Schimmel’s orientation toward the East was preceded not by an academic choice but by a striking encounter experienced at an early age. This event occurred during a period when she was unable to attend school due to a kidney infection she suffered at the age of seven. Family members and friends brought her various books to read, one of which was a fairy tale titled Padmanaba and Hasan. In this story, a Hindu sage teaches the secrets of supreme wisdom to a Muslim youth in Damascus and asks him to guide him to a marvelous realm located at the bottom of a deep well. There lay the tomb of the world’s greatest Emir, and inscribed beneath it were the words: “People are asleep; they awaken when they die” [2]. According to Schimmel, this sentence became a turning point that determined the course of her life. She would learn only ten years later that the saying was attributed to Ali ibn Abi Talib, Prophet Muhammad’s son-in-law (peace be upon him) [3]. Yet this childhood intuition—however subjective—opened a gateway that led her to encounter the tradition of Islamic wisdom.

A life of learning

Schimmel was born on April 7, 1922, in Erfurt, Germany. Her childhood passed within a family nurtured by affection and compassion. Her father, Paul, had an interest in philosophical and mystical subjects, while her mother, Anna, was an avid reader. Demonstrating scholarly aptitude beyond her age, Schimmel’s favorite pastime as a child was arranging words in alphabetical order.

After learning French and English in high school, she studied Persian, followed by Ottoman Turkish and modern Turkish. When she decided to learn Arabic at the age of fifteen, she encountered Dr. Hans Ellenberg, a scholar deeply knowledgeable about Islamic culture and devoted to the East. Ellenberg required her not only to learn Arabic but also to read extensively in history, literature, and religion. Thrilled at having found what she was searching for, she read three books a week from the very first lesson. During this period, Schimmel skipped two grades and completed high school at the age of sixteen. [4]

At a time when her extraordinary talents were leading her from one success to another, all high school students were summoned to Berlin for compulsory service due to the impending outbreak of World War II. Students in medicine and the natural sciences were exempt, prompting her to enroll in physics and chemistry at university. Meanwhile, she continued taking courses in Islamic art history from Ernst Kühnel and Arabic from Walther Björkman. Recognizing her exceptional talent in Islamic arts, Kühnel encouraged her to pursue a doctorate and promised to take her on as an assistant upon completion [5].

Accepting this academic plan, Schimmel devoted herself entirely to the East. Under the encouragement of her mentor Richard Hartmann, she completed her doctoral dissertation entitled The Status of Scholars under the Mamluks and the Problem of Relations between the Turkish-Speaking Military Class and the Muslim Elite at the age of nineteen [6].

In October 1940, eager to go beyond her readings, she asked her mentor Hans Heinrich Schaeder whether he would recommend reading Rumi’s Masnavi. Schaeder instead suggested reading the Dīvān-i Kabīr through Reynold Nicholson’s translation. Schimmel would later describe the profound impact of this work as follows: “When I picked up the Dīvān, I felt as though struck by lightning. The harmony of the poems swept me away; although I was unfamiliar with Persian meter and rhetoric at the time, I could understand the texts directly. As I read, the poems seemed to translate themselves into German. Since photocopying did not exist, I copied Nicholson’s entire book by hand, including the footnotes” [7]. This experience explains why she gravitated toward understanding Islam primarily through Sufism.

After completing her doctorate, Schimmel worked as a translator at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. During this time, World War II ended with the victory of the United States, and she was sent to Marburg, where she was detained for five and a half months. There, she further developed her habilitation thesis prepared earlier in Berlin and completed The Social and Cultural Roles of Soldiers, Emirs, and Sultans in the Mamluk State. She submitted this work to Marburg University in 1946, thereby earning her second habilitation [8].

She was subsequently appointed to a vacant position in Arabic philology, where she taught Arabic, Turkish, Persian, Islamic arts, and the history of Islamic literature. She also attended the lectures of Heiler, the only scholar in the faculty advocating mysticism, and under his supervision completed her third doctoral dissertation on The Concept of Mystical Love in Islam [9].

“Who could resist the allure of the Süleymaniye?”

Schimmel’s period in Turkey represented not merely a phase of academic research but also a direct engagement with Islam as it was “lived.” She first came to Istanbul in 1952 to examine manuscript collections and met figures such as Abdülkadir Gölpınarlı, Nihat Sami Banarlı, and Yahya Kemal. Her friendship with Samiha Ayverdi was so close that she addressed her as “sister.” Reflecting on the joy she felt while examining the calligraphy and tilework of mosques and historical sites, she later remarked: “The finest thing I did here was to visit the mosques; who could resist the allure of the Süleymaniye, rising like a crown over Istanbul?” [10] This statement reveals that her presence in Turkey was not merely an academic obligation but a conscious and heartfelt choice.

A year later, she traveled to Ankara, where she encountered other prominent figures. For Schimmel, Ankara’s primary significance lay in her appointment to the newly established Faculty of Theology—the first of its kind in Turkey. She later recounted that there were several reasons why she was appointed to the job: It was in Ankara where she delivered her first lecture in Turkish; she was being regarded as sympathetic to Islam; and she had recently earned a second doctorate in the history of religions in Marburg. All these factors made her an ideal candidate for the vacant chair of History of Religions at the Faculty of Theology. “When I received the offer to begin work on November 1, 1954,” Schimmel says, “I accepted with pleasure, believing that I had found an ideal opportunity to live in a country I deeply loved while gaining knowledge about Islam.” [11]

Having completed her third doctorate on Mystical Love in Islam, Schimmel felt compelled to visit Rumi. She made her first visit in 1952 and was invited to the Shab-i Arus ceremonies in 1954. As elsewhere, she formed lasting friendships there. What gave her the greatest joy during these visits was witnessing the sincerity of Anatolian women and customs previously unfamiliar to her.

During her stay in Turkey, Schimmel traveled extensively across Anatolian cities such as Kayseri, Konya, Sivas, and Hatay. She also frequently visited other parts of the Islamic world, including Tunisia, Iran, Riyadh, India, Egypt, and Pakistan. Her particular affection for Pakistan, inspired by her admiration for Muhammad Iqbal, was something she believed originated from the tale Padmanaba and Hasan.

Pakistan became her second homeland. She first visited the country in 1958, which she described as “the place where my destiny was shaped.” She was deeply moved by the shrines she encountered there and remarked: “…I loved my Sindh and visited many villages and sacred sites. I befriended singers and musicians who played and sang for me on moonlit boats. I never tired of listening when they performed old melodies accompanied by double flutes and various percussion instruments” [12].

Prejudice and exclusion in European academia

Though it was difficult to leave Anatolia, Schimmel left Turkey in the autumn of 1959 with a warm farewell. Upon returning to Marburg, however, she was met with a cold atmosphere and was not reinstated to her former position. The reason lay in the intolerance of colleagues who could not accept a female professor of international renown who approached Islam, its culture, and Muslims without prejudice [13]. Bias and resentment now stood before her like the Great Wall of China.

During this period, her mentor Heiler asked for her assistance in organizing a congress in Marburg, which occupied her for a year. Nonetheless, unemployment weighed heavily on her, leading her to briefly consider emigrating to Pakistan. Around that time, the President of Pakistan, whom she had met in Karachi, visited Bonn and requested a meeting. At that meeting, Prof. Otto Spies, dean of the Oriental Institute and a Turkologist, offered her a professorship. Thus began her Bonn years, lasting from May 1, 1961, to 1967. There she taught Arabic, Persian, and Turkish, as well as the history of religions, Sufism, and Islamic history. She was like a fertile land yielding three harvests in a single season. Despite her heavy workload she also served as editor of the Arabic journal Fikrun wa Fan (Thought and Science) and contributed articles to it [14].

American years and global impact

By the mid-1960s, Schimmel had become a leading authority in the history of religions. She was invited to the 1965 Congress of the History of Religions in Claremont, California, where Harvard University offered her a chair to teach Indo-Muslim culture. Although she had long awaited such recognition from her own university, male administrative dominance had prevented it. Thus, she moved to the United States and spent twenty-five years at Harvard University introducing Islam to Western students through its poetry, symbolism, and mystical language. Her studies on Rumi, Yunus Emre, and Muhammad Iqbal, in particular, had a broad impact. Yet in America—what she called the “ghurbat al-gharbiyya” (Western exile) of her soul, borrowing from Suhrawardi—she carried the voice of the East to the West until her retirement [15].

The autumn of her life

A life that bore fruit in every season could hardly be confined to quiet retirement. During what she called the autumn of her life, Schimmel published three-five books annually, bringing her total output to over one hundred works. Among these, And Muhammad Is His Messenger is especially significant for its profound portrayal of Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him). She prefaced the book with the words of Sir Kishan Prasad Shad (Kishen Pershad) (d. 1943), the Hindu Prime Minister of Hyderabad state:  

Be I infidel or true believer

God alone knows, what I am!

But I know: I am the Prophet’s servant,

Who Medina’s ruler is.

“Poets like him” Schimmel writes “want to leave their native country and leave their garden like a disturbed nightingale” and ask God “to lift the veil of separation” between them and the beloved Prophet [16].

Additionally, after reviewing a doctoral dissertation on Fethullah Gülen, she stated: “I was deeply impressed by what I read and heard. This movement represents a beautiful aspect of engagement with the modern world… If these ideals are properly introduced and implemented, they would greatly benefit Turkey, the Turkish people living here, and humanity as a whole. Humanity should come to know Fethullah Gülen and his ideals. His idea of tolerance and “accepting everyone as they are” is extremely important” [17].

Alongside her prolific writings, numerous awards crowned the autumn of her life. Although she was awarded the Peace Prize of the German Book Trade in 1995, some envious critics—unable to challenge the scholarly merit of her works—criticized the institution for honoring her. Among them was even one of her former students, Gernot Rotter.

In her later years, Schimmel received numerous international awards not only for academic excellence but also for poetry and literature: Rückert Prize, Germany (1965), Grand Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany (1989), Order of Merit of the Republic of Turkey 1996, and many more. One of her latest works was Morgenland und Abendland. Mein west-östliches Leben (East and West: My Life in the East and the West) [18].

By the age of eighty, Schimmel’s physical body was ready to bid farewell. Having devoted her life to studying the intricacies of Islam—particularly its mystical tradition—she mastered Arabic, Persian, Turkish, Urdu, Pashto, Sindhi, Gujarati, Marathi, Kashmiri, Bengali, Sanskrit, Czech, Hebrew, Ancient Greek, Latin, Italian, Russian, Spanish, Dutch, French, and English. She passed away on January 26, 2003. On her gravestone, she requested that the phrase which had shaped her life since childhood—“People are asleep; they awaken when they die” [19]—be inscribed in both German and Arabic.

References

1. Annemarie Schimmel, Morgenland und Abendland: Mein west-östliches Leben (München: C.H. Beck, 2002), 12–15.

2. Damla Çeliktaban “Ölüm Bir Uykudan Uyanmaktır”, K dergi, S. 131, (2009), p. 17.

3. İsmail b. Muhammed el-Aclûnî, Keşfü’l-Hafâ ve Müzîlü’l-İlbâs, c. 1 (Beirut: Dâru’l-Kütübi’l-İlmiyye, 1988), 413.

4. Senail Özkan, “Zümrüt Hayallere Adanmış Bir Ömür”, İslâm Araştırmaları Der., S. 9, (2003), p. 154

5. Ibid. p. 154.

6. Ömer Faruk Altıntaş, “Bereketli Bir Ömrün Kısacık Hikâyesi; Annemarie Schimmel”, ehlibeytalimleri.com. 21.09.2022.

7. Schimmel, Morgenland und Abendland: Mein west-östliches Leben (München: C.H. Beck, 2002), 49-50.

8. Schimmel, “Social and Cultural Roles of Soldiers, Emirs and Sultans in the Mamluk Empire,” (dissertation), Marburg University, 1946, 45–78.

9. Semanur Bal, “Annemarie Schimmel’in Tasavvuf Anlayışında Türkiye’de Geçirdiği Dönemin Rolü,” Istanbul: Üsküdar Üniversitesi Tasavvuf Araştırmaları Enstitüsü, 2019, p. 67.

10. Cengiz Batuk, “Türkiye’de Dinler Tarihi Çalışmalarının Tarihsel Seyri”, Dinbilimleri Akademik Araştırma Dergisi, C. IX, S. 1, (2009), pp. 82-83.

11. Mustafa Kara, “Doğudan Batıya, Batıdan Doğuya Bakan Bir Alim Prof. Dr. Annemarie Schimmel”, Tasavvuf: İlmî ve Akademik Araştırma Dergisi, Vol. IV, Number. 11, (2003), p. 498.  

