Self-denial is not renouncing things, it is denying the self; and the first lesson of self-denial is humility.
Hazrat Pir-o-Murshid Inayat Khan
Related Material by Pir-o-Murshid Inayat Khan
Compiled by Wahiduddin Richard Shelquist – wahiduddin.net
There is a story of a dervish who spoke with a young person who was very interested in words of wisdom. The young person said, ‘If I come to your part of the world, I will come to see you. Will you tell me where you live?’ The dervish replied, ‘I live in the place of the liars’. … When they went to that country and asked for the dervish, the people said, ‘We do not know any place of liars, but there is a dervish living somewhere here’. So they took them near the graveyard where the dervish lived.
The first question the young person asked was, ‘Why did you give me a name which is not the name of the place?’ The dervish replied, ‘Yes, this is a place of liars’. It was the graveyard. The dervish said, ‘Come with me, I shall show you. This here is a tomb, they say, of a general. Where is his sword, where is his power, where is his voice, what is he now? Is he a general? Here, this one was called a prime-minister. Where is her ministry, where is her office, where is her pen, where is her power? In the same ground! This person was called a judge. Whom is this one judging now? They are all in the ground. Were they not liars? Did they not tell a lie saying I am so and so, and I am such and such?’
There is a beautiful story told of the King Akbar that when he was grieving with an almost ungovernable grief over the death of his mother, his ministers and friends tried to comfort him by influence and power. Akbar replied, “Yes, that is true, and that only makes my grief greater; for while I have everyone to bow before me, to give way to me, to salute me and obey me, my mother was the one person before whom I could humble myself; and I cannot tell you how great a joy that was to me.”
Think then of the far greater joy of humbling oneself before the Father-Mother God on Whose Love one can always depend. A spark only of love expresses itself in the human father and mother; the Whole of Love in God. In whatever manner we humble ourselves it can never be enough to express the humility of the limited self before Limitless Perfection. Self-denial is not renouncing of things, it is denying the self; and the first lesson of self-denial is humility.
( from Unpublished Papers from the Nekbakht Foundation Archives, Prayer, 8 May 1921 and 15 May 1921 )
Commentary by Murshid S.A.M. (Sufi Ahmed Murad)
Samuel L. Lewis
When the rich young person came to Jesus Christ for advice and was told to sell all that they had and give to the poor, they did not understand the words of the Master. At that time, it was quite common for the rich to come to spiritual teachers and surrender all their worldly goods. This has been a custom through the ages and there is nothing strange in the story — only the European mind, accustomed to different traditions, has not always understood it.
Now anybody is rich in a worldly sense, who is intoxicated with life and places values in things — be they riches, possessions, worldly honor, fame, knowledge, or anything which does not lead one to the realization of God. It is almost self-evident that a person cannot serve two masters, be they God and Mammon, or any two masters. The real truth about wealth is that one is never the possessor of such wealth; one is the servant of such wealth. If one possessed it, one could take it with one, both on earthly travels and beyond this plane when one departed. Obviously this is impossible and it teaches that one does not really own things but serves them when one claims such ownership.
Now to renounce what one does not own is not really surrender; to renounce what is one’s possession is surrender. The nufs is nothing but the thought of self, and this stands in the way of all spiritual realization and perfection. Giving that away, throwing one’s sense of self down makes it possible to gain the kingdom of Heaven. The miser on earth, though possessing only a farthing, cannot reach the gates. The kindly person, though having millions, may be blessed by Allah.