By Matt Pointon

This blog is part of a series where I look at various faiths and explore where they have inspired me and where I have questions/struggles.

Although I am Christian, I believe that God wants us to explore and learn from other traditions as part of our spiritual journey.

This is my journey, no one else’s, and this series of blogs merely record how I see things. They are not intended to offend or convert, nor do I expect you to agree with me.

I do however, appreciate feedback, friendship and further learning. Thank you!

Other blogs in this series:

My interfaith journey (part 1): why I’m a Sikh… and why I’m not

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“The Sufi who sets out to seek God calls himself a ‘traveller’ (sālik); he advances by slow stages (maqāmāt) along a ‘path’ (tarīqat) to the goal of union with Reality (fanā fi ’l-Haqq).”

“The Mystics of Islam“ by Reynold A. Nicholson (1914), p.28

My Sufi journey, as in the classical mould set out above, has been gradual. It has progressed in stages (maqāmāt), along the divine path.

I’ve had an intriguing, soulful experience so far. But I believe there’s also more to come.

So, here’s my story of the path trodden thus far…

Stage 1: Demir Baba (Bulgaria, 2003)

Demir Baba Teke (the 16th century Alevi mausoleum) had first been recommended to me by my friend Fatme.

Fatme is not a Sufi, although she is Muslim. She had been told about the shrine by a friend, and later visited. Impressed by the site, she suggested that I check it out.

And I was glad that she did!

One summer’s day, I took the bus and then a taxi from my home in Varna and descended to the shrine via a path strewn with scraps of material tied to tree branches, each symbolising a prayer.

Even though I knew nothing about its history or the tradition it represented, the historic sanctuary overwhelmed me with the beauty of its simple sanctity.

Here was an Islam that I could relate to, that I felt at home in, that accepted me.

After visiting, I wrote a piece on Demir Baba and, in order to do so, did some rudimentary research.

Those were the days of internet infancy so, rather than Wikipedia, I used local knowledge.

“The Turks that worship at Demir Baba, we call them Kazalbashi [Alians]” explained my friend Pavel.

“They’re different from the others and not particularly liked by them. They’re much more open-minded… there’s none of ‘This is my wife and that’s yours’ stuff and locking their women away. Their women don’t cover their heads and they all drink.”

Now, how true that all is regarding Sufis is debateable. But, what I did learn was that there were Muslims out there who broke the orthodox mould.

Stage 2: Jodhaa Akbar and India (2013)

“Jodhaa Akbar” (2008) is a Bollywood film — a dramatisation of the life of the Mughal emperor Akbar and his marriage to his Hindu bride (Jodhaa).

Akbar was famously tolerant. He would debate holy men from other faiths and respected the beliefs of all of his subjects, including Jodhaa who was allowed to keep her faith after marriage and who even had a small Krishna temple built for her to worship in the palace.

This tolerance came from his Sufi faith. In the film he visits to shrine of Moinuddin Chisti at Ajmer to pray for a son, and, at his wedding, itinerant Sufi dervishes come and sing and dance for him, showcasing the haunting ARR Rahman song “Khwaja Mere Khwaja“.

The whirling dervishes I already knew about. Several months before visiting Demir Baba, I had visited the shrine of Rumi, the founder of their order and perhaps the most famous Sufi of them all.

But, although I had enjoyed the trip, I had not really connected the dots.

Slowly, I began to realise that Rumi, Akbar and Demir Baba were all connected — part of an Islam that was tolerant and welcoming.

And crucially, that I don’t always encounter in Britain — where there is a vocal very conservative orthodox (up to Islamist) presence.

So, I travelled to India. Primarily to visit the Golden Temple but also to tread in Akbar’s footsteps and pray at some Sufi shrines.

I was blown away by the rhythmic Qawwali chanting at the shrine of Hazrat Nizamuddin in Delhi. I then visited the greatest of the Chisti Sufi darghars (tombs), that of Moinuddin Chishti in Ajmer.

And I was welcomed in both.

I was clearly and publicly Christian, but it didn’t matter. There was no attempt at conversion or judgement. As a seeker, I was accepted.

Stage 3: lockdown reading at home (2019 – 20)

Incarcerated at home by the Covid-19 pandemic, I began to read.

I explored Balkan history and discovered more about Demir Baba and other shrines I had encountered on my travels around the peninsular.

I learnt that they were all Bektashi, a Sufi order that had spread with the Janissaries, the shock troops of the Ottoman Empire — Christians forcibly converted as children.

