JOURNAL OF TURKISH STUDIES T0RKL0K BiLGiSi ARASTIRMALARI JOURNAL OF TURKISH STUDIES T0RKL0K BiLGiSi ARASTIRMALARI VOU IME 2611 2002 CiLT 26/1 2002 hlitcd hy ~inasi TFKiN . Ci(intil J\. TFKiN Yav1nlayanlar Sinasi TEKiN . GonUI A. TEKiN

ESSAYS IN HONOUR OF BARBARA FLEMMING BARBARA FLEMMiNG ARMAGANI I • I

Guest Editor .I an SC IIJ'vll DT y ayma Haz1rlayan Jan SCHMiDT

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I (' ; ' ' !

L Puhlishcd at the Department of Ncar Lastcrn Languages and ( ·j, iii/at ions ; I laJYard Unin~rsitv !, Harvard Oniversitesi Yakmdogu Dilleri vc Medcniyctkri 2002 f i Boli.imUnde yaymlanm1~tlr 2002

•• r'1 80 ELEAZAR BIRNBAUM

CHAINS OF GOLD: 'S DEFENCE OF

J.T.P. de BRIJN*

To Barbara Flemming, teacher, colleague and friend.

I. Timurid literature

In the history of , the fifteenth century constitutes a rather problematic period. Writers who have tried to define its significance within a long-term development have made different estimates of its significance: on the one hand as the last phase of the "golden age" of classical literature, which in the next century went into its "silver period"!, on the other hand, as the beginning of a long process of decreasing creativity signalling the exhaustion of the classical conventions. This decline continuing throughout the Safavid period culminated in the radical stylistic innovations known as the "Indian style"2. Mu!)ammad-Ric;Hi Shafi'l Kadkanl, one of the most severe modern critics of Timurid poetry, only saw a period "barren of climaxes", in spite of the great number of poets. In Kadkanl's evaluation- which is perhaps influenced by his critical standpoint as a distinguished modern Persian poet - all the poems these poets wrote are devoid of any particular value; a peculiar lapse of vitality would have occurred in the literary tradition, a dead tide in comparison to which even the literature of the Safavid period is to be appreciated as a revival of some kind.3 If Timurid culture is considered as a whole, it seems hard to accept this harsh verdict on its literature. The century when the descendants of Timur Lang ruled over most of the Persian lands was undeniably a splendid period in the history of the arts in Persia, especially of those which were closely related to literature such as calligraphy and miniature painting4. The period has left us an impressive amount of exquisite manuscripts, some of which are among the finest specimens of traditional Persian book art. This was also an age of great care for the textual tradition ofthe Persian classics: great philological projects, such as the revision of the

* Universiteit Leiden Arthur J. Arberry, Classical Persian Literature, London 1958, p. 450. 2 Cf. , "Persian poetry of the Timurid and Safavid periods", in The Cambridge History of , 6, Cambridge 1986, pp. 965-94; idem, "The Indian or Safavid Style: Progress or Decline?" in Persian Literature, Albany 1988 (Bibliotheca Persica), pp. 249-88. 3 "Persian literature (Belles-Lettres) from the Time of Jami to the Present Day" in G. Morrison, ed., History of Persian Literature from the Beginning of the Islamic Period to the Present Day, Leiden, 1981, pp. 133-206, especially pp. 135-7. 4 Recently, Michael Rogers has put what he calls the "myth of the Timurid period as one of super-creativity" into question; however, his arguments seem to be aimed only at the concept of a deliberate artistic policy on the part of the Timurid rulers ("Centralisation and Timurid Creativity" in Oriente Modemo, NS Anno XV (LXXVI), 1996, 2, pp. 533-50).

