Rumiposting

[Miestră Schivă, UrN]

از کفر و ز اسلام برون صحرائیست
ما را به میان آن فضا سودائیست
عارف چو بدان رسید سر را بنهد
نه کفر و نه اسلام و نه آنجا جائیست

"Az kafr va'z Eslam berun sahrâ'i'st,
Mâ râ be miân ân fazâ sudâ'i'st,
'Âref chu bedân resid sar râ benahad,
Ne kafr va ne Eslam va ne ânjâ jâ'i'st."

Piusutra el Islam és l'agnhosïă
Për noi, ja'n espaçal për estar mäts
Quand el medä là ariva, o slec'htara
Là j'ont n'agnhosïă n'Islam ni pläts.

[Miestră Schivă, UrN]

This is of course the stanza notoriously and badly translated into English by Coleman Barks as "Out beyond ideas of wrongdoing and rightdoing, there is a field..." A literal English translation would run:

Beyond infidelity and Islam there is a desert/field,
Within there is a space for us to desire/dream/go crazy
When the gnostic/Enlightened one arrives there, he will bow his head
There, there is no infidelity, no Islam, nor any place.

[Éovart Andrinescù]

Have I been called out for being a poser Sufi?  :P ;)

[Miestră Schivă, UrN]

a) I thought you were a Catholic;
b) this is about bad translations and the New Age publishing complex, not you :D
c) it's REALLY about creating Talossan-language literature

[Miestră Schivă, UrN]

More translator nerds stuff: the Arabic term کفر, usually translated as "being an infidel", literally means something like "ingratitude" - i.e. ingratitude to God.

[Iason Taiwos]

I'm just now reading this, and went and dug out my copy of Rumi's works. Well, shit. Yeah, I have the Bark's translation. (I guess I could say, "Worse than that, most of the material I have about Sufism is by Hakim Bey.")

[Miestră Schivă, UrN]

I heartily recommend Michael Muhammad Knight's William S. Burroughs vs. the Qur'an, which speaks of his years being mentored by Hakim Bey aka Pedophile Peter Lamborn Wilson and how they came to an end.