Mysticism Sufi Wisdom Quotes

Farsi Couplet:
Agar firdaus bar roo-e zameen ast,
Hameen ast-o hameen ast-o hameen ast.


English Translation:
If there is a paradise on earth,
It is this, it is this, it is this ~ Amir Khusrau

…The heavens could not bear my debt
And wrote me as a madman in my fate.
But lovers bled their hearts
And on the face of the Beloved
Did a beauty spot create.

The fire that burns
In the flame of the lamp
Is not the fire;
It burns in the essence of
The moth and consumes him entire… ~ Hafiz Shirazi

Sleep is the boundary between being/existence and not-being/non-existence. ~ Wasif Ali Wasif

Farsi Couplet:
Naala-e zanjeer-e Majnun arghanoon-e aashiqanast
Zauq-e aan andaza-e gosh-e ulul-albaab neest


English Translation:
The creaking of the chain of Majnun is the orchestra of the lovers,
To appreciate its music is quite beyond the ears of the wise. ~ Amir Khusrau

Khusrau darya prem ka, ulti wa ki dhaar,
Jo utra so doob gaya, jo dooba so paar.

English Translation.

Oh Khusrau, the river of love
Runs in strange directions.
One who jumps into it drowns,
And one who drowns, gets across. ~ Amir Khusrau

In reality, every reality is a veil over reality. ~ Wasif Ali Wasif

Do not destroy anybody's peace. You will find peace. ~ Wasif Ali Wasif

…The heart, the body and the soul
By her thought was consumed whole;
The only one left untouched
Was I alone, and none to console.

In front of the Beloved
I did not mention Khusrow's faults;
Entranced by her beguiling beauty
I forgot my honest duty! ~ Amir Khusrow Dehlavi

Sleep is a mirror of life in which can be seen the reflection of death. ~ Wasif Ali Wasif

You are unlimited you are limitless
you are expanded and every single
thought ~ Syed Sharukh

The mystic, identifying neither with his-her race-religion-gender nor with any mind-made blunder, lives and dies in One's splendor. ~ Fakeer Ishavardas

When the child is ill, the mother will know how to pray. ~ Wasif Ali Wasif

My heart is your student,
it studies love,

And, like the night,
waits at the gate of dawn.

Where I go,
I follow where love's face leads.

Because oil flows
to the flame that it feeds. ~ Rumi

This life is but a dream. A state of sleep but how unfortunate that man's eyes open only when they are about to be closed (forever). ~ Wasif Ali Wasif

The world is ancient, but it has not lost its newness. ~ Wasif Ali Wasif

If behaviors become equivalent it is possible for knowledge to become equivalent (for any two individuals). ~ Wasif Ali Wasif

My heart gave me no respite,
I was like a madman last night.
All night I was beguiled,
Indulged and fantasized.

The flame of Love
In my heart burnt bright
And I was a moth
That on the flame alights… ~ Amir Khusrow Dehlavi

Poets must be grounded in the education of the arts, drama, history, mysticism, esotericism, and philosophy. To gain knowledge and become learned of the above is easy - read. Poets should apply this knowledge to their work, so a poet will advance to the next level, to their next phase of their emotional, psychological and spiritual development, growing in years in a short space of time, in hours or months if he or she is an avid reader. This knowledge will birth work that is not meretricious but of noble parentage. ~ Abigail George

In order to spend out our time (life) we sell some of this time. We work for someone, we labour. In freedom we do slavery. ~ Wasif Ali Wasif

It is not long before those who are obedient in service obtain command. ~ Saadi

In the bosom of success lie not delights but deprivations ~ Wasif Ali Wasif

In love, there is no distinction between success and failure. If love remains then even separation is union otherwise even union is separation. ~ Wasif Ali Wasif

We wish to become one thing or another, rather we wish to become everything and in this pursuit of becoming everything we only end up becoming idiots. ~ Wasif Ali Wasif

