7 Famous Rumi Couplets in Persian | Script, Translation, Word-by-Word Breakdown
The real Rumi, not the Instagram one. Each couplet is sourced from Masnavi or Divan-e Shams, with Persian script, careful romanization, English translation, and the vocabulary that lets you read Rumi yourself.
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Most of what circulates as “Rumi” in English is not Rumi. It is Coleman Barks paraphrasing Reynold Nicholson, or anonymous Instagram captions that no one can source. Real Rumi was a 13th-century Persian-speaking Sufi from Khorasan whose major works, the Masnavi-ye Ma’navi and the Divan-e Shams, are still memorized line by line in Iranian households today.
The seven couplets below are real. Each one is sourced (Masnavi Book and line, or Divan ghazal number). Each one gives you the Persian script, a careful Romanization, an English translation, and the vocabulary you need to actually read Rumi rather than read about him.
Why these seven
These are not the most translated quotes. They are the most quoted: the lines an Iranian grandmother will recite in conversation without telling you they are from Rumi, the lines schoolchildren memorize for Persian class, the lines that show up at funerals and weddings. If your goal is to understand Persian culture from the inside, start here.
The opening of the Masnavi
Masnavi I, line 1
از جداییها حکایت میکند
- بشنو beshno: listen (imperative of shenidan, to hear)
- نی ney: reed flute. The central metaphor of the Masnavi.
- شکایت shekāyat: complaint, lament
- جدایی jodāyi: separation. The plural jodāyihā means “separations” plural, which is the heart of the metaphor.
- حکایت hekāyat: story, tale. The reed does not just complain; it tells.
Anyone separated from their origin
Masnavi I, line 4
- هر کسی har kasi: anyone, any person
- دور dur: far, distant
- اصل asl: origin, root, source
- خویش khish: one’s own, oneself (literary form of khod)
- جوید jūyad: seeks (from jostan, to search)
- روزگار ruzgār: era, days, time
- وصل vasl: reunion, union
The secret of beloveds
Masnavi I, line 136
گفته آید در حدیث دیگران
- خوشتر khoshtar: sweeter, more pleasant (comparative of khosh)
- سر serr: secret, inner truth
- دلبر delbar: beloved (literally “heart-stealer,” from del heart + bordan to take)
- حدیث hadis: tale, narration, talk
- دیگران digarān: others (plural of digar)
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I died as mineral
Masnavi III, line 3901
- جمادی jamādi: mineral, inanimate state
- مردم mordam: I died (from mordan)
- نامی nāmi: plant, vegetative (one that grows)
- شدم shodam: I became
- حیوان heyvān: animal
- سر زدم sar zadam: I emerged, I sprouted (idiomatic: “stuck my head up into”)
You are nothing but your thought
Masnavi II, line 277
- برادر barādar: brother. Used in classical Persian as a general address, not just male sibling.
- همان hamān: the same, nothing but
- اندیشه andishe: thought
- مابقی mā baqi: the rest, the remainder (Arabic loan)
- استخوان ostokhān: bone
- ریشه rishe: root, fiber
Out of love
Divan-e Shams, ghazal 1393
وز خویشتنم نام و نشان نیست
- عشق eshq: love (the intense kind; not affection, but consuming devotion)
- گذشتم gozashtam: I passed, I crossed (from gozashtan)
- خویشتن khishtan: one’s own self (intensive of khish)
- نام nām: name
- نشان neshān: trace, sign, mark
Come, whoever you are
Often attributed to Rumi; actually by Abu Sa’id Abu’l-Khayr
گر کافر و گبر و بتپرستی بازآ
- بازآ bāzā: come back (imperative of bāz āmadan)
- آنچه ānche: whatever, that which
- کافر kāfer: unbeliever (originally a religious term, used here without judgment)
- گبر gabr: a (sometimes pejorative) historical term for Zoroastrian
- بتپرست botparast: idol-worshipper (from bot idol + parastidan to worship)
Want to actually read Rumi yourself?
That takes alphabet first, then vocabulary, then a teacher who can walk you through a couplet at a time. ZabanYar is the Persian app I am building for exactly this: heritage learners who want to read the poetry their grandparents quote. Join the waitlist below for founder pricing at launch.
FAQ
Was Rumi Persian, Turkish, or Afghan?
All three nations claim him. Rumi was born in 1207 in Balkh (now in Afghanistan), wrote almost entirely in Persian (Farsi), and lived most of his adult life in Konya (in modern Turkey) under Seljuk Turkish patronage. His mother tongue and literary language were both Persian. The “Rumi” name comes from his life in Rūm, the Persian/Arabic word for Anatolia. He is a Persian-language poet by every standard scholars use; modern political claims by Turkey and Afghanistan are about national pride rather than linguistic fact.
Why is so much “Rumi” on the internet not actually Rumi?
Coleman Barks, an American poet who does not read Persian, produced popular English “translations” in the 1980s and 1990s. He worked from earlier scholarly translations and reshaped them into free verse, often removing the Islamic and Persian cultural framing. These are beautiful as English poetry but are not literal translations. Even worse, anonymous social media accounts have been adding new sentences attributed to Rumi for years. If a “Rumi quote” you have seen does not include a Masnavi book number or a Divan ghazal number, treat it as unverified.
How do I start reading Rumi in Persian?
Start with the alphabet (about a week of focused work for most heritage learners). Then learn the first 50 high-frequency Persian words (a few weeks of spaced repetition). Then the first couplet of the Masnavi (Beshno in ney) is your first real text. Persian poetry is written with the same script as everyday Persian, so the alphabet you learn for the news is the same one that lets you read Rumi.
What is the Masnavi and what is the Divan-e Shams?
The Masnavi-ye Ma’navi (“The Spiritual Couplets”) is Rumi’s long instructional poem in six books, about 25,000 lines of rhymed couplets teaching Sufi philosophy through stories. The Divan-e Shams (or Divan-e Shams-e Tabrizi) is his collection of about 3,000 ghazals (lyrical love poems), written in the voice of his beloved master Shams of Tabriz. Iranians treat them differently: Masnavi for wisdom, Divan-e Shams for ecstatic love.
Where can I find verified Persian text of Rumi?
The Ganjoor.net site has the full Masnavi and Divan-e Shams with original Persian text, cross-referenced by book and line. For academic editions, Reynold Nicholson’s edition of the Masnavi (8 volumes, 1925–1940) is the gold standard, with the Persian text on the right and his literal English translation on the left.