85. DOES THE DEVIL EXIST? -- More Sufi Wisdom

Excerpts

from

"The Tale

of the Reed Pipe:
Teachings
of the Sufis",

by

Massud Farzan,

E. P. Dutton,

1974

 
Lessons from
Mohammad Ghazali:
 
DOES THE DEVIL EXIST?
 
One can entertain
such thoughts
as
whether
Satan
is
a real entity
and,
if so,
whether
something material
can enter
man's body.
 
But
such questions
are
irrelevant
to
transactional knowledge.
 
The person
who occupies himself
with
such problems
is like
the one who
finds a snake
creeping
up his sleeve;
instead of
ridding himself
of
the danger
immediately
by
removing the snake,
he wants
first
to
ascertain its color,
measure
its size,
and
determine its shape.
 
This
is
sheer lunacy.
 
[p. 61]
 
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A TALENTED MAN

LIKE YOU
-- AN EXAMPLE
 
The Devil
may address
a scholar
in this way:
"Don't you see
how
people
are suffering
from
their ignorance?
 
Don't you
want
to alleviate
their sorrow
through
your
teaching
and
guidance?
 
God
has given you
intellectual
and
verbal talents.
 
Why
shouldn't you
avail yourself
of them
instead of
letting
God's bounties
go to waste?
 
How
can you
remain silent?
 
The Devil
keeps hammering
his subtle persuasions
until
the learned man
becomes convinced
that he should
set about
teaching people.
 
But then
the Devil
intimates
to the scholar:
"You should
embellish
your thoughts
with
pretty language
and
impressive conceits.
 
Also
play up
your
qualifications.
 
Otherwise
your words
won't have
much effect;
they
won't reach
people's hearts
and
they
will not succeed
in attaining
the truth."
 
He
will go on
whispering such
innuendoes
in
the poor
scholar's ears.
 
What
the Devil
is
actually doing
is
subtly leading
his victim
into hypocrisy,
to
the desires
of
fame,
prestige,
and
respectability,
to
the desire
for
selling
his knowledge
and
for becoming
more and more
self-important.
 
The Devil
goes on
in this fashion,
pulling his victim
further and further
into the marshes
of doom.
 
And the scholar
gives lectures
and interviews,
thinking
that
his intentions
are good
and godly.
 
[p. 61 - 62]
 
+++
 
Lessons from
Sa'di of Shiraz
(who died in 1291):
 
ON BEING
A DERVISH
 
Ten dervishes
will sleep
under
a blanket,
while
two rulers
cannot be
accommodated
in
one continent.
 
[p. 34]
 
+++
 
THE VIZIER
WHO LOST HIS OFFICE
 
A certain vizier
who had been
expelled
from
the royal court
sought
the company
of
the dervishes.
 
The blessing
of their
proximity
affected him
favorably
and
soon his mind
attained peace
and
tranquility.
 
About this time
the king's
previous opinion
of
the dismissed vizier
changed
and
he
asked the man
to
accept
his office back.
 
The king's offer
was
turned down.
 
Trying to win
the abused
vizier over,
the king said:
"But
you are
the only
intelligent man
worthy
of my court."
 
The ex-vizier
replied:
"How can
a person
be
intelligent
and do
what
the holders
of these offices
are
supposed to do?"
 
[p. 35]
 
+++
 
PEARLS
 
I once heard
an Arab
telling this story
amidst
a group
of jewelers
from Basra:
 
Once upon
a time
I lost my way
in
the middle
of a desert.
 
I had
nothing to eat
and
pretty soon
gave myself up
for lost.

Then,

all of a sudden,
I found
a full sack.
 
I'll never forget
the joy
I felt,
for
I thought
that the sack
was full
of
roasted wheat
or
rice.
 
And
I shall
never forget
the feeling
of
utter bitterness
and
disillusionment
when
I saw
that
the contents
of the sack
was
nothing
but
pearls.
 
[p. 39]
 
+++

71. Opposed Ways of Thinking -- "Your Thought and Mine" -- by Kahlil Gibran

Excerpts

from

"Spiritual
Sayings
of
Kahlil Gibran",

translated
from
the Arabic
and
edited by
Anthony Rizcallah Ferris,

Bantam Books,
1962,
pages 109 - 114.


Your

Thought

and
Mine


Your thought
is
a tree
rooted deep
in
the soil
of tradition
and
whose branches
grow
in the power
of
continuity.

My thought
is
a cloud
moving
in
the space.

It turns into
drops
which,
as they fall,
form
a brook
that
sings its way
into the sea.

Then

it rises

as vapor
into the sky.

Your thought
is
a fortress
that
neither gale
nor
the lightning
can shake.

My thought
is
a tender leaf
that sways
in
every direction
and
finds pleasure
in its swaying.

Your thought
is
an ancient dogma
that
cannot change you
nor
can you
change it.