There can only be two contexts of your life. Either you are the author of your life, or He (the Creator) is the author of your life.
People who feel that their creation is the responsibility of the Creator, find opportunities unexpectedly.
Those who feel that their lives are their own, have to fashion their own means. ~ Wasif Ali Wasif

He who has no light in his heart, what will he gain from the festival of lamps. ~ Wasif Ali Wasif

A yellow dog is brother to the jackal. ~ Idries Shah

If you really want to learn, do not be surprised if someone tries to teach you. And do not lightly reject the method. ~ Idries Shah

Do not think that your magic ring will work if you are not yourself Solomon. ~ Idries Shah

Sufis are those who have expunged from their minds the human tendencies of envy and enmity. ~ Idries Shah

Intellect is the knowledge obtained by experience of names and forms; wisdom is the knowledge which manifests only from the inner being; to acquire intellect one must delve into studies, but to obtain wisdom, nothing but the flow of divine mercy is needed; it is as natural as the instinct of swimming to the fish, or of flying to the bird. Intellect is the sight which enables one to see through the external world, but the light of wisdom enables one to see through the external into the internal world. ~ Hazrat Inayat Khan

The thing we tell of can never be found be seeking, yet only seekers find it. ~ Bayazid Bastami

There is a Persian proverb: 'To test that which has been tested is ignorance.' To try to test something without the means of testing is even worse. ~ Idries Shah

Life abides between life as if it were an island amidst its own ocean ~ Wasif Ali Wasif

You live where you lived
You sit where you sit
Nothing seems to have changed
At the end of the day ~ Qrembiezs

Those who say 'I am ready to learn', or 'I am not ready to learn' are as often mistaken as they are correct in their surmise. ~ Idries Shah

Sufis Know the Secrets of Love
"Longing takes us back to God, takes the lover back into the arms of the Beloved. This is the ancient path of the mystic, of those who are destined to make the journey to the further shores of love. Why we are called to this quest is always a mystery, for the ways of the heart cannot be understood by the mind. Love always draws us back to love, and longing is the fire that purifies us. Sufis know the secrets of love, of the way love takes and transforms us. They are the people of love who have kept alive the mysteries of divine loving, of what is hidden within the depths of the human being. ~ Llewellyn Vaughan-Lee

Prescribing hard work for the soft, or easy work for the hardy, is generally nonsense. What is always needed in any aim is right effort, right time, right people, right materials. ~ Idries Shah

Practise your knowledge, for knowledge without practice is a body without life ~ Idries Shah

If Allah created you for this world, He would have created you without death. ~ Habib Umar Bin Hafiz

Trust is needed before lessons can be learnt. ~ Idries Shah

Make me drunk.
Make me drunk, Beloved.
I crave your drink.
Break these thought chains
and tear these garments.
I crave your nakedness.
I'm speaking to you.
I'm speaking to you, Beloved
Take me to the depths of your ocean.
I'm thirsting for your drink.
I have followed the scent
of your intoxicating perfume
and having arrived at this altar,
I sacrifice my body for your soul.
Oh Beloved, make me drunk.
Make me drunk! ~ Kamand Kojouri

The main problem is that most commentators are accustomed to thinking of spiritual schools as 'systems', which are more or less alike, and which depend upon dogma and ritual: and especially upon repetition and the application of continual and standardised pressures upon their followers.
The Sufi way, except in degenerate forms which are not to be classified as Sufic, is entirely different from this. ~ Idries Shah

One day the cub will become a wolf, even if it has been reared among the sons of man. ~ Idries Shah

What the self-imagined mystic seeks only in his meditation is visible to the Sufi on every street corner and in every alleyway ~ Idries Shah

Neither to heaven nor to hell, my journey is towards my home. ~ ~Sw. Chidananda Tirtha

The teacher works in accordance with the prospects of his students and the possibility of maintaining the community of Sufis. ~ Idries Shah

The feet and their tapping
Write many a lovely couplet
The body dances to your rhythm O lord
After all, you are the master and I a puppet ~ Neelam Saxena Chandra

