Marife Turkish Journal of Religious Studies

Abstract

Classical Turkish literature, which is known by different names such as Divan literature, old Turkish literature, Ottoman literature, continued its uninterrupted existence from the 13th century to the second half of the 19th century. This literature, which was formed after the Turks entered Islamic civilisation, was largely fed by Arabic and Persian literatures as well as Islamic cultural sources. Classical Turkish poetic language became a literary language under the impact of New Persian, also called Darī Persian, which came into being after the adoption of Islam, and became classical. Persian literature, rather than Arabic literature, formed a model for classical Turkish poetry and formed this literature with its traditions and aesthetic principles. In this respect, it is necessary to mention Hafez al-Shīrāzī, one of the greatest representatives of classical Persian poetry. Estimated to have lived in the 14th century, the poet deeply impacted poets such as Ahmed Pasha, Fuzulī, Bakī, Nedīm and Sheikh Galib, who are considered masters of classical Turkish poetry. Divan of Hafez was one of the most widely read books in Ottoman madrasas, and Hafez’s poems were used as educational material in Persian language teaching. This study deals with the nazires written in classical Turkish poetry to the matla couplet of the third ghazal in the Divan of Hafez al-Shīrāzī, whose influence transcends the ages. In this context, general information about the nazire, one of the most deep-rooted and widespread traditions in Turkish poetry, is given in the introduction. In order to better understand the subject and to see the position of the model text in Persian poetry, firstly, the nazires in Persian literature are given. Then, the impact of the relevant couplet in classical Turkish poetry is presented. Before the sample couplets, the connotations of the words “Turk”, “Bukhara” and “Samarkand” in the base text are emphasised, and the meaning framework and commentary of the text are presented by making use of the commentaries on Hafez’s Divan. In this context, the poet's inclusion of the word “Turk” in the couplet is important in terms of revealing the relationship between classical Persian poetry and classical Turkish poetry. Because Hafez says, “If the Turk of Shīrāz (beautiful, lover) gives her heart on me, I will give the cities of Samarkand and Bukhara to her Indian mole.” The use of the word Turk here in the sense of beautiful and lover is an indication that the Turk brought a new image of beloved and beauty to Persian poetry with her beauty and beauty features. Again, the giving of the cities of Bukhara and Samarkand in exchange for the lover’s mole in the text is remarkable in terms of revealing the worthlessness of these two cultural centres, which are extremely important for Islamic civilisation, in front of the lover. As a result of our study, it has been observed that the nazires in Persian literature largely conform to the rhyme and poet metre of the model text. In the examples in classical Turkish poetry, on the other hand, many major and minor changes have been made. In the sample couplets, the lover herself, her hair, or the kiss given to the lover was replaced with the small black mole in the model text. Another change is that the cities of Samarkand and Bukhara, which are given in return for the lover's mole in the base text, are replaced by other cities, cities such as Egypt, Kandahar, Khwarezm are mentioned in addition to these poets, or completely different place names are brought instead of the cities in the model text. In the examples identified in classical Turkish poetry, all couplets except Avnī’s poem are written in Turkish. Avnī, on the other hand, wrote his text in Persian, the language of the model text. An interesting example was also encountered during our research. This example; although not written in the tradition of classical Turkish poetry, Rashid Fānī, one of the statesmen and poets of the last period, in his poem titled shathiyya in his work titled Fānī Cicekler, gives Kilis to the languorous of the lover. It is surprising that the poet, who uses the name Kilis for rhyme, refers to Hafez’s base text at the end of the relevant verse. The example of Rashid Fānī is striking in that it shows that the phrase in question was used even centuries later in a poem that was not written in the same poetic tradition. Of course, with this couplet, it is once again understood how wide Hāfez al-Shīrāzī’s sphere of influence is both within the classical Persian poetic tradition to which he belongs and within the classical Turkish poetic tradition. It is necessary to make a comparative study of the literary material of both literatures with similar studies. In this way, it will contribute to clearly revealing the relations between two deep-rooted literatures belonging to Islamic civilisation.