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Let's ask Allah to help us to self-control:
for one who lacks it, lacks His Grace.
The undisciplined person doesn't wrong himself alone—
but sets fire to the whole world.
Discipline enabled Heaven to be filled with light;
discipline enabled the angels to be immaculate and holy.
The peacock's plumage is his enemy.
The world is the mountain,
and each action, the shout that echoes back.
This discipline and rough treatment are a furnace
to extract the silver from the dross
The spiritual path wrecks the body
and afterwards restores it to health.
Anger and lust make a man squint;
When self-interest appears, virtue hides:
Fortunate is he who does not carry envy as a companion.
If ten lamps are present in one place,
each differs in form from another;
yet you can't distinguish whose radiance is whose
when you focus on the light.
In the field of spirit there is no division;
no individuals exist.
The idol of your self is the mother of all idols.
To regard the self as easy to subdue is a mistake.
If you wish mercy, show mercy to the weak.
The stoppered jar, though in rough water,
floated because of its empty heart.
When the wind of poverty is in anyone,
she floats in peace on the waters of this world.
As long as desires are fresh, faith is not;
for it is these desires that lock that gate.
The tongue of mutual understanding is quite special:
to be one of heart is better than to have a common tongue.
If you dig a pit for others to fall into,
you will fall into it yourself.
Many of the faults you see in others, dear reader,
are your own nature reflected in them.
With will, fire becomes sweet water.
The lion who breaks the enemy's ranks
is a minor hero
compared to the lion who overcomes himself.
O son, only those whose spiritual eye has been opened
know how compulsive we are.
Whoever gives reverence receives reverence.
The intellectual quest,
though fine as pearl or coral,
is not the spiritual search.
The intelligent desire self-control;
children want candy.
Since in order to speak, one must first listen,
learn to speak by listening.
When, with just a taste, envy and deceit arise,
and ignorance and forgetfulness are born,
know you have tasted the unlawful.
Know that a word suddenly shot from the tongue
is like an arrow shot from the bow.
O tongue, you are an endless treasure.
O tongue, you are also an endless disease.
I am burning.
If any one lacks tinder,
let him set his rubbish ablaze with my fire.
Although your desire tastes sweet,
doesn't the Beloved desire you
to be desireless?
The world's flattery and hypocrisy is a sweet morsel:
eat less of it, for it is full of fire.
Forgetfulness of Allah, beloved,
is the support of this world;
spiritual intelligence its ruin.
For Intelligence belongs to that other world,
and when it prevails, this material world is overthrown.
Were there no men of vision,
all who are blind would be dead.
All these griefs within our hearts
arise from the smoke and dust
of our existence and vain desires.
Whoever lives sweetly dies painfully:
whoever serves his body doesn't nourish his soul.
Your thinking is like a camel driver,
and you are the camel:
it drives you in every direction under its bitter control.
If you are wholly perplexed and in straits,
have patience, for patience is the key to joy.
Fast from thoughts, fast:
thoughts are like the lion and the wild ass;
men's hearts are the thickets they haunt.
If you are irritated by every rub,
how will your mirror be polished?
Anyone in whom the troublemaking self has died,
sun and cloud obey.
If you wish to shine like day,
burn up the night of self-existence.
Dissolve in the Being who is everything.
There is no worse sickness for the soul,
O you who are proud, than this pretense of perfection.
The heart and eyes must bleed a lot
before self-complacency falls away.
Can the water of a polluted stream
clear out the dung?
Can human knowledge sweep away
the ignorance of the sensual self?
How does a sword fashion its own hilt?
Go, entrust the cure of this wound to a surgeon,
Many are the unbelievers who long for submission,
but their stumbling block
is reputation and pride and continual desires.
I'm the devoted slave
of anyone who doesn't claim
to have attained dining with Allah
at every way station.
Everyone is a child
except the one who's intoxicated with Allah.
Allah has said, Knowledge that isn't from Him is a burden.
like a woman's makeup, it doesn't last.
Be cleansed of the (false) self's features, and see your pure Self:
Know the mirror of the heart is infinite.
Either the understanding falls silent, or it leads you astray,
because the heart is Allah,
or indeed the heart is He.
Everything, except love of the Most Beautiful,
is really agony. It's agony
to move towards death and not drink the water of life.
Fiery lust is not diminished by indulging it,
but inevitably by leaving it ungratified.
