Islam - Sufism
Sufism can be traced back to its origins to the Qur'an. The opponents of Sufism – Salafi do object to certain doctrines and practices of Sufi, but cannot make claims against its authenticity. In fact, it is easier to make claims that Sufism is the more authentic as its traditions are more dependable with the historical outlines of Islamic thought. Many Sufis arose from their retreats and became an active part of the society.
The substance of Sufism is based on Truth and realization of Truth by love and devotion. This is a spiritual path towards God and Sufi is a lover of Truth and works his way towards the perfection. He is taken away from all except the Truth. Sufism is the actualization of divine ethics and relates to an enlightened inner being by divine ethics. It is the mystical Islamic practice where the Muslims seek to discover the truth of divine knowledge through direct experience of God (Cornell). There are different mystical paths that lead to facilitate the experience of divine love in the world.
According to Smith, we are religious creatures but polarized at the same time. He has studied Sufism for over ten years. The division that one sees in Islam today is because the Sufis rejected worldliness to seek that inner bond of love with God. They embraced mysticism of love, mysticism of intuition and mysticism of ecstasy to express their love for God in the great poetry (Smith 257). Every religion at some stage has been used to mask aggression, according to Smith, and Islam is no exception. Muslims deny that their record of intolerance and aggression has been greater than any other. It is unfair to treat Islam as monolithic because, like many other religions, it has divisions into the mainstream Sunnis and Shiites. The Sunnis flank the Middle East, Africa, and Turkey, while Shiites are spread around Iraq and Iran.
Looking at the word Sufi, the root of the word is “Suf” (Smith 258). A century later after Muhammad’s death, some of the Islamic community was alarmed by the worldliness they saw around and donned coarse garments to spread the inner message of Islam. They came to be known as Sufis. They sought to purify and spiritualize the community from within. Thus, Sufi came to be known as the distinction between the inner and outer. The Sufis gathered around their spiritual masters for individual religious and spiritual practices of Sufism. Sufi orders were formed and the members of these orders were known as “fakir”. The Sufis were looked as higher than the other Muslims, in their search of God. However, they led normal live, married and followed different occupations.
Sufis wanted to be burned by “ God” and there were three overlapping routes of love, ecstasy and intuition. The Sufi Poetry on love for God is the world famous. Rabia is a remarkable eighth-century saint, who felt the love of God at the core of the universe (Smith, 259). She celebrates her meeting with the Divine soul, one finite and the other infinite in the following lines:
My God and My Lord, eyes are at rest; the stars are setting; hushed are the movements of the birds in their nets; of monsters in the deep. And you are the Just who knows no change, the Equity that doesn’t not swerve, the Everlasting that never passes away. The doors of the King are locked and guarded by their henchmen, but your door is open to those who call upon yummy Lord, each lover is now alone with their beloved. And I am alone with you.
The above lines are the ecstatic Sufi approach to God and to stand outside self. It speaks of not the ordinary experience but different ones. Ecstatic Sufis move in the direction shown by Muhammad and because of their totals abstractions from self, they are not attentive to who they are. Sufis, honor their ecstatic and call this a drunken state. In simple words, to be with God means to remain in the world and yet be not a part of it, by going within to discover the love of God (Smith, 257-331). Love mysticism yields “heart knowledge” while ecstatic mysticism brings “missionary knowledge”.
The principal method of Sufism for penetrating the disguise of God is via symbolism, which is known as the science of the relationship between multiple levels of reality. The Sufis assert that merely removing the shoes outside a mosque is not enough, but one must also drop the veil that separates him from his beloved, the God. Rabia says that ones’ existence is because of his sins. Sufis developed the doctrine of "fana" to make themselves extinct in the journey of love. Symbolism works powerfully for Sufis, and by polishing the heart in remembrance of God. By uttering his name alone, loudly or with others, one tries to fill every moment of their life with the name of God.
Muslims often carry two opinion son Sufism, and this is because Sufism itself comes as a mixed bag. It may come as shocking to many, but Sufism claims to have an authority that was derived directly from God. This was the knowledge that was derived directly from God. Many spiritual masters regard Sufism with an understandable suspicion. Al-Hallaj, was a Sufi of Bagdad, and he was crucified for declaring that he and God were one. Before he died, he said- forgive them as he spoke to God that these people were slaying him in their ignorance and their longing to win His favor. He asks God to them His mercy. Another Sufi poet from Khurasan (Smith, 323), in Iran said:
If on earth there be a Paradise of Bliss, it is This, it is This, it is This!
Works cited
Cornell, Dr Vincent J. "An Akbarian Basis for a Liberal Theology of Difference." Secondspring.co.uk. Journal of the Ibn Arabi Society, 2014. Web. <http://www.secondspring.co.uk/articles/cornell.htm>.
Smith, Houston. The World's Religions. Harper Collins, 2009. 257-331. Print.
