Tag Archives: Alireza Nurbakhsh

The Illusion of Self

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by Alireza Nurabkhsh

– A Discourse

Each of us tends to think of him- or herself as a distinct being, a “self” that is both separate from other people and separate from our bodies and our perceptions, thoughts and feelings. We consider our “selves” to be individual beings that live from one moment to the next, continually having mental experiences that we see as belonging to us.

Indeed, our assumption that we exist as distinct beings is so embedded in our psyches that it is almost inconceivable for us to seriously examine the notion that this perception of “self” could be false. After all, we remember certain events we had in our past which suggests a continuing consciousness that is aware of perceptions, emotions and thoughts that it considers to be “its own.” In addition it appears to us that we can at any moment become aware of our mental and emotional states by turning our focus inward. Not only can we desire something but we can also have the awareness of that desire; moreover we can remember our having that desire. Through such awareness and remembrance we come to assume that we are individual beings, separate selves that are distinguishable from our bodies and our mental states and from other people.

There have been, of course, many challenges to this “common sense” view. According to Gautama Buddha (d. c. 483 BCE), one’s emotions, perceptions and thoughts come and go, following one upon the other, and it is a mistake to ascribe them to a self. He taught that such a self is in fact an illusion and that the way to recognize this truth and free oneself from this illusion is to observe one’s experiences without identifying with them, without thinking of them as belonging to us. We ought to strive to be detached from our thoughts, perceptions and emotions. So, for example, when we experience anger, we should simply observe the state of anger as occurring in this moment, without identifying with the emotion and thinking of it as belonging to a self, i.e., us. In practicing this kind of non-identification with our mental and emotional experiences we may rid ourselves of the illusory self and experience reality.

David Hume (d. 1776 CE), the 18th-century Scottish philosopher, relied on reasoning from rigorous empirical observation of his inner experience to conclude that our notion of the self is an illusion. When he looked inward he could not find a separate entity above and in addition to his thoughts, perceptions, desires and passions. He wrote, “We are never intimately conscious of anything but a particular perception; man is a bundle or collection of different perceptions which succeed one another with an inconceivable rapidity and are in perpetual flux and movement.”1

Some recent neurological studies support a similar view of self. According to these studies, our brain constructs a self in order to make sense of our rich mental life and to be able to adapt to new surroundings.2 There is no evidence to suggest that in reality there is any such thing as a self above and in addition to these mental episodes. These studies suggest that the self is nothing more than a collection of our thoughts and emotions at any given time.

Sufism also views the concept of self (nafs) as an illusion. It teaches that in order to reach the truth the Sufi has to become liberated from this illusion and once so liberated will no longer experience an individual self, leading to the annihilation of that self in the divine. There is a wonderful story about this in Attar’s Elahi Nameh:

Someone once asked Shibli (d. 946 CE) who first showed him the path to God. Shibli replied that he was guided by a dog that he once saw at the edge of a pond. The dog was very thirsty, but seeing its own face reflected in the water, thought that its reflection was another dog and was so afraid of this “dog” that it could not drink. Finally, no longer being able to endure its thirst, the dog suddenly jumped into the water, whereupon the other dog disappeared. Shibli continues, “Having learned from so clear an example, I knew for certain ‘I’ was the illusion before myself. I vanished from myself and so I propose a dog was my first guide upon the path.”

In Sufism the self (nafs) is real and at the same time illusory. It is real insofar as we perceive it, but it is illusory in the sense that our own perception of self does not correspond to something real. It is similar to our perception that a straight stick half immersed in water is bent. Our perception that the stick is bent is real. Yet the bend is an illusion; in reality the stick is straight. Many Sufis have likened our experience of self to our experience of a mirage in a desert. Rumi writes in his Masnavi:

Don’t become united with yourself at every moment,
like a donkey stuck in the mud.
You see a mirage from a distance and you rush;
you fall in love with your own discovery.

But unlike Buddhism, which sees liberation from self in detachment and non-identification with the self, Sufism advocates an all-out war against it in order to be liberated from its illusory stronghold. Many great Sufis of the past practiced different methods to combat this self. Some chose asceticism, repeatedly denying the self what it desired; others followed the path of blame, behaving in a manner intended to cause other people to condemn them and thus denying theirnafs any pride in respect and praise from others. Still other Sufis practiced the unconditional love of God, serving and loving others to rid themselves of the self’s relentless demand for attention.

