The Teaching of Hazrat Inayat Khan      

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Volume

Sayings

Social Gathekas

Religious Gathekas

The Message Papers

The Healing Papers

Vol. 1, The Way of Illumination

Vol. 1, The Inner Life

Vol. 1, The Soul, Whence And Whither?

Vol. 1, The Purpose of Life

Vol. 2, The Mysticism of Sound and Music

Vol. 2, The Mysticism of Sound

Vol. 2, Cosmic Language

Vol. 2, The Power of the Word

Vol. 3, Education

Vol. 3, Life's Creative Forces: Rasa Shastra

Vol. 3, Character and Personality

Vol. 4, Healing And The Mind World

Vol. 4, Mental Purification

Vol. 4, The Mind-World

Vol. 5, A Sufi Message Of Spiritual Liberty

Vol. 5, Aqibat, Life After Death

Vol. 5, The Phenomenon of the Soul

Vol. 5, Love, Human and Divine

Vol. 5, Pearls from the Ocean Unseen

Vol. 5, Metaphysics, The Experience of the Soul Through the Different Planes of Existence

Vol. 6, The Alchemy of Happiness

Vol. 7, In an Eastern Rose Garden

Vol. 8, Health and Order of Body and Mind

Vol. 8, The Privilege of Being Human

Vol. 8a, Sufi Teachings

Vol. 9, The Unity of Religious Ideals

Vol. 10, Sufi Mysticism

Vol. 10, The Path of Initiation and Discipleship

Vol. 10, Sufi Poetry

Vol. 10, Art: Yesterday, Today, and Tomorrow

Vol. 10, The Problem of the Day

Vol. 11, Philosophy

Vol. 11, Psychology

Vol. 11, Mysticism in Life

Vol. 12, The Vision of God and Man

Vol. 12, Confessions: Autobiographical Essays of Hazat Inayat Khan

Vol. 12, Four Plays

Vol. 13, Gathas

Vol. 14, The Smiling Forehead

By Date

THE SUPPLEMENTARY PAPERS

Heading

The Preparation for the Journey

The Object of the Journey

Fulfillment of the Obligations of Human Life

The Realization of the Inner Life

Freedom of Action

The Law of the Inner Life

Attaining the Inner Life

The Angel-Man

The Jinn

The Five Different Kinds of Spiritual Souls

Sub-Heading

-ALL-

1. Unlearning

2. A Spiritual Guide

3. Receiving of Knowledge

4. Meditation

5. Loving Life

Vol. 1, The Inner Life

Attaining the Inner Life

3. Receiving of Knowledge

The third thing necessary for spiritual attainment is the receiving of knowledge. This being the knowledge of the inner world, it cannot be compared with the knowledge one has learned before. That is why it is necessary to unlearn the former. Man cannot adjust what he receives in this path to the ideas which he has held before; the two things cannot go together. Therefore there are three stages of receiving knowledge which the one being guided has to go through.

  1. The first stage is the receiving of the knowledge, when he does nothing but receive.

  2. The next stage is the period after this; and that stage is the assimilating of what has been learned. Man thinks upon it, he ponders upon It, in order that it may remain in his mind. It is just like eating food and then assimilating it.

  3. The third stage is the reasoning it out by oneself. Man does not reason it out as soon as he has received it; if he did, he would lose the whole thing. Because it is like a person who has learned A and B and C at one stage, and then would ask how about words that did not begin with those letters. He would reason it out much sooner than he ought, For he has not yet learned the other letters. There is a time which must necessarily be given to receiving, as one gives time to eating. While one is eating one does not run about in the street in order to assimilate the food. After a person has finished his dinner, then he does everything possible to help digest it. Assimilating is clearly understanding, feeling and memorizing knowledge within oneself; not only that, but waiting until its benefit and its illumination come as a result of achievement.

    The third part, then, to the receiving of knowledge is reasoning, to reason it through: why was it like that? what benefit has come to me from it? how can it be made practicable in life? how can it benefit myself and others? That is the third stage.

If these stages are confused, then the whole process becomes confused, and one cannot get that benefit for which one treads the spiritual path.