Ramadan Special: Tales of Sufi Wisdom

Re: # 77

urstruly:

I have one serious question.

why to you say the following?

"..Absolute Truth that there is One Creator who created the whole universe"

why is that a "truth". can you convince me that there is only one god that has created this universe. I would like to listen to your reasoning.

"Those who deny this Truth, do it only because of their arrogance and arrogance alone."

it can be said the other way also, those who believe it because of their gullibility and gullibility alone. no?

thats incorrect. i would neither

#80 Kaal

Mashallah Kaal, you are almost a muslim by now. In fact I will give you a muslim name. Henceforth, I shall refer to you as Usman the pious.

You are absolutely correct in your statement that sufism should not be considered a better form of Islam which is inaccessible to the poor (actually sufism is spread heavily amongst the poor), but your point is valid.

In fact, sufism is not supposed to be an Islamic sect. It is just a spiritual and philosophical school of thought. Sufism is important for those that are interested in it. E.g. In some cases, Philosophy may not be of interest to a business man or engineer. However, not studying philosophy does not mean that the engineer cannot live a great moral, accomplished life either.

Usman the pious, hopefully I have been of some help.
with much respect,
thinking storm

urstruly: it is not for humans to know the Absolute Truth. You need to understand the difference between Belief and Knowledge - since only then can you be intellectually honest and a believer at the same time.

Re: # 56 Dawa

I am great admirer of Pir Mehr Ali Shah Sahib. It is because of him that people in Punjab were saved from the Fitna-e-Quadiyaniat. As a matter of when Pir Sahib challeneged Mirza, the later was an undefeated champion on the manazra circuit in those days. Therefore, when Mirza lost the debate with Pir Sahib, it became the biggest news in Punjab and rest of Hindustan. May Allah bless Pir Sahib for his efforts.

Having said that please keep in mind that what traspired betweem Pir Sahib and Mirza was a debate. Manazra is a special kind of debate that goes like a dialogue of arguments and counter-arguments. The issue under debate was Mirza's claim that he was prophet of God; the counter argument, of course was, that he wasn't.

Now if you look at the nature of questions (or answers) that Pir Sahib posed to mirza, it will show the sheer genius of Pir Sahib.

For example consider this reply by Pir Sahib when he agreed to write the Tafseer of Qura'n as challenged by Mirza. Pir Sahib said " (yes lets sit down at tables and write tafseer but) whose pen raised in the air automatically and start writing the tafseer ..he will be the winner and the other will be a liar...."

Now look at this argument. This argument does not provide an industructible proof that Pir Sahib could definitely make his pen raise by itself therefore he challenged Miraz with this test. On the other hand we should see that Pir Sahib was claiming to be nothing but a mortal servant of God whereas Mirza's claim was that of Prophethood; so if things were to come to that that they actually sat on their respective tables and Mirza could not raise his pen by itself it would have falsified his claim of prophethood; whereas if pir sahib could not raise that pen it wouldn't even prove that he himself was a liar because he never claimed such thing. Mirza was trapped into his own net here.

A similar argument can be made with respect to Pir sahib's counter argument to jumping from the minaret of Badshahi mosque. In this case also the burden of proof that Mirza reached the ground safe and sound because he was prophet of God, lied entirely with Mirza. Had the things com to that and both gentlemen jumped from the minaret there was an equally likely chance that both would have died instantly. But in that case Islam would have gotten rid of an imposter and Pir Sahib would have become the martyr who made that happen. This is the genius of Pir Sahib. His argument though should not be construed as the proof that he had the ability to survive the 100 meter fall.

Here I must quote the immortal maxim which goes like thsi:

Pir Sahib nahinH uRtay, aqeedatmandt ki aqeedat unhain uRati hai

Re: # 81 Netizen

In order to focus our dicussion, may I ask whether you are speaking from the position of a polytheist or an atheist, because both take a diferrent argument respectively. The third position is that of a monotheist, which obviously is not your postion. There are only three possibilities.

ts sahib, I take that as a great, although undeserved, compliment. Thanks. Whatever little I have learnt is from the abu bakr of chowk, zee ustaad, whom I genuinely admire. :)

Usman the pious,

I see that you have seen fit to learn the more "orthodox" version of Islam. To each his own my gentle friend :)
with much respect,
thinking storm

Kaalchakra:

naqshbandi says he is a scientist.
jayp says he is an engineer.

naqshbandi says a sufi can make dead parrots walk.
jayp says killing goats can help planes fly.

Moral: getting science or engineering degrees does not mean that pigs dont have wings. or something like that. :-)

urstruly: you ignored my questioning your assumption that you knew the "Absolute Truth". is it that hard to acknowledge the obvious?

Re: # 85

" There are only three possibilities"

what if I say I am an agnostic?

#83 Bro Tahmed

How can one be intellectually honest if one is not a true believer???
How can one be a true believer if one is not intellectually honest???

Re: # 83

tahmed:

"it is not for humans to know the Absolute Truth."

why not??

are humans supposed to know no truth at all or just partial truth?

Re: # 89

I did not ignore your "questioning" but the following statement of yours does not constitute as questioning. In that statement you are only telling me your own position on the issue of the Absolute Truth. So what is the question?

"urstruly: it is not for humans to know the Absolute Truth. You need to understand the difference between Belief and Knowledge - since only then can you be intellectually honest and a believer at the same time. "

Re: # 90 Netizen

Being agnostic is not a position. Have you ever doubted that the computer screen sitting right in front is not a computer screen at all. Have such doubt ever crossed your mind that it in fact is a cow that eats and regurgitates electricity? Or the computer screen in front of you is only "partially" computer screen and rest of it is an egg. If you are an agnostic then what has made you so sure of the existence of the computer in front of you.

ts sahib

Yes. Unorthodox approaches appeared thoroughly unsatisfactory (to me). They never provided anything new, didn't explain anything of substance (beyond offering confined views of their own little niches), and totally failed to do justice to either the great faith or to its many many believers.

Developing an orthodox understanding meant going to the heart of the matter, and from there, one could see everything else flowing out, as it were, in its own merry way.

At another time, would love to get your informed opinion on these and other matters.

Best regards.


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tahmedji

That posed this quandary. Are many of those flying around on beautiful wings just.... pigs (of some sort)?

LOL

(That is not meant to offend anyone - Hindu, Muslim, Sikh, Isai. Just a crazy thought.).

Re: # 94

urstruly:
"Being agnostic is not a position. Have you ever doubted that the computer screen sitting right in front is not a computer screen at all. "

do you believe that an atheist thinks that there is no computer screen in front of him as he is surfing the web!
or a polytheist believes that there are 2.5 millions of them in front of him?

Let me rephrase my earlier post to you.

I cannot say convincingly that there is a god or not. It seems that you are very convinces about the existence of only one god who runs the entire universe. hence would you please tell me how it works and why he/she/it is the only one.