Iman and Education

By Shaykh Dr. Abdalqadir as-Sufi

Klntal, April 14, 1990
I want to shift your perspective on the
Islamic Shariat. Properly translated it
means the road as opposed to Tariqat,
which in Araic means the path or the
personal road. !ust as "oman law is a
system of structural principals deduced
from specific cases, so this is actually the
opposite. Shariat is a natural law. It is
somethin# we understand in the European
tradition ecause the #reatest European was
$oethe and $oethes whole philosophy was
to reco#nise that not only was the natural
law a metamorphosis, unfoldin# and
transformation, ut also that the
human ein# was part of it. %e are not
outside this process.
I also want to touch on the spiritual importance of &iet'sche who is, however wayward, a son of
$oethe. %hen you read his writin#s you see what enormous awe he had for the spiritual ein# of
$oethe. (e saw that $oethe, in his ein# and in his en#a#ement in life, had many of these very
qualities that he had indicated as elon#in# to the )ermensch, this over*person that he called
upon to save consciousness from oliteration y the mass spirit. &iet'sche, with his prophetic
awareness + in an intellectual sense + foresaw this comin# disaster.
%e have discussed the Shariat of Islam as somethin# natural, and also as somethin# uilt in with
the evolutionary aspect of fulfilment + not an evolutionary aspect in the ,arwinian sense, ut in the
ordinary sense of #rowth and development. &ow we come to Tariqat which is the path, the little
Shariat, which is in relation to the personal, social ne-us. Tariqat is the second part of what is the
whole of Islam, which is defined in the Islamic le#al lan#ua#e as Iman. Iman has a list of thin#s
which the Prophet, sallallahu alayhi wa sallam, defined and they e#an with trust in Allah. This list
went on to include thin#s which were all aout what you mi#ht call an invisile landscape + the
.nseen, a whole dimension of e-istence that is not visile.
%hat is very interestin# is that there is simply no way that you can tal/ aout the .nseen with this
modern creature which has een created y machine society, the technique state, and so a whole
portion of human e-istence is i#nored. It has een divided up amon# pseudo*scientists who have
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een created in the modern world to handle precisely these elements of disturance amon# the
masses + this creature who is still of the species, you mi#ht say, ut who says, 1There are thin#s I
cannot see2, 1There is a world I cannot see2, 1I have had a dream2, 1I have had a vision2, 1A dead
person spo/e to me,2 and so on. All this they have divided up and they have created the esoteric
mar/et to handle it.
They have created a romantic interest in ancient reli#ion, in anythin# esoteric and attractive which
will never threaten the machine culture, ut will allow those people with a it of ima#ination to e
canonised in a corner, where they can indul#e their interest in these thin#s, even wavin# them up to
a pseudo*metaphysical importance.
Another type of person says, 1%ell, I did see it. I was awa/e and I saw it.2Then they say, 1Ah well,
this is stress you see.2 So they put this person into the medical cate#ory, thus a whole 'one of
spirituality #ets susumed under medical analysis and ecomes a medical prolem. It ecomes a
prolem of neurosis and in e-treme is psychosis. The psychotic sees what is not there, he actually
sees thin#s that other people do not see, and since they do not see them, the common a#reement is
that the person is mad, which is also why you have amon#st some intellectuals and some medical
intellectuals, a questionin# of the modern idea of what is mad. &ot a questionin# of madness itself,
ut of this modern definin# of madness which somehow they reco#nise as politically involvin# a
re3ection of the identity and freedom of that other, however intoleraly different and other that
person may e.
%e cannot escape the fact that certain #enuine e-perience, and I am not tal/in# aout fantasy, has
een de#raded in its evaluation, and politically devalued in its ein# susumed under the identity of
the psychotic. This is very important. 4ou must rememer that the last part of !un#s life was
dedicated to findin# a way of tal/in# aout the human self in a manner that would not ne#ate the
validity of the .nseen. All his writin# on alchemy and $ree/ symols is really a spiritual quest, and
in fact a qui-otic one ecause of what he came from in the world, to confirm the reality of the
.nseen. (is wor/ remains of monumental and enormous importance + not his theory of how he
interpreted it, ut his reco#nition oth clinically and intellectually that this e-isted.
,enial of the .nseen has a political, a mythical and an intellectual dimension. 5or the masses it
leaves quite a serious industry of ma#a'ines and oo/s. 4ou will now see in any oo/shop a
si#nificant section, almost as i# as the section on physical health, for the occult, for the
interpretation of dreams and so on, in order to structure this rather tiresome frustration of
consciousness that seems to produce this irritatin# evidence of somethin# that is apparently not
there.
All the elements of Iman6 elief in Allah, (is 7oo/s, (is 8essen#ers, the risin# of odies from the
dead and so on + all these thin#s to do with the .nseen world define Iman. Iman in itself means
trust. Trust that is a moral, ethical value which has een removed and is not in the curriculum of
mass or even superior education, has een down#raded and its teachers emer#e with the same ethos
as in the mass schools.
Trust is not an ethical value unless it is emodied. Trust, unless it is e-perienced e-istentially,
cannot e e-perienced, reco#nised or identified philosophically with the hi#her self. If trust is not
already uilt in to the consciousness it is not #oin# to appear as an astract value and so this affects
the whole concept of usiness transaction. In Islam, all usiness transaction is ased on this, on the
mans worthiness to fulfil not 3ust the e-chan#e, ut the delayed payment. Even det itself is not the
same as a det e-istentially in the epoch of trust, ecause a det is somethin# for#otten until paid +
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y oth parties. 7ut a det in a non*trust society, which is now, is somethin# not for#otten. 4ou live
in it, and the an-iety of your non*fulfilment and the an-iety of the one to e paid who elieves he
will not e paid, is the condition of the person. They not only do not trust in the moment of the
contract, ut they live within a non*trust e-perience of e-istence6 1I will not e paid:2, 1I cannot
pay:2 The whole Third %orld det is an e-istential separation of millions of people as unworthy
ecause they cannot pay.
