LETTER 73: GREED AND PETITIONARY PRAYERS

In the name of God, the Merciful, the Compassionate

Dear Brother Shamsuddin, any work or action performed hypocritically, or out of a desire to attain the rank of a righteous man, cannot be considered as emanating from a master of the faith. Whatever you did would not be free from greed. The secret is this: The manifestation of devotion is sincerity, not avarice. Greed is one thing, the manifestation of devotion, something quite different. The fine distinction between them can be grasped by attentive observation. Yet you and I are such that we need to be bribed to serve God

What sort of love is this, that would love souls for a bribe?

O brother, remove greed from your path, for it is not necessary for God to do anything for anyone. Whatever is given to men today in this world is given freely, and what will be given to us tomorrow, on the Day of Resurrection, will be given freely. The wise have said: The sermon that He has commanded to be preached to you tomorrow is: This is a reward for what they did (Q56:24) Such an order was given to relieve your heart of sadness tomorrow, for a man finds food he himself has earned is more enjoyable than what is given to him by someone else.

Whatever the King of Glory bestows upon you from His abundant self-sufficiency He bestows without cause. Your task is to pay attention to your own unfortunate state first and foremost, striving to do everything as a manifestation of your devotion, not out of avarice. You should seek whatever has been commanded of you in any circumstance, not your private gain. Whatever you do should be done first and foremost for His sake, not out of the hope of heaven, nor the fear of hell!

I experience neither aversion to hell nor desire for heaven: Remove the veil from Your countenance, for it is You I long to see!

Such an outlook is a sign of the prophets, and an embellishment of the saints. Our share in all this is simply our faith, nothing more, until such time as the dust and dirt kicked up by the hooves of their blessed mounts settles on the heads of us wretched ones and becomes a crown of eternal bliss for us, unfortunate though we be! Whoever sets foot on the carpet of the Law of the Chosen One, and desires the religion of God Almighty, and takes pride in it, is really proud of this desire, and is boasting of being in this particular stage. But when one steps onto the carpet of the Law, the real struggle is precisely in be- coming purified, and in standing firm in compliance with all that God has commanded and prohibited. The true seeker should weigh himself on the scale of religion to see how far he has abandoned prohibited things. Then will it be fitting to repeat this saying of the father of the community, Abraham, the Friend of God. I desire the One Who, I hope, will forgive my sins on Judgment Day (Q26:82). In the beginning of his period of trial Abraham said: Save me and my children from idol worship! (Q14:35). At the end of this period of trial he said [I desire] the One Who, I hope, will forgive my sins on Judgment Day! (Q26:82). It might happen that a person, in the days of his youth, does not know anything else except playing and amusing himself, and does not observe the demands of the Islamic community without, however, intending to differ from the father of that community, that is, Muhammad. If anyone has the desire of weighing his actions against the measure of service, then say: Give the reins of your heart into the hands of right intention! Hence religious scholars in Islam have noted: Intention is the activity of the heart. An action that does not fulfill the expectations of intention does not pass beyond the world of habit, nor is the treasury of divine service attained. Moreover, every action that is cut off from right intention is bound to the threshold of one's habit, and will not find its way to the row of manly actions.

The intention of serving God forms the pillar of faith for those blessed with inner peace. It is the safe-conduct pass of the Lord for His own servants. The secret of this is that, by means of intention, you cleanse the skirt of your heart of everything except what pertains strictly to religion. Thus you will be able to gird up your loins for service without the bother of habit and calamity and, without apprehension about enemies, you will be able to implement faithfully the covenant of unity that was made at the outset.

If you are aware of the primeval covenant, Why separate yourself from that Presence Return your soul to awareness of its meaning! Make yourself worthy of proximity to the King!

There may be someone who forever repeats the words of his rosary and sings the divine praises, who considers that he has already placed his foot in the row of those remembering God, and thinks that he is now on the path of those going straight toward Him. This is a great mistake for a man of devotion, for the tongue is only like a branch. If it is lopped off, there is no harm done to the trunk of faith! The remembrance of those who act merely out of habit does not go any deeper than the tip of their tongue. The rosaries and praises of the tearful are nothing but the practice of hypocrisy and the production of sound-and yet they desire to be equal in perfection to the masters of sincerity!

O brother, whatever you send without the help of purification is, for all eternity, nothing but loss. He was given no other command than to serve God with a sincere heart (Q98:5). Habit, of itself, cannot be raised to the heights of sincerity. We know nothing but the path of habit and custom, yet, in our blindness and inability to see ourselves, are convinced that with such capital we can serve God faithfully. All this is a sign of our lack of wealth.