My thought
is new,
and
it tests me
and
I test it
morn and eve.

You have
your thought
and I have
mine.

Your thought
allows you
to believe
in the
unequal contest
of
the strong
against
the weak,
and in
the tricking
of
the simple
by
the subtle ones.

My thought
creates in me
the desire
to
till the earth
with my hoe,
and
harvest the crops
with my sickle,
and
build my home
with stones and mortar,
and
weave my raiment
with woolen
and linen threads.

Your thought
urges you
to marry
wealth and notability.

Mine
commends
self-reliance.

Your thought
advocates
fame
and
show.

Mine
counsels me
and
implores me
to
cast aside notoriety
and
treat it
like
a grain of sand
cast upon
the shore
of Eternity.

Your thought
instills
in
your heart
arrogance
and
superiority.

Mine
plants
within me
love for peace
and
the desire
for independence.

Your thought
begets
dreams of palaces
with
furniture of sandalwood
studded with jewels,
and beds
made
of twisted silk threads.

My thought
speaks
softly
in my ears,
"Be
clean
in body
and
spirit
even if
you have
nowhere
to lay your head."

Your thought
makes you
aspire
to
titles and office.

Mine
exhorts me
to
humble service.

You have
your thought
and
I have mine.

Your thought
is
social science,
a religious
and
political
dictionary.

Mine
is
a simple axiom.

Your thought
speaks
of
the beautiful
woman,
the ugly,
the virtuous,
the prostitute,
the intelligent,
and
the stupid.

Mine
sees
in every woman
a mother,
a sister,
or
a daughter
of
every man.

The subjects
of
your thought
are
thieves,
criminals,
and
assassins.

Mine declares
that thieves
are
the creatures
of
monopoly,
criminals
are
the offspring
of
tyrants,
and assassins
are
akin
to the slain.

Your thought
describes
laws,
courts,
judges,
punishments.

Mine
explains
that
when man
makes
a law,
he either
violates it
or
obeys it.

If there is
a basic law,
we are
all one
before it.

He

who disdains

the mean
is himself
mean.

He

who vaunts

his scorn
of
the sinful
vaunts
his disdain
of
all humanity.

Your thought
concerns
the skilled,
the artist,
the intellectual,
the philosopher,
the priest.

Mine
speaks of
the loving
and
the affectionate,
the sincere,
the honest,
the forthright,
the kindly,
and
the martyr.

Your thought
advocates
Judaism,
Brahmanism,
Buddhism,
Christianity,
and
Islam.

In
my thought
there is
only one
universal religion
whose varied paths
are
but the fingers
of
the loving hand
of
the Supreme Being.

In
your thought
there are
the rich,
the poor,
and
the beggared.

My thought
holds
that
there are
no riches
but life;
that
we are
all beggars,
and
no benefactor exists
save
life herself.

You have
your thought
and
I have mine.

According to
your thought,
the greatness
of nations
lies in
their politics,
their parties,
their conferences,
their alliances
and
treaties.

But mine
proclaims
that
the importance
of nations
lies
in work --
work in the field,
work in the vineyards,
work with the loom,
work in the tannery,
work in the quarry,
work in the lumberyard,
work in the office
and in the press.

Your thought
holds
that the glory
of the nations
is in
their heroes.

It sings
the praises
of
Rameses,
Alexander,
Caesar,
Hannibal,
and
Napoleon.

But mine
claims that
the
real heroes
are
Confucius,
Lao-Tse,
Socrates,
Plato,
Abi Taleb,
El Gazali,
Jalal Ed-din-el Roumy,
Copernicus,
and Pasteur.

Your thought
sees power
in
armies,
cannons,
battleships,
submarines,
airplanes,
and
poison gas.

But mine
asserts
that
power lies in
reason,
resolution,
and
truth.

No matter
how long
the tyrant endures,
he will be
the loser
at the end.

Your thought
differentiates
between
pragmatist
and idealist,
between
the part
and the whole,
between
the mystic
and materialist.

Mine realizes
that
Life is one
and
its weights,
measures and tables
do not coincide
with
your weights,
measures, and tables.

He
whom
you suppose
an idealist
may be
a practical man.

You have
your thought
and
I have mine.

Your thought
is interested in
ruins
and
museums,
mummies
and
petrified objects.

But mine
hovers
in the
ever-renewed
haze
and
clouds.

Your thought
is
enthroned
on skulls.

Since
you
take pride in it,
you
glorify it too.

My thought
wanders
in the
obscure
and
distant valleys.

Your thought
trumpets
while
you dance.

Mine
prefers
the anguish
of death
to
your music
and
dancing.

Your thought
is
the thought
of gossip
and
false pleasure.

Mine
is
the thought
of
him
who
is lost
in
his own country,
of
the alien
in
his own nation,
of
the solitary
among
his kinfolk
and friends.

You have
your thought
and
I have mine.

+++