12. Ethem Cebecioğlu, “Bir Akademisyen Olarak Annemarie Schimmel,” Tasavvuf: İlmî ve Akademik Araştırma Dergisi, Vol. IV, p. 11 (2003), pp. 583-58.

13. Özkan, “Zümrüt Hayallere Adanmış Bir Ömür,” İslâm Araştırmaları Der., Number 9, (2003), p. 154.

14. Ibid.

15. Schimmel, And Muhammad Is His Messenger, The University of North Carolina Press, 1985, p. 192.

16. Ibid.

17. Aymaz, Abdullah. “Annemarie Schimmel,” Çağlayan, Sep. 2020.

18. Altıntaş, 21.09.2022.

19. Altıntaş, 21.09.2022.



A very important principle to uphold is to view everything in a positive light, as long as it does not contradict the spirit of faith. It is also essential to evaluate such efforts fairly and, wherever possible, express appreciation and support. Even in cases where events could be interpreted negatively, one should strive uncover reasonable explanations and draw out constructive meaning.

When faced with unpleasant attitudes or behaviors, it is often wiser to respond with patience and tolerance. Minor issues need not be magnified, nor differences turned into sources of conflict. Rather than rekindling old disputes or creating new ones, choosing calm over confrontation helps open the door to understanding. Such an approach—refraining from hostility and leaning instead toward empathy—can lay the foundation for reconciliation and mutual respect across social divides. In societies marked by deep scars from long-standing resentments and hostilities, nurturing love and goodwill becomes an essential endeavor. And for those who hope to cultivate a culture of compassion and tolerance, the task often begins with seeking new paths forward.

Thanks be to God, the fruits of such efforts begin to appear even in a short time. Problems that cannot be resolved through force or fury slowly start to unravel through love. People who once feel pressured or coerced into submission no longer reject invitations to meet on common ground. Even the rusted locks on hearts that harshness can never open begin to yield to gentleness.

After all, human beings—created in the best of forms and inherently drawn to perfection—cannot remain indifferent to sincere acts of goodness. Throughout history and even today, efforts rooted in love and tolerance have always been worthy and noble pursuits in the eyes of humanity.

Who could possibly take offense at those who follow the path of Mawlana Jalal al-Din Rumi, Haci Bektas Veli, Ahmed Yesevi, or Yunus Emre—figures who open their hearts to all, with no distinction between Muslim or non-Muslim, embracing others simply because they are human? To embrace everyone purely on the basis of shared humanity, to open one’s heart without discrimination, to demonstrate that the essence of existence is rooted in love, to affirm that the religion is for compassion—what harm could there possibly be in any of this?

If these values were considered noble and praiseworthy in the past—as they continue to be seen today—why, then, do some people now feel uneasy or disturbed by them?

There are those who hold Rumi in the highest esteem, who constantly quote Yunus Emre, who speak admiringly of Yesevi, and who take pride in the legacy of Haci Bektas. Yet strangely, when individuals today embody that same spirit and strive to keep it alive across the globe, they are met with accusations and stigmatization. Why? Because the issue is not what is being done—it’s who is doing it.

Since the figures of the past are no longer a threat, there’s no risk in praising them. But when it comes to contemporaries—people who are alive and active today—the standards begin to shift. No matter how admirable the actions may be, if they are carried out by those with a different worldview, that’s when anxieties and paranoia take over.

Those who echo the ideals voiced by Rumi, Yesevi, or Yunus—those who strive to cultivate an atmosphere of love and tolerance in society—are suddenly viewed as dangerous or subversive. Certain vested interests fear that such spiritually grounded individuals may gradually gain influence; that the moral weight, sincerity, and public resonance they carry might place those in power in a morally uncomfortable position; and that, in time, these same power holders may feel compelled—by circumstance rather than coercion—to sit down and engage in genuine dialogue with them.

Had these paranoid minds lived during the time of Rumi, they would have tried to silence him—or even exile him. And if Rumi were alive today, gathering around him a growing circle of admirers, and if people began responding to his call with sincerity—he too would be labeled a threat. Plans would be drawn up in dark corners on how to silence his voice.

Those same malicious voices who now hurl slanders and insults at anyone they label an opponent would no doubt have said similar things about Ahmed Yesevi. They would scheme to undermine the influence of Yunus Emre, who draws people through the love and warmth he spreads. They would brand Haci Bektas Veli a “traitor” and throw him into prison.

Why? Because they cannot tolerate the presence of a will beyond their own, or any form of influence, moral authority, or persuasive appeal that does not stem from their own sphere of control. Sadly, the militaristic mindset of past eras continues today—under new names and disguises—still crushing anyone who refuses to toe their line or follow their roadmap.

In the face of such irrationality and inconsistency, it is only natural for one’s inner strength to be shaken at times. In moments like these, questions may arise about whether the efforts being made—or the dedication shown by those walking a similar path—are truly right and meaningful.

In such moments, a person may find themselves asking, “Am I doing something wrong? Why is there such strong opposition to these efforts?”

Yet, in truth, nothing is amiss. What is being carried out today reflects—almost down to the smallest detail—the very path that Rumi once walked. Today’s Rumis—souls devoted to the Divine, sincere and selfless in their service—continue along that same line, conveying that same message to humanity in a renewed form.

Yet some people refuse to consider the beauty of what is being done. Instead, they focus entirely on who is doing it. Because in their minds, they have already placed these individuals in a box—passed judgment on them, labeled them as “the other,” and branded them as “bad.”

As a result, any good deed carried out by such individuals is automatically deemed bad—not because of the deed itself, but because of who performed it. The reasoning becomes painfully shallow: “If they are the ones doing it, then it must be wrong.”

Even if they were to guide people toward paradise, shield them from the fire, awaken faith in their hearts, help the seeds of eternal bliss bloom within their souls, and bring peace and contentment to the world—they would still be condemned. Their actions would still be misjudged, and they would still be declared guilty.

Because, from the very beginning, the decision had already been made: “We see these people as the other, and so whatever they do must be wrong.” That, in truth, is the heart of the matter.

None of this should discourage anyone or diminish one’s inner strength. On the contrary, good efforts must continue—and even grow—by being multiplied. Those engaged in such work understand their own path and responsibilities, and it is not for anyone to dictate their course. But this much can be said: in times like these, panic is never the right response.

Panic is merely a reflection of the opposing side—their state of mind, their anxieties, their fears. Those who lash out are often the ones most gripped by insecurity. For this reason, what is needed is not panic, but steady, thoughtful resolve. When people devote themselves to serving others—whether ten thousand go out into the world this year to share compassion and inspiration with those in need, and perhaps one hundred thousand do so the next—the true goal is to let such goodness grow. Service, when multiplied, becomes a force that expands naturally and powerfully, reaching more hearts and transforming more lives. In places where hostility is met with walls and offensives, the most powerful response is to take steps inspired by love, dialogue, human embrace, and positive action—steps so sincere and unexpected that negativity cannot reach them. By the time adversaries attempt to catch up, all they encounter is the dust left behind by those advancing through goodwill.

In such moments, it becomes far more difficult for opposition to interfere with or obstruct what is being accomplished. Their efforts collapse under the weight of their own paranoia; they flail within the whirlpool of panic they themselves have created and stumble when confronted with the beauty being brought into existence.

As hearts are drawn toward sincerity and as the reasonableness of compassionate work gathers people together, those who are unsettled by such light—like souls who shrink from brightness—may, in time, become consumed by their own hatred.

Yet it is essential to remember that the aim is never to provoke, enrage, or harm anyone. A spirit rooted in mercy does not respond to curses, seek revenge, or wish misfortune upon others. Even if someone, overwhelmed by paranoia or resentment, were to fall into personal ruin, there is no joy to be found in such an outcome.

There was a moment in my own life that revealed just how easily the heart can be tested. Someone who had caused great harm and acted with deep hostility spoke in such a way that, for an instant, a harsh thought arose within me—a fleeting wish for divine punishment in response to the injustice being endured. At first glance, such a reaction might seem understandable. Throughout history, even revered spiritual figures like Muhammad Bahauddin Naqshband, Imam Ghazali, and Bediuzzaman Said Nursi sometimes sought relief by appealing to divine justice when faced with persistent cruelty or oppression. But for me, the thought was only momentary. As soon as I paused to reflect, my eyes filled with tears. I found myself saying, “No, my Lord—how could I wish punishment upon anyone, even those who act with hostility or seek to discredit sincere efforts with slander and falsehood? Such a wish is too heavy to utter. If You choose to act, let it be through guidance. Let their encounter be not with ruin, but with truth, clarity, and transformation.”

Let the whole world hear this: this must be the state of the heart. One should not wish for anyone to perish in paranoia, anger, restlessness, or inner suffering. Such thoughts have no place in a heart that seeks what is right.

Our sole prayer is this: that God may grant all people fairness and sound judgment. May He allow them to see the truth as it is, in accordance with its full value and dignity. Rather than spending their time in bitterness, stubbornness, and exclusion, may they embrace the good that is being done and allow it to find a place in their hearts.

This path has always been carried by a generous spirit. Whenever someone offers even a small act of kindness, that goodness is cherished and uplifted. The aim is simple: to win hearts and to seek God’s pleasure by helping build a world shaped by peace and harmony. There is no other agenda. Those who manufacture conflict as though it were real only reveal themselves as the true source of unrest.

The great spiritual figures of the past—Rumi, Yesevi, and others—left behind a legacy of expansive love for humanity. Anyone who strives to follow their example will feel their heart drawn toward compassion rather than hostility. Hatred, vengeance, and rage belong to another way of being—one that leads only to division and sorrow. The commitment here is different: never to see another person as “the other,” and even when seen that way by others, to keep one’s arms open.

Even if someone were to approach with hostility or harm in hand, the response must remain: “Come, dear friend—there is still a place for you in my heart.”

May God grant the strength to remain firm upon this path and the ability to carry these good efforts forward in ever-growing measure. Amen.

The third discipline: A carnal, evil-commanding soul that has not yet been able to step on the way to refinement through journeying in itself and the outer world, ascribes to itself whatever good and achievement it is favored with, while imputing evils and failures to either external factors and causes or its incorrect, stunted concept of Destiny. Instead of overflowing with thankfulness for whatever favors it receives, it inwardly collapses because of self-pride, conceit, and arrogance, and extinguishes its feelings of thankfulness to and praise for God Almighty. It contaminates its horizon with the filth of such bad morals, and ruins itself. Whereas, if the carnal soul is able to attribute to God all the good and achievements and impute all evils, shortcomings and failures to itself, then it would be favored with blessing after blessing, even in the most unfavorable circumstances. What is necessary is that the carnal soul should see that its perfection lies in its perception and acknowledgment of its imperfection, and that it should always be humble before and devoted to God. The carnal soul should also overflow with thankfulness and zeal by perceiving and acknowledging that its power comes from its helplessness, and its richness lies in its innate poverty.

It is extremely important for us as believers to know that all our merits and accomplishments are from God, while all our imperfections and errors are from our own selves, and that we should keep our system of self-interrogation and self-control alive and active. So long as the travelers to God can do this, they will always yield fruit, even in the most unfavorable circumstances. Whereas, from the moment when aridity arises in their spiritual world due to certain erosions, then only thorns will grow in their climate, even in the most favorable circumstances, and they will hoot like an owl lamenting in ruins.

If human beings were only physical beings, their concerns and worries about corporeality would be meaningful. Seeing a noble being as consisting only of a physical body means reducing it to the level of flesh, which is bound to disintegrate and rot away and be food for microorganisms. This is the most abominable form of despising the noblest and most honorable of all creation. But the actual fact of the matter is that humankind, by virtue of their creation, endowment, and potentials, are more valued and sublime than even the angels. Human beings are much more than being mere body; they are endowed with heart, spirit, and other inward spiritual faculties, with consciousness, intellect, perception, intelligence and other outer and inner senses and feelings. Human beings are an assemblage of values that transcends the physical dimension of their being. Human beings are such precious and well-endowed creatures that they can sometimes fly so high that even the angels desire to catch up with them; sometimes they can reach the peaks which separate the realm of mortal beings from eternity and infinity. Using their mental faculties to the utmost degree, they arrange travel to celestial bodies, and transfer sounds, voices and images from great distances, offering us the most beautiful melodies of time and space shrinking at great speed.

