Introduction by Coleman Barks
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- Introduction by Coleman Barks
What We’re Missing
On television we see lines of Islamic men bowing down, touching their foreheads to the ground, sitting back, standing up, kneeling, bowing again. What we may not see is that they’re doing a form of prayer acknowledging unity, not political or religious solidarity with each other, but praising the mystery of oneness within all living things, all molecules even. That unity, which makes us want to bow in praise and surrender is true Islam. I met the essence of that in Muhammad Raheem Bawa Muhaiyaddeen.
“My brothers and sisters,” he tells us in this book (pp. 129-130), “even though we have not yet seen God, there is no place where He does not exist. He is within every life. He is in the trees, the flowers, the fruits, and in the plants and shrubs and vines. There would be no flowers or fruits on a tree if His power did not exist within it. When we squeeze a fruit its sweet juice can quench our thirst and satisfy our hunger, because it has His power within it. The same intensity of sweetness exists within the ideals of Islam.”
In these times, people in the West may have difficulty tasting that “intensity of sweetness,” but it is there. It was there in Bawa Muhaiyaddeen’s presence, and hopefully it will come through these words of his to readers.
So there’s the unity and the sweetness. There is also the deep inward search. “…if you can know your own life and understand it, you will find the ocean of divine knowledge within you. You will find the Qur’an within you. You are the Qur’an; you are your own book. If you can study that book and reach the state of fully ripened knowledge, then you will be able to speak of its sweetness and know peace and comfort in your life.” (pp. 126-127)
There is also a coolness and peace in Islam, like the coolness of the huge round pillars that hold up the Blue Mosque in Istanbul. They are filled with circulating spring water.
As-salaamu ‘alaikum (God’s peace be with you) is the greeting heard everywhere; I have come across an interesting etymology that I hope is true. In the 1840’s sailors back from the slave trade routes in the English seaports of Bristol and Cardiff were heard exchanging the greetings they had heard among the slaves. “So long,” one would say, and “So long,” the other would answer. They were mispronouncing As-salaamu ‘alaikum, the salaam part anyway. I love it when sacred traditions mix in a friendly way, so that when some good old boy in overalls in Thomson, Georgia backs his pickup out of the hardware store parking lot, and waves to the guys on the steps, what they are wishing each other is the peace of Islam. We know not what we do. So long.
Bawa Muhaiyaddeen advised that we should look within our religions and
find where we meet. A child asked him once what she should say at school
when they asked her what religion she was. The answer he gave can help us
learn how to widen the boundaries of community until we all become one family.
“Say, ‘I am Saivam (a Hindu).’ And if they
ask you what Saivam is, say, ‘Saivam is purity.’
“Then say, ‘I am a Christian.’ And if they ask you what
Christianity is, say, ‘I follow the pure soul.’
“Then say, ‘I am a Jew.’ If they ask you what that means,
say, ‘It means…to be freed from all the things that enslave
us in our life so we can reach that pure soul.’
“Then say, ‘I am Islam.’ And when they ask you what Islam
means, say, ‘Islam is unity. La¯ ila¯ha illalla¯h.
There is nothing else other than God. You are Allah, You are God. That
is the kalimah. You affirm that there is only one God and have firm faith
in Him....My religion is purity. To become free and to become one family
is Islam....’
“Tell them, ‘I am in a group that brings all people together in unity. God said that when we go to Him we must go as one. I belong to a group that unites everyone, so I belong to all the groups.’” (Why Can’t I See the Angels? pp. 73-74)
Here in 2002, our situation has gotten very simple and urgent: If we hold
to what divides us into different religions, nations, and races, we will
be encouraging the world itself to commit suicide. Read this book then,
as Rumi tells us to read: Feel the presence inside the language, the healing
and the compassion and the tremendous courtesy. Adab, courtesy and
manners, is a deep quality in the Islamic and Sufi traditions. Francis of
Assisi absorbed the Sufi gentleness. Thich Nhat Hanh and the Dalai Lama
suggest that it is time for us to become conscious of our anger and not
to act from there. Only more suffering comes from such discourtesy. We must
sit down and talk with the great souls of other lineages, find where we
agree and develop understanding when we cannot agree. We must protect and
nourish each human life. As Bawa Muhaiyaddeen instructed:
“Make yourself aware, and by making yourself aware, you will make others aware. Don’t
waste your time. We have very little time left! We must say this silently
with every breath, Other than God there is nothing.
God alone exists. “In this way we are in unity with the eternal One.”
Love is the way this sense of unity says its truth. Love for every life form on this fragile blue planet, and in the eighteen thousand universes (!) too, that Bawa Muhaiyaddeen referred to with such grace and tenderness and humor.
Coleman Barks July 24, 2002