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

1,1: Magnetism

1,4: Insight

1,5: Spirit

1,6: Purity

2,1: Breath

2,2: the Spirit In the Flesh

Sub-Heading

-ALL-

1: Our Physical Constitution

2: The Mystical Significance of the Body

3: The Nature of the Sense and their Organs

4: The Source of Bodily Desires

5: The Source of Emotions

6: The Constitution of the Mind

7: The Influence of the Mind upon the Body, and of the Body upon the Mind

8: The Soul in Itself Alone

9: The Soul with Mind

10: The Soul with Mind and Body

11: The Experience of the Soul through the Body

12: The Experience of the Soul through Other Beings

13: The Experience of the Soul through Other Things

14: The Experience of the Soul through the Mind

15: The Experience of the Soul through Other Beings

16: The Experience of the Soul through the Heart

17: The Experience of the Soul through the Heart of Another

18: The Experience of the Soul through the Spirit

19: The Experience of the Soul through the Experience of Another

20: The Experience of the Soul through the Abstract

21: The Journey to the Goal

22: The Journey to the Goal (continued)

23: The Purpose of Life

24: Self-Realization

25: The Divine Light

26: The Soul

27: The Destiny of the Soul

28: The Connection of the Soul and the Body

29: The Radiance of the Soul

30: The Radiance of the Soul (continued)

The Healing Papers

2,2: the Spirit In the Flesh

23: The Purpose of Life

A deep study of anything shows the seer that there is a purpose beneath it all. Yet, if one could look beyond every purpose, there would seem to be no purpose. This boundary is called the Wall of Smiles, which means that all purposes of life, which seem at the moment to be so important, fade away as soon as one looks at them from that height called the Wall of Smiles.

But as deeply as the purpose of life can be traced, there seems to be one ultimate purpose working through all planes of life and showing itself through all planes of existence; that is as if the Knower, with His knowing faculty, had been in darkness, desiring to know something; and in order to know something He created all things. Again, it is the desire of the Creator that has been the power which created; and, too, it is the materialized substance of the spirit, a part of Himself, that has been turned into a creation, yet leaving the Creator behind as the absolute Spirit, constantly knowing and experiencing life through All different channels, some developed, some undeveloped for the purpose.

This Knower, through His final creation, man, realizes and knows more than through any channel of knowledge, such as bird, beast, worm, gem, plant, or rock. This one Spirit, experiencing through various channels, deludes Himself with the delusion of various beings; and it is this delusion which is the individual ego. He experiences, therefore, two things in his delusion: pain and pleasure; pleasure by the experience of a little perfection, and pain by the lack of it. As long as the cover of this delusion keeps His eyes veiled He knows, yet does not know; it is an illusion; He experiences all things, and yet everything is confusion. But as time goes, when this veil becomes thinner and He begins to see through it, the first thing that comes to Him is bewilderment; but the next is knowledge, culminating in vanity, which is the purpose of life.