Talk:Rumi/Rumi's heritage

The arguments and violation of Wikipedia rules

Unfortunately some new users to Wikipedia do not follow WP:RS, WP:weight and instead try to violate WP:OR. Wikipedia works by quoting reliable Western sources. In the case of Rumi, the Encyclopedia of Islam, and Lewis Franklin are among the highest quality sources. Unfortunately some new users and ips come and blankout these sources.

Or some do original research.

Here is an example of an Original Research:

"Mevlana says:“Aslem Türk-est egerci hinduguyem” So he says: I am a Turk...He likes Turks.. Turks were praised by Mevlana. BABP (talk) 16:24, 19 January 2010 (UTC)" And the guy follows up by creating a webpage and inserting in wikipedia as a fact [1].

And another example:

"Mevlana Jelaleddin Rumi is TURKISH and he is also a component of TURKISH culture. Rumi was born in Baklh. At that time Khwarezmian Empire was in power. Khwarezmian Empire was also a TURKISH State. Then Rumi came to Konya. There was Seljuk Sultanate of Rum in Konya and it was a Turkish State. Rumi wrote his masterpieces with Persian as in that the language of literature was Persian. So that he is not an Afghan nor Iranian. He is TURKISH. Listentotheney (talk) 18:22,"

Here is a response to both users:

1) Obviously you have not read the archives and talkpages and have repeated some stuff that has been been responded to multiple times. New users should read the archives.

2) Rumi did not just write in Persian. He spoke in Persian and all of his sermons (Fihi ma Fihi) recorded by his students are in Persian. The Fihi Ma Fihi is in an informal Persian and best proof that Rumi spoke Persian in everyday affairs. Had he spoke Turkish in everyday affairs, then his lectures would have been recorded in Turkish. But they are in informal Persian. These lectures were recorded by his students while Rumi was preaching are in Persian and are in everyday informal (not written but spoken) Persian. So that puts an end to the theory that "he wrote Persian because it was more beautiful". Obviously the propents of this theory have not read Fihi ma Fih or the Seven Sermons (Friday sermons again in Persian recorded by his students). Also his recorded conversations with Shams are in Persian (and some in Arabic), but never Turkish. So you have: A) His conversations with his students all in Persian. B) His friday sermons all in Persian. C) His conversations with Shams, primarily and overwhelmingly in Persian. 3) As per the verse you claim. It says: "my origin is Turkish although I speak Hindi". Obviously Rumi did not speak Hindi. But Turk and Hindu are used as opposites in Persian poetry.

Here is an acounterexample:

Rumi also says"To Maah Torki o man Agar Tork nistam- daanam beh in qadar keh beh Torkist, Ab su"

تو ماه ِ ترکي و من اگر ترک نيستم

دانم من اين قَدَر که به ترکي است، آب سُو

To Maah-i Torki o man Agar Tork nistam Daanam man in Qadar keh Beh Torki ast, 'aab Su

Professional Translation:

You are a Turkish moon, and I, although I am not a Turk, I know that much that in Turkish the word for water is su(Schimmel, Triumphal Sun, pp 196)

In Persian poetry, the words "Rumi"(Greek), Turk, Hindu and Zangi (Black) take symbolic meaning and this has lead to some confusions for those that are not familiar with Persian poetry. See for example: Annemarie Schimmel. “Turk and Hindu; a literary symbol”. Acta Iranica, 1, III, 1974, pp.243-248 Annemarie Schimmel. “A Two-Colored Brocade: The Imagery of Persian Poetry”, the imagery of Persian poetry. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press. (pg 137-144).

As an example, Rumi compares himself to a Hindu, Turk, Greek and etc.

A) تو ماه ِ ترکي و من اگر ترک نيستم، دانم من اين قَدَر که به ترکي است، آب سُو

“You are a Turkish moon, and I, although I am not a Turk, know that much, that much, that in Turkish the word for water is su”(Schimmel, Triumphal Sun, 196)

B) “Everyone in whose heart is the love for Tabriz Becomes – even though he be a Hindu – a rose-cheeked inhabitant of Taraz (i.e. a Turk)”(Schimmel, Triumphal Sun, 196)

C) گه ترکم و گه هندو گه رومی و گه زنگی از نقش تو است ای جان اقرارم و انکارم

“I am sometimes Turk and sometimes Hindu, sometimes Rumi (Greek) and sometimes Negro(African Black=Zangi) ”O soul, from your image in my approval and my denial” (Schimmel, Triumphal Sun, 196)

For the general meaning of the usage of these terms see: Annemarie Schimmel. “Turk and Hindu; a literary symbol”. Acta Iranica, 1, III, 1974, pp.243-248 Annemarie Schimmel. “A Two-Colored Brocade: The Imagery of Persian Poetry”, the imagery of Persian poetry.

So these imageries are not a proof of background. Turk vs Hindu, and Rumi vs Black are faviorate symbols of Persian poetry.

The verse you brought says "Agarcheh hendu gooyam" . Assuming authentic, it means "I speak in Hindu".. Now we know Rumi did not speak in Hindu. However Turk as opposed to Hindu is a constrast of climates, colors, lifestyle, kings vs desolates and etc in Persian poetry. You can read a very detailed explanation of it here: [2] [3]

4) The connection of Rumi's mother to the Khwarizmshah empire is seen as legendary hagiography and not factual due to both chronological reasons as well as textual reasons. Scholars reject it and it was designed to simply connect him to royalty. In reality, the grandmother of Rumi is a simple woman as demonstrated by Baha al-Din's Ma'arif. I would read the articles in Encyclopedia of Islam on Rumi as well as the book of Franklin. These are the secondary sources acceptable in Wikipedia.

5) Although Hindu, Turk, Rumi (Roman) and Black are faviorate symbols of Persian poetry and even "Rumi" is called Rumi, if you look at Aflaki, there are also some comments about Turks. Here is an anectode from Rumi quoted by Aflaki (pg 503) about Tukrs vs Greeks. Note he is not putting Turks downs or praising Greeks (in my opinion) but just making an observation: "Likewise, it is a well-known story that one day Shaykh Salah al-Din happened to hire Turkish laborers to do building work in his garden. Mowlana said: ‘Effendi’— that is to say lord—‘Salah al-Din, when it is time for building, one must engage Greek laborers and when it is time for destroying something, Turkish hirelings. Indeed, the building of the world is assigned to the Greeks, whereas the world’s destruction is reserved for the Turks. When God—He is sublime and exalted—ordered the creation of the world of sovereignty (‘alam-e molk’), first He created unaware-infidels, and He conferred on them long life and great strength so they would strive like hired laborers in building the terrestrial world. And they built up many cities and fortresses on mountain peaks and places on top of a hill such that after generations had passed these constructions were a model for those who came later. Then divine predestination saw to it that little by little these constructions would become completely destroyed and desolate, and be eradicated. God created the group of Turks so that they would destroy every building they saw, mercilessly and ruthlessly, and cause it to be demolished. And they are still doing so, and day by day until the Resurrection they will continue to destroy in this manner. In the end, the destruction of the city of Konya will also be at the hands of wicked Turks devoid of mercy.’ And this being the case, it turned out just as Mowlana said. " (pg 503) See: Shams al-Din Ahmad al_Afkali, Manāqeb al-ʻārefīn, ed. Tahsin Yazici, 2 vols, Tehran, Donyaayeh Ketab, 1983. English translation: Shams al-Din Aflaki, "The feats of the knowers of God: Manāqeb al-ʻārefīn", translated by John O'Kane, Brill, 2002.

Here are some quotes from Rumi: "“God created the group of Turks so that they would destroy every building they saw, mercilessly and ruthlessly, and cause it to be demolished.”" “Oh ignorant Turk! Give up (tark) this idea and undertaking. Take back your Turks (torkan) to your lady (tarkan) as quickly as possible. Otherwise, you will not escape with your life.” “Majd al-Din, why did you let out a shout and release your quarry from your gullet? A Turk who is a recent disciple is able to bear the burden, but you divulge the matter. Many things like this occur to abdals to God.” “Indeed, the building of the world is assigned to the Greeks, whereas the world’s destruction is reserved for the Turks. “

Note I only brought these for demonstrations. The Diwan Shams overall contains a positive usage of the word Turk, the Mathnawi seems somewhat neutral towards negative, but the Manaqib Aflaki seems negative. The reason is that Diwan Shams is a mystical book and the imagery of Turk in Persian mysticism has been positive (along with that of "Rum/Rumi"(Greeks)).

6)

Rumi's son (Sultan Walad) on multiple occassions has attested that his Turkish is very poor.. yet his son was born in Anatolia but he claims little knowledge of Greek and Turkish. This is described in this article: [4]

According to Franklin: “Sultan Valad elsewhere admits that he has little knowledge of Turkish”(Franklin Lewis, Rumi Past and Present, East and West, Oneworld Publications, 2000.,pg 239)

“Sultan Valad did not feel confident about his command of Turkish”(Franklin Lewis, Rumi Past and Present, East and West, Oneworld Publications, 2000.,pg 240)

Sultan Walad actually admits the fact that his knowledge of Turkish and Greek is rudimentary four times. For example in the Ibtedanama, Sultan Walad states:

بگذر از گفت ترکی و رومی که از این اصطلاح محرومی گوی از پارسی و از تازی که در این هر دوخوش همیتازی

Translation: Abandon the speech of Turkish and Greek Since you are deprived of these expressions Instead speak Persian and Arabic Because you are well versed in these two Sultan Walad, Masnaviyeh Waladi, Ensha’ Baha al-Din b. Mowlana Jalal al-Din Mohammad b. Hosayn-e Balkhi, Mashur beh Mowalana, ed. Jalal al-Din Homa’I (Tehran:Eqbal, 1316) (pp 393-4)

His son admits 3-4 times that he has very poor command of Greek and Turkish.

7) A complete response to the arguments you have and could have is given here: [5] Wikipedia works by standards of Western scholars. Schimmel and Franklin are the top Rumi scholars and they have called Rumi a Persian and Persian poet. That is sufficient. It is unfortunate that the same arguments get repeated again and again. It is extremly tiring that instead of reading the archives some new user always comes to make the same repetative arguments. The fact is Rumi is known because of his Persian poetry. No one is going to examine his corpse for DNA evidence.