But one thing they have all recognised is that one cannot wage a war against the illusory self by him- or herself. The reason for this is simple: one can’t use the illusory self as a weapon to destroy itself, just as one can’t use a knife to cut itself. This is why for centuries Sufis have pointed to the deceitful nature of the self, which cannot be trusted to do anything other than preserve itself. As Rumi says in his Masnavi:

If the self tells you to fast and pray,
It’s but a trickster, hatching a plot against you.

Thus, whatever method one uses, it must be prescribed by someone other than oneself, hence the importance of a guide to prescribe the right medicine to dispel the illusion of self.

There still remain, however, some fundamental questions about how one can lose the self and what exists beyond the self. How do we “realize” that our perception of self is an illusion, assuming that we are not convinced by Hume’s arguments based on introspection? By “realize” I mean a subjective perception or experience of the illusory nature of the self. This sort of realization is something that is made manifest to the individual in a manner different from an objective, scientific determination based on, for example, experiments in neuroscience.

Even more fundamentally, how do we know that what lies beyond the illusory self is “real”? The neurologists whose studies “prove” the illusory nature of the self do not claim that this insight alone actually frees one from the false perception that there is a self, nor do they assert that it leads one to any understanding or experience of the divine.

For most people, a conviction that there is a reality outside the self doesn’t come through intellectual argument or reasoning. It comes through moments of ecstatic experiences in the world when we encounter the sublime. In such moments, which may come about in meditation, through our experience of nature or painting, music, poetry and other forms of art, or “out of nowhere,” we feel as if we leave our selves behind and become part of a more profound and inclusive reality. Such experiences lead us to suspect that there is more to reality than the experience of our own selves. They also instill in us a sense of longing for the sublime, a desire to return to the state of unity, with no consciousness of self.

George Bernard Shaw once wrote, “There are two tragedies in life. One is not to get your heart’s desire, the other is to get it.” It is the human condition that one is never satisfied with his or her situation, always seeking new hopes and ideals. Yet, the satisfaction of one desire seems always to be followed by the arrival of new ones.

Perhaps the realization that one’s desires are infinite and one will never be in a position to satisfy them makes us realize that we are suffering from an illusion, the illusion of thinking that we can satisfy something that can never be satisfied. The longing we experience for a reality outside ourselves becomes even more intense once we truly comprehend the illusory nature of the self.

But what actually happens in a state beyond self is not so susceptible to being described in words. The reality of such an experience lies at the heart of all mystical traditions.

NOTES
1  David Hume, A Treatise of Human Nature, I, IV, VI.
2  See, for example, Bruce Hood’s The Self Illusion: Why There is No ‘You’ Inside Your Head, Constable & Robinson Ltd., 2012.

 

*This discourse appears in Sufi Journal #85, Summer 2013.

Love’s Disciple: Some Recollections About Mr. Kobari

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By Alireza Nurbakhsh

 

Do not say the Beloved has left

And the City of love is empty.

The world is full of perfect masters,

But where are the sincere disciples?

 

I have always wondered what makes certain people have such a strong belief in a spiritual path and master, the kind of unshakable belief we have, for example, in the rising of the sun each morning. There are, it seems to me, two kinds of people who have such strong religious beliefs. One sort, very common in this day and age, are totally dogmatic about they believe to the extent that they find it their duty to impose their beliefs on others, sometimes even through force. Such people are fanatics and nothing of interest can be said about them.

There are, on the other hand, others who do not talk much, who have no interest in converting us to what they believe. Try as one may, one cannot figure quite figure out what their beliefs really are. They are, so to speak, true mystics, and they approach spirituality from a completely different angle, being the very embodiment of spirituality, full of deeds with few words. They speak to us through their actions with little concern about whether we believe in them or not. In short, they go ahead leading a spiritual life while the rest of us spend out time worrying about what spirituality is.

Hasan Kobari was such a person.

Raised in the province of Gilan at the edge of the Caspian Sea, Mr. Kobari was already a middle-aged man when he first came to the Nimatullahi khanaqah in Tehran. For thirty years he had devoted himself to government work, and he was at the time of his arrival at the khanaqah a high-ranking official in the Ministry of Finance with great power and prestige. However, after his initiation into the Sufi Path by Dr. Nurbakhsh, a young shaykh at the time, he resigned his government post and gave up all that he had achieved in the world to devote himself whole heartedly to the Path of Love.

