Original Ottoman Turkish Text

Metre: Mefʿūlü fāʿilātü mefāʿīlü fāʿīlün

Feyżü’l-vücūd kim ʿurefādır şarāb aña
Yer yer ḥabābdır küre-i bī-hisāb aña
Bilmem ne şīşedir olan ol bāde-yi muḥīṭ
Virmez bu rütbe cūş u ḫurūş ıżṭırāb aña
Nūş eyleyen o meyden olur mest-i raḳŝ ider
Geçdikce neşʾe devr virür inḳılāb aña
Şeyḫim egerçi maẓhar-ı feyżü’l-vücūdsun
Billāhi nice maẓhar-ı kāmil şebāb aña
Mā fiʾl-vücūdi ebdaʿu min ẕalikeʾl-vücūd
Tefsīr içün bu nükteyi ʿālem kitāb aña
Bir devḥadır ki anda açar ŝad hezār gül
Hep başḳa başḳa renk virür āb u tāb aña
Benzer cihān meżāhir-i dil-ber yanaġına
Baḳtıkca ʿārıż olmada rengīn ḥicāb aña
Her nerde olsa feyż bulur müsteʾid olan
Allāh nümūn olur ḳamer ü āfitāb aña
Bilmez ḫudāyı maẓhar-ı maḫūṣa münḫaṣır
ʿĀrif ki her cihetden olur fetḥ-i bāb aña
Cūdī şu yem-i ṭaḳayyüd ü ıtlāḳı añdırır
Ŝābit midir ḥudūŝ u nigāriş bir āb aña

In English

1. The bounty of being, which is the wine of the knowers of God; the countless spheres (heavenly bodies) are its bubbles here and there.

2. I do not know what flask holds that all-embracing wine; an ordinary flask could not give it such surging, seething and agitation.

3. Whoever drinks of that wine grows drunk and dances; as joy goes round, the turning of time brings it change.

4. My sheikh, it is true that you are a place where the bounty of being appears; but by God, youth is many a time a more perfect mirror of it.

5. (Arabic) There is nothing in being more wondrous than this being; to explain this subtle point the world is a book for it.

6. (Being) is a great tree on which a hundred thousand roses bloom; water and lustre give it ever-changing colours.

7. The world is like the cheek of the beloved of manifestations; the more one looks, the more a coloured shyness, a blush, comes over it.

8. Whoever is receptive finds bounty wherever he is; the moon and the sun become for him examples that show God.

9. The knower of God does not think God confined to one particular place of manifestation; for a door opens to him from every side.

10. Cûdî, this being recalls the sea of the bound and the absolute; are the things that come to be and the patterns (the waves) fixed in it, like the face of the water? (The sense of the last line is not entirely clear.)

Literary and Historical Commentary

The Wine of Being

This untitled ghazal of ten couplets expresses, through the images of wine and sea, the idea of the unity of being (vahdet-i vücûd) that appears often in Cûdî's divan. Şarâb, hisâb, ıztırâb, inkılâb, şebâb, kitâb, tâb, hicâb, âfitâb, bâb: the first of the rhymes before the redif (refrain word) "aña" (to it) is wine, and every image of the ghazal grows from it. In the opening couplet the wine of the knowers of God is the bounty overflowing from being itself, and the countless spheres in the sky are the bubbles on the face of this wine. This image, matching the foam overflowing the cup with the planets, carries the old tavern motif to the scale of a new cosmology.

The fourth couplet adds a light touch of rindlik (the free-spirited stance of the tavern poet) to the poem. The sheikh is a place where the bounty of being appears, there is no objection to that; but the poet swears that youth is a more perfect mirror of this bounty. The Arabic line in the fifth couplet expresses a thought that recalls the saying attributed to al-Ghazâlî, "there is nothing in possibility more beautiful than what is": there is nothing in being more wondrous than this being, and the world is a book explaining this subtle point.

The later couplets of the ghazal spread the divine manifestation everywhere. Whoever is receptive finds bounty wherever he is, and the moon and sun show him God; the knower does not confine God to a single place of manifestation, for a door opens to him from every side. The last couplet recalls the relation between sea and wave: being is a sea in which the bound and the absolute are found together, and the forms that come to be are passing, like patterns on the face of the water. The line as the thesis reads it seems to support this view, but its sense never becomes certain.

Bibliography

  • Havva Tok Yıldız, Merzifonlu İbrâhîm Cûdî Dîvânı (İnceleme-Metin-Sözlük) [1b-43a], Master's thesis, Ondokuz Mayıs University, Samsun 2017, pp. 23-24 (poem no. 11; manuscript fol. 5b). http://libra.omu.edu.tr/tezler/116853.pdf

Online sources