However, despite the extent of their capacity and exceptional nature, humans can fall into a net of hatred, grudges, greed, and lust, becoming the most wretched and abased of all beings. They can be wretched slaves and beggars, despite their nature and capacity to be the masterpieces of creation; they can become nothing more than worms creeping on the earth, despite their potential to be heavenly beings. But if they turn completely to God with all their inner dynamism, overflowing with thankfulness for all the good He has bestowed on them, and impute to themselves all the evils they may commit and shortcomings they may suffer, and if they can attain their essential purity by being cleansed under the taps of self-control and supervision a few times every day, they can set up the tent of true humanity on the debris of evil feelings and passions, and express themselves through accomplishments, without ever losing their humility and feelings of nothingness before God Almighty. This also means discovering themselves anew at every attempt, being fully aware of themselves in their own depths, and experiencing a new revival at every moment. Mawlana Jalalu’d-Din Rumi sees this as the feet of the soul being freed from the fetters of corporeality and the spirit starting to become heavenly. A spirit which has become heavenly also attempts to arrange its own, inner world with its whole power of perception and consciousness, makes incessant efforts to repair the defects standing in the way of its perfection. Such a spirit travels sometimes in the realm that stands before the veil over existence and sometimes beyond it, and goes into ecstasies at every seeing of the depths of its heart. Every such seeing arouses in it a new desire to grow into perfection, and every desire a new zeal for self-renewal. It sees its heart as a home of God and utters:

The heart is the home of God;
purify it of whatever is there other than Him,
so that the All-Merciful may descend into His palace at nights.

The truly and fully human beings cleanse the heart of foul concepts and images, adorn their “secret” with knowledge of God, illuminate their “private” with the torch of love and zeal, and make their “more private” utter loyalty. They are always occupied with the All-Beloved, and ready to sacrifice themselves for His sake. This is their affliction, which is preferred to all cures; they are exhausted with the excitement of being on the way to Him. However, their affliction is sweeter than all cures, and their exhaustion is preferable to every rest or repose. Their affliction causes them to travel through deserts in quest of greater afflictions, saying:

I used to seek a cure for my inward affliction;
they said: “Your cure is the affliction itself.”
I used to seek something to sacrifice in the court of the Beloved;
they said: “Your soul is the thing you seek to sacrifice.”
(M. Lutfi)

The soul also utters, as many have uttered:

I used to seek a cure for my affliction;
I have come to know that my affliction itself is my cure.
I used to try to find that which is hidden in my origin;
I have come to know that my origin is that which is hidden.
(Niyazi Misri)

Many have sung melodies of love about Him, and of separation from Him and yearning to meet with Him with all of their being, as if each part of their bodies were a flute. Concerning this, Mawlana Rumi says:

O heart! You and your suffering for Him exist; ah, how nice it is always to be concerned with Him and suffering for Him! That suffering is, in fact, your cure. So, bear with all the afflictions and troubles coming from Him, without making the least complaint. So does He decree. If you have been able to trample your bodily desires, then you have killed the dog of your carnal soul, which is the thing that should be killed.

The fourth discipline: The carnal soul sees itself as if it were a being which exists independently. It sometimes adopts a manner so refractory and abased that every attitude and act it performs is disobedience and hostility to Him Whom it must unquestionably worship. In reality none other than Him has an independent existence of itself. Every existing being or thing, living or non-living, functions as a mirror to the Names of the All-Exalted Creator with respect to the level of life with which it is favored. Even though the human carnal soul has an exceptional nature and capacity particular to itself among other beings, its existence with whatever it has is from Him, and subsists by Him alone. For this reason, with respect to itself, it is a zero in the face of Eternity, a shadow in the face of the Original Being, and is nothing in the face of the Truly Existent One. Its perception of this is the first step to the attainment of true existence, while thinking otherwise is a lethal stumbling. When one sees oneself as an independent being existing and subsisting by oneself, one rolls headlong into the dark abyss of non-existence. Yet, when one functions as a polished mirror to the Ultimate Truth (having whatever is good and valuable as only a reflection from Him), one is en route to eternity. One smashes the tight frame around one and finds the light of the Existence of the True Being. Concerning this, Muhammad Iqbal says:

In your essence, there is a substance from the Existence of God, and a ray from His manifestation. But for His ocean, I do not know where we would have been able to find this “pearl.”

The following couplet, whose author is not known, relates the matter to the famous saying, “He who knows himself, knows his Lord”:

Know your own self, if you desire to have knowledge of God;
only he who knows his own self, is one who has knowledge of God.

Mawlana Rumi sums up the matter as follows:

So long as a servant is annihilated with respect to his ego and conceit,
it is impossible for him to attain true belief in God and His Unity.
Unity does not mean union with God; it means freedom from ego.
Whoever says otherwise, speaks a lie and cannot make falsehood truth.

To sum up, it is possible to say that, other than the way composed of love, suffering and similar essentials by which one can reach God, there is another way; this is the way of one’s perception and the acknowledgment of one’s own helplessness and poverty before God, and of affection and reflection. This second way is safer and more direct than the former one.

Travelers following such a way in consciousness of their helplessness turn to the One of Infinite Power with all of their being, each saying: “Hold me by the hand, hold because I cannot manage without You.” The more aware they are of their poverty, the more sincerely they take refuge with the Divine Wealth, and attribute to Him whatever in their possession is good and praiseworthy. They are in constant thankfulness and act zealously where others stumble because of their self-pride and utterances that are incompatible with the rules of Shari‘a. Those who study deeply and reflect on their inner world and the outer world do not fall into pride (by ascribing any accomplishment and the favors they have received to themselves,) nor do they fall into mental and spiritual confusions by imputing evils to external causes or Destiny. On the contrary, they attribute to God all of their accomplishments and the favors they receive, rely on Him, and enjoy the pleasure of dependence on Him. As for evils, they ascribe them to themselves and turn to God with repentance, penitence and contrition, feeling pangs of separation from Him and pleasures in the expectation of again meeting with Him. Since they regard their existence as a shadow of the light of the Divine Existence, they never consider that they have independent self-existence, nor do they need to be preoccupied with such notions as Unity of Being and Unity of the Witnessed. With the conviction that their existence, with all its attributes and potentials and whatever endowment they have been granted, are all from Him, then they live with the pleasure or the hope of His company, and act in thankfulness for being on the way to Him. They never value or esteem easy behavior or utterances that suggest self-pride and self-complacency.

The basic essentials of this way were once expressed by the present author as follows:

O friends, come and listen, O friends!
Our way is the way of zeal;
The comrades satisfied with belief,
thorns are roses for us.
Thanks to Him, we have seen the Face of the Ultimate Truth,
and found the very essence of everything.
We have adopted His every word as a principle;
and His Speech is evidence for us.
All strength by which we are strong is His;
we are known for His Name, by Which we act,
and travel, going beyond the summits;
all difficulties are easy for us to surmount.
We have no wealth but are extremely wealthy;
and are noble and honored by relation to Him.
Reflection is our way; and everything, wet or dry,
is a source of knowledge of God for us.
Plains, residences, and deserts,
all voices mention Him throughout the universe;
roses of all colors that have opened,
each is a message to us from Him.
You know us from serving God with utmost zeal;
our work is always thinking of Him.
And what we will always do and declare:
His Book is the guide for us.
We have found Him and submitted to Him;
and been saved from grief and despair.
We were sullied but have been cleaned;
His Mercy is the ocean in which we were cleaned.

O Lord! Accept my repentance, and clean me of the dirt, answer my prayers, secure my place in religion, guide my heart, make my voice always speak the truth, and root out all kinds of hatred and envy from my heart. And bestow Your blessings and peace on our master and support Muhammad, and on his Family and Companions, all of them.

Some make spiritual journeys by refining and developing the faculties, while others purify the carnal soul within, causing it to take certain steps. In both these ways, suf­fering for certain periods is essential to reach the rank of perfec­tion and to become a perfect human being. Yet there are other ways, different from these two ways, to reach the ranks and sta­tions and the favors and blessings that come through spiritual journeying and suffering. Among these ways, there is one which is based on the way of the Prophet’s Companions and may be regarded as a manifestation of the truth of Messengership.

Helplessness, poverty, affection, reflection, zeal and thankfulness are the basic elements of this way. Helplessness means being aware of one’s inability to do many of the things that one wants to do, and poverty denotes the awareness of the fact that it is God Who is the real Owner and Master of everything. Embracing everybody and everything because of Him is affection, while reflection is thinking deeply, analytically and systematically about and meditating on the outer and inner world, with a new excitement every day. Zeal is the great, ardent desire and yearning to reach God and to serve in His cause. Always thanking God for His bounties and proceeding to Him in full consciousness of all His blessings during the journey is thankfulness.

According to Bediuzzaman Said Nursi, this way is more direct and safer. Helplessness is a path of light leading to being loved by God that is safer and quicker than love; in it the more one perceives one’s helplessness, the more quickly one will reach one’s goal. Poverty is an inexhaustible treasure which, to the extent of one’s consciousness of it, will lead one to the protection and direction of the All-Merciful and His infinite Power much sooner and more safely than the greatest discipline, efforts and endeavors could. Affection is deeper and more sincere than love. No traveler having this feeling, which is a manifestation of Divine Compassion, has ever been left halfway. Reflection is the way of the enlightened spirits who relate everything to wisdom through study and the observation of one’s inner world and the outer world. As for zeal, it is the characteristic of those who are always conscious of the points or senses of reliance and asking for help that are innate in human conscience. These two senses always remind of God. Those endowed with zeal never become desperate or disappointed. And finally, thankfulness is returning with gratitude all the blessings of God that we receive almost gratis.

The essence of the way can be summed up as: “I am helpless, You are the All-Powerful; I am poor, You are the All-Wealthy; I am needy and in straitened circumstances, You are the All-Compassionate; I am bewildered and seeking a way out, You are the Goal Which is sought and to be reached.” It is not possible for those who are aware of their helplessness, poverty, neediness and bewilderment to see themselves as pure or of being of any rank, thus it is not possible for them to be heedless or forgetful of God while knowing that whoever forgets Him is forgotten and bound to forget him or herself also. Nor is it possible for them to attribute to themselves the accomplishments with which God has favored them, using the pretext of their endeavors, nor to ascribe their evil and sins to Destiny, thus regarding themselves as existing independently of God.

According to Bediuzzaman, this way can be dealt with from the viewpoint of the following four disciplines:

• Making efforts to see the carnal soul as not being purified and sinless, as against its innate tendency to see itself as pure and sinless.
• Being careful and resolved to forget oneself when and where one should forget and remember oneself when and where one should remember.
• Being well aware of the fact that God creates everything— good and evil—and is the only source of all Thus, one should attribute to oneself all one’s sins and evil as being caused by one’s own person, albeit it is God Who has created them, and all good and all accomplishments should be attributed to God, and one should be thankful.
• Whatever state one is in and whatever rank one reaches during one’s journey, one should know that both one’s existence and merits are but a shadow or a shadow of the shadow of the lights of Divine Existence, and that all aspects of one’s existence are a mirror of the manifestations of His Knowledge and

Now let us explain these points in accordance with the approach of Bediuzzaman:

The first discipline: The carnal soul in its nature is fond of itself, and only loves and has relations with others because of itself. The self-love of the carnal soul is so great that its adoration of itself is like the adoration of God felt by a sincere believer devoted to the One Who absolutely deserves worship and who should be sought. It never shows inclination to acknowledge its errors and always sees itself as being pure and free of error. So, one should wage the major (greater) jihad against such an attitude, always criticizing and questioning it, softening and melting it in the blast-furnace of self-criticism and self-supervision in order to re-shape it. One should never see oneself as free and absolved of errors and sins, and the acceptance of this is, in fact, the tap under which it should and can be cleaned. Only by doing so can one’s innate positive potentialities be developed.

If we continuously seek purification in seeing ourselves as prone to evils and errors, angels and other spiritual beings will greatly appreciate our decency and cleanliness, and, as stated in a Prophetic saying (Muslim, Tawba, 12-13), they will come down from all sides to shake hands with us. If, by contrast, we are so heedless that we see ourselves as clean and infallible, we will inevitably be representatives of a loathsome nature from which even devils will keep aloof in disgust. As Rumi said, human beings are such that sometimes they become like the Devil under the influence of satanic impulses, and sometimes they are on a par with angels at the summits of spiritual life.

The second discipline: A person with an unpurified, evil-commanding carnal soul may be forgetful of the most vital matters, which should never be forgotten, and such a person does not even want to recollect them, while pulling up from the heart matters that should never be remembered. Human beings should always think of serving God’s cause, of being earnest in their deeds, of their responsibilities to the people around them, and of death and what lies beyond it. They should uproot from their spirit hatred, jealousy, worldly ambitions, greed, and carnal desires. Only by doing so can human beings keep their innate tendency toward spirituality alive and hold themselves back from rousing the satanic tendencies within them.