Mr. Kobari hardly ever talked about Sufism; rather, he lived the life of a Sufi. If you were to push him, you might get a few words about Sufism, but even that was rare. You had to work very hard indeed to show him that you needed his advice for practical purposes before he would speak. I remember someone once asked him about the spiritual significance of a dream he’d had. Mr. Kobari responded by apologizing for not knowing anything about the meaning of dreams, telling the man that what mattered was not understanding one’s dreams but accepting them, like everything else, as Godsent and continually remembering Him. And then he asked the man to run an errand for the khanaqah, saying this was far more useful.

To the western mind, this approach to spirituality will surely sound strange. One would think that spiritual matters must be understood at some level first before putting them into practice. If I don’t know, for example, them meaning and the significance of dhikr (remembrance), how can I go about practicing it? Mr. Kobari’s approach was that the understanding comes later – after one practices what one is supposed to practice and does what one is supposed to do. For him, a spiritual life was a life of selfless deeds, and understanding the meaning and value of such deeds took place only after one became totally immersed in them. I can recall him saying once that to truly understand what pain is, one has to feel it, experience it, and that reading various theories about pain, though interesting, would never enable one to understand it fully.

* * *

Mr Kobari

           I first met Mr. Kobari when I was quite young and, naturally, very naive. Nevertheless, he accepted me with openness and respect, the way he accepted everyone. He never acted spiritually superior, despite his many years as a darvish, and always treated me as an equal. As a result, I felt quite at ease around him and began to follow him around throughout much of the day.

Since there was always something to do around the khanaqah, he allowed me to help him with various chores, such as watering the plants, serving tea, or getting the books issued by the khanaqah ready for publication. He firmly believed that the various jobs around the khanaqah had to be done in the most economical and hardest way possible. At one point I became tired of using a small pot for watering the many plants around the khanaqah and instead decided to water using a hose. As soon as Mr. Kobari saw me with the hose, he reproached me for being lazy, telling me that I was wasting water and had taken the easy way out.  He went on to explain that work around the khanaqah was there to discipline one’s nafs (ego), and that one’s nafs always wanted to take the easiest way out. At the time, his admonition didn’t make much sense to me. In my naivete, I thought, surely, the important thing was to get the job done, not how you did it. Only years later did I finally come to see the truth of his words.

Mr. Kobari constantly struggled against his nafs, against his worldly desires, to the extent that at times I wondered whether he had any sense of self at all. Even a single negative thought was enough to make him take drastic measures to correct himself. Once, in the presence of twenty or so darvishes, we were proofreading a book against the Arabic manuscript. Since he knew Arabic well, he was reading the Arabic text out loud from the manuscript while I had to see if the printed version corresponded with it.

We were in the middle of this work when the doorbell rang and a mullah who had an appointment to see the master arrived and sat with us waiting for him. The minute the mullah sat down, he asked for tea and began to preach to everyone. Mr. Kobari listened to him for a few minutes and then turned to me and said that we should continue our work. To my total astonishment, he began to recite the Arabic incorrectly, especially the Koranic verses. As soon as the mullah heard Mr. Kobari’s incorrect recitation of the Koran, he began to correct him.

For the next half an hour, the mullah constantly corrected Mr. Kobari in a very rude and obnoxious way. Each time he did so, Mr. Kobari would apologize, asking the mullah for forgiveness. After what seemed like hours, the mullah was finally summoned to see the master. As he was leaving the room, he ordered Mr. Kobari to stop reading altogether, reminding him that it was blasphemy to recite Koranic verses incorrectly.

During this episode, I had been forced to exert great restraint to keep myself from insulting or cursing out the mullah. I was also totally confused by Mr. Kobari’s actions. When I finally found him alone later that day, I asked him about the meaning of his behavior with the mullah and why he had purposely mispronounced the Arabic so badly. “The moment I saw the mullah,” he replied, “the thought entered my mind that I was better than him. So shamed did I feel by this thought that I had to make amends to the mullah and seek forgiveness for my arrogance and sense of superiority.”

Although he had the means to maintain a very comfortable lifestyle, Mr. Kobari instead lived a simple life. He devoted half of his retirement pension to the everyday necessities of the khanaqah and the other half to his family, which consisted of his wife and an old servant whom he treated like a sister. His home contained but two rooms, a small kitchen, and a garden. In the mornings he would travel around Tehran, running various errands for the khanaqah: making sure the printers were doing their job, buying groceries, going to the bank, and performing numerous other services that were essential for the everyday running of the khanaqah. In doing so, he always attempted to be as frugal as possible. As an example, he avoided taking public transportation as much as possible, traveling on foot except when this was impossible and then taking the bus rather than a taxi, with no thought of the hardship it involved.

