I was busy writing on sheepskin parchment when I heard a faint rattling sound behind me. It was Aladdin, his lips set in a tense scowl. God knows how long he had been standing there like that, watching me with a strained look in his brown eyes. He asked me what I was doing.
“I’m copying an old lecture of our father’s,” I said. “It’s good to have an extra copy of every one of them.”
“What’s the use of it?” Aladdin exhaled loudly. “Father has stopped giving lectures or sermons. In case you haven’t noticed, he doesn’t teach at the madrassa either. Don’t you see he has thrust aside all his responsibilities?”
“This is a temporary situation,” I said. “He’ll soon start teaching again.”
“You are only fooling yourself. Don’t you see that our father doesn’t have time for anything or anyone other than Shams? Isn’t that funny? The man is supposed to be a wandering dervish, but he has taken root in our house.”
Aladdin emitted a chuckle, waiting for me to agree with him, but when I said nothing, he started pacing the room. Even without looking at him, I could feel the angry blaze in his eyes.
“People are gossiping,” Aladdin went on morosely. “They are all asking the same question: How can a respected scholar let himself be manipulated by a heretic? Our father’s reputation is like ice melting under the sun. If he doesn’t get a hold of himself soon, he might never be able to find students again in this town. Nobody would want him as a teacher. And I wouldn’t blame them.”
I placed the parchment aside and looked at my brother. He was only a boy, really, although his every gesture and expression said he felt on the edge of manhood. He had changed a lot since last year, and I was beginning to suspect he could be in love. Just who the girl could be, I didn’t know, and his close friends wouldn’t tell me.
“Brother, I realize you don’t like Shams, but he is a guest in our house and we ought to respect him. Don’t listen to what others say. Honestly, we shouldn’t make a mountain out of a molehill.”
As soon as these words came from my mouth, I regretted my patronizing tone. But it was too late. Like bone-dry wood, Aladdin easily catches fire.
“A molehill?!” Aladdin snorted. “Is that what you call this calamity that has befallen us? How can you be so blind?”
I took out another parchment, caressing its delicate surface. It always gave me tremendous pleasure to reproduce my father’s words and to think that in doing so I was helping them to last longer. Even after a hundred years passed, people could read my father’s teachings and be inspired by them. To play a role in this transmission, however small a role it might be, made me proud.
Still complaining, Aladdin stood next to me and glanced at my work, his eyes brooding and bitter. For a fleeting moment, I saw a longing in his eyes and recognized the face of a boy in need of his father’s love. With a plunging heart, I realized it wasn’t Shams he was truly angry at. It was my father.
Aladdin was angry at my father for not loving him enough and for being who he was. My father could be distinguished and famous, but he had also been utterly helpless in the face of the death that had taken our mother at such a tender age.
“They say Shams put a spell on our father,” Aladdin said. “They say he was sent by the Assassins.”
“The Assassins!” I protested. “That is nonsense.”
The Assassins were a sect famous for their meticulous killing methods and extensive use of poisonous substances. Targeting influential people, they murdered their victims in public, so as to plant fear and panic in people’s hearts. They had gone as far as leaving a poisoned cake in Saladin’s tent with a note that said You are in our hands. And Saladin, this great commandeer of Islam who had fought bravely against the Christian Crusaders and recaptured Jerusalem, had not dared to fight against the Assassins, preferring to make peace with them. How could people think Shams could be linked with this sect of terror?
I put my hand on Aladdin’s shoulder and forced him to look at me. “Besides, don’t you know the sect is not what it used to be? They are barely more than a name now.”
Aladdin briefly considered this possibility. “Yes, but they say there were three very loyal commandeers of Hassan Sabbah. They left the castle of Alamut, pledging to spread terror and trouble wherever they went. People suspect that Shams is their leader.”
I was starting to lose patience. “God help me! And could you please tell me why a Hashshashin would want to kill our father?”
“Because they hate influential people and love to create chaos, that’s why,” Aladdin responded. So agitated was he by his conspiracy theories that red blotches had formed on his cheeks.
I knew I had to handle this more carefully. “Look, people say all sorts of things all the time,” I said. “You can’t take these awful rumors seriously. Clear your mind of spiteful thoughts. They are poisoning you.”
Aladdin groaned resentfully, but I continued nonetheless. “You might not like Shams personally. You do not have to. But for Father’s sake you ought to show him some respect.”
Aladdin looked at me with bitterness and contempt. I understood that my younger brother was not only cross with our father and infuriated at Shams. He was also disappointed in me. He saw my appreciation of Shams as a sign of weakness. Perhaps he thought that in order to earn my father’s favor, I was being subservient and spineless. It was only a suspicion on my part, but one that hurt me deeply.
Still, I could not get angry at him, and even if I did, my anger would not last very long. He was my little brother. To me he would always be that boy running after street cats, getting his feet dirty in rain puddles, and nibbling slices of bread topped with yogurt all day long. I couldn’t help seeing in his face the boy he once had been, a bit on the plump side and a tad short for his age, the boy who took the news of the death of his mother without shedding a tear. All he did was to look down at his feet as if suddenly ashamed of his shoes and purse his bottom lip until its color was gone. Neither a word nor a sob had come out of his mouth. I wish he would have cried.
