Wisdom in Contrast with Love and Madness in Masnavi and Shams Sonnets

A long-time existing subject in Persian mysticism, which has formed innovative works, is wisdom and its contrast with mystical love and madness or the contrast of Aristotelian peripatetic school (philosophy and reasoning) with the platonic Eshragi school (mysticism and intuition). The wisdom which is confronted, and humiliated, by a mystic poet like Molana in his two eternal works, i.e. Masnavi and Shams Sonnets, is Greek wisdom which follows self and dream, acting as an obstacle in reaching the destination, and in Molana's words, “It is the incomplete love which denies love.” This does not refer to the complete wisdom, bearing the title of “wisdom of wisdom,” which has been admired and praised in religious verses and sayings and in the works of some mystics such as Molana. This paper, by referring to other mystical poems and texts, tries to examine the contrast between such wisdom and mystical love and madness.