8) Wikipedia works by WP:weight and WP:RS. Western scholars in general and Rumi Western scholars in particular (like Franklin and Schimmel) affirm Rumi's heritage and background as a Persian. So that is what counts and not endless polemics that is constantly repeated. But if you are interested in this matter, read here:[6]. However from Wikipedia's point of view, the most comprehensive books on Rumi are those written by Rumi scholars and amongst them, the book fo Franklin currently stands out as the most detailed and objective biography of Rumi in any language. And he is a Professor of University of Chicago. The Encyclopedia of Islam is also another weighty source. GoshtaspLohraspi

1) Franklin Lewis, Rumi Past and Present, East and West, Oneworld Publications, 2000. How is it that a Persian boy born almost eight hundred years ago in Khorasan, the northeastern province of greater Iran, in a region that we identify today as Central Asia, but was considered in those days as part of the greater Persian cultural sphere, wound up in Central Anatolia on the receding edge of the Byzantine cultural sphere, in which is now Turkey, some 1500 miles to the west? (p. 9)

2) Annemarie Schimmel, “The Mystery of Numbers”, Oxford University Press,1993. Pg 49: “A beautiful symbol of the duality that appears through creation was invented by the great Persian mystical poet Jalal al-Din Rumi, who compares God's creative word kun (written in Arabic KN) with a twisted rope of 2 threads (which in English twine, in German Zwirn¸both words derived from the root “two”)”. 3) Ritter, H.; Bausani, A. "ḎJ̲alāl al- Dīn Rūmī b. Bahāʾ al-Dīn Sulṭān al-ʿulamāʾ Walad b. Ḥusayn b. Aḥmad Ḵh̲aṭībī ." Encyclopaedia of Islam. Edited by: P. Bearman , Th. Bianquis , C.E. Bosworth , E. van Donzel and W.P. Heinrichs. Brill, 2007. Brill Online. Excerpt: "known by the sobriquet Mawlānā (Mevlânâ), Persian poet and founder of the Mawlawiyya order of dervishes" 4) Julia Scott Meisami, Forward to Franklin Lewis, Rumi Past and Present, East and West, Oneworld Publications, 2008 (revised edition) 5) John Renard,"Historical dictionary of Sufism", Rowman & Littlefield, 2005. pg 155: "Perhaps the most famous Sufi who is known to many Muslims even today by his title alone is the seventh/13th century Persian mystic Rumi" 6) Frederick Hadland Davis , "The Persian Mystics. Jalálu'd-Dín Rúmí", Adamant Media Corporation (November 30, 2005) , ISBN-10: 1402157681

In the end wikipedia works with WP:RS and WP:weight. Rumi is known as Persian in Western scholarship and that is the view Wikipedia reflects. Those that are interested in the details can look here:[7].--Chetori5 (talk) 21:30, 21 January 2010 (UTC)

Summary #1

One can only quote scholars who write authoritatively about Rumi. The most important biography is now that of Franklin Lewis. Encyclopaedia of Islam also calls him a Persian poet. I'll respond to the proponents of the Turkish theory (absolute fringe) below and their unsound arguments. However, what I want to emphasize is Wikipedia works by weight. 2000+ and 370+ google books call Rumi a "Persian poet" and "Persian mystic" respectively. Wikipedia needs to reflect the most authoritative sources such as a Franklin and the most widely used convention. Else quote a minor random book is like quoting a minor random book that claims Obama is a Muslim. Unless a book is about the biography of Rumi himself (such as Franklin), I think it takes a back set.

Undo/Fringe viewpoint being pushed

Unfortunately, some users have not WP:RS, WP:UNDUE and WP:Weight.

• • I suggest authoritative articles and books on Rumi be used. Franklin calls him Persian and Encyclopaedia of Islam states Persian poet.

Google books:

• "Persian Poet Rumi" [8] (2720+ hits)
• "Turkish Poet Rumi" [9] (19 results!)

(Note four of the books are repeated,many from Turkish authors and none of them specifically deal with Rumi)

• "Persian mystic Rumi" [10] (370 results)
• "Turkish Mystic Rumi" [11] (9 results).

Please see Wikipedia's policty about weight and fix the article appropriately.

WP:UNDO is very clear. Per WP:UNDO

• If a viewpoint is in the majority, then it should be easy to substantiate it with reference to commonly accepted reference texts;
• If a viewpoint is held by a significant minority, then it should be easy to name prominent adherents;
• If a viewpoint is held by an extremely small (or vastly limited) minority, it does not belong in Wikipedia regardless of whether it is true or not and regardless of whether you can prove it or not, except perhaps in some ancillary article.

Now here are two secondary sources clearly showing that the Turkish (nationalist) viewpoint is fringe theory.

• Franklin Lewis: "On the question of RUmi's multilingualism (pages 315-17), we may still say that he spoke and wrote in Persian as a native language, wrote and converesd in Arabic as a learned "foreign" language and could at least get by at the market in Turkish and Greek (although some wildly extragavant claims have been made about his command of Attic Greek, or his native tongue being Turkish") (Lewis 2008:xxi). (Franklin Lewis, "Rumi, "Past and Present, East and West: The Life, Teachings and Poetry of Jalal al-Din Rumi", One World Publication Limited, 2008)

• Conclusion 1: The top Rumi biographer states that the claim of Rumi being a native Turkish speaker is extragavant. (i.e. Fringe).

• Talat S. Halman, "Rapture and Revolution: Essays on Turkish Literature", editor by Jayne L. Warner, Syracuse University, 2007, p.265-266) (Please note Halman is the only author and Warner is an editor (perhaps of the series)).:"Bahauddin and his family eventually settled in Konya, ancient Iconium, in central Anatolia. They brought with them their traditional Persian cultural and linguistic background and found in Konya a firmly entrenched penchant for Persian culture. In terms of Rumi’s cultural orientation – including language, literary heritage, mythology, philosophy, and Sufi legacy – the Iranians have indeed a strongly justifiable claim. All of these are more than sufficient to characterize Rumi as a prominent figure of Persian cultural history. Such a characterization is naturally reinforced by his impact on the succeeding centuries of Persian literature and intellectual life. In the West, scholars have always accepted Rumi as Persian on the basis of his exclusive use of the Persian language and because he remained in the mainstream of Persian cultural heritage. No account seems to have been taken of the Turkish and Afghan claims, except some occasional references such as the one by William Hastie in his introduction to The Festival of Spring, featuring his translations from Rumi’s Divan:

“ “The Turks claim Jelaleddin as their, although a Persian of royal race, born of Balkh, old Bactra, on the groundoof his having sung and died in Qoniya, in Asia Minor… whence he was called Rumi “The Roman,” usually rendered “the Greek,” as wonning with the confies of Oriental Rome” ”

• Conclusion 2: Talat Halman who is actually not as biased as clearly mentioned: "In the West, scholars have always accepted Rumi as Persian on the basis of his exclusive use of the Persian language and because he remained in the mainstream of Persian cultural heritage. No account seems to have been taken of the Turkish and Afghan claims". Consequently, it is not for Wikipedia either. Based on these secondary specialist sources, the Turkish nationalist viewpoint does not belong to Wikipedia per WP:UNDO, and users have absolute right to remove them.

• Conclusion 3: Some users mention Farabi article. But there is a fundamental difference. In the Farabi article, several scholarly sources were brought that mentioned there is a difference of opinion. Also historical sources from about 800-1000 years ago seem to be stating contradictatory stuff. On Rumi, the issue is different as the claims of the Turkish viewpoint is considered extravagant and "not taken by Western scholars". By Western scholars, it is clear that it means scholars who specialiaze in Rumi and understand Persian. Not random google books that are not specialized and unrelated to the topic.

• Conclusion 4: The "Turkish" for Rumi that has miniscule number of links (all from non-scholars and books with hardly any relavence to Rumi) is from non-scholars and furthermore, even these non-scholars do not use the word "origin", but are referencing the fact that he spent most of his time there and mistakenly juxtaposing modern geography for a classical area/era. That is they are using a modern geographical identifier to identify a classical Persian mystic who used to live there and this is as wrong as claiming Herodotus was "Turkish". Anyhow these fringe links have no specially are overwhelmingly outnumbered by mainstream links (both scholarly and non-scholarly) that use Persian mystic/poet/origin.

• Conclusion 5: Only authoritative scholars on Rumi count and not a random website, pamphlet or writer who is not writing about Rumi and does not have even a knowledge of the Persian language.

Persian heritage

That portion is obvious.

• C.E. Bosworth, "Turkmen Expansion towards the west" in UNESCO HISTORY OF HUMANITY, Volume IV, titled "From the Seventh to the Sixteenth Century", UNESCO Publishing / Routledge, p. 391: "While the Arabic language retained its primacy in such spheres as law, theology and science, the culture of the Seljuk court and secular literature within the sultanate became largely Persianized; this is seen in the early adoption of Persian epic names by the Seljuk rulers (Qubād, Kay Khusraw and so on) and in the use of Persian as a literary language (Turkmen must have been essentially a vehicle for everyday speech at this time). The process of Persianization accelerated in the thirteenth century with the presence in Konya of two of the most distinguished refugees fleeing before the Mongols, Bahā' al-Dīn Walad and his son Mawlānā Jalāl al-Dīn Rūmī, whose Mathnawī, composed in Konya, constitutes one of the crowning glories of classical Persian literature."
• Franklin D. Lewis, "Rumi: Past and Present, East and West: The life, Teaching and poetry of Jalal Al-Din Rumi", Oneworld Publication Limited, 2008 pg 9: "How is that a Persian boy born almost eight hundred years ago in Khorasan, the northeastern province of greater Iran, in a region that we identify today as Central Asia, but was considred in those days as part of the greater Persian cultural sphere, wound up in central Anatolia on the receding edge of the Byzantine cultural sphere"

• Franklin Lewis: "On the question of Rumi's multilingualism (pages 315-17), we may still say that he spoke and wrote in Persian as a native language, wrote and converesd in Arabic as a learned "foreign" language and could at least get by at the market in Turkish and Greek (although some wildly extragavant claims have been made about his command of Attic Greek, or his native tongue being Turkish") (Lewis 2008:xxi). (Franklin Lewis, "Rumi, "Past and Present, East and West: The Life, Teachings and Poetry of Jalal al-Din Rumi", One World Publication Limited, 2008)
• Franklin Lewis on Turkish scholar Onder: "There, we can only surmise that his cultural jingoism represents a conscious effort to rob Rumi of his Persian and Iranian heritage, and claim him for Turkish literature, ethnicity and nationalism") (Lewis 2008:549). (Franklin Lewis, "Rumi, "Past and Present, East and West: The Life, Teachings and Poetry of Jalal al-Din Rumi", One World Publication Limited, 2008)

• Turkish scholar Halman states(pg 266): “In the West scholars have always accepted Rumi as a Persian on the basis of his exclusive use of the Persian language and because he remained in the mainstream of Persian cultural heritage. No account seems to have been taken of the Turkish and Afghan claims, except some occasional references such as the one by William Hastie in his introduction to The Festival of Spring, featuring his translations from Rumi’s Divan: The Turks claim Jelaleddin as their own, although a Persian of royal race, born of Balkh, old Bactra, on the ground of his having sung and died in Qoniya, in Asia Minor…Whence he was called Rumi “the Romans,” usually rendered “the Greek,” as wonning wihin the confies of old Oriental Rome."..
• Halmann is a Turkish scholar but he even admits: "The Turkish ambassador and scholar Halmann who is unsure of the geneology of Rumi’s father mentions that: “In terms of Rumi’s cultural orientation – including language, literary heritage, mythology, philosophy, and Sufi legacy –the Iranians have indeed a strongly justifiable claim. All of these are more than sufficient to characterize Rumi as a prominent figure of Persian cultural history..and Rumi is patently Persian on the basis of jus et norma loquendi.”(Halmann 2007:266-267).