We, travelers on the way to God, should see belief in God and living along the line of His good pleasure as a blessing, and concentrate on how we can please Him with all our thoughts, feelings, and actions. We should also try to lead our lives in His company, and by virtue of this company, we should continually seek new means to be always in close relationship with Him. We should always be aware of what Rumi reminds us of: “There is a hidden One here; O heart, do not see yourself as alone.” Based on our relationship with Him, we should strive to transcend our limited nature in order to advance toward infinity, developing our drop-like existence into an ocean, and seeking the mysteries of the universal in our particular existence. If we lead such a life, the things that are seen as impossible to do are done and obstacles that seem insurmountable are surmounted. Particulars become reflections of and mirrors to the universal, and what we see as non-existent takes on the color of existence, a dewdrop excels the moon in reflecting the sun, earth becomes as elevated as the heavens, and our particle-like natures expand to the extent of the universe.

Mawlana Rumi, the prince of the lovers of God, advises us to transcend the corporeal dimension of our existence and discover the mysterious potentialities of our spirit, saying:

A pitcher which has found the way to the sea: rivers prostrate themselves before it.

A salik (initiate) is a traveler who follows a way to a goal and makes efforts to meet with God. The way of traveling differs according to the capacity, abilities and gifts with which each individual has been favored. Some are extraordinarily attracted and taken by God Himself to the ranks of loving and being loved by God and being pleased with Him and His being pleased with them, without having to observe some of the rules that must be observed during journeying. Such are mentioned as those who are attracted by God. They can reach, through the blessings of the Prophet’s Ascension, in a few minutes, hours or days the states and stations that others can reach after many periods of suffering, and become purified of carnal dirt. Their hearts are refined in the shortest way possible and, reaching their Beloved and Desired One at a speed that is not possible through other efforts, they are able to feel all the spiritual pleasures of being favored with His company. They have reached the horizon of “a perfect human being,” which is regarded as the point where the outward and inward have been united.

These perfect ones, who are attracted by God toward Him, are the hidden treasures of the Divine mysteries, the centers on which the lights of the Divine Knowledge and Existence are focused, and those who offer the water of life to believers for the health of their spiritual life, a water with which they will quench their thirst for eternity. They revive dead hearts with their speeches, open blind eyes with their glance and attentions, and cure the spiritual wounds of those who are in their aura. They live intoxicated with ever new gifts and favors, and cause those around them to experience the most dazzling of observations. With their seeing directed by their insight, and their speaking dependent on their hearts, they are enraptured with the colors and lines which pertain to Him, and which they see in every- thing they look at, and they scatter pearls and coral whenever they open their mouths to speak. Since they are dazzled and enchanted by even a half-seeing of Him, those who do not know them think that they are insane or intoxicated. Ruhi of Baghdad [1] describes their state very well:

Do not think that we are intoxicated with the wine of the grape; we are among the intoxicated from eternity in the past.

If some temporarily go into ecstasies with the initial signs of Him, they immediately come to their senses because of their nature, and they take refuge in wakefulness and self-possession, continuing on their way to meeting God in wakefulness. There is nothing in their feelings, thoughts or acts which causes people confusion; nor are there utterances of pride incompatible with the rules of Shari‘a, nor any affectations, nor relaxed behavior. They advance toward being pleased with Him and His being pleased with them in reliance on Him in the atmosphere of The eye did not swerve, nor did it stray (53:17).

Some others complete their spiritual journey by observing its heavenly rules, reaching the horizon of attraction toward God with the support of Divine help and feeling as if their will-power has been connected to a sacred center of attraction. They con- tinue their future life connected to that center in the manner of those who have let themselves go in the current. You can find in such people, who have taken off toward nothingness and carnal non-existence, neither anxieties, worries, nor grief. They are occupied with the Eternal Friend, they feel His intimacy, and live free from uneasiness and troubles because of the peace they find in His presence. The following verses of Niyazi Misri [2] indicate this horizon in one respect:

Having renounced the worldly worries, and
taken off to carnal non-existence; zealously
flying without ceasing,
I call, “O Friend, O Friend!”

There are still some others who constantly make an effort, from the beginning to the end, and, without expecting any return, sincerely fulfill their duties of servanthood. They neither feel attraction nor are attracted toward God, nor do they display any affectations, nor have any superiority or inferiority complexes or fancies and fantasies. They show great will-power and patience, observing even the least important rules of devotion without any show and being extraordinarily steadfast on His way. They prefer living an Islamic life over wonder-working and pleasures, and never adopt Paradise and what lies beyond it as a goal of their devotion. Regarding believing and devotion as the greatest blessing of the Lord, they live in thankfulness for such gifts in utmost humility and modesty. With his particular style, Mawlana Jalalu’d-Din Rumi describes being favored with this blessing as follows:

Happiness has come and held us by the skirt,
and set up our tent in the heaven.
Yesterday the Beloved asked me: “How do you do with this unfaithful world?”
I answered: “How can one be who, has seen the fortune of the fortunate state?
Thanks that I have found in the bottom of my teeth the sugar that Egypt cannot see even in her dreams.”

The first thing an initiate must do is to turn to God in repentance and contrition, in determination to emigrate to what God is pleased with from what He is not, to what He asks us to do from what He does not, and to a life in the heart and the spirit from a carnal life. So long as their efforts are supported by such a high degree of purification of the carnal soul, refinement of the heart, and good morals, initiates feel that they change both inwardly and outwardly while their horizons become gradually enlightened. To the extent of their sincerity and purity of intention, they begin to present an example of straightforwardness in acting, with the mechanism of their consciousness becoming gradually radiant. With belief developing into conviction, and conviction deepening with increasing knowledge of God, and knowledge of God being transformed into love, and love growing into burning passion, and passion ending in constant wonder, a human being, who has been created of dust, of wet clay, becomes the focus of attention for the inhabitants of the heavens. Those dwelling in the pure realm of the Divine dominion regard it an honor to follow the example of such humans. Whoever turns to them for guidance is guided to the truth, and whoever holds fast to them has grasped a strong rope.

This “greatest copy and pattern of creation”, who has become a source of radiance in the inner depth of his or her self, turns into a center of Divine gifts and a storeroom of favors, becomes a blessed one who offers everyone the water of life. Each of the different mansions which such a traveler passes through during the journey upward is called a “state,” and the relatively stable point to which his or her abilities develop, and which we may describe as the “arch of perfections” of a traveler, is called a “station.” “The gifts and radiance of everyone is in proportion to his or her capacity.”

Every traveler to the Ultimate Truth ends the journey at a certain peak and observes all the worlds, materially and spiritually, from this summit or pinnacle. The final point which every traveler reaches according to his or her capacity is the peak particular to that individual, and therefore each peak is of a relative height. The highest, the only real peak, which separates the mortal from the Eternal or the contingent from the absolutely necessary, which is mentioned in the Qur’an as “or even nearer” in the statement the distance between the strings of two bows (adjacent to or facing each other), or even nearer (53:9), which describes the nearness of God’s Messenger to God, is the one belonging to the master of creation, upon him be the most perfect of blessings. All other heights are defined, in comparison with one another, with such expressions as “lower” or higher” or “greater” or “less” and belong to the godly and those near-stationed to God are relative and in proportion to the capacity-capital of everyone and the Divine gifts with which they are favored.

When the initiates step on their individual horizon of perfection and make their heart into a polished mirror to the sacred Divine gifts, that heart becomes familiar with the Divine look and the breezes of Divine inspiration, and they begin to feel and view creation differently, according to the individual’s level. They burn with the excitement of demonstrating to others what each sees and feels.

Those initiates always think of Him and mention Him as “The One ever-worshipped is He—God”, breathing the truth of “The One ever-sought is He—God”, pondering their inner world and the outer world, respiring with “The One ever-known is He—God” and relating everything to the truth of the Divine Being or Essence around the axis of Names and Attributes, developing their belief, first based on acceptance without seeing what is believed in, into a conviction based on a seeing by the heart, supported by a state of spiritual pleasures. They experience verbal and physical devotion with such delight that it is as if they have entered Paradise and been favored with a vision of God. Haqani [3] says:

What behooves an initiate is to proclaim: We worship but God alone.

They hold back from everything which they think is not approvable in His sight, and think of Him only. They reflect deeply on a profound understanding of the fields that He allows.

Initiates who have come to the end of their journey think only of Him, consider Him, know and concentrate on Him with the title of “He.” They consider and concentrate on Him because of Him and because they must do so, and they consider all else than Him—whether relating to this world or the next—only in accordance with and in proportion to His permission. For one who has focused on Him only and considers all else save Him because of Him, the only thing to be sought and desired is He and His good pleasure. Let us listen to Rumi once more:

O you who are seeking the world; you are like a day laborer in this world; and you, lover of Paradise, are also far distant from truth.
O you, who are unaware of the truth and pleased with the two worlds,
You are excused, for you have not felt
the pleasure of suffering for the Beloved’s sake.

In short, initiates who have determined their goal well and who are aware of the horizon where they are, leave both their bodies and souls, with which others are most concerned, on the bench where corpses are washed for burial, and scatter all their capital of being before the door of their heart. Freed from all concerns of everything save Him that may keep them from their way, they turn to their heart and try to understand its voice. They put their eyes and ears under the command of their insight, they plunge into the pure world of metaphysical considerations. It sometimes occurs that they can transcend space in one attempt, and make their voices heard by the inhabitants of heavens in another.

This point, where the heart turns completely to the invisible speaker in it, is like a launch pad from which initiates can rise to the door of eternity in one leap. A step forward, with their head and feet having met at the same point, the heroes of ascension (to God) and descent (to return to being amidst the people) become like a ring. In such state, where the “bird of petition” should be sent to God, lips and voice fall silent, and only the warm sounds of the heart are heard. The head bends itself down to lean ever increasingly on the heart, and whispers to itself: Worship your Lord until certainty, which is bound to come, comes to you (15:99).

O God! I ask You for Your love and the love for him who loves You, and for the deeds which will cause me to get near to love of You. O God, bestow blessings and peace on Your beloved one and the Messenger, the pure, chosen one, and on his Family and Companions, esteemed, appreciative and faithful.

Notes

1. Ruhi of Baghdad (d. 1605) was one of the important figures in the Ottoman-Turkish classical literature, who usually wrote about moral issues. (Tr.)
2. Mehmed Niyazi Misri (d. 1694) was a Sufi poet who was born in Malatya (Turkey), educated in Egypt and lived in Istanbul and Edirne. (Tr.)
3. Haqani Mehmet Bey (d., 1606) was an Ottoman Turkish poet. He spent his whole life in Hilya (“The Portrait”) and Miftah-i Futuhat (“The Key to Conquests”) are his well-known works. (Tr.)

Although suffering always takes on the same form, dervishes experience it differently according to their capacities and their powers of resistance. Some are almost completely freed from corporeality and worldliness, and are content with extremely little to meet the essentials of life, spending all their time in worship, thinking and mentioning God. Some others try to live consciously every hour, minute and second, letting no part of life pass without an effort to attain His nearness. Hours pass, weeks follow one upon another, and hunger, thirst and other hardships continue, without any sign of ending, but a dervish who has been accustomed to suffering as a way of life never desires the periods of suffering to come to an end. However, when the first period of forty days ends, the guide investigates to see at what stage the dervish is. The guide looks into the heart of the individual or reflects upon any dreams or visions reported. If the dervish has reached the point of being able to lead a life at the level of the heart and spirit, the guide will then put an end to the period of suffering with certain ceremonies. But it is always possible that new periods will be assigned if the guide considers that the dervish still needs more suffering in order to complete the spiritual purification.

In addition to the Mawlawis—followers of the Sufi order attributed to Mawlana Jalalu’d-Din Rumi—Persians, Azerbaijanis and even some Baktashis—followers of a Turkish mystical order—have ceremonies of their own for suffering. To whatever spiritual order or way a dervish belongs, the purpose of suffering is that travelers to God should purify themselves, discover their inner world and advance toward new horizons through the steps that are to be taken during the spiritual journey, leading a life at the level of the heart and then deepening through their other innermost faculties, such as “the secret” and “the private,” and “the more private,” observing their relations with and duties to the guide, perceiving the significance of obedience to orders, and endowing their spirit with humility and a feeling of nothingness, sincerely adopting the principle of being a simple human being among the people. This is what the guides, who teach dervishes suffering, and the dervishes who suffer, are seeking and what they expect from suffering. The final goal is to become true, perfect human beings.

However, it is not inevitable that one must suffer a certain period in order to attain what is expected from suffering. It is possible to obtain the expected result by abstention from doubtful things, not only the forbidden ones, being content with the pleasures inherent in the lawful sphere under the supervision of a guide who has truly succeeded God’s Messenger, upon him be pace and blessings, and who has achieved the degree of great sainthood, by the acknowledgment of one’s innate poverty and helplessness before God, by thankfulness to Him, by zeal in serving His cause, and by exceptional piety, abstinence, and sincerity. What is absolutely essential in this way is that we should not approach the forbidden things, we should be careful about doubtful things, and we should benefit from the lawful only to the extent of what is necessary.

