Idries Shah Quotes
Collection of top 100 famous quotes about Idries Shah
Idries Shah Quotes & Sayings
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The tongue is the best masseur of furrowed brows.
— Idries Shah
Talent is the presence of ability and absence of understanding about the source and operation of knowledge.
— Idries Shah
Only the search for truth is valid, the desire for wisdom the motive. The method is assimilation, not study.
— Idries Shah
Almost every day I am reminded of Saadi's reflection that there is no senseless tyranny like that of subordinates.
— Idries Shah
When humility is exercised, people begin to realise that they do not, as it were, exist at all.
— Idries Shah
Saying of the ProphetMonkishness
No monkery in Islam. — Idries Shah
Knowledge is not gained, it is there all the time. It is the "veils" which have to be dissolved in the mind.
— Idries Shah
Definitions from Mulla Do-PiazaTruthful man:
He who is, secretly, regarded by everyone as an enemy. — Idries Shah
We and all our existences are non-entities. Thou art the absolute being whose appearance is transitory.
— Idries Shah
among roses, be a rose, among thorns, be a thorn
— Idries Shah
It is the goldsmith who can assay the gold.
— Idries Shah
There is no wisdom where there is no common sense: it cannot under those conditions find any expression.
— Idries Shah
Unbelief and belief are both marching on His road, while both are saying, 'He is one and He has no associates'.
— Idries Shah
The man who knows must discharge a function. The one who does not, cannot arrogate one to himself; he can only try to do so.
— Idries Shah
A stolen kiss is not easily returned.
— Idries Shah
The stupidest man I ever met had a favourite saying. It was: 'What do you think I am, stupid, or something?
— Idries Shah
If you cannot sit on a throne like a king, seize, like a tent-pitcher, the rope of the Royal tent.
— Idries Shah
Most systems end up by making imagined humility into a form of vanity, so they end up with vanity just the same.
— Idries Shah
No colour comes after black.
— Idries Shah
There is a saying that, according to what a person's mentality is, even an angel may seem to him to have a devil's face.
— Idries Shah
A man who believes the word of a donkey in preference to my word does not deserve to be lent anything.
— Idries Shah
A great deal of thought is only a substitute for the thoughts that the individual would really find useful at the time.
— Idries Shah
What do I sing, and what does my tambourine sing?
— Idries Shah
Remember that greed includes greed for being not greedy.
— Idries Shah
A MOTTO OF THE HUMAN RACETell me what to do; but it must be what I want you to tell me. — Idries Shah
Form is useful, but it is secondary.
— Idries Shah
The degree of necessity determines the development of organs in man ... therefore increase your necessity.
— Idries Shah
I am an idol worshipper; for I understand what idol worship means, and the idolater does not.
— Idries Shah
The Sufis have said: 'The importance of something is in inverse proportion to its attractiveness.
— Idries Shah
When tomorrow comes, think tomorrow's thoughts.
— Idries Shah
To Him who has sense, a sign is enoughFor the heedless, however, a thousand expositions are not enough. — Idries Shah
Better to quarrel with a friend than to support enemies.
— Idries Shah
Do not dwell upon whether you will put yourself into the hands of a teacher. You are always in his hands.
— Idries Shah
Words have to die if humans are to live.
— Idries Shah
It is experience which teaches, not controversy based on supposed logic and assumptions of what is likely to be true.
— Idries Shah
SENTENCES OF THE KHAJAGANRUDBARI : Heart to heart is an essential means of passing on the secrets of the Path. — Idries Shah
A generous person may not have wisdom: but, unlike others, he has the means to gain it.
— Idries Shah
He who knows himself, knows his Lord' means, among other things, that self-deception prevents knowledge.
— Idries Shah
The Sufi must be able to alternate his thought between the relative and the Absolute, the approximate and the Real.
— Idries Shah
Sufism is the essence of all religions.
— Idries Shah
When the mind is full of established biases, it will not be able to graft Sufism on top of them.
— Idries Shah
How many friends would you have if you went from one to another asking them to conceal a dead body?
— Idries Shah
Sufis aim to refine human consciousness. This is Sufi mysticism: not mystification or magic, but a specific Path.
— Idries Shah
Sufism is the doing in this lifetime what any fool will be doing in then thousand years' time.
— Idries Shah
Sufi secrets are perceived, not understood by words.
— Idries Shah
Better to be safe than to be sorry' is a remark of value only when these are the actual alternatives.
— Idries Shah
One lie will keep out forty truths.
— Idries Shah
Satisfaction is a treasure which does not decay.Proverb — Idries Shah
Deep in the sea are riches beyond compare. But if you seek safety, it is on the shore.
— Idries Shah
The fruit of timidity is neither gain nor loss.
— Idries Shah
RemedyYour medicine is in you, and you do not observe it. Your ailment is from yourself, and you do not register it.
Hazrat Ali — Idries Shah
It was being written in the East that 'Sufism was formerly a reality without a name: now it is a name without a reality'.
— Idries Shah
For every Pharoah there is a Moses.
— Idries Shah
Brave is the thief who carries a lamp in his hand.
— Idries Shah
The great poet Hafiz says that you should dye your prayer-carpet with wine if your teacher tells you to do so.
— Idries Shah
Be a dog, but don't be a younger brother.Proverb. — Idries Shah
You must improve yourself on a higher level if you are to be able to help people, and not just weep over them.
— Idries Shah
No practice exists in isolation.
— Idries Shah
Helping othersI order you to assist any oppressed person, whether he is a Moslem or not. — Idries Shah
The major barrier to understanding is wishful thinking and following that which pleases one.
— Idries Shah
From time to time ponder whether you are unconsciously saying:'Truth is what I happen to be thinking at this moment. — Idries Shah
Never follow any impulse to teach, however strong it might be. The command to teach is not felt as an impulsion.
— Idries Shah
Forms are vehicles and instruments, and vehicles and instruments cannot be called good or bad without context.
— Idries Shah
Because sugar is not arsenic, many graves are full.
— Idries Shah
Saying of the ProphetSleep
Sleep is the brother of death. — Idries Shah