• Seyyed Hossein Nasr, "Islamic Art and Spirituality", Suny Press, 1987. pg 115:"Jalal al-Din was born in a major center of Persian culture, Balkh, from Persian speaking parents, and is the product of that Islamic Persian culture which in the 7th/13th century dominated the 'whole of the eastern lands of Islam and to which present day Persians as well as Turks, Afghans, Central Asian Muslims and the Muslims of the Indo-Pakistani and the Muslims of the Indo-Pakistani subcontinent are heir. It is precisely in this world that the sun of his spiritual legacy has shone most brillianty during the past seven centuries. The father of Jalal al-Din, Muhammad ibn Husayn Khatibi, known as Baha al-Din Walad and entitled Sultan al-'ulama', was an oustanding Sufi in Balkh connected to the spiritual lineage of Najm al-Din Kubra."

• Carter Vaughn Findley, “The Turks in World History”, Oxford University Press, Nov 11, 2004. Pg 72:Meanwhile, amid the migratory swarm that Turkified Anatolia, the dispersion of learned men from the Persian-speaking east paradoxically made the Seljuks court at Konya a new center for Perso-Islamic court culture, as exemplified by the great mystical poet Jelaleddin Rumi (1207-73).

• Annemarie Schimmel, The Triumphal Sun: A Study of the Works of Jalaloddin Rumi, SUNY Press, 1993, p. 193: "Rumi's mother tongue was Persian, but he had learned during his stay in Konya, enough Turkish and Greek to use it, now and then, in his verse" (see also the section on Schimmel below).

• Richard Ettinghausen, Oleg Grabar, Marilyn Jenkins-Madina,"Islamic Art and Architecture, 650-1250 "Yale University Press, Jul 11, 2003. pg 134: "In effect then, wherever their conquests took them, the Turks, or at least their princes, carried largely Persian culture and Persian ideas, even the Persian language. The greatest Persian mystic poet, Jalal al-Din Rumi, lived and wrote in Konya in central Anatolia"

• Louis Gardet, "Religion and Culture" in the "The Cambridge History of Islam- part VIII: Islamic Society and Civilization” - edited by P. M. Holt, Ann K. S. Lambton, Bernard Lewis, Cambridge University Press (1977) , pg 586: "It is sufficient to mention 'Aziz al-Din Nasafi, Farid al-Din 'Attar and Sa'adi, and above all Jalal al-Din Rumi, whose Mathnawi remains one of the purest literary glories of Persia"

• (Franklin Lewis, "Rumi, "Past and Present, East and West: The Life, Teachings and Poetry of Jalal al-Din Rumi", One World Publication Limited, 2008)(p9): "The Anatolian peninsula which had belonged to the Byzantine, or eastern Roman empire, had only relatively recently been conquered by Muslims and even when it came to be controlled by Turkish Muslims rulers, it was still known to Arabs, Persians and Turks as the geographical area of Rumi. As such, there are a number of historical personages born in or associated with Anatolia known as Rumi, literally “from Rome”. In Muslim countries, therefore, Jalal al-Din is not generally known as Rumi"

• (Franklin Lewis, "Rumi, "Past and Present, East and West: The Life, Teachings and Poetry of Jalal al-Din Rumi", One World Publication Limited, 2008) (p 75): "The institution of the Madrase had come to Syria from Khorasan, where the movement to patronize the teaching of Islamic law by founding colleges began, and consequently professors from eastern Iran enjoyed a certain prestige. ..Instead something induced him [Rumi’s father] to try his luck in Asia Minor, perhaps the prospect of a professorship for himself or his sons, perhaps the promise of greater political stability, or perhaps the desire to promulgate the teachings of Islam on the frontier, where the Christian Greeks, and Armenians and the Turkmen tribes did not yet accept or observe the practice of Islam...He must, therefore, have been in search of a position for himself and his sons, a position more easily gained in the Persian-speaking lands of the Seljuks of Rum.

• (Franklin Lewis, "Rumi, "Past and Present, East and West: The Life, Teachings and Poetry of Jalal al-Din Rumi", One World Publication Limited, 2008) (p 75):"For Baha al-Din, the ideal situation would undoubtedly have included a ruler predisposed to heed and foster his teachings, to abstain from wine and other impieties, and to uphold and spread poetry and religious learning, preferably of the Hanafi school and preferably in a Persian-speaking area."

• (Franklin Lewis, "Rumi, "Past and Present, East and West: The Life, Teachings and Poetry of Jalal al-Din Rumi", One World Publication Limited, 2008) (p 79):“The decisive defeat of the Byzantine army at Manzikert in 1071 led to the populating of Asia Minor by Turkish tribesmen. Qelij Arsalan shaped these tribesmen into a loosely organized state during his nearly forty-year rule, corresponding to the time of the Crusades and Saladin’s rule in Syria. When he died in 1192, his sons fell to fighting amongst themselves, but Kay Khosrow I eventually consolidated power in his own hands and took control of Konya in 1205. His regnal name, and those of his successors, all harked back to the glories of the pre-Islamic Iranian kings, an indication that though Turkish in origin, the Seljuks of Anatolia consciously modeled themselves on Persian culture and royal traditions. Having replaced the Persophilic Samanid and Ghaznavid empires in eastern Iran, the Seljuk Turks consciously set about acquiring the Iranian habits of kingship, assisted by their Iranian viziers. It was to instruct the early Turkish Seljuk rulers in the ways of the pre-Islamic Iranian court traditions that Nezam al-Molk wrote his famous book on royal politics, Siasat name (also known as the Seyar al-Moluk “The manners of the Monarch”), so that they might convincingly wear the Iranian crown. As the Turkmen tribes spread westward conquering new lands, at least nominally to the glory of the Seljuks, they brought the language, culture and administration of the Persians in their wake. The populace the conquered in the former countryside of the Byzantium was, however, primarily Armenian and Greek by ethnicity, Christian by religion and agricultural by occupation. The town and cities, however, consisted of Turkish tribesmen, urbanized Turks and Iranians, many of whom had fled from the Mongols”

Summary quote for Persian heritage

Rumi's works are written in the New Persian and his Mathnawi (Masnavi) remains one of the purest literary glories of Persia and a crowning achievement of the Persian language. A Persian literary renaissance (in the 8th/9th century), alonside the development of Sufism, started in regions of Sistan, Khorāsān and Transoxiana and by the 10th/11th century, it reinforced the Persian language as the preferred literary and cultural language in the Persian Islamic world. Rumi's importance is considered to transcend national and ethnic borders. His original works are widely read today in their original language across the Persian-speaking world(Iran, Tajikistan, Afghanistan and parts of Persian speaking Central Asia). Translations of his works are very popular in other countries. His poetry has influenced Persian literature as well as Urdu, Punjabi, Turkish and some other Iranic, Turkic and Indic languages written in Perso/Arabic script e.g. Pashto, Ottoman Turkish,Chagatai language and Sindhi. His poems have been widely translated into many of the world's languages and transposed into various formats. In 2007, he was described as the "most popular poet in America."

He was born to native Persian speaking parents, likely in the village of Wakhsh, a small town located at the river Wakhsh in Persia (in what is now Tajikistan). Wakhsh belonged to the larger province of Balkh (parts of now modern Afghanistan and Tajikistan), and in the year Rumi was born, his father was an appointed scholar there..

Greater Balkh was at that time a major center of a Perso-Islamic culture and Khorasani Sufism had developed there for several centuries. Ineed, the most important influences upon Rumi, besides his father, are said to be the Persian poets Attar and Sanai. Rumi in one poem express his appreciation to Attar and Sanai:"Attar was the spirit, Sanai his eyes twain, And in time thereafter, Came we in their train" and mentions in another poem: "Attar has traversed the seven cities of Love, We are still at the turn of one street".

He lived most of his life under the PersianateSeljuq Sultanate of Rum, where he produced his works and died in 1273 AD. He was buried in Konya and his shrine became a place of pilgrimage. Following his death, his followers and his son Sultan Walad founded the Mevlevi Order, also known as the Order of the Whirling Dervishes, famous for its Sufi dance known as the Sama ceremony. He was laid to rest beside his father, and over his remains a splendid shrine was erected. A hagiographical account of him is described in Shams ud-Din Ahmad Aflāki's Manāqib ul-Ārifīn (written between 1318 and 1353). This hagiographical account of his biography needs to be treated with care as it contains both legends and facts about Rumi. For example, Professor Franklin Lewis, Chicago University, in the most complete biography on Rumi has a separate section for the hagiographical biography on Rumi and actual biography about him.

Franklin

The book by the University of Chicago Professor, Prof. Lewis Franklin is considered the most important biography on Rumi and is highly cited and well reviewed by many authors [12] Here is the website of Dr. Franklin: [13]

• Rumi: Past and Present, East and West. The Life Teachings and Poetry of Jalâl al-Din Rumi. Foreword by Julie Meisami (Oxford: One World Publications, 2000), xvii+686pp. Reprints 2001, 2003. Revised expanded edition, 2007. Awards: British Society for Middle Eastern Studies, British-Kuwaiti Friendship Society for the Best Book in Middle Eastern Studies published in the UK in 2000; Encyclopædia Iranica Foundation, 2001; Saidi-Sirjani Award (Hon. Mention), Society of Iranian Studies, 2004.
• Mowlavi: Diruz o emruz, sharq o gharb, Persian translation by Farhād Farahmandfar (Tehran: Nashr-e Sāles, 1383 Sh./ 2004).
• Mowlānā: diruz tā emruz, sharq tā gharb, collaborative Persian translation by Hassan Lahouti with Franklin Lewis, including author’s preface to the translation (Tehran: Nashr-e Nāmak, 1384 Sh./2005; 2nd ed., 1385 Sh./2006.
• Mevlânâ: Geçmiş ve şimdi, Doğu ve Batı (Mevlânâ Celâleddin Rumi’nin Hayatı, öğretisi ve şiiri, Turkish Trans. by (Hamide Kokuyan &) Gül Çağali Güven, ed. Safi Argapus (Istanbul: Kabalcı Yayınevi, 2010). * Rumi før og nu, Øst og Vest. Jalal al-Din Rumis liv, lære og digtning. Danish translation by Rasmus Chr. Elling. Carsten Niebuhr Biblioteket (Copenhagen: Forlaget Vandkunsten, 2010).

Unless, the Turkish theory proponents can bring up a serious Rumi scholar (note the keyword “Rumi scholar”) discussing their viewpoint and giving it credence in academia, then they need to accept the fact that their viewpoint is fringe. Simply, they need to find a scholar on the caliber of Franklin (who knows Persian and has written a biography on Rumi that is widely acclaimed and highly cited) which shares their POV.