The second head of the %orld 7an/ was as/ed aout why they made more money out of the det of
countries than they #ave in loans. To cover up their emarrassment, he said, 1%ell, we have a
completely new pro#ramme now, ecause we are #ivin# money and not #ettin# payment, and we
are not #oin# to pay money to rats any more to live in sewers.2 This was his view of the ma3ority of
the human race: This is the society in which we live and also the evaluation which affects the
ordinary domestic situation.
This in itself is offensive ut what is ama'in# is the passivity with which it is accepted. There is a
disdain for people that is not mental. There is nothin# in the world that can e mental amon# the
same population. There is no real mentation as such, the only real mentation that does not connect
to the physical intricacies of e-istence are the mentations of the psychotics who have cut themselves
off from the ody ecause the house of the ody is not a place in which they want to live anymore.
So they have elected to e on the moon or wherever they can pro3ect the self to a safe place. I thin/
there is no mentation. Even if you are thin/in# astract ideas or doin# mathematics it is all actually
an e-pression of your e-istential everyday e-istence, your 7ein#.
Iman then, is how we relate to the .nseen and our acceptance of it. (ow can we accept it if we are
already tuned in to an an-iety that does not permit us to #o eyond a view of the .nseen which is
that the others hiddenness, which is after all their selfhood, is totally untrustworthy and will not
honour us ecause honour is not tau#ht; There has een no concept, no doctrine and no teachin# of
the ethical value of honour since the reconstruction of mass schoolin# from 0<=> to 0<>? in Europe.
I cannot tal/ aout the rest of the world. I am told y @hinese intellectuals that @onfucian teachin#
is not tau#ht in the 8andarin schools which mi#ht e an equivalent, thus ma/in# it a #loal
phenomenon, ut I have to deal only with what we /now as our European tradition. This is why the
cities have collapsed, noody is safe, and people endlessly have conversations aout how you used
to e ale to leave your door open and so on and so on.
In an Islamic society, you were safe in the city and it was considered that in the country, in the wild
places, you were not safe and there you had to #o armed. %here men and women lived to#ether
there was this Shariat, this natural law, so you were safe. Today, it is the other way around: If you
#o into the country, peoples doors are open and you are safe with them, ut in the city your chances
are reduced daily. Some cities are eyond the limits of dan#er + as a policeman said to me in &ew
4or/6 1&ew 4or/ is fine, 3ust dont #o out of your hotel: It is too dan#erous.2
This has not happened 3ust y the production of "oc/ and "oll and the mar/etin# of dru#s + they
are the effects and not the causes. The dru# is an effect of a society that has ta/en its values and
removed them. At the heart of this you cannot have these ethical elements of honour and trust ased
on material e-perience of the encounter of the other as this person in front of me ecause the whole
element that is trust is to do with the .nseen. .nless you elieve in the fundamental asic element,
which is that "eality itself is to e trusted, then you cannot have trust in any specific conte-t.
If you do not have Iman, if you do not have trust in Allah, then of course you are #oin# to thin/,
1%hat (e has set up is malevolent to me, and if what has een set up has not een set up y a
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@reator who is merciful then I am in an e-posed and dan#erous position.2 7ut that elief in itself is
not an intellectual elief, it is transmitted, and it is also an educational process.
I want to tal/ aout education + not in the sense that it is used peda#o#ically, ut education in the
sense of the En#lish word uprin#in# + the raisin# of the child. Some of what I say may sound
stran#e and some of it may sound new, ut you have to understand that the Sufis are not esoteric,
they are not people who #o to te-ts and interpret them in a way that moves people to have a nice
feelin#. This is not tasawwuf. Au 8adyan, the #reat Sufi of 8orocco said, 1Sufism is nothin# ut
study.2 Shay/h 8uhammad in al*(ai, radiyallahu anhu, said, 1As far as we are concerned, the
Shay/hs are the doctors, the Salihun + the people of nole qualities + are the nurses, and the world
is the hospital.2
%hen this teachin# is alive it does not ecome involved in personality, ri#hts, rituals, Shay/hs,
Tariqats, initiations, #ivin# the hand and all this #ara#e + this is not interestin#. %hat is interestin#
is the raisin# up of people, ecause that is what the Islamic phenomenon is aout, and it is, to put it
in modern parlance, what is needed. 8an has een down#raded. (e is now alreadysu. %e have
een made su*human. So we must ta/e the &iet'schean ima#e of reachin# the )ermensch as an
Islamic duty, an Islamic call. The ,awa of Islam is to call people to e more than they have een.