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Shah-nama, executed in 82911425-6 at Baysunghur's library in Samarkand, and the revision II. Jami. of the Divan of f:Iafi?- carried out in 80711501-1502 at the court of Herat5, bear witness to a great love and respect for the literary monuments handed down from the past. By this Timurid The contradictions of Timurid civilisation present themselves very sharply in the case of literati have contributed significantly to the preservation of medieval literature and, in this MauHina Niir ad-Din 'Abd ar-Ral)man Ja.mi (1414-1492), who was not only the outstanding respect, show a remarkable resemblance to their contemporaries, the humanists of the literary figure of his times, but might be called the quintessential Timurid man-of-letters. He European Renaissance. wrote extensively on mysticism and the religious sciences as well as on various branches of The political situation was not unfavourable to this cultural flower. Notwithstanding the medieval scholarship; besides, Himi distinguished himself in particular as a poet with a never-ending dynastic rivalries, the fifteenth century was a relatively peaceful time, at least if profound knowledge of the literary tradition. His poetry includes the entire range of the it is compared to the previous centuries with their devastating invasions by the Monools and genres established during the preceding centuries of Persian literature. No one among his the armies of Timur Lang. Under the benevolent attention of Timurid and Turkma; rulers, predecessors or contemporaries produced anything like this monumental oeuvre. In spite of the courts of Herat, Samarkand, Tabriz and Shiraz were safe havens for artists, poets and all the universal respect for his impressive output of poetry, also in his case the question has been others who were dependent on royal patronage. raised whether Jami really deserves the status of a great and above all an original poet. Edward Perhaps a situation in which the arts are favoured because they cater for the demands of Browne who, on the whole, was well-disposed towards him, would not give him that the courts, is not always a fertile soil for literary creativity as this is understood in our days. distinction but only admitted that he was "one of the most talented, versatile and prolific" of As a m~tte~ o~ fa~t, one of the defects critics have decried in Timurid poetry is the emphasis on the Persian poets 10. Acknowledging that his part in the transmission of Persian literary emulatmg Imitation of the great classics combined with an ever more refined rhetorical culture, especially to the Ottoman Empire, has been important, Hellmut Ritter did not find vir.tu?sity. This may ve~ .well h~ve s~ited the taste of courtiers, but did seldom lead to poetry much originality, either of form or of content, in his many works II. A very different opinion stnkrng the ~odern crrtic by Its ~nginality. As Maria Subtelny has pointed out, already was expressed by Y.E. Bertel's, who wrote extensively on Jami and his friend and adept, the contem.por.anes ~uch as Daulatshah and Nava'i condemned the "affected refinement and Turkish poet Nava'l. He ascribed a strategical purpose to Jamis comprehensive use of the formal mtncacy (takalluf) of their fellow poets, although it is difficult to assess the precise poetical tradition: valu~ ~f sue~ statements. Moreover, it should be realised that the particular concept of "It was not by chance that Jami tried his skill at all genres of poetry, but in order to creatiVIty which has always prevailed in Persian literature as a normative tradition became prove his basic theory that a work lives not by its form, as was commonly thought at ~ervasive in ~his period. To be an original poet meant, more than ever, to restrict oneself to that time, but by the profundity of its content. Himi demonstrated that not a single one the el~boratwn of set themes dictated by convention", which entailed that "refinement of expression became of necessity its prime focus."6 of the classical forms has died out definitively but that it was possible to revive them if the poet were capable of lending them a deep and significant meaning." I2 The. prob~em how to assess the notion of "creativity" within its proper perspective also presents .Itself I~ the case of Ottoman literature of the sixteenth century, which took the two A satisfactory answer to the question of Jamis literary stature and, above all, his most e~me~t Tu~urid_ w~i.~ers, Mulla Jami and Mir 'Ali Shir Nava'i, as its "guiding stars"7. originality can only be given when the many threads linking his poetry to that of older Persian Mal)mud b. Osman Lami I (1472-1531), who earned himself the epithet "the Jami of Rum" poets have been properly examined. In the present paper I intend to make a small contribution seems at first sight to h~ve been a~ almost perfect replica of his Persian paragon, whom h; to a better understanding of Jiimis position as a poet as well as a mystic by looking into the ev~n ~losely resembled rn actua.l lrfe, both by being a prominent Naqshbandi sheikh and by manner in which he defended poetry in his own works. As it will become clear very soon, this enJoymg t.he benevolent. attention of the powers that be without actually being a courtier. topic will bring us into the heart of the problem of the intertextual features of his works. The Altho~g.~ m almost all his works the relationship to the Persian tradition is in evidence, so is material in which I have carried out this research consists mainly of his didactical poems in the ~lso his mdepe.ndent and lively i~tellect" se~king originality "not by breaking out along new mathnavi form. hnes but b~ fusmg new themes with the traditional conventions"8. As Barbara Flemming has show~ ~s I~ o~~.of her recent articles, Jamis famous collection of hagiographies, the NafaMt III. Himis didactical mathnavis as sources for his views on poetry. al-uns, m Lami I s .Terceme underwent a transformation which gave it a value of its own as a document for the history of Anatolian mysticism9. Throughout his life Jami has taken much care for the· collection of his poetical works. The final results of the poet's philological concerns are preserved in an authorised ,

5 dated 890/1485, a copy of which has been described in detail by Victor Rosen in his catalogue cr. Ahmed Ate~, istanbul kiitiiplwnclerinde Fanra IIUl/IZU/11 eserler Istanbul 1968 289 6 M . E S b I ' 'p. . ana .:a . u te ny, "The Persian Poetry of the Late Timurid Period" · · . · Morgenlmuilschen Gesellschaft, Band 136 (1986), pp. 56-79, in particular pp. 58-;~, Zellschrift der Deutschen I 0 A Literary History of Persia, Volume iii, Cambridge 1920, reprint Bethesda 1997, p. 548. 7 E.J.W. G1bb, A History of Oltomwr Poetry, ii, London 1902, p.8. II islam Ansiklopedisi, s.v. Cami: " ... eserleri, ne muhteva ve ne de ~ekil bak1m1ndan bliylik bir orijinallik 8 Barbara Flemming, The Encyclopaedia of lslanr. New Edition, s.v. Uimi'i. gostermez". 9 12 Cited by Jan Rypka, History of Iranian Literature, Dordrecht 1968, p. 287. The essays by ~ertel's o~ !hese tw? "Glimpses of Turkish saints: Another look at Liimi 'i and Ottoman bio ra hers" in Jo . . . . poets have been reprinted in a volume of his collected works (lzbrmmi'ye tmcli). under the t1tle Nav01 1 Dzlumu, Harvard 1994 ( Amremarie Schimmel Fesll'clrri'i ed b ME S b g) P urnal ofTrokrsh St11d1es 18, . '1'• . y . . u te 1ny , pp. 59-73. Moscow 1965.