For those who succeed the Prophets, suffering is, rather than going into retreat to be busy with worship and the recitation of God’s Names, and the abandonment of an easy life for the sake of torment, the pursuit only of God’s good pleasure and approval, always being aware of God’s company even while among people, arousing in hearts zeal for worshipping God with sincere Islamic thoughts, feelings and attitudes, representing Islam in daily life in the best way possible, stirring up Islamic feelings in others, and by developing in others the desire to believe. This is the way of the Companions.

Suffering in this sense becomes, beyond our own spiritual progress, the dedication of our lives to the happiness of others in both worlds and living for others. In other words, we should seek our spiritual progress in the happiness of others. This is the most advisable and the best approved kind of suffering: that is, we die and are revived a few times a day for the guidance and happiness of others, we feel any fire raging in another heart also in our own heart, and we feel the suffering of all people in our spirits. In response to selfish considerations, such as “One who has not suffered does not know what suffering is,” we groan with the afflictions and pains which others in our immediate and distant surroundings endure.

Actively expecting (exerting the necessary efforts for) the subsidence of the storms of denial and heresy is a great suffering, while enduring with humility and grace life among rude and ignorant people in order to enlighten them both mentally and spiritually is double suffering. The struggle with the cruel people who take belief in and submission to God as a sport and who reject Islamic values is suffering upon suffering. Finally, in an atmosphere where all the causes of suffering already mentioned exist, and where friends are unfaithful, where time and conditions are pitiless, where troubles are numerous, where cures are extremely scant, where enemies are powerful, and where the wheel of events turn in the opposite direction, to always breathe in the atmosphere of the Ultimate Truth while having to live every moment of life as if sipping poison is the greatest of sufferings. All of this will help travelers to God to reach the final point in a very short time.

Those who suffered the most in this sense are the Prophets, and on their right and left are the pure, verifying scholars who succeed them and the saints. The hadith, Those who are subjected to the greatest afflictions and suffering are the Prophets, and then come others (according to the depth of their belief) [1] indicates this fact and reminds us that the intensity of suffering is directly proportional to the resistance of the sufferer.

There are few who really suffer in the sense that has been discussed here. It is not genuine suffering that people are subjected to in daily life. Those who really suffer feel suffering and bear it in their private worlds. It cannot be shared by others. Prophet Joseph, upon him be peace, whose suffering began when he was cast into a well, experienced suffering doubly in a foreign county when he was sold as a slave and thrown into jail, and left among a people who had a different culture and language, and who did not sympathize with him. The suffering he experienced purified and perfected him in the name of his mission as a Messenger; and God made him nearer to Him. Prophet Adam, upon him be peace, bore his suffering with tears, and Noah, upon him be peace, had to breast terrible disasters and destruction, while Abraham, upon him be peace, whom God took to Himself as an intimate friend, always had to travel in rings of fire. Prophet Moses, upon him be peace, whom God addressed directly, struggled fiercely against the rebellion of brute force. Jesus, upon him be peace, a pure spirit from God, called people to God under the fatal shadows of the gallows. And finally, the master of creation, upon him be peace and blessings, suffered all that the other Prophets and Messengers suffered. He wept tears, groaned and burnt inwardly for the salvation and happiness of others, but without displaying any sign of suffering.

Hundreds of sufferers from the first day of human history have tasted the pleasure of suffering for the salvation and happiness of others in both worlds in utmost submission to God and have been wholly dedicated to the life of others, without ever considering that they have been made to experience the greatest of sufferings. More than this, they have welcomed such suffering and have been intoxicated with the pleasure thus received.

Suffering of thought is also another great suffering. Thinking, leading others to think, setting themselves to solve the severest problems and world-heavy enigmas, including that of existence, is a form of suffering. Without yielding, making  compositions and syntheses from the thought under the guidance of the Divine Revelation and presenting pure extracts produced from these compositions and syntheses to “hungry” and “thirsty” hearts and minds: this is the suffering in which the heroes of suffering, who are as sincere as angels and who have followed the Messengers, have found an antidote for poison in the poison itself, peace and coolness in the fire, having experienced such with the greatest pleasure. Such people are fortunate that there is no end to their periods of suffering; they cannot be pleased with the idea that such suffering is bound to come to an end. If you attempt to take them out of gardens of suffering, you will not be able to do so; if you were able to do so, you would extinguish their fire and leave them to die.

It is this suffering which is the purest source that feeds the spirit of a true dervish, and which is the most powerful means for travelers to the Ultimate Truth to reach eternality.

Our Lord! In You we trust, and to You we turn in contrition, and to You is our homecoming. Our Lord! Pour out upon us patience, and set our feet firm, and help us to victory over the unbelievers. And bestow blessings and peace on our master Muhammad, the leader of those nearest and most lovable to You, and on his Family and Companions, patient and faithful.

Notes

• at-Tirmidhi, “Zuhd,” 57; Ibn Maja, “Fitan,” 23.

Tawhid, derived from wahda (oneness), means unifying, regarding as one, believing in God’s Oneness or Unity, and sincerely accepting the reality that there is no deity but God. The Sufis add to these meanings the ideas of seeing only He Who is the One, and knowing, mentioning, desiring, and calling Him alone, and conducting relations with others than Him only because of Him.

The beginning of unity is admitting that the Divine Being is beyond and above all concepts that occur to the mind concerning Him, the result of this being that there is no room for anything else save Him in one’s heart, according to the depth of the spiritual state and pleasures, and fixing one’s eyes on Him alone. In this meaning, unity is both the foundation of Islam and its fruit. Sufism has considered unity with respect to both its beginning and end. Those who are not included in the fold of Sufism have regarded it slightly differently.

According to such people, unity means recognizing the Almighty as the Lord of all creation, and responding to His Divinity with servanthood or worshipping, and acting with a feeling of responsibility. In other words, unity is the belief we must acknowledge with both our words and our actions that God has absolute authority over the whole of creation and disposes as He wills, and He is absolutely above having a like, a rival or an equal. In addition, since He is the One Who absolutely deserves to be worshipped and to be desired, we must serve Him perfectly in a way that contains the meanings of glorifying, exalting and praising Him, and by declaring that He is the All-Holy. To sum up these definitions, we can say that unity has three types or degrees: unity based on knowledge and belief, unity based on spiritual discovery and pleasures, and unity based on the Divine Being’s bearing witness to Himself. Being aware of the last one is a special gift granted by the Almighty to His chosen servants.

• “Unity based on belief and knowledge” is the kind or degree of unity which is acquired through observation, inference or Those who have acquired this degree of unity are free from associating any kind of partners to God and spend their lives thinking about God’s Oneness, mentioning Him and feeling Him in the depths of their hearts.
• “Unity based on spiritual discovery and pleasures” means feeling the knowledge of God which has been acquired through observation and reasoning in one’s conscious nature, sipping the pleasures originating in this knowledge, and experiencing it in the heart and daily life.
• “Unity based on the Divine Being’s bearing witness to Himself” is so profound that only those whom God has favored with it can feel it, and those who can feel it either become dumbfounded or can express it to those around them only to the extent to which He allows In the sight of the initiates who can feel such a degree of unity, all proofs and indications of the Almighty fade away, things turn into a mirage, all existence is reduced to relativity, and the attitude of modesty which initiates must adopt before God tells them to keep silent. For this station is that where an initiate must keep silent and this degree or kind of unity is the unity that brings about silence.

Jalalu’d-Din Rumi says concerning the unity of this degree:

O brother, keep aloof from those
who are busy with discussion about the Divine Being,
so that the Almighty may cause knowledge
from His Presence to rise in your heart.
When speech comes to this point,
lips are no longer able to move or close;
and the pen breaks when it reaches the same point.
This is not the station where eloquent words will be uttered;
So, come and give up talking; God knows best the truth.

This station, where knowledge from God’s Presence has turned into knowledge of God from His Presence, where the consciousness has been awarded special favors, and where travelers to God feel that they are being attracted toward Him by Himself, is the station of being a mirror to God where a drop has become like an ocean, an atom like the whole universe, and non- existence is honored with existence. In his introduction to Harabat, Ziya Pasha [1], with his poetic ability and pleasure, describes the state of an initiate in this station as follows:

O You Who exist,
and Who have brought existence into existence,
there is nothing which does not exist;
how can it be possible to claim Your non-existence!

Those who are the foremost in unity, which has opened for a drop the way to become an ocean and an atom to become a sun, and which has caused that which does not exist to gain existence, and has encompassed both the beginning and the end of the journey, and which it is possible for everybody to attain according to the capacity of each, are the Prophets. They begin their speeches with unity, and stop where they must stop because unity requires them to do so. The first platform for the travelers to God on their way to God is also this objective consideration of unity, where the beginning and end of the journey are united. All the Messengers and Prophets of God, from the first to the last, who carried out their responsibilities on the way of wakefulness, preached this greatest pillar of belief first, declaring: Worship God alone: you have no deity other than Him (7:59, 65, 73, 85 …). Then they went on to communicate other principles and commandments to explain its meaning and content and to establish these in this world.

This consideration of unity is the first door to entering Islam and is the means to feeling and experiencing Islam with a certainty based on knowledge, and a certainty based on observation, and a certainty based on experience. This is also the first call of God to know Him—according to the individual’s capacity—as He makes Himself known. One enters the fold of Islam with such a concept of unity, and those who have the potential to advance, advance by means of it. Studies and mental endeavors gain profundity through this concept, and it is again through it that what lies beyond the relative truths appears. The difference between eternity and what is eternal and what is contained in time can be discerned within this concept. One perceives through this concept the nature of the relation between God as the Creator and the Sole Object of Worship with other beings as the created and those responsible for worshipping and servanthood. Again, it is through this concept that one understands that the Creator is not of the same kind as the created, and that His Attributes are perfect, universal and essential to Him, while the attributes of the created are imperfect, particular, relative and borrowed. This concept of unity causes one to base all one’s views on the principles taught by the Prophets. Starting from these principles, one is saved from falling into errors such as, while arguing (in the name of unity) that He is absolutely free of any imperfections that belong to the created, going to the extreme of denying God any Attributes; or (another extreme) assuming that God takes on bodily form (incarnation) or that a created being can be united with God and become God (union). One is also saved, while observing His manifestations, from likening God in any respect to the creation, or, while interpreting His Attributes, likening Him to the created or attributing to Him a body and being that are contained in time and space. Thus one displays the worthiness (and need) to be counted among the people of the Straight Way, when one prays at least forty times a day (in the daily Prayers) to God to guide one on this Way.

That conception of unity also serves to guide travelers to God so that they can perceive the sole source and nature of the Divine Destiny and Decree. Turning to Him, they do not waste their lives in the philosophical deviations of the Mu‘tazila (the Muslim theologians who maintain that human beings will and create their actions) and the Jabriya (who deny human free will). They serve God sincerely, and feel a deep respect for Him because of His every commandment. Without denying that they have been endowed with free will, they believe that God is the Creator and the eternal origin or cause of everything, and expect from Him the attainment of all their purposes. They always rely on Him, and implore Him for happiness in both this world and the next.

Philosophers such as Aristotle, Abu ‘Ali ibn Sina (Avicenna), and Nasiru’d-Din at-Tusi [2], who considered unity as the Existence alone with no identity or Attributes, opened the door to the deviation of monism, which would later evolve as a philosophical system, in turn giving rise to many other falsehoods. Those who have strayed into incarnation and union—which can be said to have been smeared onto the belief-system of Islam by Neo-platonism—have fallen into associating partners with God by seeing existence as the constant appearance or externalization of the Necessarily Existent One, and therefore as being (in some measure) identifiable with Him. Among other groups or movements, the Qadariya and Jahmiya, which deny God any Attributes, have attributed to God impotence and to human will absolute power. The attitude of the Jabriya in particular, who deny human free will and regard humans as if they were dried leaves blown about by winds, is totally contrary to the most rational realities and is a great slander against God. What is true for all such movements, even if there was a grain of truth in them, is that their early followers were not able to save themselves from going to extremes and they prepared many points from which those who followed them and the ideas they promoted might stray.