• Franklin Lewis: "On the question of Rumi's multilingualism (pages 315-17), we may still say that he spoke and wrote in Persian as a native language, wrote and conversed in Arabic as a learned "foreign" language and could at least get by at the market in Turkish and Greek (although some wildly extragavant claims have been made about his command of Attic Greek, or his native tongue being Turkish") (Lewis 2008:xxi). (Franklin Lewis, "Rumi, "Past and Present, East and West: The Life, Teachings and Poetry of Jalal al-Din Rumi", One World Publication Limited, 2008)

• Franklin Lewis on Turkish scholar and cultural ambassador Onder: "There, we can only surmise that his cultural jingoism represents a conscious effort to rob Rumi of his Persian and Iranian heritage, and claim him for Turkish literature, ethnicity and nationalism") (Lewis 2008:549). (Franklin Lewis, "Rumi, "Past and Present, East and West: The Life, Teachings and Poetry of Jalal al-Din Rumi", One World Publication Limited, 2008)

• Franklin D. Lewis, "Rumi: Past and Present, East and West: The life, Teaching and poetry of Jalal Al-Din Rumi", Oneworld Publication Limited, 2008 pg 9: "How is that a Persian boy born almost eight hundred years ago in Khorasan, the northeastern province of greater Iran, in a region that we identify today as Central Asia, but was considred in those days as part of the greater Persian cultural sphere, wound up in central Anatolia on the receding edge of the Byzantine cultural sphere"

• Franklin Lewis:”Living among Turks, Rumi also picked up some colloquial Turkish.”(Franklin Lewis, "Rumi, "Past and Present, East and West: The Life, Teachings and Poetry of Jalal al-Din Rumi", One World Publication Limited, 2008, pg 315)

• Franklin Lewis on Turkish scholar Onder: "There, we can only surmise that his cultural jingoism represents a conscious effort to rob Rumi of his Persian and Iranian heritage, and claim him for Turkish literature, ethnicity and nationalism") (Lewis 2008:549). (Franklin Lewis, "Rumi, "Past and Present, East and West: The Life, Teachings and Poetry of Jalal al-Din Rumi", One World Publication Limited, 2008)

• (Franklin Lewis, "Rumi, "Past and Present, East and West: The Life, Teachings and Poetry of Jalal al-Din Rumi", One World Publication Limited, 2008)(p9): "The Anatolian peninsula which had belonged to the Byzantine, or eastern Roman empire, had only relatively recently been conquered by Muslims and even when it came to be controlled by Turkish Muslims rulers, it was still known to Arabs, Persians and Turks as the geographical area of Rumi. As such, there are a number of historical personages born in or associated with Anatolia known as Rumi, literally “from Rome”. In Muslim countries, therefore, Jalal al-Din is not generally known as Rumi"

• (Franklin Lewis, "Rumi, "Past and Present, East and West: The Life, Teachings and Poetry of Jalal al-Din Rumi", One World Publication Limited, 2008) (p 75): "The institution of the Madrase had come to Syria from Khorasan, where the movement to patronize the teaching of Islamic law by founding colleges began, and consequently professors from eastern Iran enjoyed a certain prestige. ..Instead something induced him [Rumi’s father] to try his luck in Asia Minor, perhaps the prospect of a professorship for himself or his sons, perhaps the promise of greater political stability, or perhaps the desire to promulgate the teachings of Islam on the frontier, where the Christian Greeks, and Armenians and the Turkmen tribes did not yet accept or observe the practice of Islam...He must, therefore, have been in search of a position for himself and his sons, a position more easily gained in the Persian-speaking lands of the Seljuks of Rum.

• (Franklin Lewis, "Rumi, "Past and Present, East and West: The Life, Teachings and Poetry of Jalal al-Din Rumi", One World Publication Limited, 2008) (p 75):"For Baha al-Din, the ideal situation would undoubtedly have included a ruler predisposed to heed and foster his teachings, to abstain from wine and other impieties, and to uphold and spread poetry and religious learning, preferably of the Hanafi school and preferably in a Persian-speaking area."

• Franklin Lewis, "Rumi, "Past and Present, East and West: The Life, Teachings and Poetry of Jalal al-Din Rumi", One World Publication Limited, 2008) (p 79):“The decisive defeat of the Byzantine army at Manzikert in 1071 led to the populating of Asia Minor by Turkish tribesmen. Qelij Arsalan shaped these tribesmen into a loosely organized state during his nearly forty-year rule, corresponding to the time of the Crusades and Saladin’s rule in Syria. When he died in 1192, his sons fell to fighting amongst themselves, but Kay Khosrow I eventually consolidated power in his own hands and took control of Konya in 1205. His regnal name, and those of his successors, all harked back to the glories of the pre-Islamic Iranian kings, an indication that though Turkish in origin, the Seljuks of Anatolia consciously modeled themselves on Persian culture and royal traditions. Having replaced the Persophilic Samanid and Ghaznavid empires in eastern Iran, the Seljuk Turks consciously set about acquiring the Iranian habits of kingship, assisted by their Iranian viziers. It was to instruct the early Turkish Seljuk rulers in the ways of the pre-Islamic Iranian court traditions that Nezam al-Molk wrote his famous book on royal politics, Siasat name (also known as the Seyar al-Moluk “The manners of the Monarch”), so that they might convincingly wear the Iranian crown. As the Turkmen tribes spread westward conquering new lands, at least nominally to the glory of the Seljuks, they brought the language, culture and administration of the Persians in their wake. The populace the conquered in the former countryside of the Byzantium was, however, primarily Armenian and Greek by ethnicity, Christian by religion and agricultural by occupation. The town and cities, however, consisted of Turkish tribesmen, urbanized Turks and Iranians, many of whom had fled from the Mongols”

• Franklin Lewis, "Rumi, "Past and Present, East and West: The Life, Teachings and Poetry of Jalal al-Din Rumi", One World Publication Limited, 2008). pg 239:"..Sultan Valad elsewhere admits that he has little knowledge of Turkish”

• Franklin Lewis, "Rumi, "Past and Present, East and West: The Life, Teachings and Poetry of Jalal al-Din Rumi", One World Publication Limited, 2008). pg 240:"Sultan Valad did not feel confident about his command of Turkish”

Schimmel

The only scholarly source I saw that the Turkish users use was Schimmel. This is their source:

• “He was, as is claimed of Turkish origin.”(The Triumphal Sun: A Study of the Works of Jalaloddin Rumi, SUNY Press, 1993, p. 371) However, Schimmel is discussing Rumi studies in Turkey which claims Rumi as Turkish. Thus she is implicitly quoting the works of Turkish authors in Turkey about Rumi. This is clear from the context of those pages and section of the book which is titled:”Mowlana Jalal al-Din’s Rumi’s influence in the East and West” where the author discusses Rumi’s influences in various countries. On the pages about Turkey, Schimmel writes: “It is small wonder that the Turks were and still are extremely fond of Mowlana Jalal al-Din Rumi who took his surname Rumi, from the Romans e.g. Anatolian, area were his spent most of his life.”. Thus Schimmel is discussing the Turkish claim. But this claim is not accepted by Schimmel hereself who states: “..Turks are absolutely convinced that Mowlana was a Turk..Rumi’s mother tongue was Persian, but he had learned during his stay in Konya, enough Turkish and Greek to use it, now and then, in his verse” (Annemarie Schimmel, The Triumphal Sun: A Study of the Works of Jalaloddin Rumi, SUNY Press, 1993, p. 193).

They have also ignored these Schimmel quotes:

• Annemarie Schimmel, "The Mystery of Numbers",Oxford University Press, Apr 7, 1994. pg 51:"These examples are taken from the Persian mystic Rumi's work, not from Chinese, but they express the yang-yin relationship with perfect lucidity."
• Annemarie Schimmel, “The Mystery of Numbers”, Oxford University Press,1993. Pg 49: “A beautiful symbol of the duality that appears through creation was invented by the great Persian mystical poet Jalal al-Din Rumi, who compares God's creative word kun (written in Arabic KN) with a twisted rope of 2 threads (which in English twine, in German Zwirn¸both words derived from the root “two”)”.

Given these, the Turkish users cannot use Schimmel. Also she is a passed away scholar. So one must use alive scholars and currently, the most authoritative book on Rumi's biography is that of Franklin.

• Annemarie Schimmel also remarks on Rumi’s native tongue in the “ The Triumphal Sun: A Study of the Works of Jalaloddin Rumi”, SUNY Press, 1993, p. 193: "Rumi's mother tongue was Persian, but he had learned during his stay in Konya, enough Turkish and Greek to use it, now and then, in his verse"..Note the author discusses the background of Rumi and makes such a statement. [14]. She has also called him a "Persian mystic"[[[15]].
• Annemarie Schimmel, "The Mystery of Numbers",Oxford University Press, Apr 7, 1994. pg 51:"These examples are taken from the Persian mystic Rumi's work, not from Chinese, but they express the yang-yin relationship with perfect lucidity."

Note the last book is published in 1994. So it is the definitive opinion ("Persian Mystic). Of course, if an author gives contradictatory viewpoint, then Wikipedia should not use such a source. But as explained she is simply describing the Turkish viewpoint, and then rejecting it by has described Schimmel is not contradiction but in the first quote is just giving the Turkish viewpoint while rejecting it by her firm statement on Rumi's mothertongue)

Quote from Halman

Note this is the opinion of a Turkish cultural ambassador of Turkey and not necessarily that of Rumi scholars. But it gives a good Turkish viewpoint of the material. Quote 1 (Talat S. Halman, "Rapture and Revolution: Essays on Turkish Literature", editor by Jayne L. Warner, Syracuse University, 2007, p.265-266) (Please note Halman is the only author and Warner is an editor (perhaps of the series)). Here is the quote:

“The available documentary evidence is so flimsy that no nation can invoke jus sanguinis regarding the Rumi genealogy. Besides, an exploration into his background must take into account such additional factors as the tumultuous life of the area in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, the uncertain lineage of rulers and dynasties, miscegenation, and the identity crises resulting from shifting population and mass conversions to Islam. One must also consider, at least speculatively, that Rumi’s family, living in Balkh, perhaps regarded itself as neither Persian nor Turkish nor Arab nor anything else for that matter but as Muslims, refusing to be assimilated or to identify themselves as Persian or Turkish any more than did the Greeks, Armenians or Jews in Balkh.

