M6:3554 — دو قضیهٔ دیگر او را شرح داد / لب به ذکر آن نخواهم بر گشاد

Translation: He (the deceased) explained two other matters to him (the intermediary) / But I (Rumi) shall not open my lips to mention them. Meaning: This verse indicates that the narrator (Rumi) deliberately refrains from disclosing two crucial details of the dream, thereby preserving the mystery of his discourse.

This verse is situated within a narrative where a foreign guest, through the mediation of an intermediary, settles the debts of a deceased merchant. At this point, Rumi states that the departed merchant revealed two other matters to the intermediary in a dream, but Rumi refrains from mentioning them in his Masnavi. This deliberate omission, I believe, is one of Rumi's astonishing rhetorical devices.

I discern two primary reasons for Rumi's silence here. Firstly, he wishes these two matters to remain 'secrets and mysteries' (sirr-o rāz). This not only heightens the sense of enigma within the narrative but also provokes the reader's curiosity and anticipation. This 'stimulation of appetite' serves as an invitation—an invitation to ponder more deeply what lies behind the veil of words. Secondly, Rumi himself admits that he withholds these secrets to prevent the Masnavi from becoming 'too long' (as this is the sixth and final book, and Rumi perhaps sensed that his time for writing was drawing to a close). This reference to the book's length indicates Rumi's fluid and spontaneous nature; unlike Hafez, he was not typically given to meticulous editing and conciseness in the conventional sense. Yet here, a sense of urgency seems to compel his silence.

However, we can move from this apparent silence to a deeper insight: Rumi immediately thereafter delves into the theme of 'opposites' (azdad) and 'antinomies' in the order of creation. He declares: "O You who have placed awareness in unawareness / You have bound a beloved in disheartenment." This statement transcends mere literary device for maintaining mystery or brevity. It points to the formlessness and the 'existent hidden in non-existence' that underpins the universe. Opposition, for Rumi, is the driving engine of existence. As philosophers like Avicenna and Mulla Sadra famously articulated: "Were it not for antinomy, the continuous emanation from the Generous Originator would not be sustained." It is this antagonism and friction that makes 'work' (kār) possible in the world, much as Sadi Carnot, the French physicist, demonstrated in the second law of thermodynamics that work occurs only due to potential differences and temperature variations. If everything were uniform and at the same level, the world would fall into stasis. Rumi finds this principle echoed in the Quran: "He brings forth the living from the dead, and brings forth the dead from the living."

Therefore, Rumi's silence about those two matters is not simply about leaving things unsaid. Rather, it is an allusion to those unspeakable truths embedded in the heart of contradictions: wealth in poverty, fruit from waste, and eternal life within death. These are the 'unfolding secrets' that Rumi teaches us not through direct assertion, but by illustrating the very mechanism of existence emerging from non-existence and opposition. He does not state what is hidden, but rather demonstrates that hiding itself is part of the wisdom of creation. Those two matters are themselves a riddle and a mystery that Rumi, through the language of antinomies, invites us to comprehend. As he says, "Beings are hidden in non-existence" — those two matters were also beings of meaning that became hidden in the non-existence of explicit mention, in order to be more impactful.

Key takeaways

• Rumi deliberately omits certain narrative details to heighten the sense of mystery and provoke the reader's curiosity.
• His silence in this verse also reflects his awareness of time constraints towards the end of his life and a desire for conciseness in the Masnavi.
• This narrative omission serves as a prelude to a profound discussion on 'opposites' (azdad) in creation, which Rumi views as the engine of existence and the source of divine emanation.
• Rumi sees truth embedded within antinomies: awareness in unawareness, wealth in poverty, and eternal life within death.
• This method of Rumi is a form of indirect articulation, using the unsaid to allude to fundamental and inexpressible truths – an 'existent hidden in non-existence'.