Anger is a king over kings,
but anger once bridled may serve.
for one who lacks it, lacks His Grace.
The undisciplined person doesn't wrong himself alone—
but sets fire to the whole world.
Discipline enabled Heaven to be filled with light;
discipline enabled the angels to be immaculate and holy.
The peacock's plumage is his enemy.
The world is the mountain,
and each action, the shout that echoes back.
This discipline and rough treatment are a furnace
to extract the silver from the dross
The spiritual path wrecks the body
and afterwards restores it to health.
Anger and lust make a man squint;
When self-interest appears, virtue hides:
Fortunate is he who does not carry envy as a companion.
If ten lamps are present in one place,
each differs in form from another;
yet you can't distinguish whose radiance is whose
when you focus on the light.
In the field of spirit there is no division;
no individuals exist.
The idol of your self is the mother of all idols.
To regard the self as easy to subdue is a mistake.
If you wish mercy, show mercy to the weak.
The stoppered jar, though in rough water,
floated because of its empty heart.
When the wind of poverty is in anyone,
she floats in peace on the waters of this world.
As long as desires are fresh, faith is not;
for it is these desires that lock that gate.
The tongue of mutual understanding is quite special:
to be one of heart is better than to have a common tongue.
If you dig a pit for others to fall into,
you will fall into it yourself.
Many of the faults you see in others, dear reader,
are your own nature reflected in them.
With will, fire becomes sweet water.
The lion who breaks the enemy's ranks
is a minor hero
compared to the lion who overcomes himself.
O son, only those whose spiritual eye has been opened
know how compulsive we are.
Whoever gives reverence receives reverence.
The intellectual quest,
though fine as pearl or coral,
is not the spiritual search.
The intelligent desire self-control;
children want candy.
Since in order to speak, one must first listen,
learn to speak by listening.
When, with just a taste, envy and deceit arise,
and ignorance and forgetfulness are born,
know you have tasted the unlawful.
Know that a word suddenly shot from the tongue
is like an arrow shot from the bow.
O tongue, you are an endless treasure.
O tongue, you are also an endless disease.
I am burning.
If any one lacks tinder,
let him set his rubbish ablaze with my fire.
Although your desire tastes sweet,
doesn't the Beloved desire you
to be desireless?
The world's flattery and hypocrisy is a sweet morsel:
eat less of it, for it is full of fire.
Forgetfulness of Allah, beloved,
is the support of this world;
spiritual intelligence its ruin.
For Intelligence belongs to that other world,
and when it prevails, this material world is overthrown.
Were there no men of vision,
all who are blind would be dead.
All these griefs within our hearts
arise from the smoke and dust
of our existence and vain desires.
Whoever lives sweetly dies painfully:
whoever serves his body doesn't nourish his soul.
Your thinking is like a camel driver,
and you are the camel:
it drives you in every direction under its bitter control.
If you are wholly perplexed and in straits,
have patience, for patience is the key to joy.
Fast from thoughts, fast:
thoughts are like the lion and the wild ass;
men's hearts are the thickets they haunt.
If you are irritated by every rub,
how will your mirror be polished?
Anyone in whom the troublemaking self has died,
sun and cloud obey.
If you wish to shine like day,
burn up the night of self-existence.
Dissolve in the Being who is everything.
There is no worse sickness for the soul,
O you who are proud, than this pretense of perfection.
The heart and eyes must bleed a lot
before self-complacency falls away.
Can the water of a polluted stream
clear out the dung?
Can human knowledge sweep away
the ignorance of the sensual self?
How does a sword fashion its own hilt?
Go, entrust the cure of this wound to a surgeon,
Many are the unbelievers who long for submission,
but their stumbling block
is reputation and pride and continual desires.
I'm the devoted slave
of anyone who doesn't claim
to have attained dining with Allah
at every way station.
Everyone is a child
except the one who's intoxicated with Allah.
Allah has said, Knowledge that isn't from Him is a burden.
like a woman's makeup, it doesn't last.
Be cleansed of the (false) self's features, and see your pure Self:
Know the mirror of the heart is infinite.
Either the understanding falls silent, or it leads you astray,
because the heart is Allah,
or indeed the heart is He.
Everything, except love of the Most Beautiful,
is really agony. It's agony
to move towards death and not drink the water of life.