Bahauddin and his family eventually settled in Konya, ancient Iconium, in central Anatolia. They brought with them their traditional Persian cultural and linguistic background and found in Konya a firmly entrenched penchant for Persian culture. In terms of Rumi’s cultural orientation – including language, literary heritage, mythology, philosophy, and Sufi legacy – the Iranians have indeed a strongly justifiable claim. All of these are more than sufficient to characterize Rumi as a prominent figure of Persian cultural history. Such a characterization is naturally reinforced by his impact on the succeeding centuries of Persian literature and intellectual life. In the West, scholars have always accepted Rumi as Persian on the basis of his exclusive use of the Persian language and because he remained in the mainstream of Persian cultural heritage. No account seems to have been taken of the Turkish and Afghan claims, except some occasional references such as the one by William Hastie in his introduction to The Festival of Spring, featuring his translations from Rumi’s Divan:

“ “The Turks claim Jelaleddin as their, although a Persian of royal race, born of Balkh, old Bactra, on the groundoof his having sung and died in Qoniya, in Asia Minor… whence he was called Rumi “The Roman,” usually rendered “the Greek,” as wonning with the confies of Oriental Rome” ”

In the Encycloapedia of Islam, B. Carra de Vaud and H. Ritter, in separate enteries, make no reference to Rumi as Persian or Turkish, in fact, no reference at all to the question of nationality.

Quote 2

(Talat S. Halman, "Rapture and Revolution: Essays on Turkish Literature", editor by Jayne L. Warner, Syracuse University, 2007, p.266-267) "The Iranian claim on the grounds of the language is inctrovertible, although some Turkish writers have tried to create the impression that Rumi composed a substantial body of verse in Turkish in addition to Persian. The statistical record is clear: The Mesnevi (Persian: Mathnawi) consists of nearly 26,000 couplets; the Divan-i Kebir (Persian Divan-e Kabir) probably has about 40,000 couplets, although the figure varies greatly. Of this vast output, everything is in Persian except for a handful of poems, couplets, lines, and words Turkish, Arabic, Greek, and Hebrew. ... This is infinitesimal compared with his output in Persian. Rumi is patently Persian on the basis of jus et norma loquendi."

-- My analysis:

• Actually, Halman has probably not looked up the latest version of Encycloapedia of Islam. Since Bausani is the second author and Halman does not mention that. Here is what the current Encycloapedia of Islam states: Ritter, H.; Bausani, A. "ḎJ̲alāl al- Dīn Rūmī b. Bahāʾ al-Dīn Sulṭān al-ʿulamāʾ Walad b. Ḥusayn b. Aḥmad Ḵh̲aṭībī ." Encyclopaedia of Islam. Edited by: P. Bearman , Th. Bianquis , C.E. Bosworth , E. van Donzel and W.P. Heinrichs. Brill, 2007. Brill Online. Excerpt: "known by the sobriquet Mewlānā, persian poet and founder of the Mewlewiyya order of dervishes"
• I suggest we can start the introduction with this and clean it up a bit.
• Halman is a good source that shows what mainstream scholarship believes. That is Rumi is Persian according to Western scholars and Halman believes this is due the language and culture.
• Halman despite being of Turkish background is taking the viewpoint that there is not enough evidence. However, I believe there is much evidence and I have brought some above (like Sultan Walad not being proficient in Turkish or the quote from Aflaki, Rumi's father using Sogdian (East Iranian) colloquial words and etc.) and the quote from Aflaki about Greeks/Turks, Rumi's usage of everyday Persian with his students, etc..
• Be that it may be..Halman is actually clear that " No account seems to have been taken of the Turkish and Afghan claims". Which means that it is WP:fringe and does not beling to Wikipedia.

--Khodabandeh14 (talk) 18:25, 12 August 2012 (UTC)

OR claims without references by propents of Turkish viewpoint

As per the repeated OR Turkish claims on this page, it has been responded to here: [[16]], and much more extensively here: A Study about the Persian Cultural Legacy and Background of the Sufi Mystics Shams Tabrizi and Jalal al-Din Rumi [17] (which has been suspiciously removed from the external links!).

it is mainly centered on three false arguments:

false argument one- Rumi's usage of allegorical symbol of Hindu, Turk, Rumi, Zangi (black)

a) Claim one: Rumi compares himself to a "Turk". Response:

• Yet these same people ignore this verse: "You are a Turkish moon, and I, although I am not a Turk, I know that much that in Turkish the word" for water is su(Schimmel, Triumphal Sun, pp 196).

• Another Turkish user above falsely translates the verse: "Aslem Türk'est egerçi Hindi miguyem" means: "I'm Turk though I write Persian".. where as the verse says "Hindi" and not Persian! Also "Hindu" and "Turk" are figurative opposites in Persian literature.

• As noted by Kafadar when quoting the Turkish scholar Golpiranli and such ethnonyms in the works of Rumi: “Golpiranli rightly insists that ethnonym were deployed allegorically and metaphorically in classical Islamic literatures, which operated on the basis of a staple set of images and their well recognized contextual associations by readers; there, ‘turk’ had both a negative and positive connotation. In fact, the two dimensions could be blended: the ‘turk’ was ‘cruel’ and hence, at the same time, the ‘beautiful beloved’” .

(Kafadar, Cemal (2007), "A Rome of One’s Own: Reflections on Cultural Geography and Identity in the Lands of Rum", Muqarnas: An Annual on the Visual Cultures of the Islamic World , vol 24:7-25, Brill.)

• And also noted by de Bruijn: “In such imagery the link to ethnic characteristics is hardly relevant, so that it may be used together with features of another ethnic type in the characterization of a single person, e.g., when Nezami describes the princess of Hend as āhu-ye tork-čašm-e hendu-zād (“a gazelle with Turkish eyes, of Indian blood” . (J.T.P. de Brujin, Hindi in Encyclopedia Iranica "In such imagery the link to ethnic characteristics is hardly relevant" Encyclopædia Iranica).

• An example: "Everyone in whose heart is the love for Tabriz Becomes – even though he be a Hindu – a rose-cheeked inhabitant of Taraz (i.e. a Turk)”(Schimmel, Triumphal Sun, 196)".

Also these people ignore the fact that Rumi has called the Ghuzz (Oguz) Turks as savages several times in the Mathnawi (which does not use allegorical symbols) and the Divan.

Or for example many negative quotes about Turks quoted by Aflaki. These are not poetry anymore and cosequently allegory and symbolism does not imply anymore. Amongst the severe ones:

• Oh ignorant Turk! Give up (tark) this idea and undertaking. Take back your Turks (torkan) to your lady (tarkan) as quickly as possible. Otherwise, you will not escape with your life. (Shams al-Din Aflaki, "The feats of the knowers of God: Manāqeb al-ʻārefīn", translated by John O'Kane, Brill, 2002. pg 229-231)
• Majd al-Din, why did you let out a shout and release your quarry from your gullet? A Turk who is a recent disciple is able to bear the burden, but you divulge the matter. Many things like this occur to abdals to God. (Shams al-Din Aflaki, "The feats of the knowers of God: Manāqeb al-ʻārefīn", translated by John O'Kane, Brill, 2002. pg 266)
• Indeed, the building of the world is assigned to the Greeks, whereas the world‘s destruction is reserved for the Turks. (Shams al-Din Aflaki, "The feats of the knowers of God: Manāqeb al-ʻārefīn", translated by John O'Kane, Brill, 2002. pg 503)
• when it is time for building, one must engage Greek laborers and when it is time for destroying something, Turkish hirelings. (Shams al-Din Aflaki, "The feats of the knowers of God: Manāqeb al-ʻārefīn", translated by John O'Kane, Brill, 2002. pg 503)
• God created the group of Turks so that they would destroy every building they saw, mercilessly and ruthlessly, and cause it to be demolished. (Shams al-Din Aflaki, "The feats of the knowers of God: Manāqeb al-ʻārefīn", translated by John O'Kane, Brill, 2002. pg 503)

See:

• Shams al-Din Aflaki, "The feats of the knowers of God: Manāqeb al-ʻārefīn", translated by John O'Kane, Brill, 2002.

false argument two - Rumi's usage of languages

b) Claim two: Rumi uses "Turkish"...

Not sufficient. Rumi also uses Greek as well and the percentage of Greek/Turkish is less than 1/3 of 1% of his poems.

• And as noted by Franklin:”Living among Turks, Rumi also picked up some colloquial Turkish.”(Franklin Lewis, "Rumi, "Past and Present, East and West: The Life, Teachings and Poetry of Jalal al-Din Rumi", One World Publication Limited, 2008, pg 315)

• Annemarie Schimmel, The Triumphal Sun: A Study of the Works of Jalaloddin Rumi, SUNY Press, 1993, p. 193: "Rumi's mother tongue was Persian, but he had learned during his stay in Konya, enough Turkish and Greek to use it, now and then, in his verse"..Also Rumi uses much more Arabic than Turkish.. but 97% of his poems are in Persian and less than 1/3 of 1% are in combined Greek and Turkish."

• Halman: “A refutation of the Turkish claim may be found in historical fact evinced by Turkish sources. No Ottoman Tezkire’ tush-shuara (poet’s live; Who’s Who in Poetry) lists biographical data on Rumi, thus indicating that he was not considered a Turkish poet by the Ottoman Turks themselves. Also significant is the statement of Mehmed Fuad Kopruli, generally recognized as the greatest scholar of Turkish literary history in the twentiweth century: “Although one encounters several pieces of Greek and Turkish verse in the Divan-I Kebir, these could not be considered, on the basis of their nature and numbers, sufficient to presume that he was a Turkish poet”. Golpinarli corrobates this view: “With Mevlana’s arrival from Balkh to Anatolia, a branch of Iranian literature was transported into Anatolia. The Turkish couplets and the few Turkish words he used in Mulemmas [ compound verses in two or more languages+ could never confer on him the status of a Turkish poet” (Halman, pg 268-269)

• (Talat S. Halman, "Rapture and Revolution: Essays on Turkish Literature", editor by Jayne L. Warner, Syracuse University, 2007, p.266-267) "The Iranian claim on the grounds of the language is inctrovertible, although some Turkish writers have tried to create the impression that Rumi composed a substantial body of verse in Turkish in addition to Persian. The statistical record is clear: The Mesnevi (Persian: Mathnawi) consists of nearly 26,000 couplets; the Divan-i Kebir (Persian Divan-e Kabir) probably has about 40,000 couplets, although the figure varies greatly. Of this vast output, everything is in Persian except for a handful of poems, couplets, lines, and words Turkish, Arabic, Greek, and Hebrew. ... This is infinitesimal compared with his output in Persian. Rumi is patently Persian on the basis of jus et norma loquendi."

• finally Franklin again criticized Turkish ministry of Cutlure: "This is very creative use of statistics, since a couple of dozen at most of the 35,0000 lines of the Divan-e Shams are in Turkish and almost all of these lines occur in poems that are predominantely in Persian. ((Franklin Lewis, "Rumi, "Past and Present, East and West: The Life, Teachings and Poetry of Jalal al-Din Rumi", One World Publication Limited, 2008, pg 549).
  • Note the Greek lines are also like these.

false argument three - "Persian was common"

c) the third wrong claim is that: "Persian was popular poetry language"..

