Tuesday, September 15, 2009


WOW!

This has been a really interesting week. Eight or nine days ago, I'm not sure exactly, I received a message from someone who wanted to know if I would help some younger people in Istanbul establish a Sufi group. I will not go into details about the ensuing conversation but I did want to talk about the means by which this person found me. It turns out that my book, The Sovereign Soul, had been translated into Turkish. I had no idea this had happened. I was both really excited and worried that my book had been pirated. I could not understand why a pirate would go to all the trouble of doing a translation however. Pirating CD's and DVD's I can understand but translating a book is a lot of work. As it turned out, my publisher had sent the Turkish publisher a word file of my book and a contract was in the works. I was left out of the loop but I guess it gets that way sometimes. But there is more. The really cool part is that the book is selling really well in Turkey. Apparently there is a very real hunger in Turkey for Sufism sans Islam. This causes me to wonder how many other countries, filled with religious assumptions, have a sub-culture of dissatisfied seekers, wishing for something beyond the normal, traditional religious associations with mysticism.
If someone really seriously desires religious association then that is fine. But when they also insist that anyone who approaches them for esoteric instruction also embrace their particular version of spiritual reality then they are making mysticism small.
Those of us who offer instruction in mysticism must be extra cautious not to impose our needs on the consciousness of those that we teach. Our task is to aid those we instruct in discovering their own dormant qualities. It is not our task to demand that someone anyone become our clone.
There is a real potential within the esoteric community to embrace those who feel disenfranchised by their own culture. They are crying for teaching, for something real, but they do not want to be told what they must believe. And isn't that how evolution really happens? When someone says, I want but not that, then they are reaching beyond what they know into the unknown and asking for something that they sense but cannot quite grasp. Maybe it is time for those of us who teach to catch up with those who are seeking instruction.

Love & Blessings, Musawwir

ps: next year there will also be a Hindi edition of The Sovereign Soul translated by Readworthy Publications

4 comments:

Maggie said...

Wow is right! And how lovely that a group of young people in Turkey should request your help with setting up a Sufi group! I am so pleased and happy for you....you know I am smiling!

Love and Blessings,

Wahida

Za'ida said...

Hey, that's indeed great news! The waves your book has sent across the ocean are reaching far.

I'm happy for you

Za'ida

Anonymous said...

Musawwir,
This is terrific news and very timely in both the US and in Turkey since both countries are in need of soul level healing.

We will have to have you come visit us at Montclair State University again soon!

Many blessings to you,
Esmilda

Susan said...

Change is the only certainty in life. When we find no answers to our deepest questions, we seek more. You offer a way to learn more and perhaps a better way of thinking when properly taught. Congratulations indeed, to you who have so much to offer and to those seeking to learn.