The forty Rules of Love
The forty Rules of Love by Elif Shafak, you must have come across this book at least once. Remember, that book with a pretty cover, that’s The Forty Rules of Love.
Where there is love, there is bound to be heartache.
It’s not a romance book, it’s not a love story, it is a book about love, personal growth, and spirituality.
It has a novel within a novel, the story is told in two strokes about two very different cultures, two intervening stories almost seven centuries apart.
It starts when Ella Rubenstein, an unhappy housewife (in a loveless marriage with an infidel husband) decides to be more than a wife or a mother of three children. She starts to work for a literary agency, and receives her first assignment to write a manuscript on a novel “Sweet Blasphemy” by a first-time author Aziz Zahara from Turkey.
Sweet Blasphemy is structured in five different parts: the five elements of nature: Water, Air, Earth, Fire and Void.
Each chapter of Sweet Blasphemy is told through the point of views of different characters, and everything is based on love and spirituality which explains how it is to follow your heart.
Every chapter of the book starts with the letter ‘B.’ This is attributed to the belief that the Quran’s essence is encapsulated in Surah Al-Fatiha, particularly the phrase ‘Bismillah ir-Rahman ir-Rahim.’ According to Sufi thought, the dot beneath the initial Arabic letter of ‘Bismillah’ symbolizes the universe.
Sweet Blasphemy is set in the middle of the 13th century, when Shams of Tabriz, an unruly dervish meets a scholar Rumi who is set in his own way and the whole town respects him, but still feels empty and yearns for love. And love is the very essence of Sham’s being.
Sham imparts his wisdom and inspires Rumi through his 40 spiritual rules, challenging Rumi to surpass the conventional practices and go deeper, to find his way to God.
Initially hesitant to delve into a world so distant from her own, Ella is now drawn to the novel and its author.
She even goes ahead to write an email to him (Author-Aziz) which starts a flirtation between them, igniting a self-reflection, as she questions the mundane aspects of her life and yearns for love. Aziz is a wandering photographer who is a sufi at heart. Ella comes into his life and he encounters what “i” in sufi means for him.
As the story moves forward Rumi and Shams story starts to mirror Ella and Aziz’s.
Under the influence of sham’s, Rumi abandons his life and so does Ella for Aziz. Nor sham’s not Aziz promises a future still love seems enough.
Sham’s Sufism inspires Rumi to become a poet. Sham’s defiance of societal behavior changes Rumi. Aziz’s retelling of the story ignites the courage in Ella to free herself from her unhappy life to go on a journey where she only knows and cares about her present, as that’s truly what matters.
Even though Ella-Aziz & Sham-Rumi are main characters from both the strokes, there are many different stories still happening in the background and yearning for love is common for each character’s existence.
This book authenticates how love is not limited to romantic relationships but it’s the tapestry that weaves humanity together.
40 Rules of Love is a luxurious exploration. It suggests that a life lived without pure love is greater loss than dying by someone at your side who loves you, and knowing that your death is going to be honored.
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Articulated By Priyanshi Khrawade, 3rd year Student at Media and communication, Fergusson College.
