ĀSaint
Āshiq Pasha (Aşık Paşa)
Shaykh
One of the founding figures of Turkish Sufi literature in Anatolia; a mystic poet and the author of the Garibnâme . His given name was Ali and his pen name Âşık. The by-name "Paşa", "beşe" or "başağa" added to his name indicates that he was his father's first son. He was born in 670 (1272) at Kırşehir. What is known of his life rests on the account in the Menâkıbü'l-kudsiyye fî menâsıbi'l-ünsiyye written by his son Elvan Çelebi. According to this, his grandfather Ebü'l-Bekā Şeyh Baba İlyas b. Ali came from Khurasan to Anatolia in the thirteenth century and settled in Amasya; he was a sheikh of the order of Abû al-Wafâ' al-Khwârizmî, and his disciples were called Babaîs. His father Muhlis Paşa was Baba İlyas's youngest son. Âşık Paşa began his studies first with Süleymân of Kırşehir and afterwards with Şeyh Osman, one of İlyas Paşa's successors. At the testament of Muhlis Paşa, Şeyh Osman married his daughter to Âşık Paşa. Some time later he became vizier to Timurtaş Paşa, governor of Anatolia. Having become involved in certain political events he went to Egypt; on his way back to Amasya he fell ill upon reaching Kırşehir and died there ( 13 Safer 733 / 3 November 1332 ). His tomb at Kırşehir was built, at his own testament, on a hill to the north-east of the town, and bears an inscription. All the sources agree that the tomb is held sacred by the people and visited. Elvan Çelebi records that his father never involved himself in worldly affairs and, giving himself wholly to Sufism, lived the life of a saint. His Poetry and Sufi Line — Âşık Paşa is the most important representative, in the first half of the fourteenth century, of a great and influential family of sheikhs founded by Baba İlyâs-ı Horasânî; in his own time he was known in Anatolia as a Sufi who stood at the head of the Vefâiyye order . From his son Elvan Çelebi's own words it is understood that from an early age he received a sound Sufi training within the circle of that order. He must also have had dealings with important figures attached to the traditions of Hacı Bektâş-ı Velî, Şeyh Süleymân-ı Türkmânî and Ahî Evran, which had spread in Kırşehir and its region; he is seen to have felt a great admiration for Mevlânâ and Sultan Veled and for their works in particular. In his poems and in his Garibnâme the influence of Yûnus Emre and Mevlânâ largely prevails. His Works — The Garibnâme , written in 730 (1330), is a mesnevi of 12,000 couplets ; it is composed in the "fâilâtün fâilâtün fâilün" metre and consists of ten sections. A religious, mystical and didactic work written in Turkish for the purpose of educating the people , the Garibnâme is among the oldest and most widely influential works of Turkish Sufi literature in Anatolia; thanks to its plain language it addressed a very wide readership for centuries. The Fakrnâme , a mystical mesnevi of 161 couplets, was only recently established to be his; in it "poverty", depicted as a many-coloured bird, finally chooses the Prophet and settles with him. The Vasf-ı Hâl is a short mesnevi of thirty-one couplets, and the Hikâye a mesnevi of fifty-nine couplets relating what befell a Muslim, a Christian and a Jew. Besides the ghazals contained in the Garibnâme , a total of sixty-seven of his poems found in collections of imitative verse have also been published.
KırşehirDied 733 AHView → 