12.) To
what extent are Sufi practices, values, beliefs and principles merely a borrowing from,
and rehashing of, other mystical traditions?
To be
sure, there undoubtedly are similarities among, as well as a certain amount of overlap of,
different mystical traditions simply because all spiritually legitimate mystical paths are
but different manifestations of one and the same set of underlying truths and realities.
Nevertheless, the Sufi tradition is wholly independent of all other mystical systems.
In other
words, the Sufi path is rooted in a direct, conceptually unmediated set of experiential
engagements of Divine Reality or Truth. These experiences were not garnered while reading
some book on mysticism or while involved in a discussion of mystical issues with a
proponent of some other mystical tradition.
In effect,
the charge that the Sufi path is merely a borrowed set of beliefs and practices from other
mystical traditions is the same kind of allegation which has been leveled against Islam in
general. In other words, over time, a number of people have tried to claim that the
Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) ‘developed’ Islam as a result of some
chance encounters with various Christians and Jews during his days as a traveling
businessman.
In
reality, Islam arose out of the experiential guidance which the Prophet received from
Allah. There was nothing borrowed about it.
The
similarities of, for instance, Islam, Christianity, and Judaism is because these
traditions all come from, and are rooted in, the same Source - namely, God. However, the
experiences of Muhammad, Jesus, and Moses (may Allah’s peace and blessings be on them
all) were a reflection of their individual, direct relationships with Divinity, rather
than being a matter of derivative experiences drawn from one another or from other
Prophets before them.
The same
is true of the esoteric dimension of Islam known as the Sufi path or tasawwuf. This is
especially so since the Sufi masters consider the Prophet Muhammad to be the shaykh of all
shaykhs and, therefore, everything entailed by the Sufi tradition comes, by the grace of
God, through the Prophet and not through some other spiritual or mystical path.
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