Pick up a bee from kindness, and learn the limitations of kindness. ~ Idries Shah

The world is order or cosmos rather than chaos, one that is alive as an organism and at the same time governed by law. ~ Seyyed Hossein Nasr

When the lion had eaten its fill, and the jackals had taken their share, the ants came along and finished up the meat from the bones of the haughty stag. ~ Idries Shah

Love The Way Love, Loves You ~ Syed Sharukh

Come, come, whoever you are,
wanderer, worshiper, lover of leaving,
it doesn't matter.
Ours is not a caravan of despair.
Come, even if you have broken your vow a hundred times.
Come, come again, come. ~ Rumi

Traditional Sufi wisdom teaches that we are the creation and manifestation of Infinite Love, and that every event and circumstance of our lives serves to awaken us and remind us that true happiness and security is to be found in the deepest center of ourselves where we are closest to that Infinite Love, where our true needs will be met.
~Shaikh Kabir Helminski ~ Kabir Helminski

Happy are those who find fault with themselves instead of finding fault with others. ~ Muhammad

The world is also a tillage; sow and reap your crop, and preserve it. Throw away the chaff, and give it no importance ~ Master Nursi

Much travel is needed before the raw man is ripened. ~ Idries Shah

The would-be Sufi needs guidance precisely because books, texts, while telling you what is needed, do not tell you when. ~ Idries Shah

I asked who are you ? He said I am the one, a clay potter.

I asked what is in the clay ? He said my commanded soul.

And he then said whatever and whoever the clay are made of I am the one who command the soul in it.

And I asked curiously who is he who has born to a virgin who had breath the soul in the clay? and made it fly!

He said shush!!! he is my secret! ~ Aiyaz Uddin

Trust me, I have never seen Her yet, but I swear, forever I have felt Her all over. ~ ~Sw. Chidananda Tirtha

My heart is so small it's almost invisible. How can You place such big sorrows in it? "Look," He answered, "your eyes are even smaller, yet they behold the world. ~ Rumi

Deteriorated science is a cult, so is imitative or deteriorated Sufism. ~ Idries Shah

Do we find ourself or does our self get demolished? ~ Donna Goddard

A Sufi has a right to be served, but he has no right to demand. Maruf Karkhi of Khorasan ~ Idries Shah

Sufism," according to the Sufi, "is an adventure in living, necessary adventure. ~ Idries Shah

A short time in the presence of the Friends (the Sufis) is better than a hundred years' sincere, obedient dedication. ~ Idries Shah

Though I never told your name to anyone and forever I have cherished you within my soul alone, but since you always were dancing in my eyes, the whole world has seen you through my sight, and knew it that you are my beloved for whom my love is all meant for.

Though I never confessed my love to anyone and forever I have loved you within my heart alone, but since you are always resonating in my songs, the whole world has heard you through my words, and knew it that you are my beloved for whom my life is all meant for.

Though I never admitted my ecstasies to anyone and forever I have treasured you within my thoughts alone, but since you are always reflecting in my joys, the whole world has understood you through my delights, and knew it that you are my beloved for whom even my death is all meant for. ~ ~Sw. Chidananda Tirtha

Disappointment cannot exist without expectation. The expected apricot is never as sweet when it reaches the mouth. ~ Idries Shah

They say: 'Seek wisdom while you have the strength, or you may lose the strength without gaining wisdom. ~ Idries Shah

MAGHRIBI: Learning is in activity. Learning through words alone is minor activity. ~ Idries Shah

Sufism is education, in that it has a body of knowledge which it transmits to those who have not got it. ~ Idries Shah

Virtually all organisations known to you work largely by means of your greed. ~ Idries Shah

It is necessary to note," says Rumi, "that opposite things work together, even though nominally opposed" (Fihi Ma Fihi). ~ Idries Shah

Stand bloody tall - you're the All. ~ Fakeer Ishavardas

He who is fortunately enlightened [the Sufi]
Knows that sophistry is from the devil and love from Adam. ~ Idries Shah