Fiery lust is not diminished by indulging it,
but inevitably by leaving it ungratified.
Anger is a king over kings,
but anger once bridled may serve.
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Re: Rumi on the Nafs
Sun, October 7, 2007 - 5:37 AMPardon my ignorance, what are the Nafs? -
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Unsu...
Re: Rumi on the Nafs
Sun, October 7, 2007 - 9:57 AM
Nafs is an Arabic word meaning self. In Sufi teachings, it means more of false ego.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nafs
GHAZALI ON JIHAD AL-NAFS [FIGHTING THE EGO]
www.sunnah.org/tasawwuf/jihad002.html
Translated from the following parts of 'Ihya' `Ulum al-Din' [The Revival of the Religious Sciences]:
a)Definitions at the beginning of the book "Kitab sharh `aja'ib al-qalb" [Book of the Explanation of the Mysteries of the Heart]
b)Section entitled: "The Soldiers of the Heart" in the same book
c)Section entitled: "Shaytan's domination over the heart through whispering [al-waswas]" in the same book
d)Section entitled: "Proofs..." from the book "Kitab riadat al-nafs wa tahdhib al-akhlaq wa mu`alajat amrad al-qalb" [Book of the training of the ego and the disciplining of manners and the healing of the heart's diseases]
a) Meaning of nafs: It has two meanings. First, it means the powers of anger and sexual appetite in a human being... and this is the usage mostly found among the people of tasawwuf [sufis], who take "nafs" as the comprehensive word for all the evil attributes of a person. That is why they say: one must certainly do battle with the ego and break it (la budda min mujahadat al-nafs wa kasriha), as is referred to in the hadith: A`da `aduwwuka nafsuka al-lati bayna janibayk [Your worst enemy is your nafs which lies between your flanks. Al-`Iraqi says it is in Bayhaqi on the authority of Ibn `Abbas and its chain of transmission contains Muhammad ibn Abd al-Rahman ibn Ghazwan, one of the forgers].
The second meaning of nafs is the soul, the human being in reality, his self and his person. However, it is described differently according to its different states. If it assumes calmness under command and has removed from itself the disturbance caused by the onslaught of passion, it is called "the satisfied soul" (al-nafs al-mutma'inna)... In its first meaning the nafs does not envisage its return to God because it has kept itself far from Him: such a nafs is from the party of shaytan. However, when it does not achieve calmness, yet sets itself against the love of passions and objects to it, it is called "the self-accusing soul" (al-nafs al-lawwama), because it rebukes its owner for his neglect in the worship of his master... If it gives up all protest and surrenders itself in total obedience to the call of passions and shaytan, it is named "the soul that enjoins evil" (al-nafs al-ammara bi al-su')... which could be taken to refer to the ego in its first meaning.
b) God has armed soldiers which He has placed in the hearts and the souls and others of His worlds, and none knows their true nature and actual number except He... [He proceeds to explain that the limbs of the body, the five senses, will, instinct, and the emotive and intellective powers are among those soldiers.] Know that the two soldiers of anger and sexual passion can be guided by the heart completely... or on the other hand disobey and rebel against it completely, until they enslave it. Therein lies the death of the heart and the termination of its journey towards eternal happiness. The heart has other soldiers: knowledge (`ilm), wisdom (hikma) and reflection (tafakkur) whose help it seeks by right, for they are the Party of God against the other two who belong to the party of shaytan...
God says: "Have you seen the one who chooseth for his god his own lust?" (25:43) and "He followed his own lust. Therefor his likeness is as the likeness of a dog; if thou attackest him he panteth with his tongue out, and if thou leavest him he panteth with his tongue out" (7:176) and about the person who controlled the passion of his ego God says: "But as for him who feared to stand before his Lord and restrained his soul from lust, Lo! The garden will be his home" (79:40-41).
