Have we been forced into Islamophobia?

originally posted by: LittleByLittle
I tried to read the Quran thru many times but both my logical mind and my spiritual spider sense cannot see it as a holy book connected with the divine source. The Quran do just not measure up to the teachings of Rumi, Yeshua, Nanak and Buddha.

That's a bit ironic as Rumi was a Muslim and his writings are absolutely littered with allusions to the Qur'an. His Masnavi was often called the Qur'an in Persian. The Qur'an can be pretty inaccessible unless you learn Arabic or read commentaries by people like Rumi etc..

But.. at least you dig Rumi.
and Buddha and Yeshau..

a reply to: AudioOne

Not at all ironic. Rumi was mystic living in a Muslim society revolting in his own way as much as he could against Muhammad:s religion.

You see Muhammad and Rumi as connected where I see Rumi as rejecting Muhammad:s dualistic small minded teaching of "My team against other teams" that Muhammad thrived on when he got power. Rumi even was able to say he was not a Muslim clearly in his poems but belonged to something else. If other people did that during that time the would have been killed and even are today for apostasy.

Not Christian or Jew or Muslim, not Hindu
Buddhist, sufi, or zen. Not any religion


or cultural system. I am not from the East
or the West, not out of the ocean or up


from the ground, not natural or ethereal, not
composed of elements at all. I do not exist,


am not an entity in this world or in the next,
did not descend from Adam and Eve or any


origin story. My place is placeless, a trace
of the traceless. Neither body or soul.


I belong to the beloved, have seen the two
worlds as one and that one call to and know,


first, last, outer, inner, only that
breath breathing human being.

Sometime when teaching you have to use the language of what is known to the student even if it is not divine.

a reply to: LittleByLittle

Ummm... no... what happened is that Western new age translators focused and translated Rumi's more universal poetry and only later did scholars set the record straight by translating everything which shows Rumi was also a very devout Muslim. I have no issue and enjoy the New Age spin, as it is for our time, but to characterize Rumi as a rebel against Islam is completely unfounded and scholastically disingenuous. Rumi practiced Islamic Mysticism, Wazifas, Salats, Dhikr, Dhikr, Dhikr... It is al derived from the Quran, ..
I've been studying Sufism for more than a decade..
Read some Michael Sells, and some Ibn Arabi on Rumi.
Rumi is DEEP DEEEP SOOOO DEEEEEEEEP in ISLAMIC METAPHYSICS which was mind blowing.. to him.. and many other mystics.

Quote from Rumi:

The spirit that was bound within the form of attributes
Went to the (Divine) Essence by means of the light of
(Muhammad) the Chosen.
The moment it started going, it said out of joy,
"Blessings (be) on the joyful spirit of (Muhammad) the Chosen!"

ân rûH ke basta bûd dar naqsh-é Sifât
az partaw-é muSTafà rawân shod bar Zât
ân dam ke rawân gasht, ze shâdî mê-goft:
"shâdiy-é rawân-é muSTafà-râ Salawât"

--Mawlânâ's Rubâ`î No. 107
--from "Rumi and Islam," p. 141

You can not like Islam.. You can't go back and remake someone in your own image and bias.

Rumi was Rumi'
You are You

You haven't met yet.

a reply to: AudioOne

My views are my own and are created thru thinking, meditating and questioning everything on all levels of creation. I have made many attempts to see Muhammad as a Chosen ONE connected to the divine but his view of self importance that shines thru in the Quran make me think he is not a servant of the divine.

I think you are biasing that Rumi means Muhammad as the chosen. The chosen are not one single person but many. We will not agree since either you or I am to blind too see beyond indoctrination see the other ones points. Even if we so not agree I wish you a nice journey.

We will both find out the objective truth in the end.

originally posted by: LittleByLittle
a reply to: AudioOne

We will not agree since either you or I am to blind too see beyond indoctrination see the other ones points. Even if we so not agree I wish you a nice journey.

We will both find out the objective truth in the end.

Fair Enough.
I'm familiar with at least aspects of your point of view as it was common in 18th-19th century Colonialist Orientalist literature to take anything good in Islam (such as Sufism) as foreign to it. However, I'm not saying that your point of view is the same as theirs, but it is similar, and it (Colonial Orientalist writing) is definitely the origin of such opinions in literature.

Safe Spiritual Travels and Blessings either way.