In the evening of New Year’s Day 1926, a group of mureeds gathered for a meeting in a Centre in Manhattan; it was a special meeting, for their Pir-o-Murshid Inayat Khan had just arrived in America a few weeks before. As the Master notes in his talk, the group was a mix of newcomers and mureeds of more experience, and perhaps for that reason he chose to give this clarification of some fundamentals.
Blessed mureeds,
This evening I have a great happiness of coming together with my mureeds in the Sufi Centre and on this New Year’s Day to wish you all that is best from all directions of life, besides the illumination which you pursue, the object which has brought you together in the Sufi Movement. There are some among you who are mureeds of long standing and there are others who are new. And yet I do not feel that any of you are new. I feel you have all been known to me, that we have always known one another. As you feel at home in the Sufi Centre, so I feel at home with you.
And now I wish to explain some few things which will be perhaps asked to you by friends whom you will meet after being members of this Movement. In the first place they will ask: “What is Sufism?” And you will say that Sufism, this word comes from sophia, sophos in Greek, which means wisdom, pure wisdom. Not in the intellectual sense, but in the spiritual sense. The wisdom which is the essence of all religion. And if some of them will say: “Is it Oriental, Eastern, Muslim wisdom, what is it? Christian wisdom?”, please tell them : “Can wisdom be Eastern or Western? Wisdom is wisdom. It has always been the same, if it is Christian, if it is Jewish, if it is Muslim. No sect can claim that wisdom belongs to him who possesses it.” No, Sufism is not a kind of sect or Muslim wisdom or something else. Those who dress divine wisdom in words only go as far as the dictionary, as classification, and go no further. They must wait until they realize what wisdom means. You must not let yourself be troubled by an explanation by others, since you have heard it from my lips.
And now coming to the idea of the Sufi Movement. What is it? What is its object? What is it composed of ? It is the people belonging to different religions from different nations gathered together in different countries in the world who have made a facility for those who will study and practise, study too and meditate too and receive blessing too. And the more you will be conscious of such groups in other places also, in England, in Belgium, in Italy, in Scandinavia, in Germany, the more you will know that in your studies you are one with them. They all study the words directly coming from Murshid, they all study the same; and inwardly, in concentration, in meditation, in silence, you will join forces with them all, being silent you too will come together in spirit with them all. That is the secret of unity behind it.
And then you will meet people who mock at things called mystical, occult or philosophical and who see the uselessness of it. Be not surprised, because it is natural. They cannot think differently. But they can learn from what they see. The name occult, mystic and the names such as cults or cultures have been so abused that anyone with serious thought begins to look with suspicion if it is true. And sometimes this suspicion is so powerful that it can take away the faith of the newly faithful. Therefore it is better not to expose one’s belief, which is sacred to us, before those who are not yet ready to understand it. There is no use of exposing it before others. The initiation in the Sufi Order* you have received, this is your sacred and secret trust. You need not bring it before others. Let others be interested first in the philosophy of it. And those ready to understand it, bring them to some lectures here, let them be acquainted with it. And then help them gradually. By forcing your belief upon others, very often you make them antagonistic to your belief, be he your brother or cousin or friend or companion, if he is not yet ready; it would be to the disadvantage of the cause to try to urge upon him a belief sacred to you, if the other person is not opened to its truth.
The Sufi Order does not give such secrets which should not be spoken to the others. Yet, secrets apart, every word you say, those who cannot understand, they can misinterpret it. Therefore things of mysticism and philosophy apart, even daily affairs, if you were wise, you will not discuss with others.
And that light** point of view with which one looks at such a blessing as is given in the Sufi Order, as something like a wonderworking or clairvoyance or clairaudience or spirit communication, you will defend [against it]; because you will say light things are not to be connected with the Sufi Order. The Sufi Order is a world movement, a world cause, a divine cause; it is not an entertainment, not a pastime, it is not fooling. It is not something that brings before the world phenomena. If it is something, it is the revelation of God, the message of God. And I feel confident and strong although we are so few here in New York, in a city where there are thousands and thousands of people. I do not feel discouraged, for success belongs to truth and truth itself is success. If not today, it will come later. Besides, what is success that comes like a bubble in a moment and disappears like a bubble next moment? The success that belongs to the world, from a spiritual point of view we cannot count. The success of the Sufi Movement is a sure success, it is a certainty; it is not an expectation, it is sure.
When we look into the past, how many were the disciples of Jesus Christ? Fifteen, twenty-five, thirty? Could anyone have thought at that time, ‘There will be hundreds and thousands of churches throughout the whole world’?; and all those Christians, as believers they also will be influenced by the teachings of the master. And the fifteen fishermen who perhaps heard or did not hear, who stood before the master and perhaps all the time they stood in abashment, what did they take? Charm. It is not philosophy. And the voice, the atmosphere, the love of the master is still there today.
And so it is, when we look at another religion, Buddhism. The message which Buddha gave was before Christ. It still exists and very few know that there is a larger number of Buddhists than of Christians in the world†. A wisdom which was given so many thousands of years ago should still last! How many books there are printed by scientists, writers, poets, and they have disappeared, no one knows about them. How many philosophies and dogmas and conceptions were given to the people and then they disappeared and something else came. But that which is given from God, it remains and works through the whole world directly and indirectly.
My mureeds, the more you will realize the Sufi message, the more you will awaken to the fact that it is not a study of books, nor a place of experimenting with wonders, nor to dispute and show knowledge in occult science. If anything, it is the capacity, the accommodation, the abode, the temple in which the message of God is given, a message that is to be given at this time.
I wish you again the blessing of God, all illumination and happiness in life and light on your path.
God bless you.
*The Inner School of the Sufi Movement.
**’light’ here meaning frivolous or superficial.
†Although statistically there are many more Christians than Buddhists in the world, Hazrat Inayat’s statement was certainly intended to awaken the mureeds to a wider view of the world.