As &iet'sche indicated, you cannot 3ust suddenly have an Bverman, you have to create a rid#e to
an Bverman y sayin#, 1The way we are is not enou#h, we have een down*#raded, so we must
consciously transform ourselves.2
%e cannot transform the masses, ecause the masses are of every sic/ness, ut those people of
consciousness must re*educate themselves and from that re*educated elite they will produce heroic
people who will e ale in their turn to rin# the thin# ac/ to its perfectly ordinary level + ordinary
humans + which has een lost. It is a question of whether you want it recovered or not. If you
consciously want it recovered, then this is where the challen#e of Tariqat ta/es its place, where you
move away from ein# a passive receptor in a world state of technique which dictates everythin# to
you and replaces conscious, active participation in the life process with an on#oin#, passive, uilt*
in, lived*in an-iety aout an unpayale interest*increasin# det to people whom you have never set
eyes upon ecause your det to the an/ is not a det to 8ister Smith or 8ister !ones, ut a det to
a temple and you have not even met the priest who will, y that to/en, wrec/ your life, or put it on
hold until you die, whilst leavin# the usiness of your urial to ma/e an increased det for
unfortunate relatives, sons and dau#hters, and aunts and uncles havin# to ury you, or, if they are
luc/y, to have you quic/ly cremated and finished. This is the situation.
Tariqat is for those people who want personal transformation in order to create a new society.
Therefore this means an elite that have to e spiritually educated. This is what Tariqat is, and what it
always has een and in each a#e it has had different disciplines ecause each a#e has its sic/nesses.
Imam al*$ha'ali, the #reat Sufi said, 1If you #o to a land of drun/enness, lean heavily on the
Shariat foriddin# drin/. If you #o to a land of se-ual liidinousness and indul#ence, lean heavily
on the laws a#ainst adultery and sodomy2, in order to raise up the people. &ow, we are in a land of
usury and we have to lean heavily on those laws that not only forid usury ut indicate that you
must ma/e war on it, otherwise you cannot chan#e the system.
This is the fundamental arena, aout which I am spea/in# today. This has elements and is really a
matter of which order we ta/e them in, ut it amounts to the same at the end of the day. People are
not ale to thin/ anymore and of course, this is not my statement, it is the statement of the #reatest
philosopher since &iet'sche, the philosopher therefore of the #eneration of the aies of this
con#re#ation of people. (eide##er said that philosophers do not write for the present they write for
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the future which is an echoin# of a statement of &iet'sche.
%hen I say people cannot thin/6 yesterday I thou#ht a man was thin/in# alon# the same line as
myself, ut I saw in fact that ecause of his e-istential, everyday e-istence, he had ta/en our
e-chan#e for some /ind of clear, o3ective 'one from which he could operate. To use terms li/e
neurosis and psychosis are wonderfully inadequate actually, ecause they melt into each other with
astonishin# swiftness: 4ou thin/ you are ma/in# a rational statement to someone who will therefore
receive a rational statement and either say a yes or ano to it, ut you realise that it has not #ot
throu#h at all ecause they have #ot this inner landscape aout how thin#s are that you cannot
penetrate.
This #oes ac/ to the encounter etween In al*Arai, the Shay/h al*A/ar, the #reatest Chatu,
the #reatest of the Sufis when he was a youth, and Averroes +In "ushd, the #reatest of all the
medieval philosophers who rou#ht the whole technical apparatus of thin/in# upon which $erman
philosophy eventually was estalished and therefore the system of technique, under which we now
all live. In al*Arai was rou#ht y his father to the #reat In "ushd, who was y then a very old
man who was teachin# his class. The youn# Shay/h al*A/ar, In al*Arai, sat in the corner and he
listened to everythin# that In "ushd said. At the end the oy said, 14es: 4es: 4es:2 In "ushd said,
1%hat a clever chap:2 (e said to the father, 14ou have a very clever child, he is #oin# to #o very
far, he can come tomorrow.2 So the ne-t day In "ushd #ave his class on Aristotelian philosophy
and In al*Arai sat and listened, and then he said,1&o: &o: &o:2 Bf course the philosopher did
not li/e that at all, so when the class was finished he said to the father, 14ou /now, you have #ot a
very difficult child here, I can see you are #oin# to have prolems with him.2 Then he loo/ed at him
and said, 1%hy did you say &o to me;2 In al*Arai loo/ed up to the #reat teacher and said, 1It is
ecause I suddenly saw that etween4es and &o many throats are cut and many heads fall from
their shoulders.
This consciousness is what is necessary. Det me translate it into modern lan#ua#e6 what the child
In al*Arai was sayin# is that if we create a society ased on rational structure, it will cause the
death of millions, which was what happened in the twentieth century oth y fascism and y
communism61%e will structure a state which is #ood for the people2 + two almost identical models
which resulted in the deaths of millions of people and the devastation of the whole culture.
&ow that does not leave one with an anarchy of chaos. It leaves one with the position of In
al*Arai which was to understand e-istence. This is the Sufi way, to understand how it wor/s.
%hat we are tal/in# aout is not ideas in the sense of concepts, it is not ideolo#ical + it is a matter
of how you do thin#s. It is li/e coo/in# + discussin# efore ma/in# the dish how you are #oin# to
ma/e it, ecause you could ma/e it the Italian way or you could ma/e it the 5rench way. Are you
#oin# to use utter or oil; In the end, how do we arrive at a dish which is palatale and attractive;
This is really the sort of thin/in# that is required, ut it is not the sort of thin/in# that is applied to
the matter of human education or self*education, which has een more or less aandoned.
%e cannot mi- what we are doin# here with any sort of decadent, unlicensed, esoteric, unacceptale
thin# callin# itself Sufism + there have always een these people in the world. They must
understand that this is a process which does not allow you simply to develop yourself inwardly and
then continue as a human ein# to rin# up your children the way they are doin# out there6 this has
made Eurich a ni#htmare instead of a eautiful, enchantin# city, &ew 4or/ a hell, and 7erlin worse
+ horrile heartrea/in# cities that have een literally ro/en.
