Jalal ad-Din Rumi Quotes - Rumi Quotations

Why do you stay in prison
when the door is so wide open?
Move outside the tangle of fear-thinking.
Live in silence.
Jalal ad-Din Rumi

I died a mineral, and became a plant. I died a plant and rose an animal. I died an animal and I was man. Why should I fear? When was I less by dying?
Jalal ad-Din Rumi


In this world of trickery emptiness is what your heart wants.
Jalal ad-Din Rumi


Something opens our wings. Something makes boredom and hurt disappear. Someone fills the cup in front of us: We taste only sacredness.
Jalal ad-Din Rumi

Burdens are the foundations of ease and bitter things the forerunners of pleasure.
Jalal ad-Din Rumi



O, happy the soul that saw its own faults.
Jalal ad-Din Rumi

Paradise is surrounded by what we dislike; the fires of hell are surrounded by what we desire.
Jalal ad-Din Rumi

Only from the heart can you touch the sky.
Jalal ad-Din Rumi

The breeze at dawn has secrets to tell you; Don't go back to sleep. You must ask for what you really want; Don't go back to sleep. People are going back and forth across the doorsill where the two worlds touch. The door is round and open. Don't go back to sleep.
Jalal ad-Din Rumi

This is love: to fly toward a secret sky, to cause a hundred veils to fall each moment. First to let go of life. Finally, to take a step without feet.
Jalal ad-Din Rumi


In silence there is eloquence. Stop weaving and watch how the pattern improves.
Jalal ad-Din Rumi

Let the beauty of what you love be what you do.
Jalal ad-Din Rumi

I want a heart which is split, part by part, because of the pain of separation from God, so that I might explain my longing and complaint to it.
Jalal ad-Din Rumi

All day I think about it, then at night I say it. Where did I come from, and what am I supposed to be doing? I have no idea. My soul is from elsewhere, I'm sure of that, and I intend to end up there.
Jalal ad-Din Rumi

Silence is an ocean. Speech is a river.
Jalal ad-Din Rumi

Out beyond ideas of wrongdoing and rightdoing,
there is a field. I will meet you there.
Jalal ad-Din Rumi

Everything in the universe is a pitcher brimming with wisdom and beauty.
Jalal ad-Din Rumi


Remember, the entrance door to the sanctuary is inside you.
Jalal ad-Din Rumi

What was said to the rose that made it open was said to me here in my chest.
Jalal ad-Din Rumi


Load the ship and set out. No one knows for certain whether the vessel will sink or reach the harbor. Cautious people say, "I'll do nothing until I can be sure". Merchants know better. If you do nothing, you lose. Don't be one of those merchants who wont risk the ocean!
Jalal ad-Din Rumi


God turns you from one feeling to another and teaches by means of opposites, so that you will have two wings to fly, not one.
Jalal ad-Din Rumi



Reason is the shadow cast by God; God is the sun.
Jalal ad-Din Rumi

It may be that the satisfaction I need depends on my going away, so that when I've gone and come back, I'll find it at home.
Jalal ad-Din Rumi

The minute I heard my first love story I started looking for you, not knowing how blind that was. Lovers don't finally meet somewhere. They're in each other all along.
Jalal ad-Din Rumi


Observe the wonders as they occur around you. Don't claim them. Feel the artistry moving through and be silent.
Jalal ad-Din Rumi

We come spinning out of nothingness, scattering stars like dust.
Jalal ad-Din Rumi


If you are irritated by every rub, how will you be polished?
Jalal ad-Din Rumi


Silence is the language of God, all else is poor translation.
Jalal ad-Din Rumi

Christian, Jew, Muslim, shaman, Zoroastrian, stone, ground, mountain, river, each has a secret way of being with the mystery, unique and not to be judged.
Jalal ad-Din Rumi


Hangovers come with love, yet love's the cure for hangovers.
Jalal ad-Din Rumi