If you wander for a thousand years proclaiming His praises, I know not that you will enjoy a scent of His fragrance. Consider that your fortune depends on Him! From the viewpoint of faith, who are you? What can you offer? What does a beggar know beyond this wealth, That he can offer up his soul for the sake of the King?

The secret of the heart is required to enable you to perform divine service, then will you be engaged in genuine service. But when you are neglectful and act out of habit, then whatever you do will remain incomplete. It will be a remembrance on your tongue, but not from an inflamed heart. May that sort of remembrance not be allowed to bring disgrace upon the threshold of the Law! How can it even be called remembrance? If anyone should say, There is no god but God, which is the kernel of the way of Unity, as though it were a matter of, say, buying and selling, or like the speech of careless people, then this word could be raised up from his lips to the realm of divine Unity.

Whoever, by means of his action alone, without a covenant or internal agreement, does something and claims that he is serving God will, on the Day of Judgment, be thrown into the row of the enemies of religion and will descend, along with them, to the depths of hell. The secret of this has been expressed by the poet:

For the noble, rosary and sacred thread are the same You are free to be whatever you like, either master or slave!

Woe to you who lay claim to service, for you have bound the tur- ban of knowledge upon the head of your own excellence and have refused to be contained in this world! Look carefully to see whether you are in the row of friends or in the midst of enemies! Woe to you, O creature of habit, who tie upon your head the turban of assumption that you serve God and draw up the skirt of your own purity away from men that it may not be contaminated! Be careful, lest the dress of defection bear you off to the grave! Busy yourself in looking after others' shoes, that the sacred thread of habit and the pride of custom may perhaps be removed from your neck!

As long as you remain like a crow on a stinking corpse, How can you come like a white falcon to the presence of the

King If, like a sparrow, you become food for a falcon, Merging into the falcon, you will become fit for the hand of the King!

When the inner heart of someone is touched by respect for this word, he is more eager to trample the eight heavens under foot, like dust, than is a thirsty person to find pure water for the relief of his thirst. This is because of the claim of Islam upon you: if, throughout your whole life, you were but to utter this word from the secret of your heart, all would be well! Be careful lest you sell It for heaven, as though the latter were of more value! If you sell It, you will incur a loss. Be careful, too, lest you sell the Lord of the inn merely for the sake of the inn!

When the Beloved comes, at least we can offer our souls to Him.

You seek so many things: does He not suffice for you? Seek only One, lest you find yourself left by the wayside. Travel toward the sky, lest you get stuck in some well. When You support me, so does everything else. Everything comes to my aid, when You stretch out Your hand to help.

If you say this word except for His sake, then you are not speaking with sincerity, whether you be in heaven or in hell. If you speak for the sake of heaven, it is yourself you are worshiping. Correct worship of God occurs when a person desires to find himself for God's sake, not God for his own sake. [These are real) men who, even when engaged in business, do not forget God (Q24:37). God Almighty says: My threshold is not a place for buying and selling. When you go to the bazaar, your intention is to acquire something you do not have. But when you come to His threshold, your intention is to give Him everything you have, and return a penniless pauper. One renowned for his insight has said:

There is no other way for a lover but to become nothing. That his very existence might come from the divine court. Can you not see that, in the profession of faith, The not precedes the affirmation but God!

Khwaja Ahmad Khazru saw the Lord in a dream. He said: O Ahmad, everyone asks Me for something, but Bayazid asks Me for Myself! There are many disciples who say, with regard to this matter, that it is not permissible to speak about seeing Him in a dream. But the issue there concerns the states of the righteous, not of you and me. The dreams of the righteous are quite a different matter, they are not like your dreams and mine. Ours do not go beyond this sensible world, while the states of the righteous do not descend-either to this world or the next! As long as a person remains in this world, such an explanation is unacceptable, either in a dream or when one is awake. But when someone becomes cut off from the qualities of hu man nature, he passes out of this world and reaches the next. Whoever reaches God realizes that there is no room within him for opposition to God. It is proper, however, that the Almighty should make use of dreams for showing His friendship or that He should, in that very dream, snatch a person away, taking him out of this world and the next in order to manifest to him this wealth, about which I have spoken. In this way does He remove your rational doubts about the state of real men, and also lead you to believe in Him.

If a man is remembered for the quality of his love, And is famous because of his steadfastness, Then the mind must grant his pure existence To have a rank far beyond this world of ours!

[Details of prayers to be recited are then set forth.]

