BIOGRAPHY Muzaffer Ozak Hz. was born in Istanbul in 1916. (d.1985) He was educated by a succession of wise and learned who instructed him in all branches of the Islamic tradition. He became Muezzin and eventually Imam to many of the mosques of Istanbul. He later retired from the office of Imam and preached the […]
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Quote of the week: The way of the Lover
Sufism has played an important role in my life. Here in this page, I am going to share with you all some interesting quotes on Sufism. In Sufism it is said he who tastes knows. See if you can feel the sweetness in the following quotes. I will be adding to this collection slowly over time.
Photo by Marius Grozea. Picture taken in Romania.
The Sufi is absent from himself and present with God.
- Hujwiri
The Sufis do not abandon this world, nor do they hold that human appetites must be done away with; they only discipline those desires that are in discordance with their religious life and the dictates of sound reason.
The do not throw away all the things of this world, nor do they go after them with a vengeance. Rather they know the true value and function of everything upon the earth. They save as much as is necessary. They eat as much as they need to stay healthy
They nourish their bodies and simultaneously set their hearts free. The Beloved becomes the focal point towards which their whole being leans. God becomes the object of their continual adoration and contemplation.
The perfect mystic is neither an ecstatic devotee lost in contemplation of Oneness nor a saintly recluse shunning all commerce with mankind. The true saint goes in and out among the people, eats and sleeps with them, buys and sells in the market, marries and takes part in social intercourse, and never forgets God for a single moment.
-Abu Said
Abu Sa’id : Biography
Abu Sa’id ibn Abi’l-Khayr (d. 440/1049), was an early Sufi shaykh who at different stages of his life was an ascetic, an antinomian ecstatic, and a spiritual guide. He received a Sufi transmission from Abu al-Fadl al-Hasan (or ibn al-Hasan) al-Sarakhsi, whom Abu Sa’id called his “pir” (a Persian word refering to a spiritual guide and often equivalent to “shaykh”). After the death of Abu al-Fadl, Abu Sa’id looked to Abu ‘Abbas al-Qassab (the butcher), whom Abu Sa’id called “shaykh,” for spiritual guidance. The hagiography Asrar al-tawhid is one of the two major sources for what we know of his life and teachings. It has been translated as The Secrets of God’s Mystical Oneness.
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- Sufi festival has spirits in a whirl (independent.co.uk)
RUMI: Turning Ecstatic
In the first years of the Twenty-first Century the spiritual influence of Mevlana Jelaluddin Rumi is being strongly felt by people of diverse beliefs throughout the Western world. He is being recognized here in the West, as he has been for seven centuries in the Middle East and Western Asia, as one of the greatest […]
Thoughts of the month by Yilmaz Alimoglu
There could be a day when dictators and so called “lovers of freedom” would not have the freedom, means and opportunities to oppress ordinary people and other nations in the name of freedom, tribal values or any other label. Oppressing people should be a thing of the terrible past if we were enlightened and had […]
Book Review by Darren Logan — An Oil Painter
If there is one thing which I love about this new cultural landscape of the internet we seem to inhabit more and more, it is the ability of cultural creatives, artists, musicians, writers, armchair philosophers, spiritual seekers, and just about anyone else with an idea to make personal effort to promote themselves, find like minded […]
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