Original Ottoman Turkish Text

Metre: mef‘ûlü fâ‘ilâtü mefâ‘îlü fâ‘ilün

Yâ Rab n’olaydı ʿâlem içinde dil olmasa
Bâri olursa her güzele mâyil olmasa

In English

1. O Lord, if only there were no such thing as a heart in the world; or at least, if there must be one, if only it did not incline to every beauty.

Literary and Historical Commentary

Structure of the Poem

The couplet is the opening couplet (matla) of a ghazal by Tâcîzâde Sa'dî Çelebi; its two lines rhyme with the words "dil olmasa / mâyil olmasa". The refrain word (redif) is "olmasa" (were there not), and the rhyme falls on "-il". The rest of the ghazal is unknown. The biographical anthologies (tezkire) give no metre; the couplet scans in the muzâri‘ metre of aruz (quantitative metre) as "mef‘ûlü fâ‘ilâtü mefâ‘îlü fâ‘ilün", the phrase "mâyil olmasa" in the second line fitting the metre through liaison as "mâ-yi-lol-ma-sa".

This opening couplet is the one most often cited under Sa'dî Çelebi's name. It appears in the same form, with small differences of spelling ("Yâ Rabb", "mâ'il"), in the anthologies of Latîfî, Âşık Çelebi, Beyânî and Kınalızâde Hasan Çelebi. Latîfî calls it "maṭla‘-ı mümteni‘u'n-naẓîr", an opening couplet whose like cannot be produced. Beyânî and Kınalızâde say that Sa'dî's Turkish verse was scanty and that he was known above all for his Arabic odes, and they give this couplet as the single example of his Turkish poetry. Nothing is known about to whom or on what occasion it was written.

Meaning and Figures of Speech

The couplet finds the cause of love in the lover's own heart, and so it reads more like a confession than a complaint. The lover first wishes for a world with no heart at all; then, as if aware of the extravagance of this wish, he draws back and says "bâri", at least, let the heart not incline to every beauty. The sequence of the large wish in the first line and the small request in the second gives the couplet a tone at once serious and gently ironic. What is spoken of is less the greatness of love's pain than the fickleness of a heart that slides from one beauty to the next.

The craft of the couplet looks plain, but its plainness is deliberate. In divan literature, words that seem easy to say yet are impossible to imitate are called "sehl-i mümteni‘" (the inimitably simple). Latîfî's phrase "mümteni‘u'n-naẓîr" is close to this idea: the words are near to everyday speech, there is no metaphor or heavy compound, and yet the thought settles into the two lines without remainder. The closeness of sound between "dil" (heart) and "mâyil" (inclined) strengthens the rhyme; "olaydı" and "olursa" and the twice-repeated "olmasa" make the couplet flow like a prayer. The address "Yâ Rab" (O Lord) is used in divan poetry more often as a sigh of regret than as a true prayer; here too the lover is less imploring God to change the order of the world than marvelling at his own state.

Historical Context

Sa'dî Çelebi was born at Amasya, the son of Tâcî Bey, treasurer to Prince Bayezid at Amasya, and the brother of the chancellor (nişancı) Tâcîzâde Câfer Çelebi. The anthologies present him above all as a scholar and a master of chancery prose (münşi). According to Kınalızâde he was his elder brother's equal in learning and virtue and his superior in Arabic; Câfer Çelebi's prose became better known because it was of the kind the public liked, while Sa'dî's, though the work of a master, was valued by connoisseurs. The sources tell one event of his life above all: when Câfer Çelebi was put to death in 921 (1515) on the orders of Sultan Selim I, Sa'dî, while receiving his brother's body, spoke harsh words against the sultan and, learning that these had been reported, feared what would befall him. Shortly afterwards, when a letter had to be written to the Mamluk Sultan Kansu Gavri, the sultan remembered Câfer, and those close to him said that his brother could do the work. Sa'dî was summoned to the palace and went after making his will, believing he was going to his death, but he was charged with writing the letter; when it was approved, he was rewarded.

This story also sheds light on why so little of his Turkish verse survives. In the eyes of the anthologists Sa'dî Çelebi was first of all a master of Arabic and of chancery prose; his Turkish couplets were a sideline. Latîfî accordingly ascribes the obscurity of his poems to the lack of time left by his official duties. That among the few couplets left by such a poet this opening couplet is repeated in four separate anthologies shows that it was a saying passed from mouth to mouth among his contemporaries. Sa'dî's date of death is given in the sources as 922 (1516) or 923 (1517).

Bibliography

Primary sources

  • Latîfî, Tezkiretü'ş-Şuarâ ve Tabsıratü'n-Nuzamâ, ed. Rıdvan Canım, Ankara: Ministry of Culture and Tourism Publications, 2018 (e-book), p. 272, entry on Sa‘dî Çelebi.
  • Âşık Çelebi, Meşâ'irü'ş-şu'arâ, ed. Filiz Kılıç, Ankara: Ministry of Culture and Tourism Publications, 2018 (e-book), pp. 424-425, entry on Sa‘dî Çelebi.
  • Beyânî, Tezkiretü'ş-Şu'arâ, ed. Aysun Sungurhan, Ankara: Ministry of Culture and Tourism Publications, 2017 (e-book), pp. 90-91, entry on Sa‘dî.
  • Kınalızâde Hasan Çelebi, Tezkiretü'ş-Şu'arâ, ed. Aysun Sungurhan, Ankara: Ministry of Culture and Tourism Publications, 2017 (e-book), pp. 430-431, entry on Sa‘dî.

Books

  • İsmail E. Erünsal, "Tâcîzâde Sâdî Çelebi", TDV İslâm Ansiklopedisi, vol. 39, Istanbul 2010, p. 356. islamansiklopedisi.org.tr

Online sources