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SOME FURTHER TEACHINGS RELATED TO THE ZIRAAT

FOUND IN THE WORKS OF PIR-O-MURSHID INAYAT KHAN © *

On roots, sowing, and the farm

Learning is forming a knot in the mind. Whatever one learns from experience or from a person, one makes a knot of it in the mind; and there are as many knots found as there are things one has learned. Unlearning is unravelling the knot; and it is as hard to unlearn as it is to untie a knot. How much effort it requires, how much patience it requires, to unravel when one has made a knot and pulled it tight from both sides! So it requires patience and effort to unravel the knots in the mind. And what helps the process? The light of reason working with full power unravels the mental knots. A knot is a limited reason. When one unravels it, its limitation is taken away, it is open. And when the mind becomes smooth by unlearning and by digging out all impressions, of good and bad, of right and wrong, then the ground of the heart becomes as cultivated ground, just as the land does after ploughing. All the old stumps and roots and pebbles and rocks are taken off, and it is made into ground which is now ready for the sowing of the seed. But if there are rocks and stones and bricks still scattered there, and still some of the old roots lying there, then it is difficult for the seed to be sown; the ground is not in the condition the farmer wishes it to be.

By accusing a person of his faults, we often strengthen the roots of his faults.

If one has learned while on earth to create joy and happiness for oneself and for others, in the other world that joy and happiness surrounds one; and if one has sown the seeds of poison while on earth the fruits of these one must reap there; that is where one sees justice as the nature of life.

What is goodness? Some people who are called good are very negative; they allow their minds and bodies to be open to every sort of influence that comes to them from without. The garden of their soul is not guarded and tended by the wise gardener, and the winds blowing from north and south, from east and west, carry all sorts of seeds: seeds of weeds and thistles and thorns which fall upon the soil, take root and spring up very quickly; often they choke the flowers that are also growing in that garden, and then, in a sensitive personality, there is struggle for mastery. Disharmony results from it and consequently weakness and illness.

Would you believe, if I may say so, that the effect of certain practices comes even after ten years or twelve years? A person without patience might think, "I did not have immediate results after two, three months." But he may not think so. If they are seeds which you sow in the ground, they take root and a plant comes. But in order for the plant to be fruitful it takes ten years. This is the spiritual sowing. It might take a much longer time in some cases. In some cases the next day the result might show. There are some plants which come quicker, others which take time to bear fruit. But still the spiritual sowing has its result, and a sure result. Never therefore to doubt, to be discouraged, to give up hope; but to continue, persevering in this path.

Early childhood is like soil that is just prepared for sowing the seed. It is such a great opportunity in the life of the child, and an even greater opportunity for the guardian to sow the seed of knowledge and of righteousness in the heart of the child.

There is a desire for goodness in every heart. When a person thinks of goodness, loves goodness, admires goodness, and looks for goodness in everyone in the world, that person so to speak collects good. When we recognize the goodness in any person it is like collecting the seeds of goodness and sowing them in our hearts. But when a person looks for evil, then he can see nothing but evil in every person. In this way he grows so accustomed to it that his world becomes full of evil. He has contemplated it and looked for it and created it. We will always find a complaining person complaining about this one or that one having done wrong. We will find perhaps he has a record of a thousand people having done wrong. The world is a record in his heart, a record of all those who have done wrong or evil. But if we study him we will see that he has as much evil as he has recorded, perhaps even more; because if a man has evil in him, he collects a thousand evils; he becomes a storekeeper of evil, although he is really discontented with evil.

Life is far more productive than man can think, productive of good and evil, of right and wrong, of joy and sorrow. It depends upon the person what he wishes to produce. Life for me is a place where every person is given a piece of ground one person a larger piece, one person a smaller - and he is told, "Now you have the ground, and here are seeds: grass, weeds, corn and good fruit, flowers and poisonous fruits. Sow what you like, sow all that interests you and produce, or do not sow at all - but still the ground belongs to you".

So is the life of an individual in this world: every person has his farm. There are some who sow thorns, and when the thorns have sprung up and become painful, they say, "Why did we do this", or they say, "I am so tired of this farm, I wish I were not here". They wish they could be taken away from that farm and placed in a farm where flowers and fruits are already growing, without having to take the trouble of sowing. But that is against the law. Man is intended to live on his farm, and all through life he is sowing what will be his hereafter.

Heaven and hell are not made ready for a person after his life on earth. The same farm that is given to man is hereafter turned into his heaven or hell. So man must build heaven now on the farm that is already his possession. He must put into it all that he likes and loves, and remove from it all that is hurtful, harmful, or disagreeable, making now, while on earth, his farm of the nature of heaven -- which in the hereafter will culminate into a perfect heaven.

©Copyright Sufi Order International, Seattle, WA, 1997-98. The Works Of Pir-O-Murshid Inayat Khan, CD-ROM