Sai and Sufi Tradition: An Islamic View
(It was four years ago that I was given the directive: “You don’t even know your own religion. How can you know Me?” This led me to a study of Islam with a fresh outlook. I knocked at the doors of Sufism and when they were opened I found myself at the feet of Baba. It is due to His grace that today I am a better Muslim than I was before I came to Him. —Z. B.)
Poornachandra Hall on the eve of 23rd November. Clad in white, hands lightly folded in His lap, with the silk-black night as background for the aura that was His hair, and bejeweled with roses of devotion, Sai Baba sat in the silvery swing. From the sparkling hall rose the vibrant rhythm of thousands of voices celebrating His glory through recorded history and even beyond time in a‑full‑throated song:
Thou art Ram in a mandir,
The supreme Allah in a mosque,
Nanak in a gurudwara.
But in the heart’s temple
Thou art ever Sai—the divine beloved.
This is the image: The divine principle—self‑subsisting, luminous, swinging gently, lovingly. This is also the substance of what the Muslims call Sufi tradition, as well as of the mystic literature in Islam.
Sufi has a synonym in Sanskrit—yogi (ascetic). Baba describes true yogis as those who are able to conceive and execute a union with the supreme Lord (Sathya Sai Vahini, p. 60). Following the path of bhakti yoga (discipline of devotion) like the yogis, the Sufis, too, “regard God as the beloved, the only desired goal. They endeavor to merge their love with the ocean of love that God is.” (Sathya Sai Vahini, p. 64) These are the people who enter the haven of bliss; the yogi Sufi is greeted by the Lord at the end of his career.
Come back thou
To thy Lord.
Well pleased
and well‑pleasing
Unto Him
Enter thou, then
Among my devotees
Yea, enter thou
My heaven (Quran LXXXIX: 28‑30)
One point, however, must be remembered. Just as the divine glory, which the 20th century experiences as Sai Baba, is eternal and is described by the Vedas and the Quran as “without beginning and without end,” the Sufi, despite its Islamic framework, is also immortal. On the manifested level, where there is Lord Krishna, there is bound to be Arjuna. (“Arjuna’s name has great spiritual significance: Arjuna is one who has a pure heart.”—Summer Showers, 1979, p. 16.) Following the same analogy, it can be said that where there is Sai (divine beloved), there is Sufi. “What makes a Sufi?” asked the 13th century mystic poet, Jalaluddin Rumi, and proceeded to explain: “Purity of heart, not the patched mantle and the lust perverse.” Similarly the knowledge that illumines a pure heart is not time‑bound, it is also unlimited and eternal.
“The one reality, the learned call by different names,” is the dictum of Rig Veda. The Quran attributes to this one reality the quality of love that is more profound than the affection of the physical father and mother. Sai Baba embodies that divine love. He originally gave part of the name, Baba, to Adam, who was called Baba Adam by the Ceylonese mystics and was claimed to be the first Sufi long before Islam historically made its appearance. Later the disciples of Turkish monasteries used the name for their leaders.
The Muslim Sufis all over India followed this tradition and there were many prominent mystics such as Baba Farid, Baba Khaki, Baba Ishaq, Baba Zainuddin, and the legendary Baba Ratan. The Sanskrit meaning of Sai (the divine mother) was translated into medieval Indian mystic literature as the divine beloved. “I am in your heart,” He says and Kabir echoes the idea: “Your Sai is in you—know this truth if you can.” Guru Nanak speaks of Sai in his verses. In his folk songs, Shah Qadri of the South speaks of the union with Sai: “To unite with Sai is to be like Him, like the ingredients in the bridal paste.”
Indo‑Islamic mystic tradition sought to unite with the divine beloved and called this union its goal, but also recognized the presence of the universal in every philosophic system. The result was a free interaction and adaptation of Indian thought and mystic practices into Indian Sufi tradition that yielded rich results. Indian Sufism has traveled this broad path for centuries, and evolved and widened into a highway to reach Prasanthi Nilayam—the abode of supreme bliss.
In A Road to Prasanthi Nilayam, Sufism, the Islamic esoteric dimension, is noted for its dynamic and universal outlook. Amir Hussain, a 14th century mystic from northwestern India, was asked why the Sufis haunted taverns and believed that ideas and practices from other religions were useful to them. “The Sufis,” he answered, “are ready to appreciate the positive and the true aspects contained in other religions.” The brahmin’s morning invocations and holy thread, said Amir Hussain, were mere intermediaries. “All these are part of his religion and faith, in reality he sees nothing in his faith but Thou.” The source of this understanding was the illumined heart that has learned the truth from Quran:
To God belong the east and the west
Whithersoever ye turn,
there is the presence of God.
For God is all‑pervading, all‑knowing—(II: 115)
As early as the eighth century, the Sufis learned gnosis from Christian and Buddhist monks. From the 9th century onward, translations of Greek, Persian, and Sanskrit literature were available to the Sufis. Two great mystics, Hallaj and Abu Yazid, who had contacts in India, were influenced by advaitic (non-dualistic) thought. Hallaj, who cried “Anal‑hag (I am truth),” was the first to be crucified. He was also the first in a long line who died at the altar of the divine beloved. Sher Khan and Sarmad from Delhi and two other Bihari mystics met the same fate for a similar belief.
The influence of Indian mysticism is also seen in the life and writings of Abu Yazid. His theory of total destruction of self in God is not the only point of similarity in his teachings and those of the Upanishads [treatise commenting on the Vedas]. He advocated the controlled use of breath that was also an Indian principle. Al Beruni (973‑1050 A.D.), who translated the Yoga Sutras [Upanishadic verses] into Arabic, recorded a number of similarities between Sufi tradition and Patanjali’s yoga on the one hand and the Bhagavad Gita [song of God] on the other. (E. C. Sacham: Al‑Beiunis India).
~Zeba Bashiruddin
Source: Sanathana Sarathi, Feb. 1982