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84 J.T.P. de BRIJN CHAINS OF GOLD: JAMI'S DEFENCE OF POETRY 85

of Persian manuscripts at St.-Petersburg, published in 1886 13 • Besides the three Divans of his For the sake of our present discussion we restrict the definition of a didactical mathnavi lyrical poetry, seven matluzavis were brought together under the title Haft Aurang ("The to one particular type of such poems, marked by a kind of textual organisation which is not Seven Thrones", or "Seven Brothers", referring to the constellation of the Great Bear). The based on narrative in the first place but on a continuing theoretical discourse, resembling a number of seven poems constitutes an extension of the famous set of five poems, the Khamsa homily or a sermon 16. Whatever role is assigned to story-telling in this type of poems, it is of Jamis ultimate model Ni~ami of Ganja. However, Jami distinguished the poems written in always subordinated to the line of theoretical discourse which determines the order of the imitation of Ni~ami by putting them together under the heading of his own Khamsa and poet's text. The earliest specimen of this kind of mathnavl still extant is Na~ir-i Khusrau's further by marking them off as a special group within the collected works by means of a brief Raushana'f-nama of the eleventh century, followed shortly by Sana'i's l:fadiqat al-l:zaqfqa va prose introduction. Actually, only two of these poems, Jam!s version of Layla and Majnun and sharl'at a.t-!ariqa, which became the first really seminal work of its kind 17 • his treatment of the Alexander saga in Khiradnama-yi Iskandar, follow the canon of stories The three mathnavis by Jarni which concern us here all belong to this type of sermon-like established three centuries earlier by Ni~amL The only other narrative poem is the mystical or "homiletic" poems. In two instances, the relationship of the poem to a preceding work is allegory Yusuf and Zulaykha., substituted for the secular love story of Khusrau and Shirin. quite obvious from the choice Jami made for its metre. The sari' of Tul:zfat al-af:zrar is an The subject-matter of Haft Paykar, another tale about a pre-Islamic Iranian king, was also left indication of its dependence on Ni~ami' s didactical poem. The metre khafif used in the Silsilat aside by Jam!. Instead, he added a second didactical poem to the TuMat al-a(zrar ("The Gift of adh-dhahab, points back to Sana'I's great poem as well as to Aul)adi's. In the case of the Subf:zat the Noble"), his imitation of Nizami's Makhzan al:asrar, this one entitled Subf:zat al-abrar al-abrar, however, the pedigree cannot be established on the metre alone because Jami used ('The Rosary of the Pious"). The entire set of poems was written during the decade directly here a pattern which has been used very rarely in a mathnavi18 • Nevertheless, there are many preceding the editing of the collected works, when Jami was already in his late sixties and early similarities between the Tu(ifat and the Sub(wt: the same themes are dealt with in the prologues seventies.l4 and the arrangement of the discourse within each chapter is also identical: a theoretical The two poems which do not belong to the Khamsa are the philosophical allegory introduction followed by one exemplary story and a conclusion, the end of which is marked by Salaman and Absal, which Jami wrote for one of his royal admirers abroad, the Aq-qoyunlu the insertion of the poet's pen name, all according to Ni~ami's design. The main difference ruler Ya 'qub Beg (reigned from 14 78-1490), and another much longer didactical poem, the between these two poems is that the Tul:zfat contains in some of its sections material that Silsilat adh-dhahab, ("The Chain of Gold"), divided into three Daftars with multiple belongs to the subject-matter of a mirror-for-princes, showing that Jami addresses rulers and dedications, which were compiled at different times between 87611472 and 89011485. courtiers as well as mystics 19; in the Sub(wt evidently an audience of Sufi adepts is envisaged The didactical mathnavi is not an easily definable type of poetry. In classical Persian exclusively. poetry, the form of the mathnavi was not only suitable for the writing of long narrative poems The Silsilat adh-dhahab is, besides being by far the longest of the three poems (it counts like the Slulh-nama, but it could equally serve the purpose of moral and religious teaching. The about 7200 distichs), also the most complex. Its three Daftars are up to a large extent distinction between these two applications is not an absolute one. There are few narrative independent poems composed separately and at different times. The first Daftar, complete.d i.n poems which do not occasionally digress into moral admonitions and reflections on the deeper Dhu'l-qa'da 876/ April 147220, was dedicated to Sultan I:Iusain Bayqara of Herat but 1t 1s meanings of the stories being told. On the other hand, writers of mathnavis with a primarily concerned mainly with prescriptions addressed to Naqshbandi Sufis, and deals only didactical purpose nearly always used narrative as one of their devices to illustrate the points occasionally with political matters. There is a passage in this part of the poem condemning the they were trying to make. Even the proportion of space devoted to either of the two elements "Rafi