I am proposin# a view of transformation of yourself that involves the responsiility of the
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transformation of your children. Br, to use a $oethean e-pression, to allow your children to emer#e,
not to try to do to the child what the fascist and communist states did to its memers.
FFF
Det us start with the education of the child. It is ased on the assumption that we have a#reed that
how thin#s are is not tenale and that people already have a conscious desire to chan#e themselves,
to e demonstratively educational to another #eneration and also to e, y that to/en, the leaders of
a new society. If you ta/e on this pro#ramme you ecome quite directly, not y titles, or#anisation
or name, the leaders of society ecause you are the only free people in it. %hat is interestin# is that
most people thin/ that education in the peda#o#ic sense means play school ut it simply means
#ettin# the child off mothers hands. 8other is in the our#eois house, proaly alone, and the
husand is out doin# this thin# called wor/in# to earn their livin#, which they are not doin#
ecause the child is in play school, the mother is loo/in# out of the window wonderin# what
country she is in and he is ein# shouted at y someone in an office + this is the livin# they are
earnin#.
Play school is an e-cuse. It does not have very stron# intellectual foundations. If you #o to a play
school, what you see sometimes are nice people, some of them quite tolerale, ut asically
involved in two thin#s6 one is the manipulative therapy with o3ects and with crayons + a horrific
idea that all our#eois Europeans dealin# with children have which is that you #ive them crayons
and they do somethin# called e-pressin# themselves: They, of course, are asolutely destroyin#
the psyche of these poor unfortunate creatures. They also see that the child is not ever y itself ut
always inte#rated into the #roup, so here is the actual factory for the production of mass man who
tolerates others and who has no inwardness whatsoever.
After that comes the preparatory school, the !unior part of education where you /now what the
curriculum is. Then there is the Secondary, the serious part which is etween the Prep school and
the .niversity where they are in the hands of curriculum and teachers, all of whom are products of
the state and of that same system.
"ememer that everythin# that is education now, even the very #ood pulic school, is in fact from
the state. It is not comparale qualitatively or materially to what was efore 0<A< as that whole
system was wiped out. %hat they are teachin# asically ta/es its ideolo#y from 5ran/furt, from a
#roup of philosophers, ninety*nine percent of them !ewish, who called themselves the 5ran/furt
School. %e could call this teachin# critical depreciation as its technique was to e critical and to
question everythin#.Thus the educational process is to prevent trust, to loo/ at the o3ect and e
sceptical aout it. 4ou must dout it is there, and you must ta/e it apart and find out what its
thereness is: In doin# so you will have devalued it ecause you will have ta/en it from its total
oneness, and y ma/in# a partitive e-amination, it will always e for you the sum of these parts.
A#ain, this is precisely what $oethe was ar#uin# aout throu#h all his life and in all his lon# letters
with these scientists6 oth the so*called anatomists of the day, the emer#ent evolutionists who were
studyin# the relationships etween animal s/eletons and the human one, and of course the otanists
and the iolo#ists. This was what $oethes vast correspondence and his very si#nificant series of
essays are aout6 warnin# a#ainst a scientific research which in itself is then applied to man so that
man himself is dismantled. $oethe says that if you dismantle it, you will not #et it to#ether a#ain
and it is only ecause that process happened that it was possile for (itler and for Stalin to
say,1These people are a nuisance to the state so we will put them in a forced laour camp.2 Bnce
you have done that it is another step to sayin#, 1%ell, if they are #oin# to e difficult, /ill them:2 or,
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1%ell, we are short of food so do not #ive it to them, #ive it to our people:2 So in the end the
concentration camp victim + and I do not li/e the word victim + the citi'en of the concentration
camp, or the ruler, ecomes somethin# arrived at, which is a serious rational process of this critical
depreciation. That is what the 5ran/furt School tau#ht.
%hat is interestin# is that the ideolo#y that ended with the persecution of the !ews was
intellectually also their contriution, which in its virulent form was responsile also for the creation
of the atom om. This thin/in# too/ apart the atom and they said, 1Bh, when we ta/e it apart it is
more interestin# than when it is all to#ether:2 So in other words, creation, which in itself is life, if
we destroy, de*structure and deconstruct it, it will not only deconstruct the atom ut will destroy the
city at the same time. So this weapon was a product of a thin/in# that was this critical ta/in# apart
of everythin# in order to control it + to e the masters of it.
This is the fundamental methodolo#y, not ideolo#y, of post 0<=> western education and therefore it
is the opposite of what the Sufis consider education to e. I would li/e to ma/e a claim that we can
demonstrate that the way of the Sufis is the correct way, while their way is the opposite of that,
producin# the opposite result.
5or e-ample6 you are a university student who has a masters de#ree and you want to e a doctor of
philosophy, 1I want to e Ph,.2 So you ta/e a su3ect which you do not /now and you ta/e it to
pieces, criticise and devalue it, re3ect certain thin#s, accept certain others, and then reassess it within
a framewor/ of everythin# else which has een deconstructed and reassessed. Then you say,1That
thin#, now I evaluate it as this, not that, ut this.2 And when you have #one throu#h this process
they say, 1&ow you are a memer of our society, you are now ,octor of this.2
This is not only a#ainst the Sufis, it is a#ainst Plato and the whole western tradition of learnin#,
ecause from the academy of Plato to the circle of the Sufis, teachin# has always een the same, it
has een to sit with the teacher. Teachin# is not idea, it is transmission. To sit in front of the teacher
is li/e puttin# a camera in front of an o3ect. The receptive learner is li/e the emulsified film which
when the li#ht comes ta/es the ima#e + ta/es the whole thin# directly from the teacher. This is very
far reachin#.
