He was introduced into the mystical path by a wandering dervish, Shamsuddin of Tabriz.
Rumi 24 years old, was an already accomplished scholar in religious and positive sciences. When his father Bahaduddin Valad passed away, Rumi succeeded his father in 1231 as professor in religious sciences. Escaping the Mongol invasion and destruction, Rumi and his family traveled extensively in the Muslim lands, performed pilgrimage to Mecca and finally settled in Konya, Anatolia, then part of Seljuk Empire. Rumi was born in a family of learned theologians. Translations of his works are very popular, most notably in Turkey, Azerbaijan, the United States, and South Asia. Rumi's works are written mostly in Persian, but occasionally he also used Greek, Arabic, and Turkish. Rumi has been described as the most popular poet and the best selling Islamic poet in the United States, among Muslims. His poems have been widely translated into many of the world's languages and transposed into various formats. Rumi's influence transcends national borders and ethnic divisions: Iranians, Tajiks, Turkish, Greeks, Pashtuns, other Central Asian Muslims, and the Muslims of South Asia have greatly appreciated his spiritual legacy for the past seven centuries. Jalal ad-Din Muhammad Rumi, also known as Jalal ad-Din Muhammad Balkhi, Mawlana, Mevlana, Mevlevî, and more popularly simply as Rumi was a 13th-century Persian poet, jurist, Islamic scholar, theologian, and Sufi mystic.
