40 Days

Zaid: I have difficulty in praying out of love and because of a wish to pray. Prayer often comes through the day out of a sincere wish to pray, but evening and morning prayers are often performed as a duty and a discipline. Will consistency help to make a change in attitude?

Abdullah: Yes. If you want to learn to play the piano you must practise. When people find it hard to do one of these disciplines then they must find out where the blockage is coming from in themselves. It may be from ego, body, vanity and conceit, laziness, inattention, or identification with some other thing such as bed, sex or tiredness. When you pray spontaneously through the day, this is coming from the spirit and the emotional part of yourself, and should be fostered as much as possible. If this is done, then the same part will be able to do the prayers at a set time morning and night.

Zaid: What is behind the particular quality of a guru’s method which seems to require the question and answer system as a means of imparting teaching?

Abdullah: It allows the teacher to keep a close check on the progress of the pupil and is used in conjunction with other methods, such as Abdullah putting you and Abdul together. For any progress there must be struggle; where there is no struggle people go to sleep. Questions give a good indication of a pupil’s state, especially his identifications, limitations and attachments. When Abdullah sees you are getting too screwed up on one tack he directs you on another, thus helping you to find some balance.

… fundamentally Islam is peace, and teaches the brotherhood of man on this planet. We have to live on the planet to perfect ourselves, and if Islam were practised universally as brotherhood under the fatherhood of God you would have real socialism, from each according to his ability, to each according to his needs. The oneness of God is expounded in the inner teaching of every major religion, for this is a universal truth. We all know the Islamic world does not practise what it preaches, as the wars in Bangladesh and the persecution by Pakistan of the Pashtun people bear witness. Notwithstanding, Islam is a religion of brotherhood, and a masculine religion among a host of feminine religions.

Zaid: At the pupil’s level of development, what are the effects of a fast over several days, apart from working against the body?

Abdullah: It all depends on the degree of development. All fasts must help to make the body obedient, but they will not necessarily have the same effect spiritually for everyone. The key is motive. If you have the correct motive for the fast, then in the end the correct result will accrue. Many people do fasts out of vanity, pride, etc. and as such these fasts only build the ego. The attitude to adopt, at first intellectually or emotionally, then spiritually, is that the fast is for God.

The inner parts of all religions usually say the same truth. As a Sufi, Abdullah believes people must find this inner truth for themselves, from within the framework of whatever religion they happen to belong to. He sees the religion of the future to be cosmic in character, practised by people on their own, not relying on large gatherings at mosques, synagogues, temples, or churches. Until that time, he prays people will try to cultivate some tolerance and understanding of all religions. There are services of Ba’hai and Universal Worship of Hazrat Inayat Khan which cultivate this ideal for those who require outer worship of this calibre. Those who are firmly entrenched in the Buddhist, Muslim, Christian, or other religions must try and see the others’ point of view if they are not capable of realising that interiorly all are the same.