Know that the body is like a town and the intellect of the mature human being is like a king ruling that town. All the forces of the external and internal senses he can muster are like his soldiers and his aides. The ego that enjoins evil (nafs ammara), that is, lust and anger, is like an enemy that challenges him in his kingdom and strives to slaughter his people. The body thus becomes like a garrison-town or sea-outpost, and the soul like its custodian posted in it. If he fights against his enemies and defeats them and compels them to do what he likes, he will be praised when he returns to God's presence, as God said: "Those who strive in the way of Allah with their wealth and lives. Allah hath conferred on those who strive with their wealth and lives a rank above the sedentary" (4:95).
c) The thoughts that stir one's desire are of two kinds... praiseworthy, and that is called "inspiration" (ilham), and blameworthy, and that is called "whispering" (waswasa)... The heart is owned mutually by a shaytan and an angel... The angel stands for a creature which God has created for the overflowing of benefit, the bestowal of knowledge, the unveiling of truth, the promise of reward, and the ordering of the good... The shaytan stands for a creature whose business is to be against all this... Waswasa against ilham, shaytan against angel, success (tawfiq) against disappointment (khidhlan).
The Prophet (s) said: "There are two impulses in the soul, one from an angel which calls towards good and confirms truth; whoever finds this let him know it is from God and praise Him. Another impulse comes from the enemy which leads to doubt and denies truth and forbids good; whoever finds this, let him seek refuge in God from the accursed devil." Then he recited the verse: "The devil shows you fear of poverty and enjoins evil upon you" (2:268) [Tirmidhi: hasan; Nisa'i; `Iraqi did not weaken it].
Hasan al-Basri said: "Two thoughts roam over the soul, one from God, one from the enemy. God shows mercy on a servant who settles at the thought that comes from Him. He embraces the thought that comes from God, while he fights against the one from his enemy. To illustrate the heart's mutual attraction between these two powers the Prophet (s) said: "The heart of a believer lies between two fingers of the Merciful" [Muslim, Ahmad, Tirmidhi, Ibn Majah]... The fingers stand for upheaval and hesitation in the heart... If man follows the dictates of anger and appetite, the dominion of shaytan appears in him through idle passions [hawa] and his heart becomes the nesting-place and container of shaytan, who feeds on hawa. If he does battle with his passions and does not let them dominate his nafs, imitating in this the character of the angels, at that time his heart becomes the resting-place of angels and they alight upon it...
The Prophet (s) said: "There is none among you in whom there is not a devil" They said: "Even in you, O Messenger of God?!" He said: "Even in me, but God helped me to overcome him and he has submitted to me, so he doesn't order anything except good" [Muslim]... The mutual repelling of the soldiers of the angels and the devils is constant in the battle over the heart, until the heart is conquered by one of the two sides which sets up its nation and settles there... And most hearts have been seized by the soldiers of shaytan, who fill them with the whispers that call one to love this passing world and disregard the next.
d) The Prophet (s) said: al-mujahidu man jahada nafsahu fi ta`at Allah `azza wa jall [The fighter against unbelief is he who fights against his ego in obeying God; Tirmidhi, Ibn Majah, Ibn Hibban, Tabarani, Hakim, etc.]... Sufyan al-Thawri said: "I never dealt with anything stronger against me than my own ego; it was one time with me, and one time against me"... Yahya ibn Mu`adh al-Razi said: "Fight against your ego with the four swords of training: eat little, sleep little, speak little, and be patient when people harm you... Then the ego will walk the paths of obedience, like a fleeing horseman in the field of battle."
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Unsu...
Re: Rumi on the Nafs
Tue, October 9, 2007 - 7:33 AMIt literally means breath. In Turkey, when you enter a town, there is often a sign that says "12,000 Nufus" - 12,000
breaths' or 'souls', meaning the population is 12,000 (or whatever).
The Sufis say that existence came about because the Divine 'Himselfness' (Arabic: Huwiyyah, often translated as 'Ipseity' in scholarly works) breathed the Breath of Compassion, Nafs ar-Rahman, on the possibilities (Arabic: ayan-i-thabitah) that were latent in Himself.
Be that as it may, the human soul is referred to in the Qur'an and elsewhere as a breath, nafs. (Interestingly, the word for spirit - ruh - also means 'wind'). God moulds Adam with his two 'hands' and breathes into him His Spirit. And that part of us that is not moulded 'clay' (our materiality) is the nafs, the breath, our soul.
According to some Sufi sources, there are seven gradations of the human nafs, ranging from the habitual, unreconstructed self of people who have done no 'work' on themeselves (the so-called 'commanding self', 'Nafs al-ammarah', which is really nothing but fragments of conditioning) through to the 'completed self', Nafs al-kamilan.
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Re: Rumi on the Nafs
Wed, October 10, 2007 - 8:08 AMThank you.....beautiful words to meditate upon today.
