“Wisdom is when you understand what, previously, at best you only knew.”
“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.”
“If wine is the enemy of religion, I shall devour the enemy of religion.”
“SAYING OF SHEIKH ZIAUDIN: Self-justification is worse than the original offence.”
“It is not Sufism if it does not perform its function for you. A cloak is no longer a cloak if it does not keep a man warm.”
“Saying of the Prophet. The Bequest: I have nothing to leave you except my family.”
“The totality of life cannot be understood, so runs Sufi teaching, if it is studied only through the methods which we use in everyday living.”
“Only later – much, much later, and after losing all hope and undergoing a seemingly interminable Dark Night of the Soul – would Louie begin to see how Shah’s own work tied in with others. Not only among Sufis, nor in the general fields of spirituality and mysticism, nor in the work of Shah’s own family, friends of Shah, and friends of friends of Shah, and people who quoted people quoting Shah, but in diverse fields and in the town’s marketplace, mucky alleyways and smoke-clouded taverns of everyday life. That was a whole new vista, a continent beyond Shah’s own island – vast, exotic, and apparently self-contained as it had been, and yet not all and everything. Looking back, this wonderful caravanserai had been a very necessary, and much loved, step or two along the way.”
“La espiritualidad: la esencia de la religión. Y también hay, una esencia de la espiritualidad: el Sufismo es la esencia de las esencias.”
“Muchas veces, la gente cree estar haciendo cosas “significativas” cuando meramente quieren un intercambio de atención.”
“Tu talismán mágico es poderoso, pero ¿acaso eres Salomón para hacerlo funcionar?”
“I want to be a thief, A thief of a different kind and nature, I want to be a thief in the house of God, A thief who would instead of stealing put his heart in the house of God, I want to be a thief who wants to be clear with his theft, A thief who knows who s the house he is in and what he is invading, I want to be a thief who after getting catch surrenders, A thief who gets caught red-handedly with his theft, I want to be a thief who wishes to get caught, A thief who wishes to be caged in Divine Jail.”
“I asked who are you ? He said I am the one, a clay potter. I asked what is in the clay ? He said my commanded soul. And he then said whatever and whoever the clay are made of I am the one who command the soul in it. And I asked curiously who is he who has born to a virgin who had breath the soul in the clay? and made it fly! He said shush!!! he is my secret!”
“The person who has not seen the face of trust - has seen nothing. The person who has not found contentment - has found nothing.”
“Love of god isn t for weak and the wicked hearts. Love ask not easy things some gave life, some crucified, some hanged in their life, some sold themselves in the bazar, some got stone pelted in deserts of mecca & some got their skin flayed. For the love of god to be concealed within requires a heart of a lion.”
“Love took me to the vineyard and made me taste flavor of god s love and since then I am in love with God in the drunkyard. Love has opened the mystery of love, creation was holding the love of creator s wine and he was mine.”
“Love took me to the vineyard and made me taste flavor of god s love and since then I am in love with God in the drunkyard. I was first holding myself tight thinking I am not deserving the company of love to taste this wine, Fainted with first sip of the wine and since then I am in love with god in the drunkyard. I said to love let me get over everyone so that they get drunk as well with this wine, love said let them first taste the wine of love and then divine. Ayaz, Master s attention has opened the mystery of love, I was holding the love of creator s wine (love) and he was mine (love).”