Death of Rumi:
Sipah Salar relates that Konya was continuously rocked by earthquakes for forty days before the death of Rumi. Aflaki, however, says that while Rumi still lay in sickness, there were severe earthquakes for seven days and nights, until everyone in Konya was greatly alarmed. When the people went to Rumi to beseech his help, he calmly remarked: "Poor earth, it is starving and wants a fat morsel. It shall soon have one and then it won't bother you." During his last illness, he dictated an ode which has the following opening lines:
"Despite thy kindness and affection, (my) heart craves for anger from thee.
Like a glass fragile, break my heart by saying : 'Thou canst not see me."
Chelebi Hisamud-din says that Sheikh Sadr ud-din along with a few other mendicants paid a visit to Rumi during his last illness.

Meeting of Shams Tebrez and Rumi :
The spiritual mentor of Shams Tebrez, it is related, asked him to proceed to Rum and illuminate a broken-hearted soul yearning for the divine love. He accordingly reached Konya on the 26th of Jamadi ul-Akhir, 642 A. H. and engaged a lodging in an inn. One day, he saw Rumi coming by, riding on a mule, in the midst of a crowd of students and disciples accompanying him on foot. Shams Tebrez stepped forward and asked Rumi, "What is the object of learning and prayer ?'* "It is to know," replied Rumi, "the Shar iah and its tenets." "No", rejoined Shams Tebrez, "the object is to attain what is knowable". Thereafter he recited this couplet of Hakim Sinai:
"Compared to that knowledge, ignorance is better ;
Which allows your self to remain as it were."
Rumi was lost in amazement. He had taken to heart the remark of Shams Tebrez.
Rumi now took Shams Tebrez home with him.

Knowledge, I believe, is one and indivisible, and to separate it into parts, into ancient and modern, eastern and western and ideological and practical is incorrect. As Iqbal has said :
Talk of modern and ancient is
The sign of narrowness of vision.
I regard knowledge a truth which is a gift of God and does not and should not belong to a particular race or community. I see unity even in its diversity. That unity is truth, the search for truth, the aptitude for it, and the joy of its realization. 1 am grateful to the Chancellor and other officials of the University that their choice for this high academic honour fell upon a person who is associated with the traditional system of education.
Whatever the branch of study, literature, philosophy or science, I do not conform to the view that he, alone, is a scholar and an intellectual who appears in its "uniform' and whoever does not clothe him self with it is not worthy of recognition.

The heroic endeavours of Salah ud-din who set himself to work in the most earnest fashion with the re-introduction of ortho­dox doctrines of Islam in place of the Shia ite creed, the chain of educational institutions started for the purpose all over his wide realm and, above all, the personal example set by him and some of the Muslim rulers in following the religious precepts and code of moral conduct redirected the energies of the people towards learning and teaching of the religious sciences. As a result thereof, we find several erudite scholars during the seventh century, who had devoted themselves, body and soul, to the dissemination of Islamic teachings among their compatriots. The most outstanding personage among these savants was Sheikh ul-Islam Izz ud-din ibn Abdul Salam (d. 660 A.H.).

Tartars—The Scourge of God

The Causes of Tartar Invasion:
Islam was confronted with another danger in the seventh century, unparallel in the annals of the world, which was about to wipe it out of existence. This was the invasion of the wild and savage hordes of the Tartars who issued forth from the Mongolian steppes and over-powered almost the whole of the Islamic world with a lightning speed.
The immediate cause of the Mongol invasion can be attributed to a grevious mistake of Ala ud-din Muhammad, the Shah of Khwarism. A body of traders who had arrived from Mongolia was put to death, and when Chengiz Khan deputed an embassy to enquire into the reasons for it, Muhammad replied by killing the envoy too.

The Third Crusade:

The fall of Jerusalem and the terrible rout of the Crusaders at the battle of Hittin threw the whole of Christendom into a violent commotion. Reinforcements from Europe poured forth into Palestine. Almost all the principal sovereigns and eminent generals of the then Christendom, such as, Frederick Barbarossa, the Emperor of Germany, Richard Lion, King of England, and Philip Augustus, King of France, Leopold of Austria, the Duke of Burgundy, the Count of Flanders sallied forth with their armies against the lonely Sultan and his few chiefs and relatives who had to defend the honour of Islam.

Negotiations of Peace:

Both the parties which had been arrayed against each other in a sanguinary combat for five years at last got tired of the fruit­less, harassing and decimating struggle. They came to an agree­ment at Ramla in 588 a. h.

Salah ud-Din Ayyoubi (RA)

Salah ud-din was, in truth and reality, a standing miracle of the Prophet of Islam and a manifest sign of the truthfulness and authenticity of his message.

Salah ud-din was brought up like other Kurd youths of mode­rate means, studying the conventional sciences and the art of warfare. Nobody could have predicted before Salah ud-din captured Egypt and confronted the Crusaders, that this young man would one day emerge as the conqueror of Jerusalem and a great Defender of the Faith, and that he would achieve such an eminence as to be looked upon by posterity as a brilliant example for his ardent zeal and courage in fighting the infidels, or, for his sterling virtues which could rightly be envied even by the most pious and pure in heart.

The Crusaders :
The commonwealth of Islam was devoting its attention to the educational and intellectual pursuits, on the one hand, while Christendom was consolidating its might to wipe off the entire Islamic world, on the other. Europe had been nourishing an intense hatred for Islam ever since the Arabs had taken their arms to the eastern possessions of the Byzantine empire. All the holy places of Christendom including the birth-place of Jesus Christ were under the Muslims. This afforded, by itself, a sufficient cause to Europe for breathing vengeance on Islam but the existence of powerful Islamic States and their continued inroads into the Christian countries did not give them the heart to covet the Muslim territories. However, the downfall of the Seljukid empire and the unsettled conditions in Asia Minor and Syria towards the end of the fifth century a.h. were in many respects calculated to favour the success of Europe.

Ibn Jawzi (RA)

Ibn al-Jawzi was primarily a traditionist and jurist but he always emphasised the importance of the study of biographical accounts of the pious and saintly masters of the olden times for the purpose of purification of soul and implanting a religious zeal. He has advised the scholars, jurists and traditionists in the Talbis-o-Iblis and the Said al-Khatir to pursue this branch of learning. Speaking of his own experience in this regard, he writes in the Said al-Khatir:

"I feel that the study of juristic sciences and Traditions is not sufficient to instil a tenderness of heart which enables it to attract the divine grace. The only way to acquire this faculty is to study the inspiring biographies of the masters who were pure of heart. The knowledge pertain­ing to the lawful and unlawful matters does not produce the warmth and tenderness of heart.