Sufism in a Changing World

DERVISH ASSEMBLY IN THE WEST

Selim Brook-White

... What is this form of Sufism, and why does it attract the people of the West?

 In the first place, the Western or technological mind places

much importance upon work and the linking of the body and the mind. Sufism of the Naqshbandi branch stresses the fact that, if it has any meaning at all, mystical experience must improve the individual. It must make him a better man. The "Perfected Man" (Insan-i-Kamil) is the man who is in the world but not of it. He does not have to grow mattered hair and live in a cave. His perceptions, his value to the community have been improved. And he has found an answer to the nagging unfulfilment which is the curse of humanity.

In the West generally, the Naqshbandi principles have been adopted

under the general term of the "Tariqa" (The Path). The Sufis are

organised in Halqas (Circles) under a teacher, and the Halqas are combined

in the complete organisation, the Tariqa. The striking thing about the

Western members of the Tariqa is that among them you will not find

the long-haired semi-intellectual, the neurotic who joins every new

"craze" the weakling who seeks guidance. They are straightforward,

active, interesting people.

Sufism means to the Westerner in the earlier stages that he is

practising something which has brought obvious benifits to others.

He can see in the company of Sufis to which he is attached something

which he would like to participate in. This is the first principle : that a

man wants to become a Sufi because he likes those whom he knows,

and that he believes that they are the best advertisement for the goods

which they are purveying.

Secondly, again in the early stages, he finds that there are undeniable

benefits in the exercises (Wazifa) which he is expected to carry out.

He can actually feel the benefit of the mental and physical exercises,

working upon himself. Sufism is not offering him some undefined and

vaguely hinted at eventual satisfaction.

Thirdly, when he has actually tasted the effects of Sufism upon

himself, he enters into an understanding of the basis of Sufism. How

did it develop? Upon what is it based? How can he enter the wider

field which lies within the mysticism on whose periphery he now stands? He may be introduced to the works of AI-Ghazzali and to the Mashaf and Sunnat, in order to make it clear to him that here is the root of the teaching.

Thus Sufism in its practical expression in the West cuts right across

the mental dilemma in which modern man finds himself. It shuns the

sensation-seekers, for they congregate around the charlatans and the

miracle-mongers who run societies for commercial purposes. There are

isolated and static so-called Sufi cults in the West, it is true, modelled

upon the occult societies which are known to provide a good living for

the Guru if he can only keep his disciples in a state of mystification.

Some of these pantheistic societies try to show that Sufism is nothing

but a teaching designed to unite all religions and they study all the holy

books of all time. But the Tariqa Sufis ignore these material aims,

and concentrate upon leading people to Sufism through personal

experience of happiness and fulfilment.

But how, you may ask, can a sceptical Westerner stomach the

practice of something which he cannot understand with his intellect?

In the first place, it is nowadays more easily explained than even before

that the intellect arrives at nothing final enough. This is admitted

by all Western thinkers. Secondly-and this is vital-you merely say

to your candidate that, providing that he practises the preliminary

exercises which he is given, he will have clear proof that he is on the

"right Path". And this is the amazing thing about Sufism. There is

something which is known as "Barakat"; the power which, when contacted,

will give the man more than the insight which he needs to know

that he is at last on the way to fulfilment.

Sufism is neither a Western nor an Oriental cult. It is an eternal

one. It has produced some of the world's greatest literature, some of

the East's greatest thinkers and sages, as well as giving a stiffening to

the moral and material progress of man.

I recently had the honour to attend a meeting of thirty-one Halqa delegates from Europe, addressed by the Tariqa Grand Sheikh Idries Shah Saheb, who is of course a lineal descendant of the Prophet (Peace

and blessings of Allah upon him!) and an Afghan nobleman as well as being the grandson of H. H. of Sardhana. It was here that every single speaker gave the Kalima and stressed that the Tariqa was leading people to the truth through the methods of truth, and not through propaganda or intellectual sophistries.

There is no doubt that this work of the Tariqa will grow and will produce individuals who will carry on the work which provides humanity with the link which is needed in a materialistic world to the ultimate Truth as we already know it.

"Copyright © 1961 Sufism in a Changing World.