Doctor Nur

Doctor Nur

Sunday, January 29, 2012

Sufism and A Course in Miracles

Before I discovered Sufism, I studied a book by Helen Schuman titled A Course in Miracles. She said the material came to her through her mind from a voice she identified as Jesus.
Since discovering Sufism I have often noticed how it supports what I learned from studying A Course in Miracles (ACIM) and in many ways I think made Music of the Soul by Muhammad al-Jamal easier to understand when I first read it. The study of Sufism has answered many of the unanswered questions ACIM left me with and the practices of Sufism which my guide has given me have allowed me to deepen in the experiences of concepts ACIM introduced to me. For example:

 “I am not a body I am free I am still as God created me”

Okay, what am I then? What does it mean to be a human being? From the Qur’an and Hadith collections of the Prophet Muhammad, may Allah bless him and give him peace, we know the first human being was Adam, may peace and blessings be upon him, whom Allah created on his form and taught him the names. Since Allah has no “form”, we know by inference that this refers to the attributes of Allah. The same is true of the names, which can mean not only the “names” of Allah, referring to attributes but also knowledge of all things which even the angels did not have. Allah is the Knower (al-Alim), so what does it mean for a human being to have qualities and attributes like Allah? Similar does not mean the same, Allah is much more. However, knowledge of the portion of the names (attributes/qualities) which Allah has bestowed on the human being does give one intellectual insight into our original nature.

“I am not a body I am free I am still as God created me”

This can be interpreted as a spirit with the attributes of God. After Allah created the spirits He asked them, “Who is your Lord?” they answered, “You are.” Then Allah began to veil them with 70,000 veils of light and the spirits incarnated into physical forms over time as decreed by Allah. Even then, the lesson is true that “I am not a body I am free I am still as God created me” but it was more hidden and with our physical body we had not only 70,000 veils of light to penetrate to know our original state but 10,000 veils of darkness from the physical world and the substance of the clay from which we are composed.

ACIM: “Freedom must be impossible as long as you perceive a body as yourself.  The body is a limit.  Who would seek for freedom in a body looks for it where it cannot be found.  The mind can be made free when it no longer sees itself as in a body, firmly tied to it, and sheltered by its presence.  If this were the truth, the minds were vulnerable indeed!

The path of the Sufi is to return to the self that Allah originally created by returning to the Creator Himself ( hence the hadith, die before you die) and ultimately annihilating the self by becoming One with the Creator.  “When you know yourself, you know your Lord.”  Sidi Muhammad has blessed us with instructions on how to do this in his books, He Who Knows Himself Knows His LordMusic of the Soul and Path to Allah Most High and others.


ACIM:
“I am not a body.  I am free. For I am still as God created me.”

 I trust my brothers, who are one with me.”

No-one but is my brother.  I am blessed
with oneness with the universe and God,
my Father, One [one] Creator of the whole
that is my Self, forever One [one] with me.

“I am not a body.  I am free. For I am still as God created me.”

 “I will be still a moment and go home.”

Why would I choose to stay an instant more
where I do not belong, when God Himself
has given me His Voice to call me home?

Remembrance, dhikr means to remember Allah in our hearts, on our tongues, by ourselves or in a group. 

"Whoever comes to me walking, I go to him at speed." (Al Bukhari). "Unquestionably, by the remembrance of Allah are hearts are assured." (Qur’an, 13:28).


The practice of remembrance helps to pierce the veils that have covered our hearts and caused us to forget “I am as God Created me”.


The Prophet Muhammad, peace and blessings upon him, in a sacred hadith qudsi said, “I am to my servant as he expects of Me, I am with him when he remembers Me. If he remembers Me in his heart, I remember him to Myself, and if he remembers Me in an assembly, I mention him in an assembly better than his. (Bukhari and Muslim).


 “I am not a body.  I am free.
For I am still as God created me.”

 “I call upon God’s Name and on my own.”

The Name of God is my deliverance
from every thought of evil and of sin,
because it is my own as well as His.

Allah gave the archetypal Human Being, Adam and the “sons of Adam” (all of humanity) all of the names. Our names are the same as Allah’s names. When we remember Allah, by repetition of the name, Allah or other sacred dhikr such as la illah ha illahla Allah, or the attributes (e.g. the 99 names), we are affirming what is true for us.