Shah - The Elephant in the Dark: Christianity, Islam and the Sufis

Sufi Studies and Middle Eastern Literature

The Sufis

Caravan of Dreams

The Way of the Sufi

Tales of the Dervishes: Teaching-stories Over a
Thousand Years

Sufi Thought and Action

Traditional Psychology,
Teaching Encounters and Narratives

Thinkers of the East: Studies in Experientialism
Wisdom of the Idiots

The Dermis Probe

Learning How to Learn: Psychology and Spirituality
in the Sufi Way

Knowing How to Know

The Magic Monastery: Analogical and Action Philosophy

Seeker After Truth

Observations

Evenings with Idries Shah

The Commanding Self

University Lectures

A Perfumed Scorpion (Institute for the Study of
Human Knowledge and California University)
Special Problems in the Study of Sufi Ideas
(Sussex University)

The Elephant in the Dark: Christianity,
Islam and the Sufis (Geneva University)

Neglected Aspects of Sufi Study: Beginning to Begin

(The New School for Social Research)

Letters and Lectures of Idries Shah

Current and Traditional Ideas

Reflections

The Book of the Book

A Veiled Gazelle: Seeing How to See

Special Illumination: The Sufi Use of Humour

The Mulla Nasrudin Corpus

The Pleasantries of the Incredible Mulla Nasrudin

The Subtleties of the Inimitable Mulla Nasrudin

The Exploits of the Incomparable Mulla Nasrudin

The World of Nasrudin

Travel and Exploration

Destination Mecca

Studies in Minority Beliefs

The Secret Lore of Magic

Oriental Magic

Selected Folktales and Their Background

World Tales

A Novel

Kara Kush

Sociological Works

Darkest England

The Natives Are Restless

The Englishmans Handbook

Translated by Idries Shah

The Hundred Tales of Wisdom (Aflakis Munaqib)

Idries Shah

Copyright The Estate of Idries Shah

The right of the Estate of Idries Shah to be identified
as the owner of this work has been asserted by them in accordance
with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

All rights reserved
Copyright throughout the world

ISBN 978-1-78479-104-9 (ePub)

First Published 1974

Published in this edition 2016

No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical or photographic, by recording or any information storage or retrieval system or method now known or to be invented or adapted, without prior permission obtained in writing from the publisher, ISF Publishing, except by a reviewer quoting brief passages in a review written for inclusion in a journal, magazine, newspaper or broadcast.

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The Idries Shah Foundation

P. O. Box 71911

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In association with The Idries Shah Foundation

C HRISTIAN SCHOLARS OFTEN say that Sufi theories are close to those of Christianity. Many Muslims maintain that they are essentially derived from Islam. The resemblance of many Sufi ideas to those of several religious and esoteric systems are sometimes taken as evidence of derivation. The Islamic interpretation is that religion is of one origin, differences being due to local or historical causes.

Rumi, the Sufi teacher of 700 years ago, has emphasised and strikingly illustrated the last contention in his tale of the men who sought to examine an elephant by the sense of touch alone. Each thought that one part was the whole, and experienced it, moreover, in a manner slightly different from reality. The elephant was only, for one a fan (an ear), for another a rope (the tail), for a third a pillar (a leg) and so on.

These lectures provide material for the consideration of common factors, in theory and in development, from the viewpoint of the idea of surrender to the Divine Will, reviewing some aspects of the interplay between Christians and Muslims, and introducing material from and about Sufis.

Grateful thanks are offered to the University of Geneva, to Dean Gabriel Widmer, to Professor N. Nissiotis and Dr S. J. Samartha (Geneva), Professor Peter Antes (Freiburg University), Dr B. Mukerji (Benares University) and all the other participants in the work of the Ecumenical Institute at Bossey during my time there, for their generous spirit of service to scholarship and their help to me.

Idries Shah

T HE PURPOSE OF ecumenical studies, as it is at present employed, is to examine and encourage bases of religion, and the co-operation between people of various religions. Some Western dictionaries, I notice, define this activity as being concerned with the Christian church only; and the use of the word as confined solely to the Roman Catholic Church is noted in such authorities as the Oxford English Dictionary. Ecumenical, of course, is of Greek derivation, meaning belonging to the whole world. I shall assume, consistently with my presence here, that the narrower definitions just referred to are not sustained by my audience. It is interesting to me, however, to note them: for they both indicate the assumption, in some minds at least, that a given way of thinking expressed in certain institutions is universal (on the negative side); and that my audience, at least, is contemporary enough in its objectivity to hear at least the ideas of those who do not belong to the theological formulations which constitute the background of their own attitudes (on the positive side). I need not say which one I prefer. Since I have been asked to contribute on Salvation as a Total Surrender to God: An Attempt at Dialogue Between Christians and Muslims, and Geneva University has honoured me by naming me a Visiting Professor and suggesting this subject, I would like, after expressing my gratitude for the opportunity to teach at this ancient and illustrious institution, to indicate that I propose to introduce the subject

(1) From an Islamic viewpoint;

(2) In its historical context, however rapidly;

(3) As something which has existed since the beginnings
of Islam, nearly fifteen centuries ago, again with examples;

(4) As an opportunity of bridge-building for the present and future, as well as the utilisation of the bridges which are of considerable antiquity and tested strength.

Christian writers and scholars frequently complain that Muslims have distorted ideas about what the Christians believe, and what they practise. This may well be so, though as one who was brought up in an ancient and formal Muslim family with extensive experience of discussion with Muslims of many countries and every walk of life, I cannot recall anything analogous, even, to the report published not long ago by an American who attended a school run by the Arabian-American Oil Company in New York.

He tells us:

The questions What is Islam? and Who was the Prophet Mohammed? brought forth some interesting answers. One of our members thought that Islam was a game of chance, similar to bridge. Another said that it was a mysterious sect founded in the South by the Ku Klux Klan. One gentleman believed it to be an organisation of American Masons who dress in strange costumes. The Prophet Mohammed was thought to be the man who wrote the