Nasreddin

For other uses, see Nasreddin (disambiguation).

Nasreddin

Nasreddin (Arabic: نصرالدين means "Victory of the Faith", Persian ملا نصرالدین) was a satirical sufi figure who lived during the Middle Ages (around 13th century). Many nations of the Near and Middle East claim the Nasreddin as their own (Afgans, Arabs, Persians, Turks and Uzbek's), however, the Mullah, like all mythological characters, belongs to all humanity. His name is spelled differently in various cultures and is often preceded or followed by titles "Hodja", "Mollā", "Mullah" or "Khoja" (see section "Name variants"). Nasreddin was a populist philosopher and wise man, remembered for his funny stories and anecdotes.

Much of Nasreddin's actions and can be described as illogical yet logical, rational yet irrational, bizarre yet normal, foolish, yet sharp, and simple yet profound. What adds even further to his uniqueness is the way he gets across his messages in unconventional yet very effective methods in a profound simplicity.

Interestingly, many stories attributed to Mullah Nasreddin show striking similarities with those of Till Eulenspiegel, a popular character in German folklore.

Nasreddin's Origin & legacy

File:Khodja Nasritdin.jpg

The ever-smiling Hodja riding on his bronze donkey in Bukhara.

Where and when he was born, and where and when he died, are not known with certainty, but he is usually assumed to have lived in Anatolia. He was born in 1208 in Hortu, a village near the of town Sivrihisar in what is now Central Turkey. He moved in 1237 to Akşehir a local town, to study under the scholars Seyid Mahmud Hayrani and Seyid Haci Ibrahim. He has long been known among various Islamic peoples. Possibly due to the fact that his stories are shared among pilgrims to Mecca, his humor is familiar, under different names, to people from China, Central Asia, India, and Morocco.

Modern recognition

There is a modern tomb dedicated to him in the city of Akşehir in Turkey. He is also the symbol of Akşehir, which hosts several statues of Nasreddin Hoca and an international festival dedicated to him. The city of Bukhara in Uzbekistan also has a statue of him riding his donkey backwards and grasping its tail (as he is traditionally depicted), and journals bear his name in Baku (Azerbaijan) and Tabriz (Iran) (see: Molla Nasraddin (magazine)).

But whatever the origins of Nasreddin are, pinpointing them has become a trivial point. As generations went by, new stories were added, others were modified, and the character and his tales spread to broader regions. The types of themes and wisdom in his tales have become legendary products of a variety of nations' observations and imaginations. And although most of them depict Nasreddin in an early small village setting, the tales deal with concepts that have relevance to today's universe and people.

Today, Nasreddin stories are told in a wide variety of regions, and have been translated into many languages, and some regions independently developed a character similar to Nasreddin, and the stories have become assimilated together. In many regions, Nasreddin is a major part of the culture, and is quoted or alluded to frequently in daily life. Since there are thousands of different Nasreddin stories, one can be found to fit almost any occasion. Nasreddin often appears as a whimsical character of a large Albanian, Arab, Azeri, Bengali, Bosnian, Hindi, Pashto, Persian, Serbian, Turkish and Urdu folk tradition of vignettes, not entirely different from zen koans. He is also very popular in Greece for his wisdom and his judgment; he is also known in Bulgaria, although in a different role, see below.

Nasreddin's tales

The Nasrudin stories, known throughout the Middle East, and have touched cultures around the world, which constitute one of the strangest achievements in the history of metaphysics. Superficially, most of the Nasreddin stories may be used as jokes. They are told and retold endlessly in the teahouses and caravanserai's, in the homes and on the radio waves, of Asia. But it is inherent in the Nasreddin story that it may be understood at any of many depths. There is the joke, the moral - and the little extra which brings the consciousness of the potential mystic a little further on the way to realization.

The anecdotes attributed to him reveal a satirical personality with a biting tongue that he was not afraid to use even against the most tyrannical rulers of his time. He is the symbol of Middle-Eastern style satirical comedy and the rebellious feelings of people against the dynasties that once ruled this geography.

