Quotes about sufism

Definitions from Mulla Do-PiazaA fool:A man trying to be honest with the dishonest.

To be a Sufi is to detach from fixed ideas and from preconceptions and not to try to avoid what is your lot.

A MOTTO OF THE HUMAN RACETell me what to do but it must be what I want you to tell me.

The worst of sages is a visitor of princes the best of princes is a visitor of sages.

IMPRESSIONSTime brought a thousand impressions. Not one of them had I seen in the mirror of the imagination.(Anwar-i-Suhaili)

The spirit is the mirror the body is the rust.(Divan-i-Shamsi Tabriz)

SENTENCES OF THE KHAJAGANGURGANI:The teacher and the taught together produce the teaching.

The means through which people may perceive Truth have forms Truth has no form.

Remembering and ForgettingYou have not forgotten to remember You have remembered to forget.But people can forget to forget. That is just as important as remembering to remember – and generally more practical.

He that is purified by love is pure and he that is absorbed in the Beloved and hath abandoned all else is a Sufi.Sirdar Ikbal Ali Shah.

The impatient man is his own enemy he slams the door on his own progress.

Question 3: Why should a person study Sufism?Answer: Because he was created to study it it is his next step.

HE is a Master who may teach without it being totally labelled teaching HE is a student who can learn without being obsessed by learning.

Many people who are in reality dead are walking in the streets many who are in their graves are in reality alive.

Definitions from Mulla Do-PiazaTruthful man:He who is, secretly, regarded by everyone as an enemy.

Ignorance is the Mother of Opposition

Day and NightThe night is long: do not shorten it by sleep. The day is fair: do not darken it with wrongdoing.

The feeling cannot be described in words, it's mystical; I am changing. Perhaps the soul needed silence so that it can shout to hear the echo from the walls of my heart. It did heard something, Sufism!

Sufism is known by means of itself.

Sufism is therefore not 'Do as I say and not as I do', or even 'Do as I do', but 'Experience it and you will know'.

There is a Persian proverb: 'To test that which has been tested is ignorance.' To try to test something without the means of testing is even worse.

Sufism is experiential. Capacities, even those for learning beyond a certain point, are provoked by Sufis, by one's own efforts and what results from them, and by an element of what is referred to by Sufis as the Divine.

The first lesson to learn is to resign oneself to the little difficulties in life, not to hit out at everything one comes up against. If one were able to manage this one would not need to cultivate great power; even one's presence would be healing.

The more wakeful a man is to the things which surround him, the more asleep is he, and his waking is worse than his sleep.

Saying of the ProphetObligation to LearnThe pursuit of knowledge is obligatory on every Muslim.

Saying of the ProphetTruthSpeaking the truth to the unjust is the best of holy wars.

Saying of the ProphetTHE PEOPLEIt is the people who are God's family.(Muhammad the Prophet)

Saying of the ProphetSome behaviourI am like a man who has lighted a fire, and all the creeping things have rushed to burn themselves in it.

Saying of the ProphetThe BequestI have nothing to leave you except my family.

Saying of the ProphetFoodNobody has eaten better food than that won by his own labour.

Saying of the ProphetAccusationsAnyone reviling a brother for a sin will not himself die before committing it.

Saying of the Prophet.Lies, promises, trustHe is not of mine who lies, breaks a promise or fails in his trust.

Saying of the ProphetTasksWhoever makes all his tasks one task, God will help him in his other concerns.

Saying of the ProphetPracticeWho are the learned? Those who put into practice what they know.

I die, and yet not dies in meThe ardour of my love for Thee,Nor hath Thy Love, my only goal,Assuaged the fever of my soul.To Thee alone my spirit cries;In Thee my whole ambition lies,And still Thy Wealth is far aboveThe poverty of my small love.I turn to Thee in my request,And seek in Thee my final rest;To Thee my loud lament is brought,Thou dwellest in my secret thought.However long my sickness be,This wearisome infirmity,Never to men will I declareThe burden Thou has made me bear.To Thee alone

It was inevitable, as soon as legends of miracles became attached to the names of the great mystics, that the credulous masses should applaud imposture more than true devotion; the cult of the saints, against which orthodox Islam ineffectually protested, promoted ignorance and superstition, and confounded charlatanry with lofty speculation. To live scandalously, to act impudently, to speak unintelligibly—this was the easy highroad to fame, wealth, and power.

