Quotes by Idries Shah

A man must be a Solomon before his magical ring will work

Any society which enjoins its members to adhere to both of these (politeness and truth) is a fraud.

A man must be a Salomon before his magical ring will work. (Hafiz)

Imagination blocks you like a bolt on a door. Burn that bar. (Rumi)

Our objective is to achieve, by the understanding of the Origin, the Knowledge which comes through experience.

ScrapsThe scraps from the meal of the Emir are larger than the gifts of halwa from the merchant. Timur Fazil

As swords were designed to killThey did well to make them tongue-shaped.(Anwar-i-Suhaili)

Superior experience and knowledge will be made available to a man or woman in exact accordance with his worth, capacity and earning of it

Man (and woman) has an infinite capacity for self-development. Equally, he has an infinite capacity for self-destruction. A human being may be clinically alive and yet, despite all appearances, spiritually dead.

The decline in the influence of religion has been due, in the main, not to religion itself, but to the very shallowness of many practitioners. People who are indoctrinated and mistake implanted obsession for faith, are themselves destroyers of the very thing which they imagine themselves called upon to try to protect.In fact, of course, they have no such call: and their capacity to protect something which is other than their imaginings makes for a comical situation.

Three ThingsThree things cannot be retrieved:The arrow once sped from the bowThe word spoken in hasteThe missed opportunity.(Ali the Lion, Caliph of Islam, son-in-law of Mohammed the Prophet),

Opinion is usually something which people have when they lack comprehensive information.

Knowledge is something which you can use.Belief is something which uses you.

Sufism, according to the Sufi, is an adventure in living, necessary adventure.

Religion, for instance, cannot be accepted or rejected out of hand, until the student knows exactly what religion means.

People in this civilization are starving in the middle of plenty. This is a civilization that is going down, not because it hasnt got the knowledge that would save it, but because nobody will use the knowledge.

Knowledge cannot be attained except through humility.

Knowledge gives nothing to a man until he gives everything to it.

Sufis (the name for the realised individual, not the learner or follower) are reunited with objective Reality and Unity.

Definitions from Mulla Do-PiazaFlattery:One of the most promising of businesses: always brisk.