Some mystic traditions use jokes, stories and poetry to express certain ideas, allowing the bypassing of the normal discriminative thought patterns. The rationality that confines and objectifies the thinking process is the opposite to the intuitive, gestalt mentality that the mystic is attempting to engage, enter and retain.

By developing a series of impacts that reinforce certain key ideas, the rational mind is occupied with a surface meaning whilst other concepts are introduced. Thus paradox, unexpectedness, and alternatives to convention are all expressed. Although there are several books that attempt to put together the many jokes attributed to him, most people encounter his jokes in the context of their daily lives. Often, a Nasreddin joke is told by one party when the other party makes the kind of mistake that Nasreddin had parodied.

Some tales of Nasreddin are also adapted and used as teaching stories by followers of Sufism. This is such a common practice that, given the nature of many of Nasreddin's jokes, multiple interpretations (or several 'layers' of meaning) are to be expected. Idries Shah, a well-known Sufi and writer, published a number of collections of Nasrudin stories (see list below), and suggested that the stories' various layers of meaning have a teaching-effect.

In some Bulgarian folklore tales originated during the Ottoman rule, the name appears as an antagonist to a local wise man, named Hitar Petar (Хитър Петър, meaning "cunning Peter"). In Sicily the same tales involve a man named Giufà.

While Nasreddin is mostly known as a character from anecdotes, later whole novels and stories have been written and an animated feature film was almost made.

In Europe Mullah can be compared with the German Till Eulenspiegel. The oldest manuscript of Mullah was found in 1571.

Examples

Delivering a Khutba

Once, Mulla Nasruddin was invited to deliver a khutba. When he got on the minbar (pulpit), he asked "Do you know what I am going to say?" The audience replied "NO", so he announced "I have no desire to speak to people who don't even know what I will be talking about" and he left.

The people felt embarrassed and called him back again the next day. This time when he asked the same question, the people replied "YES" So Mullah Nasruddin said, "Well, since you already know what I am going to say, I won't waste any more of your time" and he left.

Now the people were really perplexed. They decided to try one more time and once again invited the Mullah to speak the following week. Once again he asked the same question - "Do you know what I am going to say?" Now the people were prepared and so half of them answered "YES" while the other half replied "NO". So Mullah Nasruddin said "The half who know what I am going to say, tell it to the other half" and he left!

Two sides of a river

Nasrudin sat on a river bank when someone shouted to him from the opposite side:

- "Hey! how do I get across?"

- "You are across!" Nasrudin shouted back. The man on the other side sat puzzled.

Whom do you trust

A neighbour comes to the gate of Nasreddin Hoja's yard. The Hoja goes out to meet him outside.

"Would you mind, Hoja," the neighbour asks, "to lend me your donkey today? I have some goods to transport to the next town."

The Hoja doesn't feel inclined to lend out the animal to that particular man, however; so, not to seem rude, he answers:

"I'm sorry, but I've already lent him to somebody else."

Suddenly the donkey can be heard braying loudly behind the wall of the yard.

"You lied to me, Hoja!" the neighbour exclaims. "There it is behind that wall!"

"What do you mean?" the Hoja replies indignantly. "Whom would you rather believe, a donkey or your Hoja?"

The Moving Friend

"Nasreddin," a friend said one day, "I am moving to another village. Can I have your ring, so that I will remember you every time I look at it?"

Nasreddin replied, “Well, you might lose the ring and then forget about me. How about I don’t give you a ring in the first place—that way, every time that you look at your finger and don’t see a ring, you will definitely remember me.”

The Loan Request

A friend asked Nasreddin, “Can I borrow 1000 toman from you for three months.”

“Well,” Nasreddin replied, “I can fulfill half of your loan request.”

“OK; that’s fine,” the friend said, “I’m sure I can get the other 500 toman somewhere else.”