16 See the present writer's "The stories of San5.'i's Faxri-nfime" in Pand·o Sokhan. Melanges offerts i1 Charles-Henri de Fouc/zecour, edd. Chr.Balay, C. Kappler and Z. Vesel, Tehran 1995, pp. 79-93. 13 Les mtu~u·:·~rits persans de 1'/n.~·titlll des.langues orientales, Saint-Petersbourg 1886, pp. 215-59; see also the 17 Other works of the same type are 'Anar's Asrtir-ntima, Ni?-iimi's Makh':w1 al-asrcir 0mitate? be~or~.Jami by A1_:ni~ ~umma.nes 111 E.G. B~owne, A .LIIerary Hlst.ory ~~Persia, iii, p. 509-48; Browne's descriptions of Jiimis mathnavl Khusrau Dihlavi, Khviiji Kirmani and Faqih-i Kirmani), Aul)adi's Jtim-1 Jam and Jalal ad-Dm Rum1 s Mathnavt-)'1 s are sllll useful butlus evaluat1ons, of the d1dacucal works in particular, are debatable. ma'navi. 14 Unt~l very recently no satisfactory edition of all Jamis mat/mavis was availabe. The first attempt at a complete 18 This rare variety of the pattern ramal-i mu.wddas was used earlier by Dihlavl in his narrative poem ed1llcn by Forbes F~lcone~ ~topped .after the publication of two texts, Tu{ifat a!-a{uiir ( 1848) and Saliimtin and Absiil Nuh sipihr; cf. H. Blochmann, The prosody of the Persians, Calcutta 1872, repnnt Amsterdam 1970, ~· 88. _ ( 1_850). Of the Russ tan cr111cal ed1t1on only one volume, with the texts of the Tubfat, Sublwt al-abriir and Khirad­ 19 It is, however, essentially a work intended for Sufis as the dedicating eu~?gies a!·e devote~ to the myst1cs Baha ~d­ nama (ed1te~ ~Y_ G.A. Tarbiyat, Moscow 1984) has appeared so far.For the present arti~le I used the edition by Dln Naqshbandi and Na~ir ad-Din 'Ubaid-AIIiih, better known as ~hv~p Al)rar.: acco~dmg to.. Ch. R1eu, the t1tle Mudarns-1 Gilan1 (Tehran 1~3~~195~~· T!1e H{l[t ~urang published in two volumes by A 'Iii-Khan Af~al)ziid (Tehran alludes to the latter's surname (Catalogue of the Persian Mwwscnpts Ill the Brlllsh Ltbrary, 11, London 1881, c. I 376/ 1997), as part of a Ma;mu a-y1 atlwr-1 Jam1 , was not accessible to me at the time of writing. 15 6458). ' The po~J~ not .only has its ~etre in common with 'A!!iir's Man,tiq at-,tair and Mu,fibat-niima, but also shares its 20 According 10 an Arabic colophon added in the ed. Giliini (p. 183), which however is not mentioned in Rosen s compos1t1on Wllh most of h1s works: a frame story with inserted anecdotes. description of the autograph.

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86 J.T.P. de BRIJN CHAINS OF GOLD: JAMl'S DEFENCE OF POETRY 87

unacceptable to 'Ali himself and would have embarrassed him, Jami tells the story of a poet eleventh-twelfth centuries, the discussion on poetry became focussed on the permissibility of who feels offended when his poem is admired by no one but an ignorant man21. poetry to the religiously-minded person. The shi'r va shii'iri of the courtly encomiast had Daftar I is concluded by a section under the heading I' tiqiid-ntima, a brief statement of the come under attack by men like the Ismailite Na~ir-i Khusrau and the preaching poet I:Iakim tenets of Sunnite Islam added to the request of the leading figure in the Naqshbandi order, Sana'i. They had condemned court poetry for its venality and insincerity, the underlying vice Shaikh 'Ubaid-Ailah Al)rar of Samarkand. The second Daftar, a later addition to the first, is being greed, one of the evil promptings of the lower soul. If the poetical means of expression entirely devoted to the theme of Jove, treated in the form of a long series of exemplary were applied to nobler goals than the flattering praise of a patron or the vain entertainment of anecdotes22 . Finally, the poem was concluded by a third Daftar which, like the Tufzfat, is courtiers - this higher aim of their profession was increasingly stated by Persian poets - there really a mirror-for-princes. Jami derived most of the material for this Daftar from a twelfth was a need for a defence of poetry from the point of view of the poet who was emancipated from his bondage to wordly patronage. In a famous line of Sana'i's didactical mathnavi, the century source, Ni~ami-yi 'Arii9i's famous Chahiirmaqiifa23. When the work was finally completed, Jami presented it to a third person of great importance in his days, the Ottoman l:fadiqat al-baqiqa, the dilemma of the religious poet is given formulaic force: Sultan Bayazid II (reigned 1481-1512), at some date between 1481 and 148524. ay Sanii'i chu shar' dad-at biir III. The debate on poetry and the craft of the poet. dast az.-in shii 'iri-u shi'r hadar