Being with Mr. Kobari, everything became a learning experience. One day I received permission to accompany him on an important errand. Given his predilection for avoiding public transportation, I prepared myself for a very long walk. To my surprise, however, he insisted on taking a taxi that day since I was his guest. Noticing my confusion and disappointment, he added: “Sufism is a lack of attachment to anything, even refusing to take a taxi can become an attachment.”

After performing his daily chores, Mr. Kobari would go home each day to have lunch with his wife. Though he rarely invited anyone to his home, he always welcomed those who showed up, and people were always going to his home uninvited in the hope of spending a few minutes with him. I myself often had the honor of going to his home for lunch. We would eat our lunch and then afterwards watch television for half an hour on a small black and white set that he had received as a present from his daughter.

Amazingly, even while watching television, Mr. Kobari couldn’t help but be overwhelmed by a sense of the Divine. One day, for example, we happened to be watching Gunsmoke. (Certain American shows were very popular on Iranian television at the time.) In this particular episode, one of the characters ended up sacrificing his life to save an individual he barely knew. Mr. Kobari was so overwhelmed by the episode that he began to sob very quietly and then, his whole being shaking, he turned to me and in a soft voice said, “This is love, yet I am still so far away from it.” With that, I too began to cry, being totally caught up in Mr. Kobari’s state. Later, after returning home, I realized that this was the difference between a man of God and the rest of us: he perceived Divine beauty where we see only garbage.

For twenty-five years, Mr. Kobari went to the Tehran khanaqah each day from two o’clock in the afternoon until ten o’clock at night, never leaving as long as anyone else was still there. He always took on the hardest and most menial jobs in the khanaqah, setting an example for all the darvishes. During the meeting nights, even though he had given years of service to the khanaqah and earned the highest place of honor, he continued to sit in the entrance room the darvishes would leave their shoes.

The tearoom of the khanaqah where Mr. Kobari always sat and worked during the day became a kind of training school for the darvishes, at least for those darvishes with the awareness to understand what was going on. He would teach by example, offering his services sincerely to all who needed them without ever being asked or expecting anything in return. Though he was in charge of all the khanaqah business, I never heard him order anyone directly. Rather, he would let the darvishes know what needed to be done, what was correct, by his actions, by always being the first to undertake any work, starting the most arduous and unpleasant tasks himself, but never with any trace of pride or self-satisfaction.

At the same time, no task was too small for him if service to another darvish was involved, whoever the darvish and whatever the circumstances. One time, a newly initiated darvish was sitting in the gathering on one of the meeting nights. Mr. Kobari happened to pass by and the darvish, not knowing any better, asked him for tea. A number of darvishes immediately tried to get up to go for the tea in Mr. Kobari’s place, but he told all of them to sit and went for the tea for the newcomer himself.

From the moment Mr. Kobari arrived at the khanaqah until the moment he left, he was constantly busy due to his devotion to the master and the other darvishes, whose well-being he consistently put above his own. The following story, told to me by one of the older darvishes, illustrates this well. This darvish was once staying in the Tehran khanaqah during a particularly cold winter. One night, he saw Mr. Kobari leave the khanaqah at ten o’clock as usual. About two hours later, the darvish still lay awake, being unable to sleep. Suddenly, to his surprise, he noticed Mr. Kobari slipping back into the khanaqah. Puzzled, he watched to see what he was up to. After opening a closet, Mr. Kobari took out a can of kerosene and proceeded to fill the heater in the room where the darvishes slept. Then he departed as silently as he had arrived.

The next day, the darvish asked Mr. Kobari about the previous night. He hesitated for a moment, then explained that after getting home and going to bed, the thought entered his mind that the kerosene heater might be running out of fuel in the room where the darvishes were sleeping and he was afraid it might become too cold and disturb them. As a result, he had gotten up and in the dead of the cold winter night walked all the way back to the khanaqah to make sure that the darvishes would be warm enough. Of course, if it hadn’t been for the darvish seeing him that night, no one would ever have known of this act of selfless kindness. Indeed, who knows how many other times Mr. Kobari performed such acts? They were his life.

Everyone who came in contact with Mr. Kobari, including those who never knew him as a Sufi, could not help but be affected by him in some profound way. He treated everyone with great respect while at the same time managing to be very direct. On one of our many trips together, I accompanied him to the printers where we had to see the man who was in charge of the binding department. He was a middle-aged man who was very fond of Mr. Kobari and who always charged him a fair price for the binding of books.

