Sublime

SUFI MUSICIAN, HEALER, AND MYSTIC HAZRAT INAYAT KHAN

Hazrat Inayat Khan

the technique of Islamic Sufâsm at least takes good care to forbid the use of music in worship, and to emphasize the necessity of daily congregational prayers in order to counteract the possible anti-social effects of solitary contemplation.

Chanting, flute or drum playing, and dancing in demilitarized patterns are ideally natural forms of yoga-meditation, because they silence the hypnotic chattering of thought and give one a direct feeling of shabda—the basic energy or vibration of the universe. This is why Gregorian chant, for example, gives the sense of eternity so absent from meter

Among many others, I draw on the ideas of two spiritual teachers I should mention. One is my friend Douglas Harding, whose unique and inimitable approach sheds light on the Self as Consciousness, which is pure Kashmir Shaivism. The other is the enigmatic 20th-century teacher G. I. Gurdjieff. I met his teachings in my earliest days as a spiritual se

Ali Akbar Khan, the sarod player,

Edwin Arnold's THE SONG CELESTIAL