The Third Eye – Sufism – Column

The Third Eye

Sufism

by Nicole Howard
illustration by RAchelle

If you stand in one place and whirl around, the world begins to look tired and dull, a mirage that’s losing power, because it was never really there. Or so say the Sufis, who do just that as a way to break from this mortal coil. In the book Sufism and Wisdom, Molana-al-Moazum Salaheddin Ali Nader Shah Angha says, “the human quest for knowledge is only valid when the goal is to discover the reality behind the surface value of words, things, entities, etc.” Staring at an ocean, imagine the waves as life’s unsolved mysteries; a vast majority of believers are concerned with what the wave has left behind, but it is the Sufis who are concerned with plunging into the ebb and tracing it back to its Eternal and Infinite Source.

Sufism is known as the “Way of the Heart, the Way of the Pure, the Mystical Path of Islam.” It is also called the “School of Self Knowledge.” Sufism is the way to remove the gravity of the lower self (which weighs down the spirit) and ascend through methods and practices to the state wherein the “Vision of God” is presented. It is the art of discovering the eternity within ourselves. The Sufi path takes the seeker to the Divine Essence, the ultimate goal being to dissolve in the Absolute Truth – God. The ways to God are as numerous as the breaths of mankind, and each individual has his own way. Sufism stresses the need to cut through the veils of existence while here on earth, because “Whoever is blind in this world will be blind in the next and go yet further astray.”

Derived from Islamic mysticism, Sufism’s biggest tool is the Quran (“The Instrument of Discernment”) known as “The Uncreated Word of God.” Sufis speak of “seeking to drown themselves” within its verses. They want to drink in as much as they can hold, for they realize their internal emptiness and ache to fill their Spirits rather than their Minds. Sufis continually strive to live the explicit Quran, recognizing that God is omnipresent. “We (God) are nearer to him (man) than his jugular vein.” To the Sufis, God is everything that is “Majestic” and “Beautiful.” By embodying these two divine qualities, Sufis live in Heaven, on earth. To them, the physical world is merely a projection of the heavenly world. Martin Lings’ What is Sufism? explains, “Pleasures of the senses are shadows of the paradisal archetypes that God is seeking to convey.” To the Sufi, the feeling of Wonder that comes from looking at a beautiful landscape is God. God is continually of and in us, so much within and without, that we do not recognize Him but turn around searching. “It is hidden in Its own outward manifestation wherein It doth appear as veil after veil made to cover Its glory.” As we all live and breath the same air, Mother Nature joins all of us together and screams out all the secrets between us so loud that we do not hear Her!

Sufis are Islams who have had a mystical experience. For entrance into a Sufi order or brotherhood, termed a Tar’quah, the individual must be “haunted by the thought of God” and have a “presentiment of one’s higher states.” The aim from the beginning is no less than sainthood; Sufis strive for Perfection. Of the Five Pillars of Islam (the Shahadah, prayer, almsgiving, fasting and pilgrimage to Mecca), Sufis only practice the First, which can be summed up as, “There is no God but God and Mohammed is His messenger.” The Sufis are more concerned with the supple sincerity of devotion, as opposed to the rigid Islamic concern with ritualized prayer. Sufis are wrapped in a continual struggle of non-stop striving in their pursuit of the Full Knowledge of God. Above all, the Sufis aim is to lose their sense of self.

Individuality, the Sufis say, is the sum of everything that has ever been learned by a person. As proud as we are, Sufism begs us to deliver ourselves away from this deception. The Sufi says, “let go of yourself in order to be free.” Adepts have reached Fana, the state of “self-having-passed-away,” where the Sufi has completely lost his “self” and reached the spiritual station of the “tavern of ruin.”

From an old fable:
Byazid was in his station when someone knocked at his door.
Byazid asked, “Who do you want?’
The man answered that he was looking for Byazid.
Byazid replied, ‘h! It has been years since I have had any news of him.'”

Byazid is so completely possessed of God, so full of spirituality that the physical world has become secondary and meaningless to him.

Sufism is “Heart Wakefulness.” As the bodily heart receives Life from the Divinity which floods the body with Life, so too is it the focal point of concentration of all the powers of the soul in its aspiration towards the Infinite. To the Sufi, Heart is Intellect and Spirit. This is Intellect in terms of the Latin intellectus, which is, “the faculty which perceives the transcendent.” What is Sufism? describes The Heart as, “the center and summit of mankind, it is the direct faculty of spiritual (or intellectual) vision.” We see fine with our eyes, it is our Heart that falls blind. The emphasis is on thinking with the Heart rather than the mind. Shaykh `Al’ al Jamal said, “Relax the mind and learn to swim.” The mind is a one-dimensional trap, it is only by letting go that the soul can experience intuition.

Sufism is intensely secretive. There are double meanings in their writings that go beyond ordinary poetic translations. A novice can appreciate the language of Sufism for its underlying beauty, but it is the adept that recognizes the deepest meaning. For instance, when a Sufi refers to being “In Love,” we would look at it literally and think of amorous feelings and then apply this to the way that the Sufi feels for God. But what the Sufi is really describing is an intangible state of having God completely within. Sufis do not even try to explain to outsiders. “The Bouquet of Love is not suitable for everyone.”

Sufis are people who are living a curious life on earth – here, but not really of it any longer. They’ve found their answer quietly, even while all the world shouts.