As usual, Mr. Kobari was very courteous to the man. When we sat down to discuss the cost of the binding for the forthcoming book, he suddenly turned to Mr. Kobari and said, “Please, can this matter wait? I want to ask your opinion concerning a much more serious matter.” He then went on to tell Mr. Kobari that he had decided to become a Sufi and would appreciate it if Mr. Kobari would ask the master about the possibility of him being initiated.

Without hesitation, Mr. Kobari shook his head and told the binder that Sufism was not good for him. Dumbfounded since he knew Mr. Kobari’s devotion to Sufism, the man then asked him how this could be so. “Because,” Mr. Kobari answered, “if you become a Sufi, you will no longer be able to charge us for the binding of our books. Do you think you can give up this money?”

The man lowered his head and fell silent for a long time. Finally, Mr. Kobari broke the silence, saying to him, “If you really want to know the truth, I’ve come to the conclusion that everybody is a Sufi in his or her own way without realizing it. Now let’s talk about the cost of the binding for the book since this matter is much more urgent.” After Mr. Kobari’s death, the binder came to accept the condition he had set down and was initiated into the Path.

Towards the end of his life, Mr. Kobari grew so physically weak that he could barely manage to commute from his home to the khanaqah. Thus, one day the master asked him to move into the khanaqah. Mr. Kobari was overjoyed at the master’s invitation, for moving into the khanaqah had always been his dream. More than once he had told me that the only thing he still wanted from God was to be able to live and die in the khanaqah among the darvishes and near the master.

Needless to say, he was very excited at first about living in the khanaqah. After twenty-five years of going to the khanaqah, he was at last going to be able to live in the place about which he cared so much. Soon, though, he realized it was much easier to commute to the khanaqah each day than to live in it. Living in the khanaqah, he was constantly concerned, sometimes to the point of being obsessed, with the well-being of the darvishes and the state of the khanaqah. Once he moved into the khanaqah, he found that he couldn’t sleep anymore, always feeling obligated to check and double-check everything, such that he soon grew very ill. Eventually the situation became so bad that he asked the master for permission to go home and die in peace. And that is what he did.

On March 23, 1978, a few weeks after returning home, Mr. Kobari died peacefully in bed. Perhaps the most fitting epitaph for him is the description of the disciple provided in The Path by Dr. Nurbakhsh, the master to whom he was so devoted:

      The disciple is a sincere seeker who is freed from all attachments. The disciple longs for God as he or she passes from ‘self’ and takes to the Path not speaking of self. Such a one has no tale to tell about his or her ‘I’ and can never complain about the Beloved.

The disciple is a lover whose heart is languishing and weary. He or she is one who has passed beyond both worlds and become united with the Truth. Such a one seeks God alone, and in his or her words there is only talk of God. The disciple approaches the Beloved and is ensnared by Love. Moment to moment, he or she continually purifies the mirror of the heart from the tarnish of ‘self’, and through the grace of God it shines brilliantly with His light.

 

This article originally appeared in Sufi Journal, Issue 17, Spring 1993.

Caring for Others: Sufism and Altruism

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“If we are to survive as a species on this planet, we need to embrace views or belief systems that are inclusive of others.”

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By Alireza Nurbakhsh

from Sufi Journal, Issue 84 

Altruism has been a central aspect of Persian Sufism since it was developed by such figures as Ibrahim Adham (d. 782), Shaqiq Balkhi (d. 810), Bayazid (d. 874), Abul-Hasan Kharaqani (d. 1033) and Abu Said Abel Khayr (d. 1049) in the region of Khorasan, now the north-eastern part of Iran. Altruism, as developed by these early Khorasanian Sufis and practiced by Persian Sufis for centuries down to the present day, advocates that Sufis—indeed all human beings—should serve God by remaining in society and helping and serving others. It stands in stark contrast with the Sufi tradition that was developed in Baghdad by Junaid (d. 910) and his followers, which advocated the practice of renunciation and withdrawal from society as the central tenet of Sufism.

