As El-Zein notes, one of the major feature of the 'New Sufism' is the fact that the majority of the translations of Rumi's verse comes from English, not the original Persian. The name Jonathan Star, who has also "translated" the Dao De Jing, is listed in the article as one of these adepts. Star is among a seemingly endless group of English speaking authors (e.g. Stephen Mitchell et al) who render a multitude of works from different faith traditions.
For example, Coleman Barks, whose publishing career is Rumi, worked with John Moyne to render the Essential Rumi (of which I have a copy) from A.J. Arberry's scholarly translation. El-Zein quotes Barks:
"John Moyne and I try to be faithful to the images, the tone as we hear it, and the spiritual information coming through. We have not tried to reproduce any of the dense musicality of the Persian originals. It has seemed appropriate to place Rumi in the strong tradition of American free verse." (75)
I've heard his poems expressed in the original Persian. A respected scholar of Islam who teaches where I obtained my BA in Religious Studies, fluent in Persian, recited some of his poems. American free verse melts like butter in comparison. Granted, not everyone can learn or understand Persian. Just as plastic can only be recycled so many times before it loses its strength completely, so too these renderings being removed from their original context one too many times loses any tie to its original and becomes eisegesis, proof-texting to sell the particular viewpoint of the one wielding the words.
El-Zein quotes Deepak Chopra following suit:
"They, (the poems) are not direct translations but 'moods' that we have captured as certain phrases radiated from the original Farsi, giving life to a new creation but retaining the essence of its source." (75)
Rumi has been Americanized. El-Zein states that the basic Islamic element in Rumi's work "has been diluted in the soup of 'New Sufism' to the extent that Islam appears as mainly folkloric" and Rumi himself nothing more than a product for spiritual consumption (76).
Here are some shortcomings of the New Sufism when compared to its Islamic context. The modern renderings do not stress, as in the scholarly works, the idea that human love is transformed into love of the Divine. Rumi's works are filled with allusions to Islamic themes. Without these themes there is no context, no ground, and one can say just about anything. Similarity in comparative religion does not mean sameness. Only by removing context can one sell a viewpoint that all "mysticism" looks the same, "superficial and vulgar" (78), to use El-Zein's expression. Such comparisons become nothing more than generalizations.
As an example, El-Zein takes Andrew Harvey to task. From Rumi's point of view the conception of silence, of emptiness, is interpreted through the first and most important aspsect of the shahadah, la ilaha illa allah (There is no god but God), the silence yielding to listening to the Qur'an. For Harvey, silence is related to the dance of Kali, to 'Shiva Shakti who is peace and energy in One' thus making it seem as if Rumi's verse belongs to the Tao which is not, El-Zein points out, the Tao as spoken of in the I Ching. Rumi's beloved, Shams, is even compared to a Zen master. (80)
If we pay careful attention to these New Agey interpretations, the agenda becomes clear. All bearings are lost and these comparative religions are cast adrift in a sea of endless meaninglessness, the ground of seemingly finding a "spirituality" that conforms to what is already believed, to confirm some utopian vision of the way things should be. This is not necessarily the fault of the listener/reader who is dependent upon the work of the authors nor is it to say that the authors are somehow being deceitful.
But if one really does any in-depth analysis of religious traditions the shallowness of such comparisons become abundantly clear and disconcerting. El-Zein calls this "spiritual elusiveness" (81). When everyone knows good as good, this is not good.
To drive the point home, El-Zein points out that Rumi was deeply rooted in Islamic tradition. Quoting Arberry:
"Before everything, he (Rumi) was a learned theologian after the firmest pattern of medieval Islam, very familiar with the Koran and its exegesis, the traditional sayings of the Prophet Muhammad, the sacred law and its erudite exposition." (81)
Seyyed Hussein Nasr, himself a member of the Traditionalist school, quotes Hadi Ha'iri, a renowned scholar of Rumi in Persia, as saying that some 6,000 verses of Rumi's Diwan and the Mathnawi are practically direct translations of Qur'anic verse into Persian poetry. In other words, "a different Rumi [is] created by Barks and Harvey and other interpreters, a Rumi for the American market." (81-2) To cut, isolate and dissect Rumi from his Islamic roots is to do an injustice not only to Rumi and his faith tradition but to the American public as well who are, in essence, being fed junk food.
Here are Rumi's words as rendered by Harvey:
"I do not know who I am
I am in astounding confusion.
I am not a Christian, I am not a Jew, I am not a Zoroastrian,
And I am not even a Muslim. (82)
To quote Rumi himself (as translated by Shems Friedlander):
I am the slave of the Koran
While I still have life.
I am the dust on the path of the Prophet Muhammad,
The chosen one,
If anyone interprets my words
in any other way,
I deplore that person,
And I deplore his words. (82)
What more is there to say?
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