Peace!

In the name of God, the Merciful, the Compassionate

Dear Brother Shamsuddin, any work or action performed hypocritically, or out of a desire to attain the rank of a righteous man, cannot be considered as emanating from a master of the faith. Whatever you did would not be free from greed. The secret is this: The manifestation of devotion is sincerity, not avarice. Greed is one thing, the manifestation of devotion, something quite different. The fine distinction between them can be grasped by attentive observation. Yet you and I are such that we need to be bribed to serve God

What sort of love is this, that would love souls for a bribe?

O brother, remove greed from your path, for it is not necessary for God to do anything for anyone. Whatever is given to men today in this world is given freely, and what will be given to us tomorrow, on the Day of Resurrection, will be given freely. The wise have said: The sermon that He has commanded to be preached to you tomorrow is: This is a reward for what they did (Q56:24) Such an order was given to relieve your heart of sadness tomorrow, for a man finds food he himself has earned is more enjoyable than what is given to him by someone else.

Whatever the King of Glory bestows upon you from His abundant self-sufficiency He bestows without cause. Your task is to pay attention to your own unfortunate state first and foremost, striving to do everything as a manifestation of your devotion, not out of avarice. You should seek whatever has been commanded of you in any circumstance, not your private gain. Whatever you do should be done first and foremost for His sake, not out of the hope of heaven, nor the fear of hell!

I experience neither aversion to hell nor desire for heaven: Remove the veil from Your countenance, for it is You I long to see!

Such an outlook is a sign of the prophets, and an embellishment of the saints. Our share in all this is simply our faith, nothing more, until such time as the dust and dirt kicked up by the hooves of their blessed mounts settles on the heads of us wretched ones and becomes a crown of eternal bliss for us, unfortunate though we be! Whoever sets foot on the carpet of the Law of the Chosen One, and desires the religion of God Almighty, and takes pride in it, is really proud of this desire, and is boasting of being in this particular stage. But when one steps onto the carpet of the Law, the real struggle is precisely in be- coming purified, and in standing firm in compliance with all that God has commanded and prohibited. The true seeker should weigh himself on the scale of religion to see how far he has abandoned prohibited things. Then will it be fitting to repeat this saying of the father of the community, Abraham, the Friend of God. I desire the One Who, I hope, will forgive my sins on Judgment Day (Q26:82). In the beginning of his period of trial Abraham said: Save me and my children from idol worship! (Q14:35). At the end of this period of trial he said [I desire] the One Who, I hope, will forgive my sins on Judgment Day! (Q26:82). It might happen that a person, in the days of his youth, does not know anything else except playing and amusing himself, and does not observe the demands of the Islamic community without, however, intending to differ from the father of that community, that is, Muhammad. If anyone has the desire of weighing his actions against the measure of service, then say: Give the reins of your heart into the hands of right intention! Hence religious scholars in Islam have noted: Intention is the activity of the heart. An action that does not fulfill the expectations of intention does not pass beyond the world of habit, nor is the treasury of divine service attained. Moreover, every action that is cut off from right intention is bound to the threshold of one's habit, and will not find its way to the row of manly actions.

The intention of serving God forms the pillar of faith for those blessed with inner peace. It is the safe-conduct pass of the Lord for His own servants. The secret of this is that, by means of intention, you cleanse the skirt of your heart of everything except what pertains strictly to religion. Thus you will be able to gird up your loins for service without the bother of habit and calamity and, without apprehension about enemies, you will be able to implement faithfully the covenant of unity that was made at the outset.

If you are aware of the primeval covenant, Why separate yourself from that Presence Return your soul to awareness of its meaning! Make yourself worthy of proximity to the King!

There may be someone who forever repeats the words of his rosary and sings the divine praises, who considers that he has already placed his foot in the row of those remembering God, and thinks that he is now on the path of those going straight toward Him. This is a great mistake for a man of devotion, for the tongue is only like a branch. If it is lopped off, there is no harm done to the trunk of faith! The remembrance of those who act merely out of habit does not go any deeper than the tip of their tongue. The rosaries and praises of the tearful are nothing but the practice of hypocrisy and the production of sound-and yet they desire to be equal in perfection to the masters of sincerity!

O brother, whatever you send without the help of purification is, for all eternity, nothing but loss. He was given no other command than to serve God with a sincere heart (Q98:5). Habit, of itself, cannot be raised to the heights of sincerity. We know nothing but the path of habit and custom, yet, in our blindness and inability to see ourselves, are convinced that with such capital we can serve God faithfully. All this is a sign of our lack of wealth.

