Category: The Jewelled Garden

The following verses are from the Intimate Conversations of Khwajah Abdullah Ansari. For more about him and this work, see this previous post. O God,When I look upon you,I see Continue Reading →

Yunus Emre (1238–1320 CE) was a Turkish mystic and highly esteemed folk-poet. Little seems to be recorded of his life, but his poems, written in early Turkish, have had a Continue Reading →

The following poem presents in a very musical form the contrast between the way of piety and the state of Divine intoxication. The ‘Saqi’ referred to in the third verse Continue Reading →

For more about the 11th c. Persian Sufi and poet Omar Khayyam, see this earlier post. Understand that you will be severed from your soul.     You will be annihilated at the Continue Reading →

Jamgon Kongtrul (1813-1899 CE) was a Tibetan Buddhist student and scholar who trained deeply and wrote prolifically. By the age of thirty, he had received teaching and empowerment from sixty Continue Reading →

The Persian Sufi poet Omar Khayyam (1048-1031? CE) is mostly known – and largely misunderstood – through the paraphrasal translations of the Victorian writer Edward Fitzgerald, which portray him as Continue Reading →

The following passage by Al-Ghazali is taken from his book Love, Longing, Intimacy and Contentment. For more about Abu Hamid Al-Ghazali, see this earlier post. When love overwhelms, it irresistibly Continue Reading →

Here is an excerpt from the Inner Chapters of Chuang Tsu. For more about this Chines philosopher, see this earlier post. Pondering this subtle and beguiling text, we might ask Continue Reading →

The introduction to a recent post from Al Ghazali’s On the Duties of Brotherhood listed the eight duties described in the book, and one item on the list left some Continue Reading →

The following is taken from The Duties of Brotherhood by Abu Hamid Al-Ghazali, who declared that there are eight duties towards those one considers a member of one’s spiritual family: Continue Reading →