Among the many students drawn to Hazrat Inayat Khan was a Dutch woman whom we know now as Murshida Fazal Mai Egeling. After a time in the Theosophical Society, she came into the Sufi world in the early 1920’s, when the work was growing rapidly, and when the Master was also concerned for the care of his growing family. The following autobiographical sketch, dated on Murshida Faza birthday in 1926, discreetly omits the fact that Hazrat Inayat invited Fazal Mai to come and live with them out of gratitude for the large home in Suresnes that she had given to the family. Murshid Fazal Mai was born in the Netherlands on the 27th of March, 1861, and described her childhood, her early life and her marriage as happy.
After my husband passed away I went to Switzerland to live near Lausanne with friends. One day I received a letter from a friend, telling me that he had been elected as the Secretary of Murshid Inayat Khan and that he accompanied Murshid, who was travelling to Switzerland to give a series of lectures, and who intended to give a lecture in Lausanne. My friend asked me to assist [i.e. to attend – ed.] and so it happened that I was among the audience when Murshid came on the platform. Instantly the revelation came to me: “That is the Master I have been waiting for and whom I have hoped fervently to have the privilege to see one day.”
When Murshid, on his next visit to Switzerland, proposed to me to come and live with him and his family, I did not hesitate for a single moment and answered: “Yes Murshid, I will come and live with you.” – Then I arranged everything for moving to Suresnes where I arrived half April 1922 and was received by Begum and the children, Murshid and the brothers being in Holland. We liked one another from the beginning and when Murshid and the brothers arrived, we were instantly aware that we were of one spirit and that we had one Ideal: to devote our life to the great Cause of humanity. The day of my arrival at Suresnes, Begum had given me a letter from Murshid in which he told me that my Sufi name would be “Fazal Mai” meaning “Blessed Mother” and that our home would be called”Fazal Manzil,” meaning “Blessed Home.”
A blessed time for me and the few mureeds who were in Suresnes were the Summer classes in the garden of Fazal Manzil that first year, when we were sitting in a circle under the trees listening to the lectures Murshid gave us. Then during the next two years the Summer classes were given in the same way only with more mureeds.
On the morning of Vilaldat Day (5th July) 1922 I received my ordination as a Cheraga, and on Christmas day of the same year Murshid made me a Siraja.
At the beginning of December 1922 I started the first Sunday service in Fazal Manzil, which I have officiated from that time on every Sunday at 4:30 in the afternoon.
On Viladat Day 1923 I became a Shefayat and later a Kefayat and started once a week a private healing group.
These two services in their simplicity and at the same time in their deep meaning, have become most precious in my heart. To me as a whole they are a meditation, an upliftment, a revelation to a great consciousness, to a higher state of being. The Supreme Lord, the Illuminated Souls, whose words I pass on to the audience, are a reality to me and I know that I am cooperating with them and that they surround me when I am officiating.
On the morning of Christmas Day 1923 Murshid made me a Murshida and from that date on, every morning, a Blessing goes out from Fazal Manzil to the workers and mureeds in every country. Beginning with the Messenger I bless with “Fazal” first those of India and America, then Belgium, Holland, England, Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Germany, Austria, Italy, Switzerland, France, to end with Fazal Manzil, embracing them all together in one love-chord. I look at them all as on my children, sending them my loving thoughts, being happy when they are happy, praying for them in their illnesses and troubles. More and more I realise the privilege to be trusted by my Murshid with this precious trust, working in the inner planes to help uplift mankind, to bring heaven nearer to earth and to bless my fellowmen, whenever I feel inclined to do so.
Last summer I had a glorious vision of Murshid as the Buddha. I saw him as he used to sit before us in the silence. At both sides of him there were the mureeds in the shape of long rays of light. Around and above Murshid was a splendid coloured light crowded with beautiful beings, who were radiating just as Murshid, and at his feet the whole humanity looking up at him. A big light came from above and shone upon the whole in different colours: golden, silvery and purple, at the bottom in a darker shade.
There is not much to say about the many difficulties I have had in my life: for when troubles have passed we look at them in a different way; then they are only important in so far as we know that we have gained wisdom by these very difficulties. Every sorrow as well as every pleasure has its value as a teacher. It is all given to find in the end our own self, to find the Christ within our own heart.
Solo Deo Gloria
Fazal
to every living being
Murshid Fazal Mai Egeling passed away on 27th December 1939, at Arnhem, the Netherlands, at the age of 79.