Shia and syncretistic, they appealed to men raised between two worlds and the order had once been widespread across the Balkans and Turkey.

Attacked on one side by the Christians and the other by orthodox Muslims, they had retreated to their stronghold in and around Albania. Then came the dictatorship of Enver Hoxha, with its harsh state atheism. They had almost been wiped out completely.

The Bektashis are far from being mainstream in their views.

Whilst free love and wife sharing might be taking it too far, they are famously liberal — their priests drinking and women not covering — whilst icons of their saints are often seen at shrines.

Since the demise of communism, they’ve been having a quiet revival. They are arguably the largest single religious grouping in Albania, with their world headquarters on the edge of Tirana.

From them, I learnt how diverse Sufism can be but equally, how tolerant, and how important the different orders are.

To be a Sufi is to ally yourself with an order, be it the Chistis of Ajmer, the Bektashis of Tirana, or one of countless others.

Stage 4: Nicosia (Cyprus, 2022)

Wandering the streets of Turkish Nicosia, I had an encounter with a stranger that left a lingering effect on me.

Immediately afterwards, I visited a former Sufi tekke, and then, by chance, picked up a wonderful book by the Turkish Sufi writer Hakan Menguc.

I read it straightaway. It was called “No Encounter is by Chance“.

The book argued that such meetings with strangers were never happenstance. There was a meaning to them, and my job was to discover it.

The coincidences — the meeting, the tekke and then the book — were simply too great.

I took on the message of the book and used my encounter to reach out to someone who changed my life. Ever since then, I’ve kept on reaching out and my life has kept changing… for the better; more spiritual and balanced.

I spoke to a German Sufi friend about the meeting that sparked it and he merely smiled and remarked: “Oh, you’ve met Al-Khidr!”

I’d come across this character before. In a travelogue on the Holy Land, I’d read that the Green Saint (Al-Khidr literally means “The Green One”) is seen as analogous with St. George and Elijah.

Sufis believe he intervenes in our lives as a stranger on the path. As a lover of pilgrimage and religious syncretism, that made total sense to me.

He is a pre-Islamic and indeed, pre-Christian character, dating back to legends from Mesopotamia. However, the Qur’anic account tells us that he met Moses “where the two seas meet” and then walked with him, giving spiritual lessons. 

As a committed pilgrim who feels closest to God whilst walking through the countryside, I got that.

So, I dived in. I went to Pakistan and made a pilgrimage of Sufi shrines, meditating, praying and composing poetry at each one (Al-Khidr is said to bestow the gift of poetry on those he meets — the Persian poet Hafiz being the most famous example).

At the Shrine of Shams Sabzwari Tabrez in Multan, I prayed deeply for the person whom Al-Khidr had led me to. And when he witnessed my devotions, my moto driver opened up to me, confessed that he was a Sufi himself, and took me to meet his master, a Naqshbandi sheikh.

The warmth and friendship I encountered that day was something else, and myself and Junaid, the Sufi disciple whom I befriended, are still in touch.

As well as visiting shrines, I read. I lost myself in the story of Layla and Majnun, the doomed lovers whose separation echoes that between man and God.

One verse of the poetry in particular stuck with me, and I recite it as a mantra. It talks of Majnun, in his despair, visiting the town of Layla to be close to the object of his devotion, and for me it echoes how I travel on pilgrimages around the world to understand and get closer to God:

I pass by this town, the town of Layla

And I kiss this wall and that wall

It’s not love of the town that has enraptured my heart

But of the One who dwells within this town

It all culminated in a pilgrimage I took to Italy to walk in the footsteps of St. Francis of Assisi.

It was tough, unbelievably so. But when I climbed up Mt. Verna to the spot where St. Francis received his stigmata, I felt a great outpouring of achievement, so much so that I was almost drunk with joy.

The following day I found out why: Sufi tradition teaches that there’s only been one Christian saint who is recorded to have met Al-Khidr. And that was St. Francis of Assisi, on Mt. Verna on the night he received his stigmata…

So, have I become a Sufi?

Erm… no.

For whilst there is much that attracts me to the Sufi tradition, there are also some barriers for me as well.

I could write a whole book on these, but for the purpose of brevity, I shall summarise them as falling into two categories: issues with Islam as a whole and issues around the murshid — murid dynamic (the relationship between the sheikh/Sufi master and the spiritual seeker/novice).

