Immediately beside the Dargah of Hazrat Inayat Khan is the much bigger and more well known Dargah of Hazrat Nizamuddin Auliya, a saint who passed away a little less than eight hundred years ago.  Thousands of visitors come each day to this shrine, seeking blessings, consolation and peace.

The Urs of Hazrat Nizamuddin is kept according to the moon-based Muslim calendar, and therefore ‘walks’ through the western calendar over the years.  It happens that this year, it falls just a few days before the Urs of Hazrat Inayat (which is celebrated according to the western calendar, on the 5th of February).

Hazrat Nizamuddin’s life was completely dedicated to the service of the Divine.  He once said:
If someone strews thorns in your path, and you also strew thorns in his path, then there will be only thorns in the path. Good against good and bad against bad is the way of the common run of people, but the way of dervishes is ‘good against good and good against bad too’ :
He who out of enmity strews thorns in our path,
May each flower blossom in his life’s garden without a thorn!

And he gave this example of the ‘way of dervishes’ in his own life: it is reported that someone in the assembly of Nizamuddin Auliya said, “Some people, in private and in public, speak ill of you, which we cannot tolerate any more.” Nizamuddin Auliya said, “I forgive them all…you should also forgive them. No one should harbor enmity over it.” He then continued, “A certain person always spoke and wished ill of me. It is bad to speak ill but to wish ill of anyone is worse still. When that person passed away, I went to his grave and prayed, ‘O God, I forgive him for all the evil he has spoken of or wished me. O God, punish him not on that account.’”