If I tell you this first story, the esoteric people would say, 1Bh how wonderful, how lovely:2 and
thin/ of it as somethin# ma#ical ut I will then show you that it is somethin# quite serious, practical
and real. I was sittin# in Au ,hai one afternoon with a #roup of Sufis and there was a very old,
lind Shay/h from (adramaut who had #reat love for me and we used to meet twice a wee/ and sit
to#ether and we would have conversations. E-traordinary thin#s happened etween us and I always
treasure them. (e was called Shay/h Ali. Bne day he said, 1I am told that you have a very
eautiful %ird.2 I said, 14es, it is the %ird of my Shay/h.2 (e then said, 1$ive me the permission
of your %ird, #ive it to me, #ive me your %ird:2 (is students did not li/e any of this and they said,
1%hat are you tal/in# aout;2 And he said,1Shut up, sirs: Tell him to #ive me the permission:2 So I
said, 1I #ive you the permission of my %ird.2 (e said, 1Bh: This is wonderful: I #ive you all my
%irds: I #ive you all my ,hi/rs that I have had from all my Shay/hs, it is all yours, I #ive it all to
you: &ow you #ive me all of yours:2 (e said, 1&ow I have everythin# you /now and you have
everythin# I /now:2 Bne man was smilin# and sayin#, 1This is eautiful, this is wonderful,2 whilst
others were furious and very an#ry: Bthers said, 1%hat is #oin# on, what are you tal/in# aout,
what is this;2
Another e-ample of this is that I sat with my Shay/h for over three years. I sat with him and up
until the last year I did not really understand a word that was said. Sometimes thin#s were translated
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for me, ut when he was there I sat there and never moved until he was #one. Bne day, I was #ivin#
a discourse and an Ara who /new Shay/h 8uhammad in al*(ai, radiyallahu anhu, sat there
and started to cry and he said to (a33 Adalhaqq, 1Every word he said, Shay/h 8uhammad in al*
(ai said. Everythin# he said, they are thin#s Shay/h 8uhammad in al*(ai, radiyallahu anhu,
said.2 So this is transmission. Btherwise you can 3ust #et it from your computer, ut that is not the
same.
Bne of the reasons that Islam has not een ale to e of its true nature, is ecause of the scholars
who collected the (adith. %hat they did was rilliant, and I am not sayin# they are inauthentic, on
the contrary, it is an astonishin# thin# that they collected all the thin#s the Prophet, sallallahu
alayhi wasallam, said, hundreds of years a#o, and they made a science of it. (owever, people say
1Bh, there is a (adith that says so,2 and others says, 1&o, there is a (adith that says such and
such.2 7ut #o to Tunis and meet their Shay/h, Shay/h Shadhili an*&ifa, who is now an old
#entleman. (e /nows all the (adith and has the i##est lirary in modern Islam, ut he was tau#ht
one hundred (adith y his (adith teacher who sat in front of him and said to him, 18y Shay/h so
and so had it from Shay/h so and so who had it from so and so, who had it from the companion of
the Prophet so and so, who said that the "asulullah said such and such.2 7oom: + and he said it.
,o you see what has happened; That had come face to face ri#ht down to Shay/h an*&ifa to the
one that he tau#ht. This is the /ey. %hen I declared that I was Shay/h, one of the people of Shay/h
al*5ayturi + ecause there is all this 3ealousy amon# 8urids + went to him and said, 14ou /now,
Adalqadir said that he is Shay/h, what do you say;2 5irst of all he said, 1Shay/h Adalqadir has
a /nown station,2 ut then he said, 1%hat he has, he had from me hand to hand and face to face.2
This is teachin#.
There is an official violinist, whose wife was pre#nant, and he used to #o and sit with his wife,
which he thou#ht of as 3ust sittin# and he would sit with her, and ecause she could not move as
much as she would li/e to and was used to doin#, he would ta/e his violin and play to this lady who
was lar#e with child. Every day he would play the same piece and she would sit and do whatever
thin# she was doin# to pass the time to #et throu#h the days, thin/in# of all the thin#s she wanted to
do, until the child was orn. At a certain point when the childs fin#ers were fully developed and
stron#, it must then have een aout five or si-, the violinist too/ his violin and #ave it to the child,
puttin# it under the childs chin, showin# it where the hands #o on the strin#s, puttin# the ow in the
childs hands, and the child played this whole piece, note for note:
So you see, the first story is this Sufi story ut the second story is an interestin# Sufi story ecause
it is called scientific research and that is educational. That is how values are transmitted. If you omit
this transaction and then hand your child over to the state, out will come this creature who is
ro/en, and if they are not stron# then they are ready for the dru# mar/et. If they are wildly in
search of a personality they will e cau#ht in se-ual deviation. If they are completely under the
desperate eye of the domesticated father they will simply ecome a paralysed caron copy without
any individual life and any ori#inality, or if they have some marvellous lessin#, they mi#ht run
away. This is the situation, spiritually spea/in#, of the our#eois home.
