Don’t sit
with someone
who’s (spiritual) state
doesn’t inspire you
or his station
doesn’t guide you
to God.
Ismā’īl
Dhul-Qarnayn
The goal of all mysticism is to cleanse the heart,
to educate, or transform, the self,
and to find God. The lowest level of the self is dominated by pride, egotism, and totally
self-centered greed and lust. This level is the
part within each person that leads away
from Truth. The highest level is the pure self,
and at this level there is no duality,
no separation from God.
Robert Frager
When Abu Abdullah Salemi
was asked how
the Friend of God
might be recognized
among humanity,
he said :
By the mildness of his speaking,
the grace of his temperament,
the youthfulness of his face,
his generosity,
his contentment of character,
his acceptance of all
who seek to make amends,
and his kindness
towards all,
however virtuous
or corrupt.
Sufi Wisdom
The sheikh is the master of spiritual alchemy (kibrit ahmar, red sulphur, was the mysteriously working substance in the alchemistic process); thus he can transform the base material of the novice's soul into pure gold. He is the sea of wisdom. The dust of his feet gives the blind eye of the beginner sight, just as collyrium enhances the power of seeing. He is the ladder toward heaven, so completely purified that all the virtues of the Prophet are visible in him as a mirror. Likewise he becomes the mirror whom God puts before the adept and who teaches him right behavior-just as one puts a mirror before a parrot so that he may learn how to talk.
Annemarie Schimmel
friends of Allah!
no fear comes upon them, nor
shall they grieve.
Quran (10:62)
Allah the Almighty has said: "Whosoever shows enmity to a friend of Mine, I shall be at war with him. My servant does not draw near to Me with anything more loved by Me than the religious duties I have imposed upon him, and My servant continues to draw near to Me with supererogatory works so that I shall love him. When I love him I am his hearing with which he hears, his seeing with which he sees, his hand with which he strikes, and his foot with which he walks. Were he to ask [something] of Me, I would surely give it to him and were he to ask Me for refuge, I would surely grant him it."
Hadith Qudsi ~ Divine Saying
Die before you die.
Prophetic Hadith
The perfect sheikh is he
who has
become annihilated in the
Prophet Muhammad peace and blessings upon him.
United with the haqiqa muhammadiyya
(the Muhammadan Truth), he becomes the Perfect Man and thus leads his disciples with a guidance granted directly by God.
Annemarie Schimmel
The Tariq (Path)
is mahabbah
(love, affection, attachment)
and belief,
not the struggle
of heart and mind.
Abuna Shaykh al-Mahi
May Allah sanctify
his secret
A person is either compelled to obey a master because of intense love toward the master or because that person understands the wisdom behind the master's commands on an intellectual level. The same holds true for the relationship between a servant and Allah. One's obedience to the Creator is either rooted in deep love or in intellectual understanding of the shariah (the law), and the difference between the two is that of night and day.
The intellect is handicapped in the spiritual path of tassawuf (sufism) because the destination is only reachable on the wings of love. Intellect is cunning and therefore can appear in a thousand disguises whereas love is pure and simple and therefore does not deceive. The person who attains the blessed gift of love for Allah is indeed fortunate.
Shaykh Zulfiqar Ahmed
In man is such love, a pain, an itch, a yearning, that even if he were to posses 100,000 worlds, he would not find rest or peace. People partake in all sorts of things: crafts, all manner of professions, they learn astrology, medicine, science and so forth, but they cannot find peace because what they are seeking cannot be found. The beloved is called ‘Dir-Aram’ (Provider of tranquility of heart) because the heart finds peace through the Beloved. How then can it find peace through anything else? All these other joys, objects of searching are like a ladder. The rungs on the ladder are not places to stop but are places to pass through. The sooner one wakes up and becomes aware, the shorter the long journey becomes and the less ones life is wasted on ‘these rungs on the ladder.
Maulana Jalaludin Muhammad Rumi
Illness itself is one of those forms of experience by which
one arrives at the knowledge of God ...
It is, so to speak, the cord of love by which
God draws to Himself the saints.
Al-Ghazzali
If someone relies
entirely
on his own subjective judgement,
he will go astray.
Shaykh Abdul-Qadir al-Jilani (ra)
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