Also when Jami talks about poetry, he shows his great knowledge of the tradition. The ("Oh Sana'i when you have been admitted to the audience of the Law I abandon this debate on poetry has a long history in Persian literature and has adopted many different forms. poetry and all that it entails.") The fundamental topic - widely discussed already in Arabic literature - was the question The rhetorical devices of "apparent etymology" (shibh-i ishtiqiiq) and alliteration were whether poetry was permitted at all in Islam. The answers given were often ambiguous used in this verse to sharpen the incompatibility between a religious way of life under the because the Koran and the Prophetic Tradition provided arguments on both sides. More command of Islamic Law (shar') on the one hand, and poetry (shi'r) on the other. By the latter speci:ic to the Persian context were the considerations pertaining to the principles and Sana'i probably meant the practice of court poetry in particular, but later generations have practzces of court poetry subsumed in the phrase shi'r va shii' iri. Already the poets of the interpreted it as a categorical renouncement from poetry. The argument, taken in the latter S_aman~d and Ghaznavid periods had made frequent references to their art in their poems, sense, was countered in the late twelfth century by the mystical poet Farid ad-Din 'Agar. In the e~ther m the form o~ self-advertising, or .fakhriya, a permitted topos of the panegyrical introduction of his mathnavi poem Mu:~ibat-niima, 'Agar extended Sana'i's wordplay by ?zscour~e, or by drawmg attention to personal and professional concerns in passages inserted adding a third term, based on yet another permutation of the same Arabic letters 'ayn, rii and ~.nt~ _their poem~, oft~n referred to as f:zasb-i bal. In prose works belonging to the genre of shin, namely 'arsh ('the Heavenly Throne') symbolizing the goal of mystical pursuit. By this murors-for-pnnces such matters could be discussed more systematically. The classical addition 'Attar tried in a dialectic reasoning to dissolve the contradiction between the demands staten:ent ~n- co~rt. p'oet~y _i,s the chapter on the poet as one of the four principal servants of a of religion and the practice of poetry by adding to it a transcendental perspective: the ruler. 111 NI~ami-yi Aru9I s Chahiir maqiila ('The Four Essays'). This author did not only legitimation of poetry was anchored in its orientation towards "wisdom" (bikmat), to be taken provide a number of prescriptions for the training of the professional poet, he also to include both moral and mystical instruction, as it is exemplified in 'Anar' s own works, demonstrated several characteristic incidents of a poetical career at the courts in exemplary instead of the professional poet's praise of patrons which, also according to 'Anar, had ceased anecdotes about the experiences of famous poets of the past25_ to be a respectable occupation26. -~y the middle of the twelfth century, Persian literature had ceased to be almost entirely Yet another strain in the debate on poetry are the attempts to establish the metaphysical conditiOned by the wordly atmosphere of the courts. With the rise of religious poetry in the status of poetry by linking it to the concepts of Reason and Speech, which can b0th be referred to by the Persian word sukhan ("the word"). Poetry could be defined as the manifestation of 2I In the clet~iled account of the incident in Baghdad given in the biographical sketch by w Nassau Le · h' d' · the highest qualities of the human soul and even be associated with the ultimate connotation of 1 1 1 ?f_N:[ab~ t al-un.f\", Calcutta. 1959. (pp. 11-15), the passage taken offence at is said to. have been e:n :n~~~h~~~~ "word": the command of the Creator. This line of argumentation in defence of poetry can be mse111on 111 one o t1e1 poem s cop1es .. 22 found in particular in the prologues, or dibiicha' s, of mathnavi poems from the times of A chronogram on p. 258 of Gilani's edition mentions 890/1485 as the ear f 1 • · • partly confirmed by the Petersburg copy of the kullrytit but there mention iso mta~e c~mpletiOn of Dafta~ II; this ~s Firdausi onwards. The most elaborate instance occurs in the prologue of Ni~ami-yi Ganjavi's P~_n_ of tfhcl autog~a~h by the poet (11(/;:im) as the copyist (niqim) of his own works (~l~S~I; t~epc~~plpetl~~9o)f ~~s ougm o t 1e S1/.ri/a s parts needs further investigation. ' · ., · · e Makhz.an al-asrcir, in the form of an allegory portraying the poet's search for his inspiration. 23 24 ~d. -~y M. Qazvini and M. Mu'in, Tehran 1959; English translation by E.G. Browne, Landen 1921. 11 2 1 26 See the present writer's "Comparative notes on Sana'i and 'Anar", in L. Lewisohn (eel.), Classicai_Persian Sufism ~t~~ii~~;:;~~~G~~~l:;:!~~~:~~~~o:~~~i_;~~~-~ht~ i:~.~ec;~:~i~ :~g:,i~;;;~ Iii~ I ~;:r y:~ ~\ ~~~~z~~e~;~: 1~~~e:~~~ from its Origins to , London-New York 1993, pp.375-7. Dr. Nuran_ Tezcan (Bamberg) k1ndly clre.w m_y introduced other Timurid poets to t~e '£1tOJ~~a~zcLolulel.'tc(lfslelleeH,IllS, pl. 422_;dA. DAte;;/, F:,·ars~·a manzlllll eser/er, p. 393) and attention to a similar passage in one of Lami Ts mesnevis, where the conce1t of an encounter 111 a dream With h1s Central A.rum. Joumal xx, 1976, p. 168. ' · 01rWc1 e, er s am46 • 1970 • p · 265·• E . s·trn b aum, muse, who exhorts him to write mystical poetry, is combined with a riddle (mu '(~mnui) based on the same tl:ree 25 words used by 'Anar: ~i'r, 'ar~ and ~er'; cf. Nuran Tezcan. Lcimi'i s Grzy u <;:evgan, Stuttgart 1994, p. 103. lmes Chaluir maqciala. Maq(i/a-yi duvvum: dar mcihiyat-i shi'r va sa/cihi)•at-i shci' ·r ed Qaz · · M •· 86 . 1 , VIlli· U Ill, pp. 42- . 164-9.

