-حاصل عمرم سه سخن بيش نيست؛ خام بودم، پخته شدم، سوختم The sum of my whole life is no more than these three sayings: I was raw, I got cooked, I got burned.
~ Rumi
I was Raw:
Rumi was born to native Persian-speaking parents, originally from the Balkh, in present-day Afghanistan. He was born either in Wakhsh, a village located on the Vakhsh River in the greater Balkh region in present-day Tajikistan, or in the city of Balkh, located in present-day Afghanistan. When the Mongols invaded Central Asia sometime between 1215 and 1220, Baha ud-Din Walad (Maulana’s father), with his whole family and a group of disciples, set out westwards. According to hagiographical account which is not agreed upon by all Rumi scholars, Rumi encountered one of the most famous mystic Persian poets, Attar, in the Iranian city of Nishapur, located in the province of Khorāsān. Attar immediately recognized Rumi's spiritual eminence. He saw the father walking ahead of the son and said, "Here comes a sea followed by an ocean. He gave the boy his Asrārnāma, a book about the entanglement of the soul in the material world. This meeting had a deep impact on the eighteen-year-old Rumi and later on became the inspiration for his works.
I got Cooked:
“Cooked” from the age of 15 to 40, he studied science and technology, and was wise. Maulana’s family settled in Konya in 1228 and his father became head of a madrassa. When Maulana’s father died, at age twenty-five, Maulana inherited his position in the madrassa. One of his father’s student Sayyed Burhan ud-Din Muhaqqiq Termazi continued to train Rumi in the Shariah as well as the Tariqa, especially that of Rumi's father. For nine years, Rumi practised Sufism as a disciple of Burhan ud-Din until the latter died in 1240 or 1241. Rumi's public life then began: he became an Islamic Jurist, issuing fatwas and giving sermons in the mosques of Konya. He also served as a Molvi (Islamic teacher) and taught his adherents in the madrassa.
I got Burned:
In the third stage, 40-67, he came to the truth through Shams e Tabrizi (شمسِ تبریزی). Rumi meet Shams on 15 November 1244 that completely changed his life. From an accomplished teacher and jurist, Rumi was transformed into an ascetic. During Rumi and Shams Tabrizi’s time together, a number of extra ordinary events happened, which spontaneously made him write 37,000 verses of poems in his love for Shams, known as Divan-i Kabir or Diwan Shams Tabrizi. In Rumi’s last years he dictated six volumes of his masterwork to his student Hussam, which is known as “MASNAVI”. Maulana Rumi died on 17 December 1273 in Konya. The story of how Maulana transformed in the company of Shams is still the most beautiful story among the sufis.
In one of the poems Maulana says:
غلامِ شمس تبریزم قلندروار می گردم I am a salve of Shams i Tabrizi; like an ecstatic, I whirl.