Idries Shah Quotes

Saying of the ProphetPrivacyWhoever invades people´s privacy corrupts them.

Advice is priceless: when it becomes interference it is preposterous.

I am an idol worshipper; for I understand what idol worship means, and the idolater does not.

You are still adrift while you still think that a means is an end.

Forms have changed through the centuries in obedience to the external world to which all forms belong.

The Path is not to be found anywhere except in human service

EPITAPH OF JALALUDIN RUMIWhen we are dead, seek not our tomb in the earth, but find it in the hearts of men.

Definitions from Mulla Do-PiazaCommunity: Irrationals unified by hope of the impossible.

Generosity is also marked by doing what one says one will do.

But the Sufis work IN the world, and therefore WITH 'things of the world'.

If you have no troubles – buy a goat.

The would-be students wish to transcend books.But, ask yourselves: if someone says that books do not contain wisdom, and yet he writes books; books do not contain Sufism, and yet he continues to publish books on Sufism, what is really happening? It really is your duty, and not mine, to ask and to find the answer to that question, if you are interested enough.

The proverb says that 'The answer to a fool is silence'. Observation, however, indicates that almost any other answer will have the same effect in the long run.

There is something in man which can detect real love. We rub it out, or muffle it, by substitute-love.

Definitions from Mulla Do-PiazaFlattery:One of the most promising of businesses: always brisk.

I will not serve God like a labourer, in expectation of my wages. Rabia

Saying of the ProphetSome behaviourI am like a man who has lighted a fire, and all the creeping things have rushed to burn themselves in it.

The door of illumination is open to those for whom other doors are closed.

Be kind to the hawk and harm the sparrow.

Trust is needed before lessons can be learnt.

Knowledge cannot be attained except through humility.

Wisdom is when you understand what, previously, at best you only knew.

Saying of the ProphetInk and BloodThe ink of the learned is holier than the blood of the martyr.

Show a man too many camels' bones, or show them to him too often, and he will not be able to recognize a camel when he comes across a live one. (Mirza Ahsan of Tabriz)

The significance of the dwelling is in the dweller.

A man is deficient in understanding until he perceives that there is a whole cycle of evolution possible within himself: repeating endlessly, offering opportunities for personal development.

Disappointment cannot exist without expectation. “The expected apricot is never as sweet when it reaches the mouth.

Sufism is the doing in this lifetime what any fool will be doing in then thousand years’ time.

You will always have doubts, but only discover them at a useful time for your weakness to point them out.

You call me an unbeliever. I shall therefore call you a True Believer since a lie is best met with one of similar magnitude.

Right time, right place, right people equals success.Wrong time, wrong place, wrong people equals most of the real human history.

The Apparent is the Bridge to the Real

You yourself are your own barrier – rise from within it.

It is no accident that Sufis find that they can connect most constructively with people who are well integrated into the world, as well as having higher aims, and that those who adopt a sensible attitude towards society and life as generally known can usually absorb Sufi teachings very well indeed

… when we are talking about 'Christians' and 'Moslems' we must first make sure that we are talking about people who have an idea, which should be more or less correct, as to what the other is supposed to believe and what he is expected to do as a consequence of that belief.

None should say: ‘I can trust,’ or ‘I cannot trust’ until he is master of the option, of trusting or not trusting.

Whoever might perfume a scorpionWill not thereby escape its sting. Bahaudin Naqshband

Saying of the ProphetReflectionThe Faithful are mirrors, one to the other.

Definitions from Mulla Do-PiazaEmotionalist:A man or woman who thinks he has experienced the divine.

It is a Sufi contention that truth is not discovered or maintained by the mere repetition of teachings. It can only be kept understood by the perpetual experience of it. And it is in the experience of truth that the Sufis have always reposed their trust. Sufism is therefore not 'Do as I say and not as I do', or even 'Do as I do', but 'Experience it and you will know'.

The major barrier to understanding is wishful thinking and following that which pleases one.

Do not try to be humble: learn humility.

...action is in fact knowledge in operation. Right action stems from right knowledge. Right knowledge is acquired through the teacher.

Saying of the ProphetLoveDo you think you love your Creator? Love your fellow-creature first.

Take the straight path, even if it is long: marry no widow, even if she is a houri.

You must empty out the dirty water before you fill the pitcher with clean.

Is your division of Understanding into Greater and Lesser common to all Sufis? Nothing which is put into words is common to all Sufis.

The colour of the water seems to be the colour of the glass into which it has been poured'.

The mine is always bigger than the gem.

Saying of the ProphetUnderstandingSpeak to everyone in accordance with his degree of understanding.

The Sufis say, "This is not a religion; it is religion

People talk about ‘service, effort, love, knowledge’. But with knowledge you know what love is, and what it is not.

Worry is a cloud which rains destruction.

The Sufi is 'One who does not care when something is taken from him, but who does not cease to seek for what he has not.

Words, they say, are the food of minds. But, like other foods, they can do little by themselves.

In a village where everyone has only one leg, the biped will hop about more lamely than anyone else, if he knows what is good for him.

Saying of the ProphetPracticeWho are the learned? Those who put into practice what they know.

Anyone can see that an ass laden with books remains a donkey. A human being laden with the undigested results of a tussle with thoughts and books, however, still passes for wise.

No surgeon can treat the wounds of the tongue.

Proverbs and truisms are for this reason dangerous, because they produce blindness or non-thought.