This is again discounted by the fact that Rumi's Friday prayer sermons are recorded in Persian, his letters are in Persian and his lectures to his students are recorded in colloquial Persian. Note colloquial Persian lectures show that Rumi's everyday language is Persian.. how come he has no friday sermons in Turkish? Or no lectures in Turkish? Also Arabic was the everyday religious preaching language but Rumi chose Persian. Also the invalidity of this argument can be seen by examinaning the writings of Rumi's son who is specific in the fact the he does not know Greek/Turkish well. Rumi's colloquial lectures are in Persian and similarly his sermons. However, he does not have a single lecture or sermon in Turkish.

false argument four - geography argument

d) A fourth wrong claim: "Rumi lived in Turkey under the protection of Turkish sultans. His tomb is in Turkey and he is considered as a Moslem saint by the Turkish people. Maybe his ethnical background was Persian. But what difference does it make ? (Catherine the Great was a Russian empress. Actually she was of German origin. Do we call her a German empress ?) Anyway, after the last edition to call Rumi a Persian poet, the introductory sentence of the article became too chaotic. ( Please try to read the first sentence with four paranthesis, Arabic alphabet, birth and death dates etc. )"

There was no Turkey then. It was Anatolia and the majority of its population were likely Greeks and Armenians, hence the reason Mowlana chose the epiphet "Rumi" (meaning Greek). Also if an Arab was born in Syria under Saljuq rule, it does not make them Turkish. Bear in mind that the Saljuq rulers usually had Persian viziers and indeed the Saljuqs of Rum during the time of Rumi had the Persian Vizier Moin al-Din Parvana. While forgetting that all of Rumi’s colloquial lectures are in Persian which shows him speaking everyday Persian to his students while he does not have a single lecture, sermon or letter in Turkish). Seljuqs also controlled parts of Syria and Ottomans controlled parts of Iraq, Arabia and etc. It doesn’t mean every Arab or Kurd or etc. there has relationship to modern Turkey. Rumi had of course an influence on Turkish culture and is a universal figure. However, he is known for his poetry which is in Persian and you will need to understand Persian to understand Rumi well.

• Franklin Lewis on Turkish scholar Onder: "There, we can only surmise that his cultural jingoism represents a conscious effort to rob Rumi of his Persian and Iranian heritage, and claim him for Turkish literature, ethnicity and nationalism") (Lewis 2008:549). (Franklin Lewis, "Rumi, "Past and Present, East and West: The Life, Teachings and Poetry of Jalal al-Din Rumi", One World Publication Limited, 2008). So the top world Rumi scholar rejects your claim.
• Grousset, Rene, The Empire of the Steppes, (Rutgers University Press, 1991), 161,164; "..renewed the Seljuk attempt to found a great Turko-Persian empire in eastern Iran..", "It is to be noted that the Seljuks, those Turkomans who became sultans of Persia, did not Turkify Persia-no doubt because they did not wish to do so. On the contrary, it was they who voluntarily became Persians and who, in the manner of the great old Sassanid kings, strove to protect the Iranian populations from the plundering of Ghuzz bands and save Iranian culture from the Turkoman menace."
• This can be supported by Rumi’s own words. "Speros Vryonis,"The Turkish State and History", Aristide D Caratzas Pub; 2 Sub edition (September 1992), p.51:"Djalal al-Din Rumi, the great Persian mystic and poet who lived most of his life in Konya is said to have had a very vivid and violent opinion of the nature of the Turkmen nomads of the Rum sultanate: “There is a well known story that the sheikh Salah al-Din one day hired some Turkmen workmen to build the walls of his garden. "Effendi Salah al-Din", said the master (Rumi), "you must hire Greek workmen for this construction. It is for the work of demolition that Turkish workmen must be hired. For the construction of the world is special to the Greeks, and the demolition of this same world is reserved for the Turks. When God created the universe, he first made the carefree infidels. He gave them a long life and considerable force in such a fashion...that in the manner of paid workmen they constructed the earthly world. They erected numerous cities and mountain fortresses...so that after centuries these constructions served as models to the men of recent times. But divine predestination has disposed of affairs in such a way that little by little the constructions become ruins. He created the people of the Turks in order to demolish, without respect or pity, all the constructions which they see. They have done this and are still doing it. They shall continue to do it day in and day out until the Resurrection!"” "

• C.E. Bosworth, "Turkish Expansion towards the west" in UNESCO HISTORY OF HUMANITY, Volume IV, titled "From the Seventh to the Sixteenth Century", UNESCO Publishing / Routledge, 2000. p. 391:

"While the Arabic language retained its primacy in such spheres as law, theology and science, the culture of the Seljuk court and secular literature within the sultanate became largely Persianized; this is seen in the early adoption of Persian epic names by the Seljuq Rulers (Qubad, Kay Khusraw and so on) and in the use of Persian as a literary language (Turkish must have been essentially a vehicle for everyday speech at this time). The process of Persianization accelerated in the thirteenth century with the presence in Konya of two of the most distinguished refugees fleeing before the Mongols, Baha al-din Walad and his son Mewlana Jalal al-din Balkhi Rumi, whose Mathnawi, composed in Konya, constitutes one of the crowning glories of classical Persian literature."

• And Turkish scholar Halman who says the evidence is flimsy: "Bahauddin and his family eventually settled in Konya, ancient Iconium, in central Anatolia. They brought with them their traditional Persian cultural and linguistic background and found in Konya a firmly entrenched penchant for Persian culture. In terms of Rumi’s cultural orientation – including language, literary heritage, mythology, philosophy, and Sufi legacy – the Iranians have indeed a strongly justifiable claim. All of these are more than sufficient to characterize Rumi as a prominent figure of Persian cultural history. Such a characterization is naturally reinforced by his impact on the succeeding centuries of Persian literature and intellectual life. In the West, scholars have always accepted Rumi as Persian on the basis of his exclusive use of the Persian language and because he remained in the mainstream of Persian cultural heritage. No account seems to have been taken of the Turkish and Afghan claims, except some occasional references such as the one by William Hastie in his introduction to The Festival of Spring, featuring his translations from Rumi’s Divan:

“ “The Turks claim Jelaleddin as their, although a Persian of royal race, born of Balkh, old Bactra, on the groundoof his having sung and died in Qoniya, in Asia Minor… whence he was called Rumi “The Roman,” usually rendered “the Greek,” as wonning with the confines of Oriental Rome” ”

• In other words: his language, literary heritage, mythology (yes he uses a lot of Shahnameh symbology), philosophy (from Khorasan) and Sufi legacy (the lineage is strictly Persian up to Ma’ruf Karkhi and then goes to the first Caliph and then the Prophet), he is in the Persian cultural sphere.
• Consequently, Rumi grew up in Persianate environment (his son even did not know Greek and Turkish that well according to his testimony) which is very different than modern Turkey.

false argument five - non-academic arguments

Unfortunately, non-academic arguments without any sources are constantly brought which violate WP:FORUM and WP:SOAPBOX.

Sultan Walad, Rumi's son did not know Turkish well per his own admission

Rumi's son Sultan Walad has claimed several times his knowledge of Turkish and Greek is weak. This despite being born in Anatolia. Note he has again about 60000+ verses of Persian and about 250 Greek/Turkish veres. “Sultan Valad elsewhere admits that he has little knowledge of Turkish”(Franklin Lewis, "Rumi, "Past and Present, East and West: The Life, Teachings and Poetry of Jalal al-Din Rumi", One World Publication Limited, 2008,pg 239) “Sultan Valad did not feel confident about his command of Turkish”(Franklin Lewis, "Rumi, "Past and Present, East and West: The Life, Teachings and Poetry of Jalal al-Din Rumi", One World Publication Limited, 2008,pg 240) Sultan
For example in his Ebteda-Nama, Sultan Walad admits twice in Persian after some of the lines in Greek/Turkish:
بگذر از گفت ترکی و رومی
که از این اصطلاح محرومی
گوی از پارسی و تازی
که در این دو همی خوش تازی

Translation:

Let go of the languages of Greek (Rumi) and Turkish (Turki)
Because you lack knowledge in these two,
Thus speak in Persian and Arabic,
Since in these two, you recite very well.

And also elsewhere in Ghazal in his Diwan, he writes:: If I knew Turkish, I would have brought one to a thousand. But when you listen to Persian, I tell the secrets much better.(Sultan Walad, ”Mowlavi-ye Digar:Shamel-e Ghazzaliyat, Qasayed, Qete’at, Tarkibat, Ash’ar-eTorki, Ashar-e Arabi, Mosammat, Robbi’yyat” Tehran, Sana’i, 1984. pg 556:)
ترکچه اگر بیلیدم بر سروزی بک ایدیدم
طتچه اگر دیلرسز گویم اسرار علا

He also says: If I had known Turkish, I would have told you, the secrets that God had imparted on Me.(Mehmed Fuad Koprulu, "Early Mystics in Turkish Literature", Translated by Gary Leiser and Robert Dankoff, Routledge, 2006, pg 253). According to Mehmed Fuad Koprulu, the Turkish poems are: Written in a very crude and primitive manner and with a very defective and rudimentary versification replete with zihaf (pronouncing long vowels short) and imalā (pronouncing a short vowel long).(Mehmed Fuad Koprulu, "Early Mystics in Turkish Literature", Translated by Gary Leiser and Robert Dankoff, Routledge, 2006, pg 206).

Much more evidence here

A Study about the Persian Cultural Legacy and Background of the Sufi Mystics Shams Tabrizi and Jalal al-Din Rumi [18] No need to copy & paste the whole thing.

Google books/Scholars and 50 sources+

The number for "Persian Mystic Rumi", "Persian poet Rumi" are overwhelming relative to any other adjective that denotes background. The ratio is close to 100:1..Some of these books are written by rumi scholars and some of them not necessarily from Rumi scholars ..consequently they (non-scholarly ones) only should be used if someone wants to have a contest (which is not appropriate for Wikipedia). However, in order to keep the quality of the article, each author has to be checked based on these criteria: a) Are they scholars of Rumi and know the Persian language?

b) or Are they some non-academics or a writer who has a one line sentence on a piece of work not related to Rumi?

1) Speros Vryonis,"The Turkish State and History", Aristide D Caratzas Pub; 2 Sub edition (September 1992), p.51: "Djalal al-Din Rumi, the great Persian mystic and poet who lived most of his life in Konya is said to have had a very vivid and violent opinion of the nature of the Turkmen nomads of the Rum sultanate: “There is a well known story that the sheikh Salah al-Din one day hired some Turkmen workmen to build the walls of his garden. "Effendi Salah al-Din", said the master (Rumi), "you must hire Greek workmen for this construction. It is for the work of demolition that Turkish workmen must be hired. For the construction of the world is special to the Greeks, and the demolition of this same world is reserved for the Turks. When God created the universe, he first made the carefree infidels. He gave them a long life and considerable force in such a fashion...that in the manner of paid workmen they constructed the earthly world. They erected numerous cities and mountain fortresses...so that after centuries these constructions served as models to the men of recent times. But divine predestination has disposed of affairs in such a way that little by little the constructions become ruins. He created the people of the Turks in order to demolish, without respect or pity, all the constructions which they see. They have done this and are still doing it. They shall continue to do it day in and day out until the Resurrection!"”