Altruism is a disposition in human beings and some animals that enables them to do something for other beings with no expectation of reward or even of receiving recognition for one’s altruistic act. Certain acts of altruism come naturally to most of us. If we see a blind woman who needs help to cross a street, we instinctively offer her assistance. If we see destitute people in abject poverty, we are moved and try to ease their pain by giving them some of our possessions. If we see an infant crying, we naturally wish to comfort the child. There are also many examples of altruism in the animal kingdom. Dolphins, for example, have been known to support sick or injured animals by swimming under them for hours at a time and pushing them to the surface so they can breathe.

Recent studies in neuroscience suggest that there is a neurological basis for altruism, that this trait is inherent in us. These experiments show that when we generously place the interests of others before our own, a primitive part of our brain—usually stimulated in response to food and sex—becomes activated, suggesting that altruism is not a superior moral faculty but rather something hard-wired in our brain, that when stimulated makes us feel good (see note 1). In other words, it is natural for us to behave altruistically; it is not instilled in us through religion or moral teachings. It comes to us as easily as eating food.

Altruistic behavior is rooted in empathy, in the ability to put oneself in another’s position and identify with his or her state or situation. Again, recent studies in neuroscience have shown that observing another person’s emotional state activates parts of the brain that are involved in processing the same state in oneself (see note 2). Thus, when we are confronted with the pain of another person, we tend to feel pain ourselves. Research has also shown that in people suffering from certain types of psychopathology the components of neural circuits involved in empathy are impaired, causing them not to care about other people and their feelings.

If altruism and empathy are so natural and basic to our physiology, why then do we so often act selfishly, pursuing what we think is in our best interests without regard to the feelings and interests of others? What has gone wrong? No doubt a comprehensive answer to this question requires a deeper understanding of human nature through a number of disciplines, including genetics, neurophysiology, anthropology and psychology. But here I would like to venture a limited response to this question in terms of our higher cognitive functions.

Recent scientific research shows that animals and humans are more altruistic towards close members of their family and friends than towards their distant kin and non-kin (see note 3). This is because we are more able and willing to empathize with those most similar to ourselves. In particular, empathy increases with similarities in culture and living conditions (see note 4). Put another way, the more dissimilar we feel towards others, the less likely it is that we will empathize with them and treat them with generosity.

There are many factors involved in causing us to feel similar or dissimilar to others, including our family upbringing and the cultural, religious and moral values of the society in which we happen to exist. The more we are indoctrinated by ideologies and value-systems that emphasize our differences from people whose customs or beliefs differ from our own, the more likely it is that we will lack empathy for them. We will tend to perceive such people as “other,” as somehow less than fully human. When we dehumanize others, we are no longer capable of empathizing with them. In the Holocaust and many other cases of genocide or mass killing, people were willing to destroy other people, even their own neighbors, without guilt or remorse because they were led to believe that their victims were so different from them that they were in fact not human beings!

If we are to survive as a species on this planet, we need to embrace views or belief systems that are inclusive of others, that emphasize the essential similarities among people rather than the differences, which we know with a moment’s reflection to be superficial and insignificant in comparison. Our views of the world should reinforce our basic instincts of altruism and empathy. Take, for example, the notion of sin that is an element of many religions. Once one views a person as sinful, one creates a chasm between oneself and that person, thereby blocking the path of empathy. By contrast, consider the concept of compassion, which is an integral part of Buddhist practice. Here we are encouraged to direct our compassion equally towards all beings, without distinction, which is in complete agreement with our natural instincts of empathy and altruism.

Sufism also is known for its inclusive nature. All living creatures are essentially manifestations of one being, one reality, and therefore the entire cosmos is in essence one and the same thing—a reflection of the divine. One who experiences the unity of being will embrace all of humanity and all living things with the utmost feelings of empathy. It is in the spirit of such altruism that Kharaqani placed a sign at the entrance of his khaniqah with the following message: “Whoever comes here should be given food without being asked about their creed and religion.”

The altruism practiced by the early Khorasanian Sufis went beyond the practice of altruism as I have described here. In fact it was defined in terms of caring for the welfare of others before and prior to one’s own welfare and comfort, without any expectation of reward.

‘Attar, one of the greatest Sufi poets (d. 1221), relates the following story about Ibrahim Adham. One day three people were performing their devotional practices in a ruined mosque. After they went to sleep, Ibrahim stood by the door of the mosque until morning. When he was asked later to explain his action, he replied that the weather was very cold and a harsh wind was blowing. Since there was no door to the mosque, he stood in the threshold to make it possible for the people inside to sleep.