I was tal/in# aout the education of the child and sayin# that what they call the peda#o#ic process
does not create the person. I am not sayin# there should not e a peda#o#ic process, of course there
has to e, and we want to accept processes of consciousness, /nowled#e and development that we
have, and we want to e ale to assimilate them, ut what we want is a whole human ein# who
will decide to ta/e on any of these specialised /nowled#es accordin# to their attraction to them and
their interest in them. I have found somethin# very disconcertin# in my e-amination of children at
I
the e#innin# of ordinary school a#e, which is that the ones who are attracted to the computer are
defined y the state schoolin# system as ein# the ones of superior intelli#ence. These are the ones
who are, asically, very seriously in peril as human ein#s ecause they prefer to deal with the
computer. They simply cannot sit with human ein#s as the price is too hi#h emotionally for them,
so they would rather e with this thin# to which they can pump in commands and #et ac/ a
response.
I spent two days recently in a Eurich hotel and I turned on 5rench television and there was an
astonishin# pro#ram which was aout some men and women who conducted not a porno#raphic,
ut a quite lonely, romantic e-chan#e with people they had never wanted to meet or intended to
meet throu#h the .nitel computer, which is a 5rench national computer system to which you send
messa#es. People were actually havin# this /ind of romantic love affair without any intention that it
would lead to an encounter + it was ased on an a#reed principal y oth parties that they would not
meet:
So from these e#innin#s of education I would li/e to come to the amience in which the child is, to
a asic model which Strinder# called the li#hthouse, which is the man and the woman trapped in
a /ind of white olon# room. All the crises of these two ecomes the whole world, ecause that is
where they have the thin# that is their life. 5irst of all, if you see that olon# within the normal
our#eois framewor/, it means either the man, woman or oth are out to wor/ ecause they are
doin# this thin# of earnin# their livin#. 7ut in fact the livin# is the it after they have done it,
which is usually the evenin#, the wee/end, and the holiday when they are already e-hausted, so
even the social, erotic, human encounter in every dimension not only has the stress of all that
happened in the day, ut has an intensity that cannot e re*tuned up to.
Thus the very thin# that is at the heart of a womans spiritual ein#, without which the man is not
fulfilled, is denied her. So she is almost 3ealous, ri#htly, and this is not a criticism of woman, it is
sayin# that woman is spiritually seein# what is really happenin#, with or without her realisin# it.
The process that is the office, the shop or wherever you are is li/e a mistress. %hen he comes ac/
it is li/e she has not #ot him, the lovema/in# is li/e a second lovema/in#, it has not the passion of
the first one and this affects everythin#. Therefore an a##ression sets in ut not the necessary
a##ression, the lessed warfare that is etween man and woman, out of which comes resolution,
union and the fulfilment. This is ta/en away ecause the woman is in the role of the wifeJmother to
the man whose mistress is the wor/.
Bne day a man of our community came to me and said, 1I am so worried, my wife is a urden for
me.2 I said, 1%hat a horrile thin# to say.2 And he said, 1&o, no, she is wonderful, ut she is an
an-iety for me ecause I have to #et her this money to pay the ills.2 So I said, 1%ell, this is
e-traordinary ecause to modern man, his wife is an an-iety and a urden, and his wor/ is a lover:2
(is eroticism, his passion #oes into this wor/ pro3ect, his e#o and his position in society. &ow in
this there is another /ind of a##ression, not what Dawrence called the a##ression of the wolf, of
the erotic war, ut the wonderful thin# in The "in# where Sie#fried can only conquer 7rKnnhilde
if he is not afraid, ut the one fear he has is that of 7rKnnhilde. (owever, what he discovers is that
his fear of 7rKnnhilde is sweet, he has to surrender to 7rKnnhilde and so this thin# that he thou#ht
was dreadful turns out to e delicious: %hat Dawrence says is that the encounter etween man and
woman cannot ta/e place ecause it is short*circuited. &ow this means another a##ression ta/es
place, and that a##ression then cannot successfully fall on the husand or the wife ut on the one
most easy to attac/ + the child. Therefore, whatever peda#o#ic process comes to asolutely ury the
child, the woundin# of the child comes from inside the home.
<
4ou find that y compensatory #uilt, what is offered to the child are the sustitutes for this #enuine
encounterin#. I am not #oin# to say love ecause as Dawrence quite ri#htly said, 1If you want to
have children survive, please stop lovin# them,2 + ut to avoid the encounter you find that the child
has its own concentration camp, this thin# called the nursery, as if it were another species, as if it
were a ird in a ca#e or a do# in a little as/et, and in that nursery you find there are thin#s called
toys. A toy in the ei#hteenth century was any thin# in the house that was small li/e scissors, a reel
of thread, any small household o3ect, ut suddenly we have a fantasy world created, not y hi#hly
intellectual people wantin# the development of children, ut y an industry wantin# to ma/e profits
that has an annual #eneral meetin# at which a #roup of adults, most of them men, sit around and
say, 1%hat would ma/e that child do this to that thin# rather than that thin#.2 This produces a cra'y,
non*e-istent domain in which they will live, which is then e-tended y television in animated
desi#ns of non*e-istent creatures in a complete fantasy world in which it never meets any #enuine
human emotion, even ra#e, ecause even these ra#es are these short*circuit ra#es that I have
descried, they are not even the ra#es of fury ut 3ust nerve*endin# domestic e-plosions.
So the child, if it has any humanness, withdraws and #oes off and ecomes this new /ind of child
that was not on the earth efore6 the new teena#er who is this sort of adult ut has een not 3ust
anaesthetised ut cauterised. Its nerves, its feelin#*life has een cauterised. If you ta/e a red*hot
thin# and cauterise the wound it 3ust seals it up ut there is always scar tissue that never #oes away.