As for the overwhelming majority of Muslims, who have accepted the truth of the Messenger and his Companions, they have learned unity (as well as other aspects of Islam), from, once more, the explanations, attitudes, visions, and spiritual discoveries of the true successors of the Messenger and the Companions, experiencing it in their inner and outer worlds. According to them, unity is the bedrock of Islam, a fact which the Qur’an and the Sunna give the greatest importance to with respect to the Creator’s Lordship and recognition of our being His servants who must recognize and worship Him. The Qur’an and God’s Messenger frequently refer to the Divine Being and His Attributes, Names, and Acts, including the establishment of Himself on the Throne—the nature of which is unknown to us—His speaking to the Messengers and Prophets, and honoring ever He wills with speaking to Himself, and reminding us of His absolute, unconditioned Life, Knowledge, Hearing, Seeing, Power, Will, and Speech. They also teach us that God is the Creator and the One Who takes life and revives after death, and that He is the All-Providing. All these Attributes and Acts of God have a close connection with God’s being One and Unique.

Notes

1. Ziya Pasha (1825–1880) was one of the influential political and literary figures of the second half of the 19th-century Ottoman Turkey. He published Hurriya (Freedom) newspaper (Tr.)
2. Nasiru’d-Din at-Tusi (1201-1280) was one of the leading scientists, philosophers, and theologians of the time and was a prolific writer. He also wrote poetry in Persian. He built an observatory at Maragha in 1262. His influence on sciences was immense. (Tr.)

“Sincerity” in the Islamic Tradition

Ikhlas is a Qur’anic concept that is variously translated as “sincerity” or “purity of intention,” and Gülen’s understanding of this term covers both aspects of the Qur’anic concept. In ordinary parlance, “sincerity” indicates the notion of honesty or freedom from dissimulation and hypocrisy. A sincere person is one whose external words or deeds are in accord with their interior thoughts or feelings. A sincere person does not pretend to be expressing one thought or emotion while in reality his interior dispositions are to the contrary. Thus, a sincere person is not self-promoting, hypocritical, pretentious, two-faced, or devious. The sincere person neither flatters nor manipulates others. This straightforward transparency of speech and motivation is one aspect of ikhlas.

The second aspect of the Qur’anic notion of ikhlas, which brings together the notion of “purity” with that of “dedicating, devoting or consecrating oneself” to some activity, is a key virtue in Islamic practice [1], and is the aspect of ikhlas most often stressed by Gülen. Ikhlas is an eminently interior disposition by which the faithful Muslim performs all external actions in a spirit of service and directed solely toward pleasing the Divine Lord. In fact, in Islam the perfection of one’s witness to faith can be gauged by the double standard of ikhlas (purity of intention) and ihsan (goodness).

It is noteworthy that the brief expression of the Islamic creed found in the Qur’anic Sura 112, “Say: He, Allah, is One. Allah is He on Whom all depend. He begets not, nor is He begotten. And there is none like Him,” has been known in Islamic tradition as the “Surat al-Ikhlas,” that is, “The Chapter of Sincerity” or “The Chapter of Pure Religion.”

The importance of ikhlas has been commented upon down through the centuries by Muslim scholars, exegetes, and spiritual guides in every generation. The Sufi masters have been particularly fond of elaborating on this virtue, to the extent that in the minds of many Muslims, ikhlas is considered a “Sufi concept.” In commenting on ikhlas, Said Nursi distinguishes his own advice from that of the teaching of the Sufi tradition. While praising the insights of the Sufi masters, Nursi notes that “I am not a Sufi, but these principles of theirs make a good rule for our path” [2].

Because of its roots in the Qur’an and in the tradition of Islamic spiritual writing, this aspect of ikhlas can perhaps be more adequately conveyed in English by “purity of intention” or “pure religion” than simply by “sincerity.” Ikhlas indicates the interior disposition in which one practices all the acts of religion solely for God’s pleasure rather than for any personal benefit that may accrue to them, whether that be prestige, pride, or the admiration of others. When one “worships God with sincerity” one’s intention is pure and undefiled by base or irrelevant motives. The Qur’an commends those who devote their lives to seeking God’s pleasure: “And there is the type of man who gives his life to earn the pleasure of Allah: And Allah is full of kindness to (His) devotees” (Qur’an 2: 207).

Ikhlas in Gülen’s theology

In his treatment of ikhlas, Gülen builds upon what was elaborated in the tradition and applies these insights to the contemporary needs of communitarian life and the broader society. ¨While interpreting the basic meaning of the term to be “upright, sincere, and pure,” Gülen indicates that ikhlas means “pursuing nothing worldly while worshiping and obeying God” [3]. At the deepest level, sincerity can only be understood in the mystery of the relationship between God and God’s faithful servant. Purity of intention is a grace or divine gift that God places in the heart of those He loves [4] in order to increase, deepen and give eternal value to the servant’s ordinary good acts.

Gülen considers purity of intention to be “the wing of the bird” of a person’s life before God. The other wing is faithfulness, and together these virtues make up the two wings of divine grace that God implants in the soul that enable a person to approach God directly without hindrance. He quotes Mevlana Jalal al-din Rumi to the effect that if good deeds were a body, purity of intention (ikhlas) would be their soul. That is, it is sincerity that makes good deeds live, be effective, and have everlasting value. Without sincerity to animate deeds spiritually, all human endeavors would remain lifeless, ephemeral, and ultimately worthless. But those who fly with the two wings of sincerity and faithfulness will fly with God’s protection and will unfailingly reach their destination, that is, “God’s approval and pleasure.”

Faithfulness, the other wing of the bird, enables God’s servant to stick to his intention to serve God even when it is inconvenient or seemingly fruitless. This kind of loyalty to God is one of the most evident qualities of God’s servants, an outstanding characteristic of all the prophets, and the source of wisdom in the believer. In the loyal, faithful servant, God will plant the seeds of wisdom that will then spring from that person’s heart and tongue.

Gülen quotes Abu Yazid Bistami (Bayazid) to say that it is through sincerity, not through human deeds, that a person goes to God. It is on the basis of a person’s sincerity that God judges acts, not on the magnitude or notoriety of the deed. The size and quantity of good deeds is unimportant. Even a small deed or one that is unknown to others, if it is done with sincerity, is judged pleasing by God. This intentionality, the conviction that a person’s intention determines the value of a deed, is in keeping with the Islamic tradition. Gülen notes that God rewards a small act done with purity of intention more highly than many more ostentatious deeds done without the sincere desire to serve God alone.

For Gülen, Muslims must learn purity of intention from the prophets, particularly from the Prophet Muhammad. He states: “God’s Messenger had one intention: to please God and worship Him sincerely, as he himself stated in a famous hadith: “Perfect goodness or virtue is to worship God as if you were seeing Him, and although you do not see Him, yet truly He sees you” [5]. Just as the prophets could not take a step without sincerity, so also those who follow in the footsteps of the prophets will not be able to do anything without a pure intention. Gülen describes this purity of intention as “the pursuit of no worldly purpose in one’s relationship with God [6]. In other words, worshiping and obeying God are the only valid reasons that a sincere person should have for performing any of their good actions.

Living with purity of intention

Like Said Nursi before him, Fethullah Gülen is not interested so much in being a theoretician of the spiritual life as in offering concrete, practical advice to those who come to him for spiritual counsel. It is in this way that Gülen, following Nursi, distinguishes himself from the great Sufi Masters like Al-Muhasibi, Al-Ghazali, and Hujwiri. Gülen is interested in continuing in the line of Nursi’s “path of reality,” that of providing effective, helpful advice to Muslims who are seeking God’s pleasure in this world. He cites Nursi to insist that purity of intention is nothing other than the basic motivation for the disciple’s personal and communitarian actions: “We worship God only because we are His servants and He has told us to do so. Said Nursi said: ‘Do what you do only for God’s sake; start for God’s sake, work for God’s sake, and act within the sphere of God’s good approval’” [7].

Gülen advises his students to maintain spiritual discretion. In practical terms, if ikhlas, or purity of intention, means that the servant does everything solely to seek God’s pleasure and for no worldly motive whatsoever, it follows that sincere believers should not be ostentatious in the good deeds they perform. One seeking God’s pleasure alone should hide any supererogatory acts from the view of others and remain silent about any edifying personal experiences, special treatment received from superiors, or special gifts with which one has been endowed by God.

The underlying supposition is that there is a universal human tendency to perform one’s good deeds in order to be seen by others and gain their approval. Moreover, human motivation is often complex, with the desire to serve God mixed with a craving for human admiration and approval. The sincere servant recognizes that it is only God’s approval, not that of other persons, that matters; thus, it is unimportant whether or not one is seen in serving God. A person who has purity of intention worries neither about being praised for his accomplishments nor censured for his failures. He does not care if others are aware or unaware of his achievements, nor is he preoccupied about receiving a reward. Such a person behaves with consistency, whether or not one is in public or in private.

According to Gülen, sincerity teaches that the true goal of acts of piety and goodness is God’s pleasure, not human recognition or respect. Moreover, in sincere worship the believer discovers that one’s human longing for Paradise is not a sufficient motivation for doing what is right. Speaking of worship, Gülen explains: “Those performing [acts of worship] can be categorized by their intention, resolution, determination, and sincerity as follows: those who desire to enter Paradise, those who hope to be rescued from Hellfire, those who love and stand in awe of God, and those who feel that they must do so as a requirement of their relationship between God as the Creator and human beings” [8]. The sincere worshiper no longer cares whether his deeds will form the basis for attaining Paradise.

In fact, sincerity should become second nature to God’s servants, not a virtue after which a person consciously needs to strive. Gülen advises disciples to be “so involved in worship or religious deeds in seeking God’s pleasure that one does not even remember whether one should be sincere or not” [9]. In other words, even the virtue of sincerity itself must not be allowed to become the final goal of religious observance. The only true objective in the performance of any good act is to serve and obey God and to thereby give God the pleasure and satisfaction that is due Him.

Only a humble person can act with true sincerity. As Gülen explains: “Humble people do not attribute fruits of work and efforts to themselves, nor do they regard their successes or efforts for God as making them superior to others. They do not care how others regard them; they do not demand a return for their services for God. They regard their being loved by others as a test of their sincerity, and do not exploit God’s favors to them by boasting” [10].

To arrive at a state of mind where one does not care whether one receives recognition for one’s good deeds, the disciple must engage in self-examination and self-supervision. Only the person who has learned to be honest with oneself will be able to know whether one’s motivation is solely to worship God or whether the true incentive that is being pursued is some worldly gain, such as self-satisfaction, human respect, or personal ambition. Thus, developing a habit of honest evaluation and reflection will enable a person to grow in purity of intention. Gülen calls this muraqaba (self-supervision), by which God’s servants are led “to maintain the purity of thoughts, actions, and intentions even when they are alone, in the consciousness of His continual observation” [11].

Communitarian dimensions of ikhlas

It is not only for the purposes of an individual’s spiritual growth that purity of intention is a key virtue among those who seek to do God’s will. Purity of intention also has communitarian effects. There is nothing that can more quickly disrupt the proper bonds of friendship among disciples than personal ambition, competition, and rivalry. When a disciple is in the habit of calling attention to his superior abilities or achievements in one or another area, or to boast about his relationship to his superiors, resentment and jealousy will inevitably arise among his confreres.

In his emphasis on sincerity as a key element in preserving the unity of the community, Gülen’s approach is very similar to that of Said Nursi, who repeatedly wrote of the necessity for sincerity to prevent disunity among the students of the Risale-i Nur. The history of many religious groups in various religions has shown repeatedly that jealousy and a sense of competition among members has been the cause of factionalism, resentment, and divisions into rival groups. It has produced a loss of dynamism and resulted in the break-up of many groups. It is only by the members carrying out their tasks with sincerity that this unhealthy rivalry can be avoided. In his long discursus on sincerity, Nursi envisioned a community in which “Each of the members completes the deficiencies of the others, veils their faults, assists their needs, and helps them out in their duties” [12]. If this type of relationship among fellow disciples is to be possible and the unity of the community is to be maintained, everyone must be sincerely striving solely to please God.

By contrast, the unity of heart and intention among those involved in the Hizmet cemaat can be traced in a large part to this emphasis on sincerity and purity of intention. It means that humble tasks – meeting guests at the airport, serving tea or coffee, feeding the poor in soup kitchens – have eternal value and ennoble the one performing them, if they are done wholly for the pleasure of God. A similar understanding underlies the readiness of intelligent, well-prepared university graduates to renounce prestigious and well-paying positions in academics or business to devote their lives to teaching students in distant and often impoverished regions. The emphasis on purity of intention has convinced industrialists, businessmen, and entrepreneurs to contribute generously to projects whose completion they will never see.