TUBA 2611, 2002 : 81-92 TUBA 2611. 2002 : 81-92 88 J.T.P. de BRIJN CHAINS OF GOLD: JAMI'S DEFENCE OF POETRY 89 Withdrawn from the world in a vigil, he sets out on a journey into his own heart. Three sessions of meditation (called khalvat, or "seclusion") bring him to the full awareness of his Particular to the Subbat is that also two chapters of the poem itself are devoted to the calling as a poet worthy to treat of the lofty themes to be dealt with in the didactical discourse "word" and to "poetry" respectively32. In the latter chapter poetry is described as a shiihid-i of his poem27. manzum, "a versified witness", i.e. as the beloved of a Persian in whom transcendental bea~ty manifests itself to the world33. The clothing and make-up of this beauty are the IV. Jamis defence of poetry. prosodical features - the metre is the robe, the rhyme is the embroidered hem of its garment, the radif added to the rhyme its ankle ring; the rhetorical figures are related to the features of When we survey Jami's remarks on poetry, it becomes clear that he was quite familiar the shiihid' s face: comparison (tashbih) reveals the cheeks, wordplay ( tajnis) splits the hair, with all the topics of the debate on poetry as it had been CatTied on by the predecessors who and shows in the division (jarq) the khiil or beauty spot, the lips shatter with their parallelism were his most important models for emulation 28. (tar$i') the pearls of the teeth, ambiguity (ihiim) creates confusion like seductive eyes and dark locks cover the face with their tropes (majiiz) 34. Jamis handling of the metaphysical argument in favour of poetry, although not absent from other works29, is exemplified especially in his sermon-like poems. The Tu!Ifat al-abriir An important feature of Jamis discussion, is that, unlike Sana'! and 'Agar, he does not and the Sub~at al-abriir, both composed after the model of Ni?:ami-yi Ganjavi's Makhzan al­ make a principal distinction between the religious and the profane uses of poetry. In his view, asrar, have parallel passages in their prologues on "the word" (sukhan) , "bound speech" it includes with equal rights, hymns addressed to God as well as the songs of the singers in the (kaliim-i man'?,iim), and finally "poetry". They also show their dependence on Ni~ami's samii' of the sufis; it can be sung to musical acompaniment in the khariibiit, the ruined places of example by adding to this the evocation of a nocturnal wake in an allegory of the poet's search the antinomian mystics, as well as in the social gatherings of drinkers. But poetry serves above for his inspiration. In the case of the Tu!Ifat, Jamis prayer for spiritual guidance is answered all the expression of love. In Himis view, there is no harm in enumerating the virtues of poetry by the appearance of a figure of light who reminds him of the mythical prophet Khi9r. There as in its purest form it is sanctified by the precedent of metrical phrases in the Koran its~lf, so are numerous prototypes of this scene in medieval literature, both in Arabic and Persian, that (in Jarnis words) "the hands of poetry are filled with Koranic pearls". A condemnatiOn of including such allegorical tales Ibn-i Sina's !jaiy ibn Yaq'?,iin and SanaTs Sair al- 'ibiid ilii'l poetry as such is therefore mistaken. Jami concludes that there is nothing wrong was ~oetry a.s ma 'ad. One might even be reminded of the prologue of the story of Bizhan and Manizha in long as it is pure water from the fountain of the heart (dil); the problem arises when thts ~ell IS Firdawsi's Sluih-nama, where the part of the inspiring muse is played by the more mundane contaminated by mud (gil), i.e. inferior considerations. This problem should ~e ~olve~ t.n the figure of a servant approaching the brooding poet in the night and bringing him, with a lamp, poet's heart itself, which is very much in need of an ascetic purification. Jam1 spectftcally the idea for his tale. A much closer parallel is the allegory used by Khvaju Kirmanl to points to the effects of poetry on meditation. As an example he tells an anec~ote about the poet introduce his Kamiil-nama in which Reason exhorts the poet to the life of an ascetic.30 Sa 'di who, after meditating one long night in tears on a single line of verse, IS rewarded by the angels who bring to him the light of paradise35 . In the Subbat a different narrative device has been chosen, but it fulfils essentially the same function. Resorting again to allegory, Jami tells how the cage of the world, enveloped in In the first Daftar of the Silsilat adh-dhahab, Himi makes an exposition of his ideas about the darkness of the night, became too narrow for the bird of his heart. The bird breaks out the nature of the human being within the framework of his ideas on mystical education. At the from the cage and flies up to a place above the heavenly spheres where he contemplates a end of this anthropology he turns to a searching of his own soul. A preacher shoul~ ta~e care supernatural world existing from pre-eternity. As reason and imagination are too weak to that his deeds are in accordance with his words. The proper time for self-examma~I~n has describe it properly, he is only able to talk about it in terms of precious stones and light. Jam! come with the arrival of old age and grey hair; borrowing a striking image from Sana'I 36. he takes some of these treasures with him on his return to his original place with the describes this stage of life as a "dawn": ~ubb-i shaib az shab-i shabiib d~mfd, "th: da~n of old determination to "string these pearls into a poem". This last trait of the allegory brings to mind age has risen from the night of youth". The Mother of Time ~ad~ his mother s m.Ilk co~e two famous scenes from Persian literature: on the one hand Iskandar's collecting of precious back as grey hair. This self-criticism is aimed in particular at hts bemg a poet. Why IS he still stones in the Land of Darkness, as it is told in Ni?:ami's Iskandar-niima, on the other hand writing poetry at this advance age? At first he repeats all the charge.s which are commonly Sa'd!'s tale in the prologue of the Gulistiin about the mystic who gathers roses as a gift to his brought in against poetry. It is no more than a pastime and a ba~ habit o~e hast~ get out. of, friends in the supernatural garden of his meditation31. especially at an advanced age like his own. Poetry is really nothmg but mr to W~Ich met~Ical patterns are applied. The sweeter it is, the more deceitful, according to ~he ancient ~d~gmm 27 that "the best poetry is the most untruthful". Sana'i's wordplay on .shl'r and. shar IS ~l~o 28 Cf. The Encyclopaedia of Islam. New Edirion, s.v. Shi'r 2. In Persian, with further references. reso rte d t o and , J·ust like 'Attar.. had done, Jam! adds to it variations of h1s own: Without the am Jami critical views on individual poems, expressed in particular in the seventh section of his Baharistan are discussed in M.E. Subtelny's article referred to above. ' 29 32 For instance in the prologue of Yli.l'llfva Zulaiklui, where he discusses the relationship between "word" and "love" Ibid., pp. 462-3 (2nd 'iqd) and pp. 465-8 (3rd 'iqd). . (Hafr Aurang, pp. 595-6). 33 30 On the shiihid as a mystical concept see Hellmut Ritter, Das Meer der See/e, Le1den 1955, pp. 470-7. Khvaju Kirmani, Klwmsa, ed. by Sa 'id Niyiiz-i Kirmiini, Kirman 1370/1991, pp. 110-132. 34 Haft Aurang, pp. 465-6. 31 Haft Aurang, pp. 457-9. 35 Ibid., pp. 467-8. 36 Cf. the present writer's Of Piety and Poetry, Lei den 1983, p. 30. TUBA 26/1, 2002: 81-92 TUBA 26/1, 2002 : 81-92 90 J.T.P. de BRIJN CHAINS OF GOLD: JAMI'S DEFENCE OF POETRY 91