“Do you remember the time you got into a fight with some neighboring kids?” I asked. “You came home crying, with a bloody nose. What did our mother tell you then?”
Aladdin’s eyes first narrowed and then grew in recognition, but he didn’t say anything.
“She told you that whenever you got angry with someone, you should replace the face of that person in your mind with the face of someone you love. Have you tried replacing Shams’s face with our mother’s face? Perhaps you could find something to like in him.”
A furtive smile, as swift and timid as a passing cloud, hovered over Aladdin’s lips, and I was amazed at how much it softened his expression.
“Perhaps I could,” he said, all anger draining out of his voice now.
My heart melted. I gave my brother a hug, unsure of what else to say. As he hugged me back, I felt confident that he would repair his relationship with Shams and the harmony in our house would soon be restored.
Given the course of events that followed, I couldn’t have been more mistaken.
Kerra
KONYA, OCTOBER 22, 1245
Beyond the closed door, Shams and Rumi were talking fervently about God knows what the other day. I knocked and entered without waiting for a response, carrying a tray with a plate of halva. Normally Shams doesn’t say anything when I am around, as if my presence forces him into silence. And he never comments upon my cooking skills. He eats very little anyhow. Sometimes I have the impression it makes no difference to him whether I serve a fabulous dinner or dry bread. But this time as soon as he took a bite from my halva, his eyes lit up.
“This is delicious, Kerra. How did you make it?” he asked.
I don’t know what came over me. Instead of seeing the compliment for what it was, I heard myself retort, “Why are you asking? Even if I told you how, you couldn’t make it.”
Shams locked a level gaze into my eyes and nodded slightly, as if he agreed with what I’d said.
I waited for him to say something in return, but he just stood there, mute and calm.
In a little while, I left the room and returned to the kitchen, thinking the incident was left behind. And I probably would not have remembered it again, had it not been for what transpired this morning.
I was churning butter by the hearth in the kitchen when I heard strange voices out in the courtyard. I rushed outside, only to witness the craziest scene ever. There were books everyplace, piled up in rickety towers, and still more books floating inside the fountain. From all the ink dissolving in it, the water in the fountain had turned a vivid blue.
With Rumi standing right there, Shams picked a book from the pile—The Collected Poems of al-Mutanabbi—eyed it with a grim expression, and tossed it into the water. No sooner had the book submerged than he reached for another. This time it was Attar’s The Book of Secrets.
I gasped in horror. One by one, he was destroying Rumi’s favorite books! The next to be hurled into the water was The Divine Sciences by Rumi’s father. Knowing how much Rumi adored his father and doted upon this old manuscript, I looked at him, expecting him to throw a fit.
Instead I found Rumi standing aside, his face pale as wax, his hands trembling. I couldn’t understand for the life of me why he didn’t say anything. The man who once had reprimanded me for just dusting his books was now watching a lunatic destroy his entire library, and yet he didn’t even utter a word. It wasn’t fair. If Rumi wasn’t going to intervene, I would.
“What are you doing?” I asked Shams. “These books have no other copies. They are very valuable. Why are you throwing them into the water? Have you lost your mind?”
Instead of an answer, Shams cocked his head toward Rumi. “Is that what you think, too?” he asked.
Rumi pursed his lips and smiled faintly but remained silent.
“Why don’t you say anything?” I yelled at my husband.
At this, Rumi approached me and held my hand tightly. “Calm down, Kerra, please. I trust in Shams.”
Giving me a glance over his shoulder, relaxed and confident, Shams rolled up his sleeves and started to pull the books out of the water. To my amazement, every single book he took out was as dry as a bone.
“Is this magic? How did you do that?” I asked.
“But why are you asking?” Shams said. “Even if I told you how, you couldn’t do it.”
Trembling with anger, choking back sobs, I ran to the kitchen, which has become my sanctuary these days. And there, amid pots and pans, stacks of herbs and spices, I sat down and cried my heart out.
Rumi
KONYA, DECEMBER 1245
Bent on praying the morning prayer together in the open air, Shams and I left the house shortly after dawn. We rode our horses for a while, through meadows and valleys and across ice-cold streams, enjoying the breeze on our faces. Scarecrows in wheat fields greeted us with an eerie poise, and newly washed clothes in front of a farmhouse fluttered madly in the breeze as we passed by, pointing in all directions into the semidarkness.
On the way back, Shams pulled at the reins of his horse and pointed to a massive oak tree outside the town. Together we sat under the tree, the sky hanging above our heads in shades of purple. Shams placed his cloak on the ground, and as calls to prayer echoed from mosques near and far, we prayed there together.
“When I first came to Konya, I sat under this tree,” Shams said. He smiled at a distant memory, but then grew pensive and said, “A peasant gave me a ride. He was a great admirer of yours. He told me your sermons cured sadness.”
