Idries Shah Quotes
Hazrat Ali, in a saying attributed to him, says: ‘Man is in disguise, covered by his tongue’.
A short time in the presence of the Friends (the Sufis) is better than a hundred years’ sincere, obedient dedication.
Do not tell your secrets to everyone in this headquarters, Earth. We have surveyed it well. There was nobody to whom to entrust secrets.
Abu-Yaqub al-Susi: 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.
Sufism is, in operation, pragmatic.
I longed to teach, but I had to wait until the desire had left me before I could really do so.
Nobody can stand between you and knowledge if you are fit for it.
Whoever might perfume a scorpionWill not thereby escape its sting. Bahaudin Naqshband
A book, for the Sufis, is an instrument as much as it is something to give information....The key is the teacher.
That which is given free is never knowledge. It may be information....but knowledge does not come in that manner.
To say "yes" to the Sufi way is to say "no" to imagined escapes.
When prayer, rituals and ascetic life are just a means of self-indulgence, they are harmful rather than beneficial.
Three things cannot be retrieved:The arrow once sped from the bowThe word spoken in hasteThe missed opportunity. Ali, the Lion of Islam.
Feeling important is a vice, not a virtue, however concealed as participation in something noble.
With enough information, it is almost impossible "not" to predict people's action.
But the minimum human duty is to serve others: it is no great attainment.
Sayings of the ProphetTrust: Trust in God – but tie your camel first.
Whoever gives knowledge to a fool loses itAnd who keeps it from the deserving does wrong.
ServiceI will not serve God like a labourer, in expectation of my wages.Rabia el-Adawia.
Sufism is therefore not 'Do as I say and not as I do', or even 'Do as I do', but 'Experience and you will know'.
The people of the world have a fixed destiny. But the spiritually developed receive what is “not” in their destiny.
Voice in the nightA voice whispered to me last night: 'There is no such thing as a voice whispering in the night!
As the Eastern saying, by the sage Hilali, has it, 'one person who understands is worth a hundred who merely obey a custom.
WisdomSufian said: 'The wisdom which is invisible but which sustains is a hundred times better than the appearance of wisdom, for that has itself to be sustained.
Sufism, the "secret tradition, " is not available on the basis of assumptions which belong to another world, the world of intellect.
Saying of the Mulla Nasrudin. If I survive this life without dying, I'll be surprised.
I have heard all that you have had to say to me on your problems.You ask me what to do about them.It is my view that your real problem is that you are a member of the human race.Face that one first.
Greed harms you: generosity helps you. This is why is has been said: 'Greed is the mother of incapacity'.
Water shrinks wool, urgency shrinks time.Shrinkage may be an advantage or the reverse, according to expectation.
A great deal of thought is only a substitute for the thoughts that the individual would really find useful at the time.
The stupidest man I ever met had a favourite saying.It was:'What do you think I am, stupid, or something?
What is sometimes thought to be clever is, significantly often, merely an advanced form of foolishness.
People cannot handle prejudice because they try to deal with the symptom. Prejudice is the symptom, wrong assumptions are the cause.'Prejudice is the daughter of assumption.
Banality is like boredom: bored people are boring people, people who think that things are banal are themselves banal.Interesting people can find something interesting in all things.
A motto of the human race: Let me do as I like, and give me approval as well.