Saying of the ProphetOppressionWhen oppression exists, even the bird dies in its nest.

Helping othersI order you to assist any oppressed person, whether he is a Moslem or not.

Saying of the ProphetDistributionGod it is who gives: I am only a distributor.

Saying of the ProphetWomenWomen are the twin-halves of men.

Saying of the ProphetReflectionThe Faithful are mirrors, one to the other.

Saying of the ProphetPrivacyWhoever invades people´s privacy corrupts them.

Saying of the ProphetLoveDo you think you love your Creator? Love your fellow-creature first.

To understand the extreme lengths to which the Sufis were prepared to go in reading esoteric meanings into the quite simple language of their Scriptures, it is necessary to remember that the Koran was committed to memory by all deeply religious men and women, and recited constantly, aloud or in the heart; so that the mystic was in a state of uninterrupted meditation upon the Holy Book. Many passages which would otherwise pass without special notice were therefore bound to arrest their attention,

Treat this world as I do, like a wayfarer; like a horseman who stops in the shade of a tree for a time, and then moves on.

Saying of the ProphetObjectsIt is your attachment to objects which make you blind and deaf.

Saying of the Prophet. The Bequest: I have nothing to leave you except my family.

Saying of the ProphetAngerYou ask for a piece of advice. I tell you : 'Do not get angry.' He is strong who can withhold anger.

You only truly possess that which you cannot lose in a shipwreck.

Saying of the ProphetHelping othersI order you to assist any oppressed person, whether he is a Muslim or not.

Teaching:One hour's teaching is better than a whole night of prayer.Saying of the Prophet

Saying of the ProphetMonkishnessNo monkery in Islam.

Worry is itself an illness, since worry is an accusation against Divine Wisdom, a criticism of Divine Mercy.

He causes huge bodies like sun to proclaim His Majesty through His Names the All-Gracious, Great, reciting: ' O Glorious One, O Great One, O Mighty One', while tiny animate creatures like flies and fish proclaim His Mercy, reciting: 'O Gracious One, O Compassionate One, O Generous One

Islam and Sufism are one. Teaching that to understand Islam one must be a lover, how can one understand Islam when the heart is empty of love.

Materialism, attachment to things of the world, includes pride. Many religious people suffer from pride: taking pleasure or even delight in being good, or religious.

God said to him [Eblis], 'You have become proud.' He replied, 'If I had been with you but a moment my pride would have been justified; I have been with you for centuries.

You have seen what Eblis the accursed has seen, when he said "I am of fire, while Adam is of clay."Cover up the Eblis-like eye for just a moment; how long will you see just the form? How long, indeed, how long?Alas for that eye that's blind and bruised! Within it the sun seemed like an atomOf an Adam who had no like. He saw nothing but a lump of

From my insufficiency to my perfection, and from my deviation to my equilibriumFrom my sublimity to my beauty, and from my splendor to my majestyFrom my scattering to my gathering, and from my rejection to my communionFrom my baseness to my preciousness, and from my stones to my pearlsFrom my rising to my setting, and from my days to my nightsFrom my luminosity to my darkness, and from my guidance to my strayingFrom my perigee to my apogee, and from the base of my lance to its tipFrom my waxing

The differences between religions are reflected very clearly in the different forms of sacred art: compared with Gothic art, above all in its “flamboyant” style, Islamic art is contemplative rather than volitive: it is “intellectual” and not “dramatic”, and it opposes the cold beauty of geometrical design to the mystical heroism of cathedrals. Islam is the perspective of “omnipresence” (“God is everywhere”), which coincides with that of “simultaneity” (“Truth has always been”); it aims at avoidi

Soar on to the King, the crown jewel,And then you'll truly seeThat nothing is as beautifulAs His grand Majesty.