“They used to call me the Wizard of Words,” I said. “But it all feels so far away now. I don’t want to give sermons anymore. I feel like I am done.”
“You are the Wizard of Words,” Shams said determinedly. “But instead of a preaching mind, you have a chanting heart now.”
I didn’t know what he meant by that, and I didn’t ask. The dawn had erased what remained of the night before, turning the sky into a blameless orange. Far ahead of us, the town was waking up, crows were diving into vegetable gardens to peck at whatever they could steal, doors were screeching, donkeys braying, and stoves burning as everyone got ready for a brand-new day.
“People everywhere are struggling on their own for fulfillment, but without any guidance as to how to achieve it,” murmured Shams with a shake of his head. “Your words help them. And I’ll do everything in my power to help you. I am your servant.”
“Don’t say that,” I protested. “You are my friend.”
Oblivious to my objection, Shams continued. “My only concern is the shell you have been living in. As a famous preacher, you have been surrounded by fawning admirers. But how well do you know common people? Drunks, beggars, thieves, prostitutes, gamblers—the most inconsolable and the most downtrodden. Can we love all of God’s creatures? It is a difficult test, and one that only a few can pass.”
As he kept speaking, I saw gentleness and concern in his face, and something else that looked almost like maternal compassion.
“You are right,” I conceded. “I have always lived a protected life. I don’t even know how ordinary people live.”
Shams picked up a lump of soil, and as he crumbled it between his fingers, he added softly, “If we can embrace the universe as a whole, with all its differences and contradictions, everything will melt into One.”
With this, Shams picked up a dead branch and drew a large circle around the oak tree. When he was done, he raised his arms toward the sky, as if wishing to be pulled up by an invisible rope, and uttered the ninety-nine names of God. At the same time, he began to whirl inside the circle, first slowly and tenderly but then accelerating steadily, like a late-afternoon breeze. Soon he was whirling with the speed and might of gusty winds. So captivating was his frenzy that I couldn’t help but feel as if the whole universe—the earth, the stars, and the moon—spun with him. I watched this most unusual dance, letting the energy it radiated envelop my soul and body.
Finally Shams slowed down to a halt, his chest rising and falling with every ragged breath, his face white, his voice suddenly deep, as if coming from a distant place. “The universe is one being. Everything and everyone is interconnected through an invisible web of stories. Whether we are aware of it or not, we are all in a silent conversation. Do no harm. Practice compassion. And do not gossip behind anyone’s back—not even a seemingly innocent remark! The words that come out of our mouths do not vanish but are perpetually stored in infinite space, and they will come back to us in due time. One man’s pain will hurt us all. One man’s joy will make everyone smile,” he murmured. “This is what one of the forty rules reminds us.”
Then he turned his inquisitive gaze to me. There was a shadow of despair in the bottomless depths of his eyes, a wave of sorrow that I had never seen in him before.
“One day you will be known as the Voice of Love,” Shams remarked. “East and West, people who have never seen your face will be inspired by your voice.”
“How is that going to happen?” I asked incredulously.
“Through your words,” Shams answered. “But I am not talking about lectures or sermons. I am talking about poetry.”
“Poetry?” My voice cracked. “I don’t write poetry. I am a scholar.”
This elicited a subtle smile from Shams. “You, my friend, are one of the finest poets the world will ever come to know.”
I was about to protest, but the determined look in Shams’s eyes stopped me. Besides, I didn’t feel like arguing. “Even so, whatever needs to be done, we will do it together. We will walk on this path together.”
Shams nodded absently and lapsed into an eerie silence, gazing at the fading colors in the horizon. When he finally spoke, he uttered those ominous words that have never left me, scarring my soul permanently: “As much as I would love to join you, I’m afraid you will have to do it alone.”
“What do you mean? Where are you going?” I asked.
With a wistful pucker of the lips, Shams lowere
d his gaze. “It is not in my hands.”
A sudden wind blew in our direction, and the weather turned chilly, as if warning us that the fall would soon be over. It began to rain out of the clear blue sky, in light, warm drops, as faint and delicate as the touch of butterflies. And that was the first time the thought of Shams’s leaving me hit me like a sharp pain in the chest.
Sultan Walad
KONYA, DECEMBER 1245
Banter to some, but it pains me to hear the gossip. How can people be so disdainful and scornful with regard to things they know so little about? It is queer, if not frightening, how out of touch with truth people are! They don’t understand the depth of the bond between my father and Shams. Apparently they haven’t read the Qur’an. Because if they had, they would know that there are similar stories of spiritual companionship, such as the story of Moses and Khidr.
It is in the verse al-Kahf, clear and plain. Moses was an exemplary man, great enough to become a prophet someday, as well as a legendary commander and lawmaker. But there was a time when he sorely needed a spiritual companion to open his third eye. And that companion was no other than Khidr, the Comforter of the Distressed and Dejected.
Khidr said to Moses, “I am a lifelong traveler. God has assigned me to roam the world and do what needs to be done. You say you want to join me in my journeys, but if you follow me, you must not question anything I do. Can you bear to accompany me without questioning? Can you trust me fully?”