Since it is sincerity that enables God’s servants to keep focused on serving God alone, thus making their actions, great or small, acceptable to God, if Gülen has been able to instill a sense of harmony and united service (hizmet) among his followers, it is largely because of the emphasis he has put on ikhlas. He cites Mevlana to this effect: “You should be sincere in all your deeds, So that the Majestic Lord may accept them. Sincerity is the wing of the bird of the acts of obedience; without a wing, how can you fly to the abode of prosperity?” [13]

Notes

1. L. Gardet, Encyclopaedia of Islam, Leiden: 2006, III: 1059.
2. Risale-i Nur, The Twenty-first Flash, p. 216
3. Gülen, Key Concepts in the Practice of Sufism, 1999, p. 60.
4. Ibid. p. 62.
5. Gülen, Muhammad the Messenger of God, p. 39.
6. Gülen, Key Concepts in the Practice of Sufism, p. 60.
7. Gülen, Muhammad the Messenger of God, p. 38. Gülen’s citation of the Risale-i Nur is taken from “The First Word,” p. 5.
8. Fethullah Gülen, Toward a Global Civilization of Love and Tolerance, Somerset: The Light, 2004, p. 54.
9. M.F. Gülen, Key Concepts in the Practice of Sufism, 1999, p. 62.
10. M. F. Gülen, Toward a Global Civilization of Love and Tolerance, p. 80.
11. Gülen, Key Concepts in the Practice of Sufism, p. 57.
12. Said Nursi, Risale-i Nur, The Twenty-first Flash, p. 214.
13. Jalal al-Din Rumi, cited by M.F. Gülen, Key Concepts in the Practice of Sufism, I: 62.

Gülen as Spiritual Master

In recent years, much has been written about the thought of Fethullah Gülen and the activities of the “Gülen community” [1] from diverse perspectives. Some have focused on his pedagogical principles and methods in an effort to understand the success of the schools and other educational ventures founded and administered by those in the community associated with Gülen’s name. Others have analyzed the social programs and institutions inspired by his ideas. Still others have focused on Gülen’s vision as the philosophical motor behind a social movement that is working to produce social change and renewal in Turkey, in the worldwide Islamic umma, or in modern societies in general. Others have underlined Gülen’s call for universal love, fellowship, and tolerance and consequently his encouragement of interreligious dialogue as an essentially Islamic obligation.

In this paper, I will concentrate on the theological dimension of Gülen’s thought that underlies his role as spiritual director and teacher of internalized Islamic virtue. I will attempt to look at the specific understanding of Islamic faith that Gülen communicates to the young scholars and teachers, businessmen, and householders who make up the community formed by his vision. It is this theological perspective that guides Gülen’s role as spiritual master whose counsel has guided individual Muslims and formed a coherent and workable community life among his disciples. It may well prove in the long run to be the area of his deepest and most enduring influence.

Roots in Qur’an and Sunna

Every religious tradition, whether we are speaking of Islam, Christianity, Buddhism, or others, provides a wealth of doctrinal teaching, theological reflection, and spiritual experience so vast that it goes beyond what any individual believer, including the theologian, is able to integrate personally and hand on to others. Even the greatest scholar or mystic is able to assimilate, build upon, and communicate only a relatively small part of the whole tradition. This means that every religious teacher is constantly making choices, selecting some elements of the scriptural and communitarian tradition upon which to comment, elaborate, and emphasize while passing over other elements in silence.

Since no one can communicate the whole of tradition, an individual thinker’s choices reveal much about that person’s own theology and spirituality. In the case of Fethullah Gülen, it is not surprising that his most important model and teacher is the Prophet Muhammad himself.  His teaching is not so much natural philosophy as it is commentary on the Qur’an and hadith. Gülen’s “prophetology” holds that although it is possible to arrive at a certain limited knowledge of God by reason, particularly by means of reflection on nature, much of human existence can only be known through prophetic revelation. He writes,

“Although we can find God by reflecting upon natural phenomena, we need a Prophet to learn why we were created, where we came from, where we are going, and how to worship our Creator properly. God sent Prophets to teach their people the meaning of creation and the truth of things, to unveil the mysteries behind historical and natural events, and to inform us of our relationship, and that of Divine Scriptures, with the universe.” [2]

On this basis, it is not surprising that the vast majority of Gülen’s references are to the teaching of the Qur’an and his practical examples taken from the sunna of the Prophet. Gülen holds that the sunna (Prophet’s actions, words, and things he approved) was God’s gift to Muslims so that they would know how to live according to God’s will in a way pleasing to the Creator. “The sunna, the unique example set by the Messenger of God for all Muslims to follow, shows us how to bring our lives into agreement with God’s commands and obtain His good pleasure” [3]. Moreover, the sunna is the source for the humane qualities that Gülen as a spiritual guide wants to instill. Character traits such as tolerance, piety, forgiveness, and peacemaking are rooted in the divine teachings proclaimed by, and exemplified in, the life of the prophets, particularly Muhammad. For example, in speaking of tolerance, Gülen notes that the quality is not of human origin but is derived from prophetic teaching. “Tolerance is not something that was invented by us. Tolerance was first introduced on this earth by the prophets whose teacher was God” [4].

Forbearers in the Islamic tradition

The emphasis that Gülen places on the Qur’an and sunna underlines the “orthodox” nature of Gülen’s teaching and the community’s practice. Some observers of the movement have asked whether Gülen’s theology is to be located within the mainstream of Islamic doctrine. If it is true, as many scholars hold, that there is more than a single mainstream of Islamic theology and practice, into which current does Fethullah Gülen fit? This question can perhaps best be answered by looking at those Muslim scholars and pious forbearers with whom Gülen can be seen to identify himself.

Gülen’s writings are replete with references to the words of earlier Muslim scholars and mystics. He frequently cites those whom he calls “the lovers,” [5] that is, predecessors as Jalal al-Din Rumi, Yunus Emre, Ahmad Yasawi, and Said Nursi. All of these figures are more or less associated with the Sufi tradition. Rumi [6] and Yasawi were poets and founders of tariqas (spiritual orders), and Yunus Emre was a wandering folk poet not associated with any tariqa. Moreover, those ulama to whom Gülen refers, such as Ghazali, Junayd, and Shah Waliullah, are scholars who have close connections to the broader Sufi tradition. Even among those modern figures whom Gülen holds up as “heroes of thought and action” he includes Sufis and Sufi-oriented writers like Ahmet Hilmi, Ferid Kam, and Necip Fazıl Kısakürek [7].

Gülen’s theology can be located best in this broad “humanistic current” of Muslims who stress the interior dispositions to be fostered in the believer in response to the revealed Qur’anic message and in imitation of the prophetic example found in the sunna. In this interpretation of Islam, faith is “virtue-oriented”; these Muslims stress internal qualities such as sincerity, patience, peace, tolerance, forgiveness, compassion, respect for others, and acceptance of differences, and encourage humble lives characterized by deeds of goodness, love, and service.

This current, while closely related to the Sufi tradition, antedates Sufism as such and finds its origins in the pious, ascetic community of early Muslims centered in the Madina Mosque who came to be called the ahl al-suffa. These early scholars eschewed commercial and military pursuits and devoted their lives to studying and teaching the religious usul (sources). Rıfat Atay [8] sees Gülen as reviving the ancient tradition of the suffa in two ways, firstly by embodying in his own life four of the typical characteristics of the early phenomenon (single, simple, humble, and pious), and secondly, by carrying on a consistent pattern of spiritual and theological formation for a select number of dedicated students.

Gülen’s relationship to the Sufi tradition

The suffa movement can be seen as a “pre-Sufi phenomenon, a precursor of tendencies that later developed into Sufism. While the similarities of the modern “Gülen movement” with the early ahl al-suffa are undeniably strong, the question remains of Gülen’s relation to historical Sufism. Zeki Saritoprak has called Gülen “a Sufi in his own way” [9]. Employing a term coined by Fazlur Rahman, I have referred to Gülen, and to Said Nursi before him, as “neo-Sufis” [10]. Mustafa Gökçek notes that Gülen did not begin to write about Sufism until the 1990s, when he was over 50 years old [11]. His earlier sermons and writings focused mainly on basic elements of Islamic faith and moral prescriptions, although he often included examples from the lives of earlier Muslim mystics and ascetics. However, in 1990, Gülen began to include a brief insert in the magazine Sızıntı that in each monthly issue elaborated a different concept of Sufi terminology. These articles became the basis for Gülen’s masterwork, Key Concepts in the Practice of Sufism: Emerald Hills of the Heart, of which four volumes have now been published in English [12].

The twentieth-century scholar Said Nursi would seem to provide the closest model for Gülen’s personal relationship to Sufism. Nursi, while showing respect for the Sufi tradition and affirming many of their insights, always distinguished himself from the Sufis. Nursi distinguished his theological method from that of the Sufis by means of his praxis-oriented approach, what he called the “way of reality,” in which he abstained from contemplative speculation in favor of practical guidance for his disciples’ individual and communitarian lives. He states: “However, since our way is not the Sufi path but the way of reality, we are not compelled to perform this contemplation [of death] in an imaginary and hypothetical form like the Sufis” [13].

Like Said Nursi, Gülen belongs to no tariqa and follows no pir. He explicitly rejects the idea that he is trying to found some new type of Sufi Order. He describes his complex relationship to the Sufi tradition as follows: “I have stated innumerable times that I’m not a member of a religious order. As a religion, Islam naturally emphasizes the spiritual realm. It takes the training of the ego as a basic principle. Asceticism, piety, kindness and sincerity are essential to it. In the history of Islam, the discipline that dwelt most on these matters was Sufism. Opposing this would be opposing the essence of Islam. But I repeat, just as I never joined a Sufi order, I have never had any relationship to one” [14].

Common concerns with the Sufi masters

On the other hand, Gülen shares many concerns with the exponents of the Sufi tradition and praises Said Nursi for “pouring down on us all the wealth of our schools and Sufi lodges (takka, zaviya, maktab, madrasa)” [15]. Like the Sufis, and like Said Nursi before him, he places the primacy in Islam on love, which he regards not only as a gift of the Creator God, but as the bond that unites humanity and can overcome disunity. “God Almighty has not created a stronger relation than love, this chain that binds humans one to another” [16]. Gülen’s theological vision focuses on many of the same themes founding the writings of the Sufi Masters. He elaborates, in the context of the demands of the Islamic community today, such typical Sufi concepts as ikhlas (sincerity or purity of intention), ma’rifat (knowledge), sabr (patience), and taqwa (piety).

Where Gülen’s theological vision departs from that of the Sufis is his emphasis on communitarian dimension of selfless service. While he affirms the importance of solitude and retreat (halwat) to purify one’s spirit, [17] he rejects any spirituality that supports an individualistic mystical flight to union with God that characterizes much Sufi theory and practice. He is similarly disinterested in the kind of metaphysical speculation that preoccupied so many of the Sufis.

For Gülen, spirituality must always be oriented towards service of God and of others. He states: “Individual projects of enlightenment that are not planned to aid the community are doomed to fruitlessness… Just as plans and projects for individual salvation that are independent of the salvation of others are nothing more than an illusion, so too, the thought of achieving success as a whole by paralyzing the individual awakening is a fantasy” [18].

The emphasis that he places on communitarian service of humanity is a quality that distinguishes the community inspired by the thought of Fethullah Gülen both from that of the Sufi practitioners and from that of the Nur cemaat who follow more strictly the teaching of Said Nursi. For Nursi, transformations of Islamic societies, and eventually civil societies, will come about through the personal transformation of the individual Muslim achieved through the study of the Risale-i Nur, Nursi’s 6000-page commentary on the Qur’an. While members of Gülen’s community also study the Risale-i Nur, Gülen hopes to bring about societal transformation through the establishment of institutions (e.g., schools, media instruments, dialogue centers) to promote the desired transformation. For Gülen, the way to God is by serving others. He states: “This path passes through the inescapable dimension of servanthood to God by means of serving first of all our families, relatives, and neighbors, then our country and nation, and finally humanity and creation” [19]. The community commonly refers to its activities simply as “The Service” (Hizmet).

Among the common concerns that Gülen shares with proponents of the Sufi tradition like Mevlana Jalal al-Din Rumi is the importance of concepts dealing with the “interiorization” of religious practice. In particular, he focuses on two of these Qur’anic elements, which can be said to form the conceptual basis of Gülen’s theology. These are the notion of ikhlas, which may be translated “purity of intention” or “sincerity,” and that of ‘ibada (worship), with its related concepts of ‘ubudiyya (servanthood) and ‘ubada (devotion).

Because of their centrality to the thought of Fethullah Gülen and the extent to which they shape and characterize the motivation and attitudes of the community inspired by his ideas, ikhlas and ‘ibada can be said to be the cornerstones or pillars of Gülen’s theology. I have written about the topic of ikhlas elsewhere, [20] but because the concept is so basic to Gülen’s theological perspective and so essential for the unity of Hizmet cemaat, I will take up once again key points of the topic in the next issue.

