Showing results for "Rumi" in Religious Studies

More than 700 years ago, Rumi left us, but still his light continues to burn bright. All these centuries later, he remains a best-selling poet in the United States, and every day, people turn to his poems and quotes for guidance and wisdom. In this short book, Rumi and His Master Shams-i Tabrīzī, we explore the origins of Rumi and his master, Shams-i Tabrizi. The latter—a historical figure who gets little attention—can be said to be the original flame that sparked Rumi’s interest in poetry and led him to turn to poetry during his darkest hours.

From jewelry to meditation pillows to tourist retreats, religious traditions are being commodified as never before. Imitated and rebranded as “new age” or “spiritual,” they are marketed to secular Westerners as an answer to suffering in the modern world. In Buying Buddha, Selling Rumi, Sophia Rose Arjana examines the appropriation and sale of Buddhism, Hinduism, and Islam in the West today, the role of mysticism and Orientalism in the religious marketplace, and how the commodification of religion impacts people’s lives.