2) Franklin Lewis: "On the question of Rumi's multilingualism (pages 315-17), we may still say that he spoke and wrote in Persian as a native language, wrote and conversed in Arabic as a learned "foreign" language and could at least get by at the market in Turkish and Greek (although some wildly extravagant claims have been made about his command of Attic Greek, or his native tongue being Turkish") (Lewis 2008:xxi). (Franklin Lewis, "Rumi, "Past and Present, East and West: The Life, Teachings and Poetry of Jalal al-Din Rumi", One World Publication Limited, 2008). Franklin Lewis on Turkish scholar and cultural ambassador Onder: "There, we can only surmise that his cultural jingoism represents a conscious effort to rob Rumi of his Persian and Iranian heritage, and claim him for Turkish literature, ethnicity and nationalism") (Lewis 2008:549). (Franklin Lewis, "Rumi, "Past and Present, East and West: The Life, Teachings and Poetry of Jalal al-Din Rumi", One World Publication Limited, 2008) Franklin D. Lewis, "Rumi: Past and Present, East and West: The life, Teaching and poetry of Jalal Al-Din Rumi", Oneworld Publication Limited, 2008 pg 9: "How is that a Persian boy born almost eight hundred years ago in Khorasan, the northeastern province of greater Iran, in a region that we identify today as Central Asia, but was considered in those days as part of the greater Persian cultural sphere, wound up in central Anatolia on the receding edge of the Byzantine cultural sphere". Franklin Lewis:”Living among Turks, Rumi also picked up some colloquial Turkish.”(Franklin Lewis, "Rumi, "Past and Present, East and West: The Life, Teachings and Poetry of Jalal al-Din Rumi", One World Publication Limited, 2008, pg 315). "Rumi also composed a thirteen-line poem with the refrain, "you are the Agapos," from the Greek word agape, meaning 'you are the beloved'. These poems have bits of demotic Greek; these have been identified and translated in French along with some Greek verses of Sultan Valad"(.”(Franklin Lewis, "Rumi, "Past and Present, East and West: The Life, Teachings and Poetry of Jalal al-Din Rumi", One World Publication Limited, 2008, pg 315))

3)Ritter, H.; Bausani, A. "ḎJ̲alāl al- Dīn Rūmī b. Bahāʾ al-Dīn Sulṭān al-ʿulamāʾ Walad b. Ḥusayn b. Aḥmad Ḵh̲aṭībī ." Encyclopaedia of Islam. Edited by: P. Bearman , Th. Bianquis , C.E. Bosworth , E. van Donzel and W.P. Heinrichs. Brill, 2007. Brill Online. Excerpt: "known by the sobriquet Mewlānā, persian poet and founder of the Mewlewiyya order of dervishes"

4)Julia Scott Meisami, Forward to Franklin Lewis, Rumi Past and Present, East and West, Oneworld Publications, 2008 (revised edition)

5) John Renard,"Historical dictionary of Sufism", Rowman & Littlefield, 2005. pg 155: "Perhaps the most famous Sufi who is known to many Muslims even today by his title alone is the seventh/13th century Persian mystic Rumi"

6) Frederick Hadland Davis , "The Persian Mystics. Jalálu'd-Dín Rúmí", Adamant Media Corporation (November 30, 2005) , ISBN 978-1-4021-5768-4.

7) Annemarie Schimmel, The Triumphal Sun: A Study of the Works of Jalaloddin Rumi, SUNY Press, 1993, p. 193: "Rumi's mother tongue was Persian, but he had learned during his stay in Konya, enough Turkish and Greek to use it, now and then, in his verse". Annemarie Schimmel, "The Mystery of Numbers",Oxford University Press, Apr 7, 1994. pg 51:"These examples are taken from the Persian mystic Rumi's work, not from Chinese, but they express the yang-yin relationship with perfect lucidity."

8) Cyril Glassé, Huston Smith, "The New Encyclopedia of Islam", Rowman Altamira, 2003. pg 235:"He was of Persian origin from Balkh, but left at an early age with his father Baha' ad-Din Walad, a scholar who had disagreements with the rulers".

9) Seyyed Hossein Nasr, “The Garden of Truth: The Vision and Promise of Sufism, Islam's Mystical Tradition”, Harper Collins, Sep 18, 2007. Pg 204:”Of Persian origin and born in Balkh, Rumi, the poet whose poems now are the most widely sold in America, spent the last forty years of his life in Konya in Anatolia.”

10) Jelaluddin Rumi, Andrew Harvey, Lekha Singh,"Call to Love: In the Rose Garden with Rumi", Sterling Publishing Company, Sep 1, 2007 - 112 pages. Backcover: “The Persian mystic Rumi, who lived and wrote in thirteenth-century Turkey, has become the most widely read poet in America today.

11) Sheila Blair, Jonathan M. Bloom, "Rivers of paradise: water in Islamic art and culture",Yale University Press, 2009. pg 53:"This idea is expressed by the Persian mystic Rumi, currently the best-selling poet in the United States: "The sea bears up one who is dead: but if he be living,.."

12)

Carl W. Ernst, "Rethinking Islam in the contemporary world", Edinburgh University Press, 2004. pg 244:"Currently, the best-known representative of Sufism is the classical Persian poet Rumi, who is often represented as someone who transcended all religions.5 Many people wonder what relationship, if any, Sufism has to Islam"

13) Richard Ettinghausen, Oleg Grabar, Marilyn Jenkins-Madina,"Islamic Art and Architecture, 650-1250 "Yale University Press, Jul 11, 2003. pg 134: "In effect then, wherever their conquests took them, the Turks, or at least their princes, carried largely Persian culture and Persian ideas, even the Persian language. The greatest Persian mystic poet, Jalal al-Din Rumi, lived and wrote in Konya in central Anatolia"

14) Tambi-Piḷḷai Isaac Tambyah, "Psalms of a Saiva Saint", Asian Educational Services, 1925, page 157:"The Persian mystic, Rumi, exclaims, "I gazed into my heart and there I saw Him who was nowhere else”.

15) Stephen Arroyo, “Person-to-Person Astrology: Energy Factors in Love, Sex and Compatibility”, North Atlantic Books, Jun 21, 2011. Pg 114: The Persian mystic Rumi, whose works have recently become widely known in the Western world for their inspirational beauty and profound spiritual insights, has written: “Love is the astrolabe of God's mysteries.”

16) Brush Dance, “A Journal with the Poetry of Rumi”, BRUSH DANCE Incorporated, Dec 1, 2001 “This beautifully designed writing journal features the poetry of 13th-century Persian mystic Rumi and the colorful and inspiring artwork of Michael Green.”</ref>.

17) William J. Duiker, Jackson J. Spielvogel, "World History: Volume 1",Cengage Learning, Dec 26, 2008 pg 245:"In this poem, the thirteenth-century Persian poet Rumi describes the mystical relationship achieved by means of passionate music and dance"

18) Mariam Naseem, "Not Without My Son: As Told to Lee Gittler Steup", AuthorHouse, Jan 19, 2010. pg 26:"I finish this chapter with the words of the oldest and greatest Persian poet, Rumi," https://www.google.com/search?q=%22Rumi+persian+poet%22&btnG=Search+Books&tbm=bks&tbo=1#hl=en&tbo=1&tbm=bks&sclient=psy-ab&q=%22Persian+poet+Rumi%22&oq=%22Persian+poet+Rumi%22&gs_l=serp.3...8097.10644.0.10813.19.19.0.0.0.0.156.1417.16j3.19.0.efrsh..0.0...1.9GrMo9DB8sQ&pbx=1&bav=on.2,or.r_gc.r_pw.r_qf.&fp=9a8fbacd776db0ec&biw=1536&bih=718

19) N. Hanif, "Biographical Encyclopedia of Sufis",Volume 3 of Biographical encyclopaedia of Sufis", Sarup & Sons, 2000. pg 18: "Shah Abdul Latif had an unflinching faith in the great Persian poet Rumi"

20) AC Hunsberger, "Nasir Khusraw, the Ruby of Badakhshan: A Portrait of the Persian Poet, Traveller and Philosopher", I.B.Tauris, 2003. page xiii: "If Nasir Khusraw is less well-known today, even in Iran, than other Persian poets such as Sa'di, Khayyam, Rumi or Hafiz, other travel chroniclers and historians such as Ibn Battuta or Ibn Khaldun"

21) Wayne Teasdale , “The Mystic Heart: Discovering a Universal Spirituality in the World's Religions”, New World Library, Mar 9, 2001. Pg 224: “The Persian mystic Rumi, one of the greatest Islamic poet sages..”

22) Charles Dudley Warner, "A Library of the World's Best Literature - Ancient and Modern - Vol.XXXII (Forty-Five Volumes); Rumi-Schrer", Cosimo, Inc., 2008. pg 2487: "The appelation Rumi, or Syrian, is given to the Persian poet Jalal al-Din because most of his life was passed at Iconium in Rumi or Asia Minor"

23) R Kane, "The Significance of Free Will", Oxford University Press, 1996, pg 3: "There is a disputation [that will continue] till mankind are raised from the dead between the Necessitarians and the partisans of Free Will. —Jalalu'ddin Rumi, twelfth-century Persian poet "

24) Fayeq Oweis, "Encyclopedia of Arab American Artists",ABC-CLIO, 2008. pg 121: "The Post-Apollo Press has also published one of the most important scholarly studies on the great spiritual master and Persian poet Jalaluddin Rumi (1207-1273) and his life and work"

25) Edward E. Curtis, "Encyclopedia of Muslim-American history",Infobase Publishing, 2010. pg 503:"Rumi, a Persian poet and theologian, inspired movement in the 13th century Turkey.."

26) Salma Khadra Jayyusi, Manuela Marín, "The Legacy of Muslim Spain", BRILL, 1992. pg 545:"Mystical poets like the Persian poet Rumi were to reach new extremes of delicacy and preciosity in seeing in the intimate union of the rose (gol) and sugar (shekar) .."

27) Thom Cavalli, "Alchemical Psychology: Old Recipes for Living in a New World", Penguin, Mar 1, 2002. pg 260: "I have often quoted the great Persian poet Rumi.." [19]

28) Zenius, "Arete", AuthorHouse, 2011. pg 171: "the Persian Poet, Rumi, may have been their greatest and Tagore may have been the top poet of the Indian sub-continent. .."

29) John L. Jackson, David Kyuman Kim, "Race, Religion, and Late Democracy",SAGE, 2011. pg 62:"Famous New Age writer Paolo Coelho made an annual trip to Iran, where he has in the past lectured on the Sufi, Persian poet Rumi"

30) Deirdre Johnson ,"Love: Bondage or Liberation? A Psycholological Exploration of the Meaning, Values and Dangers of Falling in Love", Karnac Books, Jun 30, 2010 . pg xiii: "The Persian writer Rumi, is one of the most widely read poets at the moment".