Notes

1. Fethullah Gülen and those Muslims inspired by his thought dislike the terms “Gülen movement” and “Gülen community,” which imply that Gülen dictates and directs everything done by the community (cemaat in Turkish). They refer to the community’s activities as the Hizmet, “the Service.) However, since the former terms have entered both scholarly and popular usage, I will employ them in this paper.
2. Fethullah Gülen, “Prophethood and Muhammad’s Prophethood,” in Essentials of the Islamic Faith, Somerset, NJ: Tughra Books, 2009, p. 163. (Originally published as İnancın Gölgesinde, Nil Yayınları, 1961)
3. Fethullah Gülen, Muhammad the Messenger of God, Clifton, NJ: Tughra Books, 2010, p. 327.
4. Fethullah Gülen, Speech to Visiting Scholars, 13 January 1996. Reprinted in Toward a Global Civilization of Love and Tolerance, Somerset, NJ: The Light, p. 82.
5. , p. 163. Cf. my analysis of Gülen’s appropriation of these figures in “Fethullah Gülen: Following in the Footsteps of Rumi,” in Peaceful Coexistence: Fethullah Gülen’s Initiatives in the Contemporary World, London: Leeds Metropolitan University Press, 2007, pp. 183-191.
6. More than any other individual, Rumi seems to epitomize for Gülen the characteristics he seeks to form in modern Muslims. “They call everyone to their embrace and to the truth, like Mawlana Jalal al-Din Rumi, and they tolerate every improper behavior toward themselves.” M. Fethullah Gülen, Key Concepts in the Practice of Sufism: Emerald Hills of the Heart, Somerset: NJ: 2009, III: 270.
7. Fethullah Gülen, The Statue of Our Souls: Revival in Islamic Thought and Activism, Somerset, NJ: 2009, pp. 68-72.
8. Rıfat Atay, “Reviving the Suffa Tradition,” in Muslim World in Transition: Contribution of the Gülen Movement, London: Leeds Metropolitan U.P., 2007, pp. 459-472.
9. Zeki Saritoprak, “Fethullah Gülen: A Sufi in His Own Way,” Turkish Islam and the Secular State, Syracuse: Syracuse University Press, 2003, pp. 156-169.
10. Thomas Michel, “Der türkische Islam im Dialog mit der modernen Gesellschaft. Die neo-sufistische Spiritualität der Gülen-Bewegung,” Concilium, Dezember, 2005. See also, “Sufism and Modernity in the Thought of Fethullah Gülen,” The Muslim World, 95/3: 2005, pp. 341-353.
11. Mustafa Gökçek, “Fethullah Gülen and Sufism: a Historical Perspective,” Muslim Citizens of the Globalized World: Contributions of the Gülen Movement, pp. 183-193.
12. Fethullah Gülen, Key concepts in the Practice of Sufism: Emerald Hills of the Heart, Vols. I-IV, Somerset, NJ: Tughra Books, 2009-2010.
13. Said Nursi, Risale-i Nur, Twenty-first Flash, p. 217.
14. Fethullah Gülen, cited in Lynne Emily Webb, Fethullah Gülen: Is There More to Him than Meets the Eye?, Paterson, N.J.: Zinnur Book, n.d., p. 80.
15. Fethullah Gülen, The Statue of Our Souls: Revival in Islamic Thought and Activism, p. 77.
16. Fethullah Gülen, The Horizon, Istanbul: Nil, 2000, p. 34. Reprinted in Toward a Global Civilization of Love and Tolerance, p. 37.
17. Gülen, Key Concepts in the Practice of Sufism, III: 27.
18. Fethullah Gülen, The Horizon, Istanbul: Nil, 2000, p. 192. Reprinted in Toward a Global Civilization of Love and Tolerance, p. 62.
19. Fethullah Gülen, Essays – Perspectives – Opinions, Somerset NJ: The Light, 2002, p. 90.
20. I delivered a paper entitled “The Wing of the Bird: Gülen on Sincerity” at an academic congress on the thought of M.F. Gülen held in Potsdam, Germany, in May, 2009, and a revised version of the paper at a similar congress held in Munich, Germany in February, 2010. The paper has been published in German in CIBEDO Beiträge, (Frankfurt, 3/2009) as “Der Flügel des Vogels: Gülen über Aufrichtigkeit (Frankfurt, 3/2009), pp. 99-102.

Question: Oppression is everywhere and exists in almost every form. How should believers respond to oppression when they have to face it?

Oppression, at its most basic form, is a transgression of boundaries and a violation of others’ rights. Killing an ant is oppressive, for nobody is authorized to take an animal’s right to life unjustly. If it is human who is being unjustly treated then it is definitely a form of oppression of a much higher magnitude. As for the oppression committed against a collective group of people, that is an incomparably greater and more horrible misdeed.

Irrespective of its exact nature, believers are seriously warned not to oppress others. Otherwise, it will appear on the Day of Judgment as a manifold darkness that will suffocate and distress the one who oppresses (Bukhari, Mazalim 9; Muslim, Birr 56). Each act of oppression and injustice – be it against animals, people, or even God – will appear before that person as a separate trouble in the Afterlife.

Oppression, according to some insightful scholars, is among one of the obstacles that can prevent a person from embracing faith. While it is an obstruction to having belief in God, it is similarly a significant reason that causes believers to drift out of the realm of faith.

Preventing oppression

Given that oppression is evil to this degree in regard to how other people are treated, it definitely needs to be prevented. According to Prophet Muhammad, peace be upon him, everyone should try to prevent oppression depending upon their capability, power, and position be it by direct intervention or via verbal objection. In the event that a person cannot resist oppression physically or verbally, it is at least necessary to protest the oppressor in one’s heart (Sahih al-Muslim, Iman 78; Tirmidhi, fitan 11; Abu Dawud, salat 239). Likewise, it is a famous old adage that “(the) one who remains silent before oppression is a mute devil.”

Preventing oppression on a smaller scale is within the capability of individuals, but there are some forms of oppression that can only be prevented by the state. In this contemporary world when justice and democracy have wide – though not perfect – prevalence such oppressions are committed at degrees big enough that even states are not able to tackle them. Preventing those oppressions and successions of atrocities, by which people are swept away in floods of blood, families are shattered, children are orphaned, and spouses are widowed, can only be possible through the hands of certain international establishments and organizations. In this respect, those who remain silent before oppression while they have the power to stop it—be they individuals, a state, or an international establishment—in a way have a share in that oppression by turning a blind eye to it and not taking the preventive action that they could have, and they will be treated accordingly on the Day of Judgment.

As it is very important to take a stance against oppression and to prevent it, determining the correct strategy to follow while not making any mistakes with the method is no less important. People must reckon well from the beginning how they can prevent unfairness, be aware of their capabilities, and also must not exacerbate problems while attempting to prevent oppression. They must not commit evil by thinking that they are doing something good.

Nothing good can come from oppression

It is a gross delusion to think that one can reach any positive goal via oppression and injustice. While it is not possible to obtain any favorable outcome with oppression, it is not possible to reclaim one’s violated rights via oppression either. If people try to move themselves or their societies in a new direction, or try to reclaim the rights that they lost by means of oppression, then this will give way to new acts of oppression, violations of rights, and a shattered system of justice. If these demands are for rights to be upheld and for justice to prevail, then strict adherence to a righteous course is needed from beginning to end. Just as the end should be lawful, so should be the means and ways to that end.

We do not know exactly to what degree we can prevent any oppression and injustice in our time. What matters most is being on the path to setting things right and correcting previous misdeeds. The duties that befall the wayfarers of the righteous path are that they must always be representatives of what is right and truthful, open one’s heart to everyone, and also not respond to oppression and injustice committed in the same wrong way. To put this in the words of the Poet Nabi:

“Do not trouble anyone with oppression
Even if they did oppress you, you do not be unjust to them
Do not arrive at God’s door with complaints
As for those who oppressed you, leave them to the Divine.”

Be like Rumi

In many instances, we quote, with a little bit of boastful considerations, the names of masters such as Jalaluddin Rumi, Yunus Emre, Ahmad Yasawi, or Haji Baktash Wali and bring their tolerance to attention. It is easy to make mention of Rumi, but it is difficult to be like him. At a time when you make mention of Rumi, are you really able to open your arms for all people, even for those who insulted you? When they come upon you, do you seek ways to settle issues in a peaceful manner? Are you able to make those who bear hostility against you share the same peaceful considerations after a while? This is how you become a Rumi in the real sense.

Historians mention the following anecdote about the tolerance of Rumi: One day, a rude bigot accosted him and criticized his statements such as, “one of my feet is in the center of Islam, while the other is among all nations of the world.” He accused Rumi of apostasy, misguiding Muslims, and proceeded to let out an invective against him. Without ever interrupting the man, the venerable master listened to him peacefully with God-granted self-restraint. On seeing that the man stopped talking and had no other words to say, he asked if he was done. When the man replied in the affirmative, Rumi spoke with a soft voice and said, “You are most welcome; my heart is open for you too.”

This is the very point at which words cease. In such a situation, all of the negative feelings within the latter melted away. The grudge and hatred suddenly started pouring down in the form of fireworks of love. While it is possible to treat people with showers of light, why should we shower them with meteors instead?

If you are focused on representing the spirit of Rumi, even if those who show hostility towards you commit oppression and injustice against you for one, two, three, or four times, they will give up such acts after some time on account of not having the same kind of response from you. Now, while there is a way to settle issues with mildness and agreement, why should we engage in other behavior that will only spur ill-feelings and hatred?

One thing that needs to be kept in mind is that we can give up on our personal rights and forgive others for their unfair treatment of us. However, we do not have the authority to forgive on behalf of others when there is an offense against values like faith or country. When such an offense happens, we should make plausible explanations to offenders to show them what they are doing is wrong. If they still insist, we deny their claims with denouncements. If they still persist, then we sue them and claim compensation.

We must always act carefully to remain within the confines of laws and ethics, and we must never make concessions on our fairness when responding in these ways. It is paramount that we must always act humanely but assertively. Even while making certain clarifications, corrections, and denouncements, we always try to give positive messages to the other side and never make concessions from our own character. We voice what we are to say not with whisperings of Satan, but with the voice and breath of the Archangel Gabriel. Oppression and assaults only indicate the character of the offender. This situation should not avert people attached to faith and universal human values to act as becomes their own character.

Is it worth it?

This passing worldly life is neither worth committing oppression against others nor responding to their oppression in the same way. After all, each of us is a traveler in this world. After staying in this guesthouse that we call life, we will pass to the Afterlife in order to be brought to account for what we did here. Is it worth it to promote fighting? Is it worth it at all to cause disunity and dissension? Is it worth it at all to commit oppression and injustice?

In an anonymous saying, the simple and transient nature of the world is expressed as follows:

Behold with the eyes of wisdom, this world is but a guesthouse;
Not a single person remains settled, what a strange abode it is.
The share of a king and subject alike, is nothing but a plain shroud.
As for those who fall for it, what else can they be called but mad?

Humankind has oftentimes made use of oppression and hatred in order to solve the problems that we collectively faced. If only we could make use of love and tolerance from now on! If only we were able to open our hearts to everyone so that those who enter therein would never have worries of remaining without a seat. If only we would treat everyone with a deep feeling of respect and reverence, and if only we could read into other’s feelings, their cultural backgrounds, and treat everyone with a serious feeling of empathy! For whatever style of treatment we expect to receive from others, they similarly expect the same from us. If we expect respect, we must show respect. If we expect observance of our rights, we must observe everybody’s rights.

It is necessary to know that the problems in our time have taken a complicated form to such an extent that they cannot be tackled by those with narrow minds and dull thoughts. There is not much that those with radical thoughts, who act out of bigotry in order to pursue arrogant purposes, can do for the sake of conquering people’s hearts and bringing peace to humanity. Particularly with this harsh attitude of theirs, they can never evoke in hearts any love towards their own values. They cannot let others love the Pride of Humanity, peace and blessings be upon him, because they are too captivated by their own worldly, illicit desires.

Therefore, for the sake of solving the problems of humanity, there is a need for people with immense conscience, rich hearts, and profound thought. Just as Rumi brought people together anew with the plausible cures he came up with some 7-8 centuries ago, in the contemporary world when people are so detached from one another, when people cannot agree on anything, and relations are built upon conflict and hostility, the duty that falls to those with faithful hearts is to revive the spirit of Rumi once again. As far as this cannot be done, it will not be possible to put a stop to oppression and hostilities in different parts of the world. This is particularly the case if we consider to what degree world peace is under threat by ambitious tyrants and horrible weapons prepared with vengeful intentions. It will then be best understood how great the responsibility is of the altruistic souls who have dedicated their lives to love and tolerance.