We start our lives as teachers, and it is very hard for us to learn to become pupils. There are many whose only difficulty in life is that they are teachers already. What we have to learn is pupilship. There is but one Teacher, God.
Hazrat Pir-o-Murshid Inayat Khan
Related Material by Pir-o-Murshid Inayat Khan
Compiled by Wahiduddin Richard Shelquist – wahiduddin.net
In order to know the Truth or to know God earthly qualifications and earthly wisdom or learning are not necessary. What one has to learn is how to become a pupil. We often start our lives as teachers, and then it is hard to become a pupil. From childhood on we start to teach our parents. There are seldom souls who have more inclination for pupilship than for teaching, and there are many whose only difficulty in life is that they are teachers already. People think that perhaps their reading or study of different religions and doctrines has qualified them and made them capable to understand the Truth and to have the knowledge of God, but they forget that there is only One Teacher, and that is God. We all are pupils, and what we can do in life is to qualify ourselves to become true pupils.
It should be remembered that all the great teachers of humanity, such as Jesus Christ, Buddha, Muhammad and Zarathushtra [ including the unnamed, unrecognized, and even unknown great women teachers — Muiz ], have been great pupils; they have learned from the innocent child, they have learned from everyone, from every person that came near them. They have learned from every situation and every condition of the world. They have understood and they have learned. It is the desire to learn continually that makes one a teacher, and not the desire to become a teacher. As soon as people think, ‘I am something of a teacher,’ they have lost ground. For there is only One Teacher: God alone is the Teacher, and all others are God’s pupils. We all learn from life what life teaches us. When a soul begins to think that it has learned all it has to learn, and that now it is a teacher, it is very much mistaken. The greatest teachers of humanity have learned from humanity more than they have taught.
Commentary by Murshid S.A.M. (Sufi Ahmed Murad)
Samuel L. Lewis
Teacher is the positive pole, and gives; pupil is the negative pole, and takes. Many want to take and also want to teach at the same time; this is impossible and leads to much misery. One is not teacher who seeks followers; one is a seeker of followers. [ In other words, the one who seeks followers is a seeker of followers, and not a teacher — Muiz ] One is only a teacher who teaches others something, who gives others something. It is not necessary to teach, it is not necessary to give. This condition is associated with Nasoul, or the rising energy.
Nasoul has its purpose and Urouj, the descending energy, has its purpose. There must be balance and order in the Universe. No doubt Urouj leads to selfishness, but Urouj also leads to growth; merely to give away for the sake of giving is of no great advantage. This assumes that self has capacity for endless evolution. Such self has not the capacity.
It is God Who is, and our evolution is God’s evolution; God’s opportunity is our opportunity. Therefore Urouj and Nasoul balance, and when we are willing to learn, God is there to teach us.