So you find these wonderful loo/in# men and women, eautiful, all with special /inds of eauty
that this fantasy household has produced, ut all cauterised, unale to feel, and cold and distant.
In the mid*twentieth century the dominant psychosis of the masses was schi'ophrenia, which is
almost a wonderfully poetic thin# as schi'ophrenics would say wonderful thin#s, ma/e surrealist
drawin#s, and were very hi#hly individuated. &ow the dominant madness of this our#eois
e-istence is the autistic child, who is cut off without feelin#*life, and who has the elements of
schi'ophrenia in that they do not differentiate etween their ody filth and what is clean, etween
food and shit, ut their main quality, you may say, is that they can only echo ac/ what si#nal they
receive. If you say to an autistic child, 1Is somethin# wron#;2 They will say, 1Is somethin# wron#,
is somethin# wron#, is somethin# wron#, is somethin# wron#;2 until you want to #o mad, ecause
you cannot ear it. If you ma/e a #esture, they will repeat that #esture ac/ to you li/e some
incredily sophisticated moc/ery of the inauthenticity of your si#nal.
These are direct results of a way of livin# which has an end. The implication of what I have said is
that you cannot have this chan#e which we need in society if you #o to an esoteric #roup and do
4o#a or some io*ener#etic thin# for yourself ecause it is not #oin# to have any effect. If you say,
1I want my child to e rou#ht up properly,2 and you then say, 1%here is this nice school I can send
it to;2 It is not #oin# to have any effect. .nless you transform the total process it is not #oin# to
have any effect.
At the heart of that social process is somethin# aout which we are at present completely helpless,
which is the usury transaction. 7ut a conscious, evolved awareness of what it does to you and your
children means that the thin# is different. 4ou say, 1%ell if you want deconstruction, I will #ive you
deconstruction: I /now that the motor of the total process is everythin# that results from the det*
interest e-istence in which I am enslaved.2 Thus the first independence from it is 3ust an awareness
of it. Equally we cannot e ideolo#ical, ecause its deconstruction is not anti*usuryism and the
smashin# of an/s as that would not solve anythin#. They have constructed their anti*antithetical,
dialectical, modular society so that to oppose it is to stren#then it + the critical method is that you
find a wea/ point and then re*enforce it. 7y that dialectic the terrorist is the upholder of the state.
The state needs the terrorist ecause he is a complete nihilist who says 1&o:2 7ut it has no effect
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and it confirms this intolerale 14es.2 !Kn#er says of democracy6 18y no is their licence that they
are ri#ht in their yes. I am the one no and they are ninety nine yeses + so I am the one that
proves it is all BC, I cannot ma/e my no.2 So not*ma/in# the no already rea/s the whole thin#
ecause there is a chan#e in consciousness.
At the moment it is only possile with an elite #roup of people who have the coura#e to e#in the
procedures of your re*education, the restructurin# of the manner in which you live and therefore the
possiility of creatin# a #eneration that is a rid#e to the Bverman, in that perfect metaphor of
&iet'sches, which is really the Islamic metaphor of ma/in# whole human ein#s. In truth, all the
intelli#ent women I have ever tal/ed to, want it. Then there are some men who intellectually a#ree
ut damn well are not #oin# to ma/e any chan#e in that domestic structure6 14es, intellectually you
are correct, ut I am not #oin# to chan#e this thin#. %hen the son arrives I am there to tell him what
to do and I shut the door. They are #oin# to #o to the school.2 Such people are not #oin# to chan#e
the social ne-us.
A #roup of people who want these chan#es have to enter not a critical, ut a conscious
understandin# of how all transactions of wealth ta/e place, which is not 3ust that we do not use
interest, ut that all transaction and trade itself is ased on trust. %e must wor/ with each other or
with people whom we can trust, and this means the de*domestication of man, not humanity, of men
who are the most difficult and the most inhiitin# factor towards this evolution. 7ecause of the
si#nals they #ive, the truth is that the our#eois women who are already defined will 3ust #ive ac/
the si#nal they want.
The tra#edy is, in the dialect of the state system, that the womens movement was desi#ned for the
woman who said, 1&o, I want the man to e another /ind of man, in order that I can e me, this new
woman.2 4et they desi#ned a dialectic which instead of allowin# that collaorative event to happen,
#uaranteed a dialectical opposite of that which was li/e a /ind of war, whose own lo#ical outcome
then ecame a form of inversion. It could only end in a se-ual inversion that was a re3ection of men
ein# helpless. So the very most heroic women, with their stron#, inspired ener#y of womanhood
and feminine power were #iven, as it were, a role in a play which stopped the very thin# they
wanted to happen. It was the very dialectic that was the equivalent of the structuralist state, which
would #uarantee that it never happened, it would #uarantee its opposite.
&evertheless the intelli#ent woman today reco#nises this and can confirm and collaorate with it.
The difficulty is to find men who have the actual e-istential coura#e to live differently from the way
they are livin#. There seems to e this incredile fear and astonishin#ly it is a fear aout provision.
7ut what is fear aout provision if it is not that e-istential an-iety of the rememered incertitude of
childhood in that our#eois situation with the an-ious mother and the food that was #iven ut was
not #iven; A#ain, 3ust to ta/e the ima#e of reastfeedin#, I rememer (a33a Chayria sayin# to a
youn# woman who had her child at the reast and who was loo/in# out of the window as if she
were on the moon, 1%hen you are feedin# it, loo/ at it:2 &ow this is a (adith of "asulullah,
sallallahu alayhi wa sallam, who said, 1.mm al*madrasa2 + the mother is the university, the
school. (e said that the mother #ives mil/ to the child and alon# with the mil/ the mother #ives
wisdom. It is the #a'in# on the ay that #ives it humanness, and if she does not, it will not e
complete.
