PREFACE

HIS booklet forms an introduction to the study of
the doctrines of Sufism. It is, however, necessary
first of all to define the point of view from which the sub-
jectis approached. The point of view is not that of pure
scholarship, whatever may happen to be the scientific
interest of the doctrinal summaries which figure in this
book ; the chief purpose is to contribute to the efforts of
those who in the world of today seek to understand the
permanent and universal truths of which every sacred
doctrine is an expression.

Let it be said at the outset that academic knowledge
is only a quite secondary and very indirect aid in assimi-

lating the intellectual content of oriental doctrines—
indeed the scientific method which of necessity ap-
proaches things from the outside and thus from their
purely historical and contingent aspects, does not set out
to promote such an assimilation. There are doctrines
which can only be understood from the “inside >’ through
a work of assimilation or penetration that is essentially
intellectual ! and, for that very reason, goes beyond the
limitations of discursive thought. Indeed, in so far as
it is stamped with mental conventions, (not to speak of
the agnostic and evolutionist prejudices which deter-

1. By ‘““intellect ”’ is here meant, not the reason or discursive thought but
the ““organ’’ of direct knowledge or of certainty, i.e. the pure light of intelli-
gence which goes beyond the limits of reason alone. The theology of the
Christian Orthodox Church, and in particular Maxim the Confessor, calls this

““ organ *’ the Nous. Sufis would say that the real ‘“seat’ of the intellect is
the heart (a/-qalb) and not the brain.