Mawlānā Jalāl al-Dīn al-Rūmī’s Relations with Qādī ᶜIzz al-Dīn al-Rāzī and Shams al-Dīn al-Mardīnī

Abstract

The mystical and intellectual milieu of the great Sufi poet Mawlānā Jalāl al-Dīn al-Rūmī (d. 672/1273) is vital reference point for researchers interested in the cultural structure and scientific life of Seljukid Anatolia. Both his scholarly and intellectual background and the political and sociocultural environment of Seljukid Konya, where he spent the most fertile years of his life, paved the way for Mawlānā to develop diverse and multifaceted relations with many segments of society (scholars, Sufis, akhīs, hāfizes/memorisers, painters, architects, physicians, merchants, statesmen, rulers, khātūns, poets, priests, etc.). From this perspective, our article aims to make a modest contribution to understanding the religious and scholarly life of Seljukid Anatolia through the relations between the prominent figures of the period. In this framework, the biographies of two jurists, one of whom was a qādī/vizier and the other a faqīh/mudarris, are presented and the nature and degree of their relations with Mawlānā are analysed. Qādī ᶜIzz al-Dīn al-Rāzī (d. 654/1256) was an essential figure of Rayy origin who held critical positions (ambassador, atabag, vizier) in the bureaucracy of the Seljuks of Türkiye. There is an intimate relationship between Qādī ᶜIzz al-Dīn and Mawlānā, who was also known for his piety and philanthropy and who favoured the scholars and scholarly assemblies. Shams al-Dīn al-Mardīnī (d. after 656/1258) was a critical Hanafī faqīh of 13th-century Seljuk Konya. However, we owe our knowledge of him almost entirely to early Mawlawī sources, especially the manāqibnāmahs. Therefore, he is an example of a person who came within the field of view of researchers due to the intimate relations he developed with Mawlānā. The fact that not only Shams al-Dīn al-Mardīnī but also many other scholars (mudarris, physician, qādī, faqīh, etc.) who lived in Anatolia in the 13th-century are the subject of Sufi sources, especially manāqibnāmahs, shows how intensive the relations between Sufis and scholars were. For this reason, manāqibnāmahs, the leading source type we use in our article, have been subjected to content analysis on the axis of other contemporary records. In terms of the relations between the qādīs and faqīhs and the Sufis, it is concluded that Qādī ᶜIzz al-Dīn and Shams al-Dīn al-Mardīnī were moderate and measured in their opposition to Sufism.

Affiliated Institutions

• Bülent Ecevit University TR

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