Some Sufis have gone so far as to say that one’s altruism is the most important disposition in reaching God. Kharaqani relates the following story to his disciples: There were two brothers, one who devoted himself completely to God and the other who dedicated himself to their mother. After a while the brother who devoted himself to God had a vision in which God tells him that his brother has reached salvation through serving their mother. He was puzzled and asked God for an explanation. “Because,” God replied, “He served the needy and you served the One who has no need.”

Another reason why we lose our empathy for others is our preoccupation with our problems and ourselves. When we become depressed, anxious or angry because our lives are not as we would like we lose the capacity to care about other people. We become so crippled with our own state that we have no time to feel others.

There are, of course, many methods to overcome such negative states, ranging from psychiatric drugs and psychotherapy to the practice of meditation. In the Sufi tradition, however, the main remedy to cure oneself of such negative states is to actively engage in altruistic actions even when one is not inclined to do so. This enforces our natural instincts. Persistent altruism towards one’s spiritual guide and other people, regardless of how one feels or what one wants for oneself, will help the spiritual traveller to rid himself or herself of negative states. This is also borne out by recent psychological studies that indicate there is strong correlation between altruism and the general well-being of an individual. People who engage in helping others suffer significantly less depression and anxiety than those who do not (see note 5). Clearly altruism plays a key factor in our psychological health.

The early Sufis of Khorasan discovered something fundamental about spirituality as well as the biology of our humanity: that the path of enlightenment converges with our basic instinct of empathy and altruism. Their discovery was as significant then as it is relevant now. With the world population increasing at an alarming rate (by the year 2050 it is estimated the world population will be nine and a half billion), and with limited resources in many poor countries, it seems inevitable that conflicts will increase throughout the world. Though we may never be able to eliminate conflict between people, we can certainly contribute to its decline by following the path of the Sufis from Khorasan.

Notes
1  See, for example, Jorge Moll and Jordan Grafman. “Human Fronto-Mesolimbic Networks Guide Decisions About Charitable Donation.” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, October 17, 2006, Vol. 103 (42), pp. 15623-15628.
2  See, for example, Preston, S., & de Waal, F. “Empathy: Its ultimate and proximate bases.” Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 2002, 25(1), pp. 1-71.
3  See, for example, Okasha, Samir. “Biological Altruism.” Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy.
4  Hoffman, M.L. Empathy and Moral Development. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 2000.
5  See, for example, Hunter, K. I. and Linn, M. W. “Psychosocial differences between elderly volunteers and non-volunteers”, The International Journal of Aging & Human Development, 1980, 12 (3): 205-213.

Friendship

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by Alireza Nurbakhsh

from Sufi Journal, issue 82

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The Sufis refer to God as the Friend (dūst). This is based on the Koranic verse yuhibbuhum wa yuhibbuhunah (God loves them and they love Him, 5:45), which is interpreted by the Sufis as meaning that it is God’s love for us that gives rise to our love for Him. Fakhruddin Iraqi, the 13th-century Persian Sufi, defines friendship with God as a relationship where God’s love precedes the spiritual traveller’s love for God. Put another way, God is the Friend because He instilled in us the experience of love and loving-kindness. One can interpret this to mean that from a Sufi point of view a friend is someone who leads us to experience love and friendliness.

But there is a deeper reason for referring to God as the Friend. This is, I believe, to highlight that through the act of friendship one can experience oneness. By this I mean the experience whereby we do not “see” ourselves as being separate from others. This gradual loss of focus on the self may begin with feeling empathy with others, then grow into a sense of identification with others and sometimes culminate in the experience of oneness, in which one is no longer conscious of any separation between oneself and other people. Muhammad Shirin Maghribi, the 14th-century Persian Sufi, has written the following poem about such an experience:

That spiritual friend knocked at my door last night.
“Who is it?” I asked. He answered, “Open the door. It is you!”
“How can I be You?” I asked. He answered, “We are one,
but the veil has hidden us in duality.”
We and I, he and you, have become the veil,
And how well this has veiled you from yourself!
If you wish to know how we and he and all are one,
Pass beyond this ‘I’, this ‘we’, this ‘you’.

The act of friendship is different from the act of loving. In a relationship of friendship both parties care for each other and give and receive benefits from each other. This reciprocity may not exist in the act of loving, for we may love someone without our beloved giving anything in return or even knowing that he or she is being loved by us.

