Original Ottoman Turkish Text

Metre: Mefāʿilün feʿilātün mefāʿilün feʿilün

Nedir bu kevkebe-i kevn-i muʿcizāt-şumūl
Taḥayyür-efken-i uʿyūn veleh-fezā-yı ʿuḳūl
Niẓām-bend-i ezel ḥükm-i lā-yeteġayyer
Ṭulūʿ-ı ġayr-ı irādī vü iltimāʿ u ufūl
İder ḳavāfil-i ẕerrāt-ı deşt-i hestīde
Hemān iyāb u ẕehāb, dirān-ı rücūʾ u ḳufūl
Miŝāl-i berḳ-i nümāyān olur geçer her şey
Ḳarar-ı ġayr-i muḳaddir, ŝebāt-ı bī-medlūl
Meʾād u mebdeʾ-i ʿayniyyetinde ŝābitdir
Vuṣūl-i mebdeʾ-i firḳat, firāḳ-ı bedʾa-ı vuṣūl
Zamān-ı süyūl kef-efşān esraʿüʾl-cereyān
Fesād-ı köhne ṣuver ḥālet-i ḥabāb-ı süyūl
Miyān-ı silsile peydā nihāyetini nihān
Hezār-ı cünbiş-i meşhūd, menşeʿ-i mechūl
Tekevvünāt-ı müselsel, ḥudūŝ-ı pey-der-pey
Tecelliyāt-ı dem-ā-dem taʿayyün-i mevṣūl
Terekkubāt-ı cevāhir teḥavvül-i aʿrāż
Taḥallilāt-ı terākīb ü inbisāṭ-ı uṣūl
Bu baḥr-ı aʿẓamıñ īcāb-ı medd ü cezr-i ruḫı
Hemīşe ẓāhir olur defʿ ü ceẕb vird ü ḳabūl
Fecelle men ḫaleḳaʾl-ʿāleme ve ṣarafahu
Feküllü ẕalike minhu bedā, ileyhi yeʾūl

In English

1. What is this splendour of being that embraces miracles? It casts wonder on the eyes and adds to the bewilderment of minds.

2. The binding order of eternity, an unchanging decree; a rising not of its own will, a shining and a setting.

3. The caravans of motes in the desert of being come and go without pause, making the round of return and homecoming.

4. Everything appears like lightning and passes; its stay is not ordained, its constancy without proof.

5. (All) is fixed in the sameness of the place of return and the beginning: union is the beginning of separation, separation the beginning of union.

6. Time is a torrent that scatters foam and flows with the greatest speed; the decay of old forms is the state of the torrent's bubbles.

7. The middle of the chain is visible, its two ends hidden; a thousand stirrings are seen, their source unknown.

8. Chained comings-into-being, occurrences one after another; manifestations moment by moment, determinations joined one to the next.

9. The combining of substances, the changing of accidents; the dissolving of compounds and the unfolding of principles.

10. By the ebb and flow of the spirit of this greatest sea, pushing and pulling, coming and going, and acceptance are ever seen.

11. (Arabic) Exalted is He who created the world and turns it about; all of this began from Him and returns to Him.

Literary and Historical Commentary

The second part of the series leaves the moral questions of the first and looks at the workings of the universe, voicing bewilderment this time in the language of natural philosophy. Most of the couplets are lists without verbs, built of noun phrases: an unchanging decree, a rising not of its own will, chained comings-into-being, the combining of substances, the changing of accidents. This manner of speech is as if the terms of a philosophy textbook had been poured into the moulds of aruz, and it builds a language close to the classroom of Cûdî, who also taught philosophy at the Gelenbevi Sultanîsi.

The poem's key images are flow and chain. Caravans of motes come and go in the desert of being, everything appears and passes like lightning, time is a torrent scattering foam and the decay of old forms is the bubbles of that torrent. The seventh couplet fits the unknown into a single line: the middle of the chain is visible, its two ends hidden. Man lives in the middle of a chain whose beginning and end he cannot see. The words in the fifth couplet, "union is the beginning of separation, separation the beginning of union", also express the continuity of return through a paradox of love.

The last couplet is in Arabic and ties the scattered appearance of the series to a single source: exalted is He who created the world and turns it about; everything begins from Him and returns to Him. This close, an echo of the Qur'anic words "We belong to God and to Him we shall return", ends bewilderment in submission.

Bibliography

  • Havva Tok Yıldız, Merzifonlu İbrâhîm Cûdî Dîvânı (İnceleme-Metin-Sözlük) [1b-43a], Master's thesis, Ondokuz Mayıs University, Samsun 2017, pp. 48-49 (poem no. 40; manuscript fol. 14b-15a). http://libra.omu.edu.tr/tezler/116853.pdf

Online sources