SUFISM

[Guest guest]

prof laxmi narain (prof_narain)

 

Source and courtesy: Sri Ramana Kendram, Hyderabad

This article was published in Sri Ramana Jyothi,

monthly magazine of the Kendram.

 

 

SUFISM: In Arabic, sufi comes from safi, which means pure. Sufism is

 

the inner mystical dimension of Islam. The essence of Sufi practice

 

is to surrender fully to God in love. For this purpose it is

 

essential to dethrone the mind from its position of king and ruler

 

and make it a slave.The lower self uses every ploy to get the

 

traveller off the road that will ultimately lead to the demise of the

 

self. The irony is that the man is in the grip of his demanding self

 

and is a slave to the material world, but he is not aware of it.

 

Sufis say that only through servanthood to God the man can actually

 

be freed from servanthood to the material world. One cannot be a

 

servant of God and a servant to oneself at the same time. A well-

 

known 16th century Hindi poet – Malik Mohammad Jayasi, was a Sufi.

 

In his classic, long poetic composition Padamavat, he says: The man

 

becomes entitled to vaikuntham only through universal love, otherwise

 

he is just a handful of dust…One who adopts the path of love for

 

all, does not come to this earth again.