That is what teachin# is and it is the same thin# as the sittin# in front of the Shay/h, the man
playin# the fiddle efore the wom of his wife, and the thin# that ma/es differentiation as opposed
to this trance*li/e #atheredness which you now see in teena#ers. They all have a common factor in
their trance*li/e state + you thin/ they are smo/in# hashish when they are not + ut when they #et it
00
they are very happy, it is not somethin# stran#e for them ecause it confirms how they already are,
it is how they have e-perienced e-istence.
All this implies the aility of the men to de*domesticate, to come out of the house, to e ale to sit
with other men and not fi#ht with them and not respond in a low do#*level of sniffin# and ar/in#L
to not ma/e su3ective assessments of them as a defence mechanism to prevent social chan#e, ut to
e ale to put the matters in front of each other and to a#ree to do thin#s. This is what rotherhood
is, this is what sallallahu alayhi wa sallam meant when he said, 1The muslims are li/e two hands
washin#.2 (ow can they e li/e two hands washin# if they will not come to#ether; This is what the
Sufis have to say. If I was in Tash/ent at the time of "umi, I would have somethin# else to say,
ecause they were under different pressures, #overnments, dan#ers, temptations and defamations.
7ut we are livin# in this a#e and unless we come to terms with these thin#s there will not e any
humans anymore to as/ what tasawwuf is and to e ale to say shahada. %e are not tryin# to ma/e a
utopia or to ma/e the whole world li/e us, we will never do it. Doo/ out there: $o as I have #one to
8alaysia and see the future, it is horrile: There are millions of them and you will never e ale to
do it, even if you introduce all the irth control in the world and #et the population down, you are
still not #oin# to e ale to do it: %hat you have to do is let it e somewhere and it should e where
you are, ecause #enerosity e#ins inside your own house. Bne of the companions of the Prophet
came to the Prophet and said, 1Doo/, I have some e-tra money, where do I #ive it, who do I #ive it
to;2 (e said, 1$ive it to your own family.2 (e said, 1I have #iven them somethin#.2 (e said, 1Then
#ive it to the people in the house ne-t door.2 (e said, 1I have #iven them somethin#.2 (e said,
1Then #ive it to the house ne-t to that.2 (e said, 1Bh, I have #iven them somethin#.2 Then the
Prophet ecame an#ry and turned away, ecause it meant the man had not understood. If you cannot
understand that then you are an idiot. It is the opposite of social welfare and pensionin#, and if you
are ta/in# money from the state you are finished efore you have e#un, you are a cripple and your
children are doomed: 4ou cannot do it: 4ou have #ot to e#in to have trust in Allah.
Allah will provide for you, Allah will feed you, you will eat till you die and you have to understand
this. "e3ection of that is not ecause you say, 1I do not elieve in $od, I will not ecome a
8uslim,2 it is ecause you do not elieve in your mother and you do not respect your fatherL you do
not thin/ she fed you and you do not thin/ he will protect you ecause either he has left or you have
een told he is a rotter.
.nless you can create this you have not created a human situation. 4ou cannot do it alone en famille
ecause en famille is hell, so you must open the doors of the household and lierate the imprisoned
wife in the li#hthouse. ,o not consider the home as the cave to which you return after the days
huntin#, ut evolve to a hi#her consciousness in which there is a shared spiritual reality etween the
man and the woman and in which you care, and responsiility for your children is neither peda#o#ic
nor imperative. It is to pass the child throu#h all sta#es, #ivin# them what little thin#s you have
learnt that are yours and of use to them, without mania and osession. So these are the asic
principles of what would e a proper and truly spiritually elite #roup of people that when they
#ather to sin# the diwan and to do the hadra, would produce an atmosphere so profoundly different
from what we already e-perience, that it would e somethin# people would come from the furthest
ends of the world to see. In itself it cannot aesthetically e realised, it can only e realised y your
coura#e to transform the lives that you are now so disastrously livin#.
09
Glossary:
dhi/r + rememrance, mention or invocation of Allah.
diwan + a collection of MSuficN poetry.
(adith + reported speech, particularly of the Prophet.
hadra + dance of the reath, invocation of the ,ivine name.
Iman + trust.
murid + the student of a Shay/h of instruction. Bne who wills what the Shay/h wills in
order to discover who he is. Diterally one who wills, he wills what the Shay/h wills.
radiyallahu anhu + may Allah e pleased with him.
"asulullah + the 8essen#er of Allah.
Salihun + developed people of ri#ht action, who are in the ri#ht place at the ri#ht time.
sallallahu alayhi wa sallam + may Allah less him and #ive him peace, said when
mentionin# the 8essen#er of Allah.
shahada + the witnessin#, the first pillar of Islam + 1Ash*hadu an la ilaha illallah, wa ash
hadu anna 8uhammadar*"asulullah,2 sallallahu alayhi wa sallam.
Shariat + literally, a roadL the le#al and social modality of a people ased on the revelation
of their Prophet.
Shay/h + leader, spiritual #uide.
Sufi + one who practices Sufism, the science of the 3ourney to Allah.
Sufism + the science of the 3ourney to Allah.
Tariqat + the inward path, a Sufic order.
tasawwuf + Sufism, the science of the 3ourney to Allah.
%ird + dhi/r constructed to contain in it certain patterns of /nowled#e and self awa/enin#.
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