Allah: An Omnipresent God

"Those who adore God in the sun behold the sun, and those who adore Him in living things see a living thing, and those who adore Him in lifeless things see a lifeless thing, and those who adore Him as a Being unique and unparalleled see that which has no like. Do not attach yourself to a particular creed exclusively so that you disbelieve in all the rest; otherwise you will lose much good; nay, you will fail to recognize the real truth of the matter. God, the omnipresent and omnipotent, is not limited by any one creed. Wheresoever you turn, there is the face of Allah."

-- Ibn 'Arabi --
("Essential Sufism," pp. 228-229)

The beauty of Sufism, the mystical branch of Islam, and of which Ibn 'Arabi is an undisputed master, is its inclusiveness. Indeed, there are those Sufis who do not recognize Sufism as being, strictly speaking, a Muslim school. (In the attached video Sufi teacher, Irena Tweedie, for example, notes that Sufism predates Islam.)

There is, thus, a wide, almost-pantheistic inclusiveness within Sufism's rich multi-cultural tradition, an inclusiveness which no doubt arises from the all embracing notion of what Allah is. Ibn 'Arabi's observation, above ("Wheresoever you turn, there is the face of Allah.") is, in fact, itself a direct quote from the Koran.

Certainly the great Sufi teachers of the past have recognized the omnipresent, inneffable nature of the Divine, an omnipresence that is inherent irrespective of one's faith. As the great Sufi poet, Rumi observed:

Not Christian or Jew or Muslim, not Hindu,
Buddhist, sufi or zen. Not any religion

or cultural system. I am not from the East
or the West, not out of the ocean or up

from the ground, not natural or ethereal, not
composed of any elements at all. I do not exist,

am not an entity in this world or the next,
did not descend from Adam and Eve or any

origin story. My place is placeless, a trace
of the traceless. Neither body or soul.

I belong to the beloved, have seen the two
worlds as one, and that one call to and know,

first last, outer, inner, only that
breath breathing human being.

                        <<<->>>

There is a way between voice and presence
where information flows.

In disciplined silence it opens.
With wandering talk it closes.

[Coleman Barks, "The Essential Rumi," p. 32.]

The "Journey From God"

"We all come from God, but when we are born into this world we forget. We forget from where we have come and that we are children of light. We take on the clothing of this world, leaving behind,"the clouds of glory' of our true Home. The Sufi calls this the "journey from God," a journey of forgetfulness in which we leave Paradise behind. But there are those who never quite forget, who keep a distant memory buried deep within them. As a result this world never quite seems like home; there is often a sense of not quite belonging, not fitting in. Mystics are strangers in this world, just because they remember their real home."

-- LLewellyn Vaughan-Lee --
("Love Is a Fire: The Sufi's Mystical Journey Home")

 In his Intimations of Immortality from Recollections of Early Childhood, Wordsworth enters the sublime, echoing the teachings of the Sufi, with his intimations of the transmigration of the soul and his explicit recognition of  a universal "home" in the Godhead.

William Wordsworth

“ … Our birth is but a sleep and a forgetting
The soul that rises with us, our life’s Star,
Hath had elsewhere its setting,
And cometh from afar.
Not in entire forgetfulness,
And not in utter nakedness,
But trailing clouds of glory do we come,
From God who is our home. ”

(William Wordsworth, from his poem, "Intimations of Immortality from Recollections of Early Childhood.")

* * * * * * * * * * * * * 

* * * * * * * * * * * * *

ONLY BREATH

Not Christian or Jew or Muslim, not Hindu,
Buddhist, sufi or zen. Not any religion

or cultural system. I am not from the East
or the West, not out of the ocean or up

From the Ground, nor natural or ethereal, not
composed of elements at all. I do not exist,

am not an enemy in this world or the next,
did not descend from Adam or Eve or any

origin story. My place is pathless, a trace
of the traceless. Neither body or soul.

I belong to the beloved, have seen the two
worlds as one and that one call to and know,

first, last, outer, inner, only that
breath, breathing human being.

    << >>                                            

There is a way between voice and presence
where information flows.

In disciplined silence it opens.
With wandering talk it closes.

[Coleman Barks, "The Essential Rumi," p. 34.]

The Wisdom of a Fool

"To be wise, you must become a fool," is an adage that runs as a substratum through many of the world's great wisdom traditions. In the Islamic tradition, we read the many stories of the seemingly foolish Sufi master, Mullah Nasruddin, and (perhaps) gain great knowledge and insight through his simplicity.

"The Nasruddin stories, known throughout the Middle East, constitute one of the strangest achievements in the history of metaphysics. Superficially, most of the Nasruddin stories may be used as jokes. They are told and retold endlessly in the teahouses and caravanserais, in the homes and on the radio waves, of Asia. But it is inherent in the Nasruddin story that it may be understood at any of many depths. There is the joke, the moral - and the little extra which brings the consciousness of the potential mystic a little further on the way to realization." [Source: www.sysindia.com]

For example:

One day an illiterate man came to Mullah Nasruddin with a letter he had received. "Mullah Nasruddin, please read this letter to me," he asked. Mullah Nasruddin looked at the letter, but could not make out a single word. So he told the ma, "I am sorry, but I cannot read this." The man cried: "For shame, Mullah Nasruddin ! You must be ashamed before the turban you wear (i.e. the sign of education)" Mullah Nasruddin removed the turban from his own head and placed it on the head of the illiterate man, saying: "There, now you wear the turban. If it gives some knowledge, read the letter yourself!"

Or, again:

Mullah Narsuddin was riding his donkey, as always, facing backwards. "Hey, Mullah!," a man called out, "That is the wrong way!" "Enough of this, already!," Narsuddin called back. "The donkey says it wants to go that way. I said I want to go this way. I am letting it go its way, and I am headed in the direction I want to go. Why pick a fight? Why do you object?"

. . . . . . . . . . . . .

"Anyone who thinks himself intelligent because of his scholarly or scientific learning," wrote St. Symeon the New Theologian (one of the most revered of Orthodox Christian saints), "will never be granted insight into divine mysteries unless he first humbles himself and becomes a fool, discarding both his presumption and the knowledge that he has acquired. But if he does this and with unhesitating faith allows himself to be led by those wise in divine matters, he will enter with them into the city of the living God. Guided and illumined by the divine Spirit, he will see and learn what others cannot ever see or learn. He will then be taught by God."

[The Philokalia, Vol. Four, pp. 46-47.]