|
Main Index
|
| |
| | | Book Name: Sufis - The People of the Path, Vol 2 | Previous Next | |
|
|
|
| |
one who has started seeking for God and the ultimate truth cannot afford them. You have a certain quality and certain quantity of energy. The whole energy has to be put into one desire. All the desires have to become one desire, only then can God be attained, only then can you surpass this third valley.
Ordinarily we have many desires. the religious person is one who has only one desire, whose all other desires have fallen into one big desire -- just as small rivers, small streams, small tributaries fall and become the big Ganges -- like that. A religious person is one whose all other desires have become one desire: he desires only God, he desires only transcendence.
So the first is the tempting world; the second is people -- attachments to people.
Sufis are again, remember, not against people, but they say that one should not become attached to people. Otherwise that very attachment will become a hindrance, a stumbling block to God. Be with your woman and be with your man, be with your children, be with your friends, but remember that we are all strangers here and our togetherness is just accidental. We are travellers, we have met on the road. For a few days maybe we will be together -- feel thankful for that -- but sooner or later, ways part. Your wife dies, she goes on her own way, and you will never know where. Or, your wife falls in love with somebody else, and your ways part. Or you fall in love with somebody else. Or your son becomes grown-up and he takes his life into his own hands and moves away from you -- every son has to move away from the parents.
We are together on this road for only a few days an(:l our being together is just accidental. It is not going to be forever. So be with people, be lovingly with people, be compassionately with people, but don't become attached -- otherwise your attachment will not allow you freedom enough to go beyond.
So the second is people, attachments. The third Al-Ghazzali calls Satan, and the fourth, the ego.
By Satan the mind is meant -- the mind that you have accumulated in the past. Although conscience has arisen, although you have become more conscious than ever, the mechanism
|
|
|
|
| |