If you wander for a thousand years proclaiming His praises, I know not that you will enjoy a scent of His fragrance. Consider that your fortune depends on Him! From the viewpoint of faith, who are you? What can you offer? What does a beggar know beyond this wealth, That he can offer up his soul for the sake of the King?

The secret of the heart is required to enable you to perform divine service, then will you be engaged in genuine service. But when you are neglectful and act out of habit, then whatever you do will remain incomplete. It will be a remembrance on your tongue, but not from an inflamed heart. May that sort of remembrance not be allowed to bring disgrace upon the threshold of the Law! How can it even be called remembrance? If anyone should say, There is no god but God, which is the kernel of the way of Unity, as though it were a matter of, say, buying and selling, or like the speech of careless people, then this word could be raised up from his lips to the realm of divine Unity.

Whoever, by means of his action alone, without a covenant or internal agreement, does something and claims that he is serving God will, on the Day of Judgment, be thrown into the row of the enemies of religion and will descend, along with them, to the depths of hell. The secret of this has been expressed by the poet:

For the noble, rosary and sacred thread are the same You are free to be whatever you like, either master or slave!

Woe to you who lay claim to service, for you have bound the tur- ban of knowledge upon the head of your own excellence and have refused to be contained in this world! Look carefully to see whether you are in the row of friends or in the midst of enemies! Woe to you, O creature of habit, who tie upon your head the turban of assumption that you serve God and draw up the skirt of your own purity away from men that it may not be contaminated! Be careful, lest the dress of defection bear you off to the grave! Busy yourself in looking after others' shoes, that the sacred thread of habit and the pride of custom may perhaps be removed from your neck!

As long as you remain like a crow on a stinking corpse, How can you come like a white falcon to the presence of the

King If, like a sparrow, you become food for a falcon, Merging into the falcon, you will become fit for the hand of the King!

When the inner heart of someone is touched by respect for this word, he is more eager to trample the eight heavens under foot, like dust, than is a thirsty person to find pure water for the relief of his thirst. This is because of the claim of Islam upon you: if, throughout your whole life, you were but to utter this word from the secret of your heart, all would be well! Be careful lest you sell It for heaven, as though the latter were of more value! If you sell It, you will incur a loss. Be careful, too, lest you sell the Lord of the inn merely for the sake of the inn!

When the Beloved comes, at least we can offer our souls to Him.

You seek so many things: does He not suffice for you? Seek only One, lest you find yourself left by the wayside. Travel toward the sky, lest you get stuck in some well. When You support me, so does everything else. Everything comes to my aid, when You stretch out Your hand to help.

If you say this word except for His sake, then you are not speaking with sincerity, whether you be in heaven or in hell. If you speak for the sake of heaven, it is yourself you are worshiping. Correct worship of God occurs when a person desires to find himself for God's sake, not God for his own sake. [These are real) men who, even when engaged in business, do not forget God (Q24:37). God Almighty says: My threshold is not a place for buying and selling. When you go to the bazaar, your intention is to acquire something you do not have. But when you come to His threshold, your intention is to give Him everything you have, and return a penniless pauper. One renowned for his insight has said:

There is no other way for a lover but to become nothing. That his very existence might come from the divine court. Can you not see that, in the profession of faith, The not precedes the affirmation but God!

Khwaja Ahmad Khazru saw the Lord in a dream. He said: O Ahmad, everyone asks Me for something, but Bayazid asks Me for Myself! There are many disciples who say, with regard to this matter, that it is not permissible to speak about seeing Him in a dream. But the issue there concerns the states of the righteous, not of you and me. The dreams of the righteous are quite a different matter, they are not like your dreams and mine. Ours do not go beyond this sensible world, while the states of the righteous do not descend-either to this world or the next! As long as a person remains in this world, such an explanation is unacceptable, either in a dream or when one is awake. But when someone becomes cut off from the qualities of hu man nature, he passes out of this world and reaches the next. Whoever reaches God realizes that there is no room within him for opposition to God. It is proper, however, that the Almighty should make use of dreams for showing His friendship or that He should, in that very dream, snatch a person away, taking him out of this world and the next in order to manifest to him this wealth, about which I have spoken. In this way does He remove your rational doubts about the state of real men, and also lead you to believe in Him.

If a man is remembered for the quality of his love, And is famous because of his steadfastness, Then the mind must grant his pure existence To have a rank far beyond this world of ours!

[Details of prayers to be recited are then set forth.]

Peace!