
Rumi and Islam: Selections from His Stories, Poems and Discourses—Annotated & Explained (SkyLight Illuminations)
Discover the richness of Rumi's spiritual tradition—through facing-page commentary that brings his writings to life for you.
"This book you are now holding is a selection of what I believe are the best of Rumi’s accounts of the compassionate actions, sayings, and qualities of the Prophet, which include Rumi’s own inspired comments and explanations. It is my hope that you will be surprised and uplifted by the profound wisdom that Jalaluddin Rumi conveys through these stories and sayings."
—from the Preface
This great Sufi poet and teacher can become a companion for your own spiritual journey.
The lyric and wisdom poetry of Mawlana Jalaluddin Rumi has been an inspiration throughout the Middle East and Asia for over seven hundred years. Recently, it has also become popular in Western countries through translations and interpretive poetic versions in English. But while popular renderings have created the appreciation of Rumi the mystic, there is little understanding today of the religious and spiritual traditions from which the great mystic came. Rumi and Islam—Selections from His Stories, Poems, and Discourses examines not the popularized Rumi of universal love but the Sufi disciple whose works express deep reverence for the Prophet Muhammad. Ibrahim Gamard focuses on Rumi’s place within the Sufi tradition of Islam, as one of the greatest Muslim followers of the Prophet Muhammed, and on the Islamic foundations of his lover-Beloved mystical poetry. By probing verse by verse Rumi’s spiritual teachings, Gamard provides insight into the mystical side of the Qur’an and Islam, a religion that holds a deep love of God at its core.
Now you can experience the profound and uplifting wisdom of Rumi even if you have no previous knowledge of Sufism or Islam. This SkyLight Illuminations edition presents the most important of Rumi’s writings, mainly from the Mathnawi, with insightful yet unobtrusive commentary that conveys how his teachings about the nature of love for God and God’s love for us can increase our understanding of Islamic wisdom in the West.
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Book details
- Author
- Ibrahim Gamard
- Imprint
- SkyLight Paths, an imprint of Turner Publishing Company
- Published
- Formats
- Paperback, Hardcover
- Subjects
- Religion › Islam
- Topics
- Sufism · poetry · spiritual wisdom · Prophet Muhammad · annotated texts · Middle Eastern literature
- ISBN-13
- 9781594730023 (Paperback)9781683362715 (Hardcover)
About the author
DR. IBRAHIM GAMARD is a Rumi scholar and retired licensed psychologist who has studied Sufism since 1971. He is the author of Rumi and Islam: Selections from His Stories, Poems, and Discourses—Annotated & Explained.
Gamard received his Ph.D. in Psychology in 1986. A member of the Mevlevi Order, the Sufi order originating with Rumi, he was made a Mevlevi Shaykh in 2007 by Faruk Hemdem Celebi.
When not writing, Gamard teaches himself classical Persian to study Rumi’s poetry directly and has posted translations online since 1997. His scholarly work is rooted in his practice of Islam, which he embraced in 1984, and his completion of the Hajj pilgrimage to Mecca in 1999.
Ibrahim lives near Santa Rosa, California.