31) Geela, "The American dream: an immigrant's true life story of winning against all odds",Indiana University. pg 22: "Similarly, many great thinkers and scientists such as Albert Einstein and the great Persian philosopher Rumi have described the universe as more of a great thought than an object." [20]

32) John Baldock, "Essence of Rumi ", Chartwell Books (September 2005). pg 68: ..writings of Rumi and other Persian poets of the twelfth and.."

33) Rumi, Ehsan Yarshater, Hasan Javadi and A. J. Arberry , "Mystical Poems of Rumi", University Of Chicago Press (April 15, 2009) . " Front Matter: "... Persian mystical poet Maulänä.."

34) Wayne Teasdale and the Dalai Lama, "The mystical heart: Discovering a Universal Spirituality in the World's Religions", New World Library, 2001. pg 222: "The Persian mystic Rumi, one of the great Islamic poet sages, comments.."

35) Roger Housden , "Ten Poems to Change Your Life",Random House Digital, Inc., 2001. pg 14: "Eight hundred years earlier, the Persian mystic Rumi said:.."

36)

A. Avery, G., A Reynolds, K, "Representations of Childhood Death", Palgrave Macmillan, 2000. pg 158: "his free translations of the work of the Persian mystic Rumi".

37) Rachel Pollack, "The power of ritual",Dell Pub., 2000. pg 23:"The Persian mystic Rumi wrote of God as "the Beloved"

38) Paul William Roberts , Tauris Parke Paperbacks, Oct 17, 2006 . pg 22:"Besides major poets like the Persian Rumi, the order produced numerous Sufi masters who were, and are, believed to possess spiritual powers and the ability to perform miracles."

39) John J. K. Lee, "Receiving God's Deeper Messages: The Pilgrimage Of A Truth-seeking Christian", iUniverse, 2005. pg 77:"Persian poet Rumi expressed this insight beautifully in the following poem. The entire world, "

40) Christopher K. Germer, Sharon Salzberg , "The Mindful Path to Self-Compassion: Freeing Yourself from Destructive Thoughts and Emotions", Guilford Press, 2009. pg 91: "Consider the following poem from the Persian poet Rumi.."

41) Jan Philips, "Divining the body: reclaim the holiness of your physical self", SkyLight Paths Publishing, Mar 30, 2005. pg 7: "The Persian poet Rumi.."

42)

T. Tymieniecka,” Islamic Philosophy and Occidental Phenomenology on the Perennial Issue of Microcosm and Macrocosm”, Springer, Aug 29, 2006. “The story of true love is so sweet that it not only cannot be narrated in one paper, but, as the Persian mystic Rumi says: 26 However much we describe and explain love, When we come to love we are ashamed of it.”,

43) David J. Roxburgh , "Writing the word of God: calligraphy and the Qur'an", Yale University Press, 2008.

44) Luci Shaw, Eugene H. Peterson, "Water My Soul: Cultivating the Interior Life", Regent College Publishing. pg 130: "Rumi, Persian poet".

45) Ilʹi͡a Pavlovich Petrushevskiĭ, "Islam in Iran ", SUNY Press, 1985. pg 399: "Rumi Persian poet and mystic"

46) Bernard Grun , "The timetables of history: a horizontal linkage of people and events", Simon & Schuster, 1991. "Djelaleddin Rumi, Persian poet, founder of the Order of Dancing Dervishes" [21]

47) Y. C. Simhadri, "Youth in the contemporary world",Mittal Publications, 1989 . pg 118: "The evation of the evils of mundane political systems was summarised by the Persian philosopher Jalal-eddin Al-Rumi in these terms: “The princely all seductive terms, but behind them lie death, torment, and the loss of our life"

48) Nyogen Senzaki, Eidō Shimano, Soen Nakagawa,"Like a Dream, Like a Fantasy: The Zen Teachings and Translations of Nyogen", Wisdom Publications, Aug 31, 2005. pg 99: "Jalal-ud-Din Rumi was a Persian philosopher and poet of the early thirteenth century"

49) Alice Peck , " SkyLight Paths Publishing, May 30, 2008. pg 4: "Jalal ad-Din ar-Rumi, the Persian sage and poet mystic who wrote during the thirteenth century, sees sowing and consumption— the beginning and the end—as one, as a cycle"

50) Michael Sebastian, "1-Step Solution Just Say Hu", AuthorHouse, 2009. pg 50: "Rumi, Jalal ad-Din, 1207-73, great Islamic Persian sage and poet mystic, b. in Balkh",.

51) Seyyed Hossein Nasr, "Islamic Art and Spirituality", Suny Press, 1987. pg 115:"Jalal al-Din was born in a major center of Persian culture, Balkh, from Persian speaking parents, and is the product of that Islamic Persian culture which in the 7th/13th century dominated the 'whole of the eastern lands of Islam and to which present day Persians as well as Turks, Afghans, Central Asian Muslims and the Muslims of the Indo-Pakistani and the Muslims of the Indo-Pakistani subcontinent are heir. It is precisely in this world that the sun of his spiritual legacy has shone most brillianty during the past seven centuries. The father of Jalal al-Din, Muhammad ibn Husayn Khatibi, known as Baha al-Din Walad and entitled Sultan al-'ulama', was an oustanding Sufi in Balkh connected to the spiritual lineage of Najm al-Din Kubra."

52)

Laura Resau, : "The Ruby Notebook “,Random House Digital, Inc., Jan 10, 2012 . p149: “You know, the Persian mystic Rumi mentions a Layla in his poetry.”

53) Andrew Harvey,"Call to Love: In the Rose Garden with Rumi",Sterling Publishing Company, 2007. "The Persian mystic Rumi, who lived and wrote in thirteenth-century Turkey, has become the most widely read poet in America today"

54) Robert Whittemore,The Review of Metaphysics Vol. 9, No. 4 (Jun., 1956), pp. 681-699. "It is, however, important to note that the inspiration for Iqbal's panpsychism is not any thinker of the west but rather the famed Persian mystic, Rum"

.

Incase fringe viewpoint is given weight

If there is ever a need for an Iranian section (which there isn't since WP:weight applies and top scholars like Franklin/Encycloapedia of Islam must be given weight, and the other viewpoints do not have equivalent weight), one can write:

Western authoritative scholars such as Franklin Lewis have criticized Turkish authorities for trying to rob Rumi of his Iranian heritage and have dismissed the extravagant claim that his native language was Turkish. Turkish scholar Halman points to the fact that Western scholars have always accepted Rumi as Persian due to his exclusive use of the Persian language and because he remained in the mainstream Persian cultural heritage.. According to Prof. Speros Vyronis, based on a passage from Aflaki (a student of Rumi and his first biogpher), Rumi had a violent opinion of the nature of Turks. Iranian scholar Firuz Mansuri has noted that Sultan Walad belittles Turks in several poems and also has mentioned several times that his knowledge of Turkish and Greek is weak. R. Minutalab also analyzes the Ma'arif of Rumi's father and the lectures of Rumi and notes: "The language of Vakhsh in Tajikistan was also Persian as shown by the colloquial everyday language of Ma‘arif" and "that the Fihi ma Fih and the seven sermon shows that the everyday spoken language by Rumi was Persian", discounting the viewpoint that the poet only used the language for literary reasons. For further explanation on Rumi's Iranian background, one can refer to the recent monograph of Dr. Minutalab. Likewise, in mystical Persian poetry, the words Rumi, Turk, Hindu and Zangi take symbolic non-ethnic meaning and this has led to some confusions for those that are not familiar with Persian poetry, with Rumi describing himself as not a Turk, Turk, Hindu, Greek, Black. Oxford historian C.E. Bosworth has mentioned the process of Persianization was accelerated by Rumi's father and son. Overall, numerous sources have supposed Rumi as a native Persian speaker and as a Persian poet/mystic .

and 1000s+ more in google books and google scholars [22][23].--Khodabandeh14 (talk) 21:25, 12 August 2012 (UTC)

What concerns Wikipedia

Wikipedia is concerned about weight. Google books/scholars as well as the most authoritative living scholars such as Franklin overwhelmingly state Persian. And scholars such as Franklin have directly criticized the Turkish claim while even Turkish scholars such as Halmann claim that Western "scholars" (note scholars and not some random book) consider Rumi as a Persian poet. Of course Halmann tries to rationalize this by saying because Rumi wrote in Persian, however there are much more evidence here:[24]. So wikipedia needs to restore the correct version: [25].

Unfortunately, ignorant users have attacked this page constantly, and bring 5-6 random books from their 19 book google search whose authors have no authority in Rumi studies.. Some of the books are outright ridicolous with authors having no university and academic background, and just writing one sentence on Rumi. Else Iranian users can do a search from 2000-3000+ google books and overwhelm the punty 5-6 books written by non-experts. Until the Turkish users can suggest an alive Western scholars with the status of Franklin Lewis who has written the ultimate biography of Rumi, and such scholars as Arberry, Encyclopaedia of Islam, Julia Meisami, etc.., then they need to desist from vandalizing this page. The book of Lewis has been overwhelmingly positively reviewed as shown in www.scholar.google.com .. wikipedia consequently must also follow scholarly sources. However, even their semi-unbiased Turkish scholars such as Halmann claim that Western scholars consider Rumi as a Persian. That is sufficient than for Wikipedia and these Turkish nationalists need to find a new play ground to appropriate Persian history. For more details see here: [26]. Thank you. --Khodabandeh14 (talk) 15:47, 12 August 2012 (UTC)

Summary #2

• The users that are arguing for different viewpoints or bring example of other articles (e.g. Farabi) are wrong based on WP:UNDO as described here:[27]. The issue resembles the article such as Scythians where all currently living mainstream specialist scholars accept them as Iranian but Turkish scholars (including Turkish (and related Turkic languages) Wikipedia) claim them as Turk (or gives credence to fringe viewpoint). I have explained the issue in detail in the link and these users are urged to read WP:RS, WP:UNDO, WP:WEIGHT, WP:RS, WP:5P, WP:FORUM and WP:SOAPBOX. Specially WP:UNDO and WP:RS. As our friend said up here: "There is not a single (!) work by experts claiming that Rumi was not a Persian". Until such experts (not random quotes) are brought, then the issue is mute.
• 50+ sources have been brought here:[28] (although not all of them are Rumi scholars but some are, unlike the fringe viewpoint).
• The quotes of Franklin, Schimmel and Halman has been discussed here [29][30][31][32]

• Worst case scenario(incase fringe viewpoint is given any weight), to counter it: [33]
• A small portion on Persian heritage (incase the article needs to be improved) here:[34][35]
• OR arguments responded to here: [36][37] (and the next three/four) and more extensively here[38]--Khodabandeh14 (talk) 22:44, 15 August 2012 (UTC)