepts of Alevi-Bektashi ethics, summed up in the principle of "mastering one's hand, tongue and loins".

The fourth quatrain sets patience against this darkness: patience grants wishes, its sword is sharp, for God knows and sees all things. The refrain recalls the same refuge in every quatrain. In the closing quatrain the poet speaks of himself: he has given up his head, has faltered unable to flee, and has seen the people fall upon one another. The short lines and the repeated refrain give the deyiş a structure suited to recitation like a dhikr.

Bibliography

Online sources