A Selection from the book “Al-Rasa’el: The Light of Salvation” [i]
By: Hazrat Molana Shah Maghsoud Sadegh Angha, Pir Oveyssi
Prophet Mohammad (PBUH) has said: “Poverty is the land of the unseen.”
It is important to note that poverty is neither possessing or desiring, but freedom from the self; exercised in patience, obedience, and a heart submitted in trust to the Lord. The key to poverty is seeking and devotion. The treasure of God is poverty and the heart of the poor its treasure-chest.
The principal of poverty, is affection and its reality annihilation. Faith is following the Guardianship of the Prophet Mohammad (PBUH) whose journey began in poverty and annihilation, ending in unity and salvation. Poverty is devotion, and the solitude of the poor is a treasure of abundance. The action of the poor surrender in trust and speak words in remembrance of the Lord, his cloak is the concealment of the revealed secrets, and his goal is God. His vehicle is an aware heart, his service is knowledge, and his efforts are in servitude.
The way and reality of a Sufi is veiled, it has no market and no outward returns.
Dualism in meaning refers to two, referring to you and I. The poor have overturned the world of illusion and passed the world of appearance and have striven for self-annihilation in union with the Almighty God. The Aref (Sufi) is he who has given his heart to his Lord and his body in service to mankind. The poor one is diligent in discovery of the light and mounts on the path to God. The true one in poverty, abstains from idleness and the superfluous. He turns his heart from men to God.
Remember your commitment on the day without beginning, without ending, now is the day of poverty.
Rise and make effort in your commitment, Unite from your dispersions. Don’t break the true bond and keep the pure Allegiance.You have been saved from the treacherous self to the Paradise of the Almighty and the Glorious Sun.
Rise, awaken and take action to please the Beloved. Do not heed the temptations of the ignorant rival. Whisper to Him from your Heart, where else will you find rest? Truly, He manifest in the hearts, in the unseen, in the depth of the ears and the eyes. Closer to you in He than your jugular vein and all seeing is He to all that is hidden.
Know that performing ritual and following rites based on personal beliefs and preferences is devoid of truth. It will not benefit you, nor bring you salvation. For the believers who have inwardly discovered the truth and the enlightened Salek, the reality of devotion is in the inward cognition of the Master of the Path.
- Hazrat Molana Shah Maghsoud Sadegh Angha, Al-Rasa’el- The Light of Salvation, (M.T.O. Shahmaghsoudi Publication®, Tehran,Iran 1975) p.11-13.