Original Ottoman Turkish Text
Metre: Mefʿūlü mefāʿīlü mefāʿīlün faʿ (fāʿ) and Mefʿūlü mefāʿīlü mefāʿīlü feʿūl
Rezzāḳ-ı kerīmiñ ne dimek maʿnāsı
Bilmez bunı nādānı degil, dānāsı
Ḫalḳ itdi dimek dāneyi, ṭopraġı, ṣuyı
Ḫurşīdi, hevāyı vü ḳuvvā-yı nāsı
In English
1. What is the meaning of the Generous Provider (Rezzâk)? Let alone the ignorant, not even the learned fully know it.
2. (To say He provided) means that He created the grain, the soil, the water, the sun, the air and the powers of men.
Literary and Historical Commentary
The subject is the meaning of God's name "Rezzâk", the Provider. Provision is usually thought of as the bread that comes to the table or the money that is earned; according to the poet, however, let alone the ignorant, not even the learned fully grasp the meaning of this name. The second line can be read two ways; the wording "not the ignorant, its learned one does not know" stresses that even knowledge cannot exhaust this meaning.
The true scope of provision is listed in the second couplet like a chain. To provide is to create not a single morsel but the whole order that makes it possible: the grain, the soil, the water, the sun, the air and the human strength to work them. This list, counting everything needed for a grain of wheat to become bread, is an everyday example of the divan's admiration for the order of the universe. Its placing near the quatrain on the hardship of earning a living is also meaningful: while man works for his living, he is in truth nourished from within a far greater order.
Bibliography
- Havva Tok Yıldız, Merzifonlu İbrâhîm Cûdî Dîvânı (İnceleme-Metin-Sözlük) [1b-43a], Master's thesis, Ondokuz Mayıs University, Samsun 2017, p. 119 (poem no. 151; manuscript fol. ). http://libra.omu.edu.tr/tezler/116853.pdf
Online sources