of shar' , "poetry" (shi'r) is equivalent to "evil" (sharr). When he continues to focus his In the third Daftar of the Silsila Jami once more returns to our topic. His discourse takes indictment on the poets of his own days he reproaches them for not not seeing the differences a remarkable turn because what he ends up defending here is not poetry in the abstract, but the between poetry (shi 'r) and "barley" (sha 'ir), the latter representing the profits they hope to panegyrics of a court poet. Given the nature of this Daftar as a mirror-for-princes the change make from their profession37. of perspective is not quite out of place. It should also be taken into account that his main model By putting the blame on the intention of the poet rather than on poetry as such- which he in this part of the Silsila was Ni~ami-yi 'An1<;li whose prose work was written according to the refuses to regard as intrinsically bad - Jami is trying to find a way out of his personal dilemma. tradition of early Persian court poetry and shows no trace of the debate on religion and poetry Being at a greater distance than his predecessors from the time when court poetry was the sole which already was going on among the religiously minded poets of Ni~ami-yi 'Aruc;IJ's age. norm, he feels free to idealise the poets of the past who, as he puts it, "used to weigh wisdom The passage opens with a discussion of the role of good poetry in the perpetuation of and religious principles on the scale of the Law" but now are no more than legendary figures. reputations. This is a topos also used by Ni~ami-yi 'Arli<;li as well as many other writers who The poets of his own time are degenerates who "run around like dogs with burning feet to find named the early court poets Riidaki and 'Un~uri as the prime examples of poets whose work out where some folks have gathered for the sake of indulging in their lusts with liquor, kebab survived the reigns of their patrons. Jami adds several other names to the list, including also and music." Their bondage to sinful entertainments has caused the name of "poetry" to stand Sana'i and Ni~ami-ye Ganjavi, not however on account of their defence of transcendental for all that is bad and pernicious38. poetry, but as encomiasts of two monarchs who happened to have the same name, Finally Jami puts the qu~stion to himself why he still goes on writing poems, "Bahramshah"4I. Quite in line with the conventional defence, Jami argues that fame lives on paradoxically making use of verse to denounce poetry. He finds no better answer to this than to by the works of the poets, more than by any other symbol of power: look how the words of the point to God's eternal Will: his in_!l~te nature does not allow him to escape from poetry which poets have survived while the palaces of former rulers have all crumbled. In one of the God has put like a chain around h_is ne~k 39 . The same argument is brought forward in a very anecdotes illustrating his point he relates a discussion between a patron and his poet, begging personal statement by which Jami later in life introduced the collection of poems from his for more gifts, about the relative worth of gold and poetical praise. When the patron argues younger years in the first volume of his Divan, under the title Tu(ifat a$-$ighar ("The Present that spoken words easily slip from memory, but gold coins can be kept in one's pocket, the of Youth"). In these words he speaks about his predestination to be a poet: poet retorts that his panegyrics are like birds flying all over the world. The king need not leave his palace for his reputation to be heard everywhere. However the money which the poet had "At the beginning the Wise and Exalted Creator made a talent for poetry my inborn earned by these poems has already disappeared from his pocket42. nature and He gave my thought in general an inclination towards it. Never have I been able to erase this verdict fully from the pages of my life so that I would be fully freed from that In the final lines of the Silsila, taking his clue again from SanaTs "farewell to poetry", f~atu~e. There was no escape from it: since the early flower of my youth, the first page of life, Jami once more calls himself to account for having been occupied with poetry for such a long ttl! this very day when I have passed the age of sixty looking on to my seventies, I never went time. However, after a summing up of all the traditional arguments against poetry, he altogether without it nor has it ever left my mind alone ... " interrupts himself and changes to a more positive line of thought. After all, as he had argued before, the essential element of poetry is the right intention of the speaker. This is the kernel, Himi continues to tell that he always was occupied with poetry, first in his youth, then, as the actual words used in a poem are merely the skin. If therefore the kernel is irreproachable, h~ ~rew up, when he.was a student in religious schools or took part in social gatherings, during there is no ground to blame the outer form. Even panegyrical poetry can be justified by this his Journeys, at the time when he led the life of a derwish, and even at the time of writing, reasoning as long as it is addressed to the right people. No one deserves better the praises of a when he h~d retreated from the world. At all times he has written down something suitable to poet than the righteous king who rules his subjects as God's shadow on earth. Such poems are the event or the occasion. He collected every idea or intuitive flash that crossed his mind but he of a quite different nature than the despicable odes filled with false praise and composed only ~id never indulge. in,~oetical speech which has no other purpose than to gather material gains, the fuel of hell fire . In a concluding quatrain he declares: out of greed. 43

This is not a volume of poetry, but a cup Uami), V. Conclusion. a table laid as it is the custom of generous hosts. Such reasoning as Jami follows here can easily be debunked as a sham hiding the poet's Ideas in all shades whatever you want are there, real intention, or as a witticism serving no other purpose than to please a patron in the hope of but no praise or satire on unworthy people.4o a rich reward. There is indeed some ground for this suspicion because Jami adds a concluding passage in which he compares the splendour of his poem to the pearls and gold coins of the

37 Ibid., pp. 60-4. 38 Ibid. pp. 64-65. 41 Sana'i dedicated his poem to a Sultan of Ghazna, Ni;r:iimi to an Atabeg in Azerbaijan. The great differences in style 39 Ibid. p. 66. and structure between the two poems are of course much more essential. 40 42 Divcin-i kcimil-i Jcimi, ed. by Hashim Rac)i, Tehran 1341/1962, pp. 289-90. Haft Aurang, pp. 300-307. 43 Ibid., pp.307-9 (Khiitima-yi kitcib).

