"Rumi spent a good part of his early life on the move, shifting from country to country, and city to city as his family's entourage made its way from Khorosan to Mecca, then traveled through Syria toward Anatolia, where it was to make many stops. The group paused often along the way, sometimes remaining briefly in a town or city, and other times taking up a fairly long residence in places where Baha al-Din [Rumi's father] found patrons and opportunities to preach.
"Rumi was probably around twelve years old when his family began its wanderings, and he was about twenty-two when the group finally settled permanently in Konya. Annemarie Schimmel has noted that this unusual nomadic childhood must have had a deep impact on the psyche of the future poet, and may have 'influenced Maulana's [Rumi's] feeling that life, and especially spiritual life, is a never-ending journey, a quest for the Divine Presence of which he was constantly aware.' The constant flux and the lack of external certainties surely sharpened Rumi's awareness of the transience of life and may have forced him to focus on absolute truths and on his God. The need to keep moving and not to throw down deep roots must have been quite painful at times."
See our map for A Celebration of Rumi
