Peace is perfected activity; that is perfect which is complete in all its aspects, balanced in each direction and under complete control of the will.
Hazrat Pir-o-Murshid Inayat Khan
Related Material by Pir-o-Murshid Inayat Khan
Compiled by Wahiduddin Richard Shelquist – wahiduddin.net
It is useless to discuss the peace of the world. What is necessary just now is to create peace in ourselves that we, ourselves, become examples of love, harmony and peace. That is the only way of saving the world and ourselves.
Peace is independently felt within oneself. It is not dependent upon the outer sensation. It is something that belongs to one, something that is one’s own self. … Peace is not a knowledge, peace is not a power, peace is not a happiness, but peace is all these. And besides, peace is productive of happiness. Peace inspires one with knowledge of the seen and unseen, and in peace is to be found the divine Presence. It is not the excited ones who conquer in this continual battle of life. It is the peaceful ones who tolerate all, who forgive all, who understand all, who assimilate all things. Those who lack peace, with all their possessions, the property of this earth or quality of mind, are poor even with both. They have not got that wealth which may be called divine and without which their life is useless. For true life is in peace, a life which will not be robbed by death.
The secret of mysticism, the mystery of philosophy, all is to be attained after the attainment of peace. You cannot refuse to recognize the divine in those who are people of peace. It is not the talkative, it is not the argumentative, who prove to be wise. They may have intellect, worldly wisdom, and yet may not have pure intelligence, which is real wisdom. True wisdom is to be found in the peaceful, for peacefulness is the sign of wisdom. It is the peaceful who are observant. It is peace that gives them the power to observe keenly. It is the peaceful, therefore, who can conceive, for peace helps them to conceive. It is the peaceful who can contemplate; those who have no peace cannot contemplate properly. Therefore, all things pertaining to spiritual progress in life depend upon peace.
And now the question is what makes one lack peace? The answer is, love of sensation. Those who are always seeking to experience life in movement, in activity, in whatever form, want more and more of that experience. In the end they become dependent upon the life which is outside, and so lose in the end their peace, the peace which is their real self. … the first thing is to seek the realm of God within ourselves, in which there is our peace. As soon as we have found that, we have found our support, we have found our self. And in spite of all the activity and movement on the surface, we shall be able to keep that peace undisturbed if only we hold it fast by becoming conscious of it.
( from the Sufi Message Series, Volume I – The Way of Illumination, Section IV: The Purpose of Life, Chapter VI )
Commentary by Murshid S.A.M. (Sufi Ahmed Murad)
Samuel L. Lewis
Until the soul has found itself far above the mind-mesh, there cannot be peace. Peace is found at the center, at the hub of things, nevertheless it cannot be separated from activity. Cessation of activity may be called non-activity, not peace; cessation of war may be called non-war, but peace is a very inappropriate term for it.
Whenever there is a change of feeling, thought or action, there is some rearrangement; and every type of change, arrangement or rearrangement causes or accompanies a disequilibrium. Any change of equilibrium is necessarily of the nature of war. Only when an equilibrium can be maintained without change is there peace. This is only found when the will has entire control of the mind.
All vibrations and atoms below the mind-mesh are constantly in motion, changing themselves and causing changes to others and being changed except where they are held in place by a stronger force. It is love or will that stands above law, which can fix these atoms and vibrations. This fixation is symbolically studied in alchemy and directly studied in the inward mystical process.
It is the Divine Will which can control all wills and all minds, and it is the Divinity which is the perfected activity. Therefore what the Buddhists call Nirvana is nothing but the natural state of God above all distinctions and differences, thus Pure Peace.