Emily O'Dell at the tomb of Rumi in Konya, Turkey
when you see
my corpse is being carried
don’t cry for my leaving
I’m not leaving
I’m arriving at eternal love
— Rumi
In a previous post, I mentioned the significance of the hats worn in the ceremony of the whirling dervishes. The wool hats worn for whirling are in the shape of tombstones to represent the death of the ego, and to remind the dervish to “die before you die.” Above, you can see graves topped with stone dervish hats at the mausoleum of Rumi in Konya, Turkey. In many cemeteries in Turkey, you can tell not only who was a dervish or Sufi sheikh based on the headgear on their tombstone–but also to which specific Sufi Order they belonged…
Wearing a symbol of one’s tombstone–along with white garments to symbolize the funeral shroud–allows a whirling dervish to “try on” death–to embody the reality of one’s life passing. At the end of the heightened ecstasy of the whirling ceremony, the dervish returns to the world with the “mystical” knowledge gleamed from having glimpsed at death–by transcending all attachments to the self. Cleansed by this spiritual unveiling, the dervish is more prepared to set aside the endless desires and demands of the ego to commit to serving others instead…
