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In the House of Remembering: The Living Tradition of Sufi Teaching

Kabir Helminski

Top 10 Best Quotes

“Coherence comes from a deep center, which is the heart. Ultimately it‘s the heart of the human being connected to Infinite Spirit. When the self is connected to the heart, and the heart is connected to God, you have coherence. It‘s really that simple. The practice we call „the remembrance of God“ is the channel to that coherence. (p. 14)”

“Worship is taking time from the momentum of our lives to stop and stand before the Face of God for a few minutes. The prostrations in the ritual prayer that are the regular practice of the Islamic tradition, and which Sufis also do, include four to eight cycles of standing, bowing, and prostrating. At most, the ritual prayer takes between five and ten minutes. It‘s a deep and mindful encounter with the Infinite Face of God, not performing a ritual with rote recitations. In fact, the Prophet Muhammad, peace be upon him, said, „If your ritual prayer is not done with presence, it‘s not worship.“ Presence is absolutely essential to the ritual prayer. The whole normative practice of Islam, its basic practices and rituals, are a spiritual training system when properly understood […] One of our friends, a great Sufi teacher, recently said, „Everything is in the prostration.“ When our foreheads touch the ground we enter into that Divine Oblivion. It is oblivion, in the sense that we are so present with the Divine that everything else just disappears. We‘re completely there in the consciousness of the Divine, forehead to the ground, for that moment. It‘s a kind of bliss. (p. 103)”

“Whatever any moment may bring, there is that unconditioned Reality, the Infinitely Compassionate, ar-Rahman, the Infinitely Merciful, the ar-Raheem. (p. 10)”

“To invite God into a conversation is to open the door of mystery and possibility. It is not about an exchange between two people, with the thought of „I‘ll do this for you, maybe someday you‘ll do it for me.“ It has nothing to do with expectation. It‘s not a quid pro quo. It‘s something entirely of a different order and unpredictable. (p. 3)”

“There's a transformative power that exists in the nature of Reality. There is something that can almost miraculously transform human beings. We need that. (p. 3)”

“There is no true justice without mercy. Mercy precedes everything, and it is why we are here. Mercy created us and is what is being revealed. The dervish dispenses, communicates, and shares that mercy. Sometimes wrath may be mixed in, but it is always in the service of mercy. God said to the Prophet, „We sent you only as a mercy to the Worlds.“ The dervish is one who is merciful. In Konya, over the entryway to the dergah where Mevlana (Rumi) is buried, is an inscription which says, „This is the Kaaba of the Lovers. Those who entered here became complete.“ The dervish walks the Path of completion. A Sufi has complete integration with life while remembering God with every breath. The great majority of Sufis have lived a family life, held a job, and contributed to society, while reaching extraordinary attainments of integrating the finite and the Infinite. They lived in a state of wahdat. (p. 76)”

“The word for paradise is actually „garden“ or jannah in Arabic. Paradise is not just something that comes after this earthly life. The Qur‘an says, The Garden will be brought near to all those who are in a state of Godconsciousness (Surah ash-Shu‘ara 26:90). To all those who deepen in their remembrance, deepen in presence, The Garden will be brought near. (p. 101)”

“The messenger of God, peace be upon him, said, „If anyone travels a path in search of knowledge, God will conduct him through one of the paths of paradise. The angels will lower their wings, delighted with the one who seeks knowledge. And the inhabitants of the heavens and the earth, and the fish in the depths of the water will seek forgiveness for him. The higher station of the gnostic over the worshipper is like the position of the full moon among the stars.“ The hadith is not talking about the sect of Gnostics, but rather the knowers of God. The knowers of God are the heirs of the Prophet. (p. 90)”

“The eye of wahdat looks out at the world with no judgments. Sufis in a state of wahdat look outwards and have no complaints against God. They see the perfection of everything as it is. It does not mean they see saint and sinner as well as justice and injustice as equal. They see the differences and contradictions, but also see their perfection and usefulness in the beautiful state of wahdat. If there is an injustice, the dervish will try to make it right while still seeing the perfection of the Oneness. (p. 75)”

“The Prophet Muhammad said, „Die before you die.“ We are being told to know the after-death state now, while we are alive. The mystics say that just as the embryo fears being born from the womb into this world, we fear our next birth. We fear being born from the womb of this material existence. The embryo can‘t imagine there is anything better than the warmth, comfort, and easy life it experiences in the womb. When it uncomfortably emerges into the expanded world outside the womb, it finds beautiful colors, fragrances, sensory experiences, and relationships. As human beings, we may similarly fear emerging into the expansive world that is beyond the boundaries of our egoistic existence. It‘s a goal of this spiritual path to be living in two worlds at once. By doing so, we can bring heaven to earth. (p. 33)”

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Book Keywords:

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