“You misunderstood me,” Nasreddin replied. “The half of your loan request I agreed to was the time: the three months. As for the 1000 toman, I cannot give it to you.”

Sack of Vegetables

Nasreddin snuck into someone’s garden and began putting vegetables in his sack. The owner saw him and shouted, “What are you doing in my garden?”

Nasreddin confidently responded, “The wind blew me here.”

“That sounds like BS to me,” the man replied, “but let’s assume that the wind did blow you here. Now then, how can you explain how those vegetables were pulled out from my garden?”

“Oh, that’s simple,” Nasreddin responded. “I had to grab them to stop myself from being thrown any further by the wind.”

“Well,” the man continued, “then tell me this—how did the vegetables get in your sack?”

“You know what,” Nasreddin said, “I was just standing here and wondering that same thing myself!”

Perfection

An admirer of his once asked the sage "Master, why did you never marry?"

"Well," he replied, "In my youth I searched for the perfect woman. I spent time with many women, but they all had a flaw. One would be beautiful, but cruel. Another intelligent, but lazy. I had almost given up hope, when I met her; the perfect woman. Healthy, intelligent, sensitive, witty, beautiful, talented...she was everything I was looking for."

"So why did you not marry her?"

"Odd thing," replied the Hoja, "She was looking for the perfect man..."

The Donkey Seller

Nasreddin brought his donkey to sell at the bazaar, but every time a customer wanted to inspect it, the donkey began biting and being uncooperative. One man asked Nasreddin, “Do you really expect to sell a donkey that behaves like that?”

Nasreddin replied, “Not really; I just brought him here so other people would experience what I have to put up with every day!”

The Pot

Nasreddin borrowed a pot from his friend. The next day, he gave the pot back to the friend, and also gave him another smaller pot. The friend looked at the small pot, and said, “What is that?”

“Your pot gave birth while I had it,” Nasreddin replied, “so I am giving you its child.”

The friend was glad to receive the bonus, and didn’t ask any more questions.

A week later, Nasreddin borrowed the original pot from the friend. After a week passed, the friend asked Nasreddin to return it.

“I cannot,” Nasreddin said.

“Why not?” the friend replied.

“Well,” Nasreddin answered, “I hate to be the bearer of bad news…but your pot has died.”

“What?” the friend asked with skepticism. “A pot cannot die!”

“You believed it gave birth,” Nasreddin said, “so is why is it that you cannot believe it has died.”

Collections

• 600 Mulla Nasreddin Tales, collected by Mohammad Ramazani (Popular Persian Text Series: 1) (in Persian).
• The Exploits of the Incomparable Mulla Nasrudin, by Idries Shah
• The Subtleties of the Inimitable Mulla Nasrudin, by Idries Shah
• The Pleasantries of the Incredible Mullah Nasrudin, by Idries Shah
• The Wisdom of Mulla Nasruddin, by Shahrukh Husain

Name variants

Nasreddin's name is also commonly spelled Nasrudin, Nasr ud-Din, Nasredin, Naseeruddin, Nasruddin, Nasr Eddin, Nastradhin, Nasreddine, Nastratin, Nusrettin, Nasrettin and Nastradin (lit.: Victory of the Deen).

His name is usually preceded or followed by a title of wisdom used in the corresponding cultures: "Hoxha", "Khwaje", "Hodja", "Hojja", "Hodža", "Hoca", "Hogea", "Hodza", "Chotzas", "Mullah", "Mulla", "Molla", "Maulana", "Efendi", ""Ependi". For these, see Hajji, Mullah and Effendi.

See also

• Islamic comedy
• Hershele Ostropoler
• Till Eulenspiegel

External links

• Works by Nasreddin Hoca at Project Gutenberg
• http://www.nasruddin.org ✓
• http://www.nasreddinhoca.org/ Template:Tr icon
• Jokes of Nasreddin
• Another collection of jokes
• Booklist comprising larger collections of Nasreddin Stories
• "Nasreddin Hodja. Tales of the Turkish Trickster retold by D. L. Ashliman"