From the Dutch Journal titled Soefi Gedachte
Foreword by Kariem Maas
Foreword by Kariem Maas
For this Jubilee Edition the editorial staff had the firm intention to not just look back. We have to go forwards. Yet, much history has been brought in.
It was inevitable to do so, as if we first had to take stock before being able to say something about the years to come. What has been the true meaning of the past, what is important nowadays? The same we say about others goes for the Sufi Movement: that one has to discern what is an externally product of its time and put that aside in order to get to the core of the Message. Each new generation is destined, in the light of that moment, to do this again in order to master the Message and not to get stuck in 'hear-say'.
For the youngest generation two things catch the eye. With amazement they are looking at the difficulties surrounding leadership and teaching.
Besides, they find that the context on the universal Sufism has changed drastically.
At the end of the nineteenth century, the beginning of the twentieth century, select groups of people were searching for a new spirituality. These groups consisted of people who could afford to be socially independent, mentally self-willed and if necessary eccentric. They found inspiration with great souls such as Steiner, Gurdjieff, Krishnamurti and others. Likewise the little group around Hazrat Inayat Khan, after, now 100 years ago, he had come to the West on September 13, 1910. They became acquainted with revolutionary new ideas and methods. Those ideas and methods have become now widely accepted. Who searches on Google for the word 'yoga' gets 493,000 hits merely in the Netherlands. Meditation is to be found on 324,000 places on Dutch websites and breath practices on 14,000. The fact that compilations with sufi- and Sufism pop up on 72,00 places on Dutch sites is so much to the good, but it is evident that, as the modest movement we are, we do not have the exclusive right on (parts of) our body of thought anymore.
At the end of the nineteenth century, the beginning of the twentieth century, select groups of people were searching for a new spirituality. These groups consisted of people who could afford to be socially independent, mentally self-willed and if necessary eccentric. They found inspiration with great souls such as Steiner, Gurdjieff, Krishnamurti and others. Likewise the little group around Hazrat Inayat Khan, after, now 100 years ago, he had come to the West on September 13, 1910. They became acquainted with revolutionary new ideas and methods. Those ideas and methods have become now widely accepted. Who searches on Google for the word 'yoga' gets 493,000 hits merely in the Netherlands. Meditation is to be found on 324,000 places on Dutch websites and breath practices on 14,000. The fact that compilations with sufi- and Sufism pop up on 72,00 places on Dutch sites is so much to the good, but it is evident that, as the modest movement we are, we do not have the exclusive right on (parts of) our body of thought anymore.
By that the image turns over. The many branches in the centenarian existence of the Sufi Movement, which hitherto have been a problem for many people, we now can see as the richness of diversity: just because of them the Message could expand and survive changes in time. What always has been a bit of a worry, the Movement being so small in numbers, quite changes sides: the Message is much more spread than we think. Not under the official flag of the composers of this magazine, the Movement and Sufi-Contact, but under the flag of much more denominators. As many gateways as there are human beings of different temperaments, with a diversity of cultural backgrounds and a kaleidoscope of ideals.
Untraceably, incomprehensibly, but distinctly the Message has taken care of itself, as Inayat Khan has been representing to his contemporaries.
Sufism is that universal.