One of the outstanding sources of resistance to imperial power in the Muslim world came from Sufi groups. While Sufi brotherhoods are generally known for a more quietist and mystic approach to Islam, they traditionally rank among the best organized and most coherent groupings in society. They constitute ready-made organizations - social-based NGOs, if you will - for maintaining Islamic culture and practices under periods of extreme oppression and for fomenting resistance and guerrilla warfare ag

Standing in Front of the Mirror of EternityDressed By True ExistenceLooking to Your Own RealityIn the Ocean of Oneness

Humility cannot be taught by propaganda, though slavery can. Shouting for humility is a form of arrogance. One of my most abiding recollections is of a priest at a religious occasion once roaring, in the most threatening way imaginable: ‘O our Lord God, we most humbly pray…!’Real humility is not always the same as apparent humility. Remember that fighting against self-conceit is still fighting: and that it will tend to suppress it temporarily. It does not cure anything.Remember, too, that humil

… the Sufi attitude is: ‘Let the real truth, whatever it may be, be revealed to me’.

People who have fallacious objectives are like the barren soil. The flowers grow from soil which is composed of the right objectives.

Mediation - Before you learn how to meditate, you must unlearn what you think meditation might be.

Definition of a SufiTo learn, people must give up a great deal, and this includes ritual as something from which they imagine they might learn. It is to emphasise this that Abu-Yaqub al-Susi, quoted in Kalabadhi's Taaruf, states that the Sufi is 'One who does not care when something is taken from him, but who does not cease to seek for what he has not.

The Sufi way is through knowledge and practice, not through intellect and talk. As Prince Dara Shikoh says, in a Persian poem: Do you wish to be included with the Lords of Sight? From speech (then) pass on to experience. By saying 'Unity', you do not become a monotheist; The mouth does not become sweet from the word 'Sugar

Only the search for truth is valid, the desire for wisdom the motive. The method is assimilation, not study.

If you are 'humble', it may help you in ordinary life. If you are not, you will get nowhere in higher things.

The secret of Sufism is that it has no secret at all'.

No practice exists in isolation.

Not to be greedy is, paradoxically, the highest form of looking after one's true interests.

Exercise power by means of kindness, and you may be causing more damage than you could by cruelty. Neither approach is correct.

Sufis hold that the superior experience and knowledge comes to a man or woman in exact accordance with his worth,capacity,and earning of it.

Sufism is transmitted by means of the human exemplar, the teacher.

Laziness - The laziness of adolescence is a rehearsal for the incapacity of old age.

Sufis aim to refine human consciousness. This is Sufi mysticism: not mystification or magic, but a specific Path.

Deteriorated science is a cult, so is imitative or deteriorated Sufism.

We and all our existences are non-entities. Thou art the absolute being whose appearance is transitory.

Sufism is the doing in this lifetime what any fool will be doing in then thousand years’ time.

The practice of the Sufis is too sublime to have a formal beginning,

The degree of necessity determines the development of organs in man… therefore increase your necessity.

Sufism was formerly a reality without a name: now it is a name without a reality.

ANDAKI: EFFORT IS NOT EFFORT WITHOUT ZAMAN, MAKAN, IKHWAN (RIGHT TIME, RIGHT PLACE, RIGHT PEOPLE).

An old fool is worse than a young one: For the young may always grow wise. (Zohair)

If you do not understand, you cannot love. You can only imagine that you love.

Sufi secrets are perceived, not understood by words.

The Sufis have said: ‘The importance of something is in inverse proportion to its attractiveness.

You may have forgotten the Way: But those who came beforeDid not forget you.Saying of Master Bahaudin Naqshband of Bokhara

Definitions from Mulla Do-PiazaDrugs: Source of the mystical experience of the ignorant.

Saying of the ProphetStruggleThe holy warrior is he who struggles with himself.

Saying of the ProphetHumilityHumility and courtesy are themselves a part of piety.

Saying of the ProphetDeathDie before your death.

You yourself are your own barrier – rise from within it.

The donkey which brought you to this door must be dismissed if you want to get through it’.

DeathIf he is a good man, death will be a release;If he is a bad one, it will release others from him.

Saying of the ProphetSleepSleep is the brother of death.