4. Harmony, Part 3
Brotherhood and Sisterhood Activity, America
From the Desk of the Peshkar
Murshida Nuria Stephanie Sabato, Peshkar
KarimaGita Erickson, Assistant Peshkar
Beloved Brothers and Sisters,
The work of the Sufi Message “is to waken the consciousness of humanity to the true nature of love, harmony, and beauty.” How do we begin to waken this ideal? Hazrat Inayat Khan teaches us to take notice and charge of the disharmonies that arise within our self rather than give attention to the faults of others. With this practice we cultivate love, harmony and beauty in daily life.
With loving regards and prayers for an enlightened world,
Nuria and KarimaGita
Social Gatheka, No. 4, Part 3, Harmony
by Hazrat Inayat Khan
Now the question is what is it that causes disharmony within oneself? It is weakness. Physical weakness or mental weakness, but it is weakness. Very often, therefore, one finds that it is bodily illness that causes disharmony and disharmonious tendencies. Besides, there are many diseases of the mind which the scientist has not yet found. Today in the world there are two things. One thing is that a person, who is too ill perhaps, is considered as an insane person, and then there are all other illnesses which are not counted at all. These people are counted among the sane people and as notice is not taken of the defects which are of the diseases of the mind, man never has a chance to notice them within himself. He is constantly finding fault with others. If he is in an office, if he is in a good position, if he is at home, everywhere he causes disharmony. Nobody knows, for to be treated as insane he must first be called insane.
The health of the mind is a question so little talked about in these days. In fact as there come more solicitors, more lawyers, more barristers, more courts and more judges, so there come more cases. Consequently prisons increase, and what is the outcome? After a person has gone to prison and comes back, he has forgotten where he was. He goes again in the same path. For the disease is not found out. In court a person is judged, but it is not found out psychologically what causes him to do this. One can find in these prisons thousands of people with whose minds there is something the matter. And if for a thousand years they were kept in prison, they would not improve. Nothing but injustice is awarded to them by putting them in prison. It is just like putting a person in prison because his body is ill.
The cause of every discomfort and of every failure is disharmony. And what would be the most useful thing at the present moment in education is to give the sense of harmony, to develop it in children. It will not be so difficult as it appears to bring harmony to their notice. What is necessary is to point out to the youths the different aspects of harmony, in different aspects of life's affairs.
The work of the Sufi Message, a message which is of love, harmony and beauty, is to waken the consciousness of humanity to the true nature of love, harmony, and beauty. And the training, which is given to those who become initiated in the inner cult, is to cultivate these three things, which are principle factors in human life.
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