TUBA 26/1, 2002: SI-92 TUBA 2611, 2002 : 8 I -92 92 J.T.P. de BRIJN royal gifts he may expect. He even goes as far as to allude to the title of his poem when he refers to these gifts as his "chains of gold" (salasil-i dhahab ). It would be mistaken, however, to put the words of our Mulla on one line with those of any courtly encomiast whose base flattery he has just so eloquently denounced. A number of arguments could be brought in against such easy conclusions, not so much with the aim to save Jam!s reputation as a pious and sincere mystic, but rather to arrive at a better understanding of the poet's real motives. First, there is the undisputable fact that Jam! was not a helpless court MOLIERE ON THE TURKISH STAGE poet, who had no other choice than to put his mouth were his money was. He led the life of a highly respected mystic and scholar, close to, but still apart from the actual seat of power. Of course, in the society where he lived no one in his position could go without any form of Petra De BRIJN * patronage whatsoever and there can be no doubt that, also in his case, this must have implied financial support of some kind. However, in view of Jamis great reputation and his excellent relations with the ruling classes there cannot have been an urgent motive for him to expose himself in a rather clumsy way and make himself vulnerable to the accusation of hypocrisy. Introduction Secondly, it should be taken into account that in the conclusion of the third Daftar of the Silsila Moliere's popularity as a playwright in Turkey, from Ottoman times to the present, is he is not addressing the ruler of Herat but the Ottoman Sultan who reigned over distant lands undisputed. But just how popular is he? In order to answer these questions, we need t~ ~ather and whose patronage could therefore be only of little importance to Jami. information about which of his plays have been published and performed. In add1t10n to If we cannot so easily dismiss Jamis defence of panegyrical poetry as a hypocritical ploy, translations there have been many adaptations of Moliere's plays. The way in which they how is it then to be explained? Let's suppose, for the sake of argument, that he really meant differ from ~he originals and the extent to which they have been modified varies according to what he was saying. For all we know, Jami was a staunch supporter of the status quo in the the period in which they are performed. By using some examples I wish to demonstrate how world he lived in. This state of affairs included the supremacy of Islamic Law according to playwrights used Moliere's texts for their own ends. Sunni principles, the canalisation of spiritual life in a soundly orthodox mystical Order like the Naqshbandiya and the loyality to rulers who could be trusted to serve the best interests of the Development of Ottoman Turkish Theatre And Drama community of the believers. These pillars of his view on the contemporary world are all Within Turkish theatre we can distinguish between folk theatre and Western-orientated reflected in the Silsila, most evidently in the threefold dedication contained in the poem when it had reached its final form. When it was finally completed, the Silsilat adh-dhahab had theatre, and within folk theatre we can make a further distinction betwee~ th~atre performed become affiliated to Sultan I:Iusain-i Bayqara and Shaikh 'Ubaid-Allah Al)rar, the highest in the countryside and theatre performed in cities such as Istanbul and Izm~r. Theatre. ~as authorities in the areas of politics and religion in Jam!s immediate environment, and existed for centuries in the isolated villages of Anatolia, with its close-kmt commumt~es simultaneously to the Ottoman Sultan who, in the late 15th century, was emerging as a beyond the reach of outside influences. And for centuries the village plays of the Anatolian powerful defender of Sunnite Islam. What Jami wanted to express in his discussion of court countryside, which are based on nature rituals, have developed i~ isol~tion from th~ re.st of the poetry was really his adherence to this order of things using in his arguments all the elements world. Other forms of theatre have developed in the cities, especially ~n Istanbul with Its broad put at his disposal by the Persian literary tradition. This also included the social conventions mix of nationalities and religious groups- Greeks, Armenians, Spamsh Jews an.d Europeans. attached to the poetical trade, such as the lavish remuneration of a poet. If considered within Theatre provided entertainment following a victory, at religious celebratiOns such as this frame of reference, this was as much a means to enhance the prestige of a ruler as a Ramadan or at circumcisions, births and marriages. People would gather at coffee houses, ~or magnificent maecenas, as it was a way to enrich the poet personally. instance,·to attend a performance by a Meddah (storyteller) or a Karagoz puppeteer, while If we accept this interpretation of Jamis defence of poetry it becomes clear that poems Ortaoyunu ('play in the middle') would take place in squares. like the Tubfat, the Sub[lat, and especially the Silsilat adh-dhahab with its great variety of During the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries Turkey became increasingly orientated themes, not only deserve to be studied as literary works or as textbooks of Sufi ethics, but also toward Europe. Young Turks were sent to France to be educa.ted and later, at the end of the as interesting documents providing the historian with a caleidoscopic view of the religious and nineteenth century, Paris became the centre for the exiled enemies. of the Sultan. Many of thes~ political culture of the Timurid era during its final decades. eo le attended the theatre. At the same time, with the increase m trade betwe~n Europe an ~ur~ey foreigners had settled in Istanbul and invited opera and theatre compames to p~rf?r: at their,embassies, occasions at which Turks were also present. The sultans and pashas mv1te

* Universiteit Leiden

TUBA 26/1,2002: 81-92