Aristotle was one of the first philosophers in antiquity to write about the nature of friendship. In his Nicomachean Ethics he sets forth three main reasons why people become friends with one another. These reasons are pleasure, utility and good character. Of these, Aristotle believed that only a friendship based on good character can turn out to be a perfect friendship. This is because it is only in such a friendship that one likes or loves the other person for the other person’s sake. In friendship based on pleasure or utility, though we may confer benefit to our friend, our basic motive is to receive benefit for ourselves.

According to Aristotle, a true friend is one who not only likes us for who we are but also one who wants what is good for us. Friendship is a relationship of reciprocal goodwill in which each party likes the other party for the other person’s sake, always wanting what is good for the other.

There are two aspects of Aristotle’s view of friendship that are relevant to our understanding of friendship from the Sufi point of view. The first aspect is that a perfect or true friendship should not be based on any ulterior motive. The more we like someone for who they are, the closer we get to not experiencing our “self” in the act of friendship. The stripping away of ulterior motives in our friendship with others brings us closer to the experience of oneness, for it is our desire to benefit ourselves first and foremost that keeps us from this experience.

The second aspect of Aristotle’s theory of friendship is what he called eunoia, meaning “goodwill” or “wanting what is good for the other.” Aristotle does not explain it, as he may have thought that this concept is sufficiently clear. From the Sufi view of friendship, “wanting what is good for the other” not only means to confer benefit on the other but also encompasses two other fundamental principles.

The first principle is the acceptance of one’s friends as they are, without criticizing them for their shortcomings. Friends do not “see” any faults in each other because each “sees” the other as being part of the whole, the One. There is a story about Ibrahim Adham, a 9th-century Persian Sufi from Khorasan, who was once visited by a stranger. The guest stayed with Ibrahim for a few days and when he was about to leave, he asked Ibrahim to make him aware of any faults that Ibrahim had noticed during his stay. Ibrahim replied, “I looked at you with the ‘eye’ of friendship and therefore everything about you was pleasant to me.”

The second principle is that for Sufis goodwill should be understood as wanting what is good for other first and foremost and prior to wanting what is good for oneself. One’s friends always have priority over oneself.

Sufis also refer to their spiritual guide as a friend, and the relationship between master and disciple in Sufism is often depicted as one of friendship. The meaning of “goodwill” in this context, however, becomes different. It seems that for Aristotle both the giver and the receiver of goodwill should be cognizant of the act of goodwill. This is how friends enjoy and appreciate their friendship, and this is also implied in my discussion above about friendship and Sufism.

But in the context of the spiritual guide’s relationship with the disciple, “what is good for the other” may not be what disciple wants; instead it may be unpleasant or even painful. This is because most of us are prisoners of our own ego and therefore consider the behavior of others toward us as “goodwill” only if it satisfies our own desires and wishes.  A spiritual guide in Sufism is someone who, without any expectation of appreciation or gratitude, creates every opportunity for us to confront our nafs (ego) and realize our own imperfections and then helps us overcome our shortcomings. This can sometimes evoke in us pain or anger at our guide, as we usually react negatively when people show us our own shortcomings.

Rumi in his Mathnawi, tells the story of Dhu’l-Nun, a Sufi master who lived during the 9th-century and was put away in an asylum by his own people because they could not tolerate his strange behavior. One day a group of Dhu’l-Nun’s so-called friends decided to visit him. As they were about to enter his room, Dhu’l-Nun asked them who they were; they replied that they were his friends. As soon as Dhu’l-Nun heard this, he began acting like a madman and cursed them, whereupon they all fled.

Dhu’l-Nun burst out laughing, shaking his head,
“Look at the hot air of my so-called friends.”
A true friend never feels burdened by the suffering of another,
The kindness of a friend is like a shell engulfing one’s suffering.
The sign of friendship cannot be found in good times,
It is at times of calamity and suffering that we come to know our friends.
A friend is like gold and one’s suffering resembles  fire.
Pure gold remains blissful in the midst of fire.

Dhu’l-Nun’s behavior was indeed an act of goodwill although his so-called friends did not have the insight to perceive it as such. He gave them an opportunity to realize their own hypocrisy and insincerity—an opportunity that they did not perceive or embrace—and thus he continued to pay the price for his goodwill, remaining confined in the asylum.

What Dhu’l-Nun’s friends lacked was the quality of trust in their friend. It is through trust of our friends that we give them the opportunity to expose us to their essential kindness. It is through trust that we can accept our friends the way they are and believe that ultimately they want what is good for us. The expression of “trust in God” means to accept, in a profound sense, what happens to us in the course of our lives because God as friend always wants what is good for us although we may not always perceive it as such.