Original Ottoman Turkish Text

Metre: eleven-syllable syllabic metre

Hakk’ın cevherinden arşın yüzünden
Anda hasıl oldu güruhu Naci
Hak sana bir evlat dünya yemişi
Verince tatlıdır alınca acı
Değme arif bu sözümü bilemez
Yoğurmazdan evvel Cibril Ademi
Münkirler ne bilir ilmi Ademi
Ruhlardı Hak ile buluşan hacı
Arif arif ile gönül katmadan
Kırklar ayan olup sema tutmadan
Selman dahi ol Kırklar’a yetmeden
Ali idi Kırklar’daki duacı
Çekilip giderken Miraç yolunda
Rast gelip de sekiz uçmak elinde
Cennet evlerinde elma dalında
Fatma Ana idi dar çeken bacı
Ben günahkâr kulum söylerim Allah
Nur örtüsü kara donlu Beytullah
Körüğü gülbanktır çeken eyvallah
Andan hâsıl oldu Ali kılıcı
Gerçek erenlerin incedir yolu
Sen seni sanma ki divane deli
Yüz yirmi dört bin nebiden evveli
Fahri alem giydi ol nurdan tacı
Kul Himmet’im eder yeter bu sözün
Söyletme Hüseyin’im açıktır sözüm
Bir sağıma baktım bir sol omuzum
Kamile yakındır dünyanın ucu

In English

1. From the essence of God, from the face of the Throne, there the community of the saved came into being. God gives you a child, the fruit of the world; sweet when He gives it, bitter when He takes it.

2. Not every sage can know this word of mine. Before Gabriel kneaded Adam, what do the deniers know of Adam's knowledge; it was the souls who were the pilgrims meeting with God.

3. Before sage joined heart with sage, before the Forty appeared and stood for the sema, before even Selman reached the Forty, the one praying among the Forty was Ali.

4. As the Prophet went off on the road of the Ascension, the one he met at the hand of the eight paradises, on the apple branch in the houses of paradise, the sister who stood at the dar, was Mother Fatma.

5. I am a sinful servant, I say Allah; the veil of God's House is of light, a black garment. Its bellows is the gülbank, the one who draws it says "eyvallah"; from it came Ali's sword.

6. The road of the true saints is narrow; do not think yourself a madman, a fool. Before the hundred and twenty-four thousand prophets, the pride of the world wore that crown of light.

7. I, Kul Himmet, say: enough of your words; do not make me speak, my Hüseyin, my word is plain. I looked to my right, then to my left shoulder; to the perfected one the end of the world is near.

Literary and Historical Commentary

Structure of the Poem

In the pen-name quatrain the name "Kul Himmet'im" appears, and in the same quatrain someone else is addressed as "Hüseyin'im"; as to attribution, then, the deyiş stands apart. According to Işık the text is known as Kul Himmet's answer to Kul Hüseyin's question "Neden hâsıl oldu güruhu naci"; it is also thought to be Kul Himmet's own, but in Gaziler Ovacığı it is handed down as a deyiş of Kul Hüseyin. In the same article Işık notes the great historical distance between Kul Himmet, a poet of the sixteenth century, and Kul Hüseyin, who lived in the nineteenth, and adds that no relation of guide and disciple can be established between them. The seven quatrains are in the eleven-syllable syllabic metre, and in Işık's classification the poem is a nefes; the last lines meet on the sound "-cı, -ci": "Naci, acı, hacı, duacı, bacı, kılıcı, tacı, ucu". Three informants contributed to the text, among them Ali Yüksel of Keçiköy and Erdoğan Koç.

Meaning and Figures of Speech

This deyiş is an example of the question-and-answer exchange of Alevi poetry. The asking deyiş asks "why did the community of the saved come into being"; this one gives the answer: from the essence of God, from the face of the Throne. The answer rests on the creation narratives of Alevi belief: the souls meeting God before Adam, Ali praying in the assembly of the Forty before Selman, Mother Fatma standing at the dar in paradise on the road of the Ascension. The images of God's House, the gülbank and Ali's sword in the fifth quatrain are dense and veiled; the source gives no explanation and our rendering is approximate.

The last quatrain shows the conversation between the two poets plainly: "I, Kul Himmet, say: enough of your words; do not make me speak, my Hüseyin". Işık writes that answering such a deyiş with another means that words held to be sacred are renewed over time through response poems. The deyiş therefore stands in this category less as Kul Hüseyin's own word than as an answer sung in the region together with his question.

Bibliography

Online sources