The Forty Rules of Love

Rumi. Konya, October 1260. Even 16 years after he first met Shams, Rumi still feels the pain of Shams’s death. He feels that his chest is a cave that Shams still resides inside. Sultan Walad has helped Shams through this difficult time, and a goldbeater named Saladin, whose work has a regular rhythm to it, also helps Rumi.

Sultan Walad eventually marries Saladin’s daughter, Fatima. The world around Rumi changes, as in 1258, Baghdad falls to Mongol invaders, only to be defeated by Egypt’s Mamelukes two years later. Husam matures from being a student and helps Rumi write down some of his poems. Rumi feels like a more complete person with each decade that passes. Rumi makes peace with the idea that in Sufism, when a person dies in the chain of love, another is born elsewhere on the chain, with names changing but the essence staying the same.