Firstly, Sufism is a form of Islam. Although it may seem a world away from literalistic Salafism or Wahabism, it is a branch grown from the same seed.

Yes, it is true that in its early years it took a lot from Gnosticism and the Eastern Christian monastic traditions, plus later on it managed to synergise with Hinduism in certain aspects,. But: Sufism is and always has been Muslim.

Indeed, I would argue that, for the majority of Islamic history, it has been the dominant form of Islam.

If today it is seen by many as some sort of “weird”, superstitious, heretical, or liberal fringe movement, that is more to do with the preconceptions of the Western colonial powers who saw Sufis as “crazed fakirs” or “Islamic mystics” rather than any historical reality.

Devout Muslim rulers sought guidance off Sufis and lay worshippers visited (and in many places, still do visit) their shrines by the million.

Become a Sufi and you have to accept at least the fundamentals of Islam.

And I can’t.

I can’t because I’ve read the Qur’an and find a very intriguing, fascinating, and complex book. But also, a very human one.

I know it’s history and the history of the faith that formed around it, and I cannot accept that it has a divine origin. I accept that a billion people on this planet do not agree with this assessment, but try as I might, I cannot agree with them.

Furthermore, one of Sufism’s greatest contributions is the Nur Mohammed theology (Light of Mohammed) which presents the Prophet Mohammed as the perfect man and a model for us all to follow.

This, I also cannot accept.

Like the book associated with him, I find Mohammed fascinating, intriguing and complex, but I struggle with him as a spiritual role model. His behaviour after Khaybar, his massacre of the Jews of Yathrib, the Zaynab and Aisha sagas, I could go on…

I have listened to countless videos and read numerous books explaining these away, but for me, they still stick. Sorry, but that’s where I am at.

I guess the issue lies with my childhood.

My childhood example of a holy man was the Nazarene (Jesus) who did not get involved in family politics and, even when attacked, refused to fight in self-defence.

Someone who led armies into battle, took part in politics, and treated his numerous women questionably (I am thinking primarily of Safiya bint Huyayy here), is always going to create mixed emotions in my breast.

I know that might offend many Muslims and I wish it didn’t, but: I have to be honest with myself.

My second objection though, is unique to Sufism and would actually be supported by most non-Sufi Muslims.

Sufis have a strong belief in the murshid-murid (master-student) dynamic which is summed up by the academic Nile Green:

“Sufis have long emphasised that all such practices must be pursued under the direction of a master (murshid) who has been a recipient of the tradition and so (in theory, at least) already trodden this path beforehand.

“Complete obedience to the master has widely been considered as fundamental to the Sufi life.”

Sufism: A Global History, p.8

I have come across the master-student dynamic in many traditions including my own, but it does seem to be particularly dominant in Sufism.

You pick a murshid, join an order and become his murid, just like my friend Junaid in Multan (Pakistan) has done.

I recall reading a book called “In Search of Secret India” by Dr Paul Bruton in which he searches across (Hindu) India for a suitable guru to follow, eventually finding the right one at the end.

A close friend of mine, Brian, was so inspired by that book, that he adopted the same tactic, eventually settling on a Taiwanese Buddhist master whose teachings he follows.

It worked for Bruton and it seems to work for both Junaid and Brian, but for me, I just cannot do it.

The thing is, I’m both too eclectic — I love collecting bits and pieces from everywhere. And I’m also too cynical.

Brian and Junaid may have found good masters, but there are plenty of frauds and fakes out there. The whole system seems to be one that can breed abuse and corruption.

Yes, I will listen to what a murshid has to say and respect his wisdom. But, I will also listen to others and make my own mind up as to which is my path to God.

That is my way… but it is not the Sufi way.

So, I am not a Sufi and yet, in many ways, I am.

I belong to no Order, nor even to the larger religion that Sufism is part of, but: I walk the Path with Al-Khidr.

I have completed four stages of my tarīqat so far — who knows how many more there are to come…?

I visit the Town of Layla, kiss this wall and that wall, and I talk with both murid and murshid when I see them.

For life, as the Sufi’s know well, is a journey, and it is one that I love to take.

And perhaps, in my current role as a Christian who explores the Path and befriends the Seekers, I am in the place where God wants me to be: a bridge between His people at the place where the two seas meet.

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Thanks:

Thanks to Elizabeth Arif-Fear, Pavel Marinov, Muhammad Junaid and Fatme Myuhtar.

Read more of Matt’s work and discover his interfaith journey here.