A 'Tale of Two Sidis'- Another Sheikh's Lifelong Ambivalence - A New Mexico Trip

In the 1980s, Aisha and I traveled to Abiquiu, New Mexico, to visit other Western students of Sidi.  We stayed in a private home, but these 'Beloveds' were also affiliated with the Dar-Al-Islam Center in Abiquiu.

I'd indirectly become acquainted with the Leader of the community, Sheik Durkee, through his earlier collaboration with my all-tine-favorite spiritual hero, Ram Dass, in creating the epochal book, Be Here Now.  

And through reading his own book, Seed, which is similar in content to Be Here Now, but also has an interesting deck of holy cards in the back that could be used as meditation or divination objects. 

The local area in New Mexico was a stunning desert environment.  Stark but beautiful.  The house where we were staying had a direct view of the backyard of Georgia O'Keefe, the esteemed and iconic American artist, still alive although aged, who we would see taking walks with her caregivers.  It was easy to understand where much of her inspiration came from.

Noorideen Durkee and Ram Dass in the Early Days

The relatively large institution, Dar-Al-Islam, was utterly unique in terms of its architecture and the composition of its residents. The residents were primarily middle-class American young people who had taken on various elements of Islam and/or Sufism under various Middle Eastern Sheiks. 

Nurideen was an artist and student of Islamic Architecture, and the layout of the community was a work of art in itself.

It was perhaps my insecurity, but I felt an undercurrent of hostility/ambivalence at Dar-Al-Islam towards Sidi Sheik al Jamal.  The American wife of our Dutch host, with whom we spent several nights, evidently had earlier made the case with Nurideen of incidences of Sidi's alleged sexual misconduct towards her.  

She later told me that Sidi had inflicted this reprehensible behavior upon my wife Aisha, as well,  but who knows the truth? 

(Though Aisha later took on the Sheik's last name despite having no apparent relationship with him, certainly not through any kind of legitimate marriage, I always considered the impetus for that to have been the fact that her later friend/boyfriend, Ali Ansari, came from a Sufi order where it was common to take on the name of the Sheik as a token of one's respect and reliance upon him. Another interpretation might have been that she somehow considered HERSELF a wife of Sidi's).

I was also violently ill at the time from some foodborne illness, so I wasn't yet my best in terms of sorting out all the claims and counter-claims.  But we were still welcomed by these two fellow (if former) disciples with whom we already had established a deep, recurring friendship.

One day, we went to meet Nurideen, who was, at the time, rather qualified in his endorsement of Sheik Jamal. He seemed to conclude that Sheik Jamal was okay and that following him was in our best spiritual interests, but there was some hesitancy. (There was apparently a standing order that Sheik Jamal would not be allowed to visit Dar-Al-Islam.) 

Naively, though, I thought as a new murid of Sheik al-Jamal, I would be somewhat celebrated, as I had been in Jerusalem, by other Muslims.  Yet, I sensed a slight hesitancy from the DAL crew. 

My perceived-to-be-ambivalent reception might have been my own self-consciousness based on my sloppy execution of everything Islamic in the company of these obviously HIGHLY COMMITTED and completely ISLAMICIZED Western Sufis.

The tenor of Dar-Al-Islam was, to ME,  mainly Islamic rather than Sufi (which, to my limited understanding, was more IMPORTANT than the 'Outside Islam,)' and the pillars of Islam were rigorously practiced.

After some hemming and hawing, Nurideen finally came up with the same tepid endorsement that I encountered more than once among Sufi Teachers who knew Sidi: "I'm sure that Sheik Jamal can help you in your journey to find ALLAH."

I was disappointed.  I'd gotten used to a fair amount of celebrity as we sometimes walked in East Jerusalem, the Old City, or the two mosques on the Temple Mount with Sidi to widespread approval.  

Typically, the passers-by would greet Sidi, and he would welcome them back and then point to us as, "New Muslims from America!"

My limited Arabic came in handy, and it somewhat perplexed me that  Sidi was primarily describing us Muslims rather than Sufis. 

 

Whereas, in MY mind, at least, we were predominantly Sufis rather than Muslims.  To a greater extent, I thought I looked upon the practice of the five pillars of Islam as "the outside Islam."  Necessary, perhaps, but not really "the Point" of it all.

I had no particular attraction to that 'Outside Islam,' which seemed like an Old Testament-style religion.  True, it did fit in the arid, desert environment where Sidi was located, but it also seemed rather medieval, patriarchal, and intolerant and often still seems so, in the context of the modern, scientifically oriented West.  

Or even in the context of New Age spirituality, which instructed me that, "It was ALL Truth and if it wasn't, that was IT'S Problem".

No, Islam asserted, and in fact, was TRAPPED in the assertion that it represented the ACTUAL, COMPLETE, INCONTROVERTIBLE LITERAL WORD of GOD!

Perhaps with even more certainty than Christianity did!

And as such, there were just too many inconsistencies in it, for me at least,  for it to be God's Diary.  And ultimately, I could just not ally myself with the secondary place of women within it--which persisted virtually universally within the Islamic world.

Men were allowed to marry 4 women, but not the other way around. Women virtually NEVER were allowed to lead a mixed group in regular prayers. 

And in all but a few cases, Sidi's groups being one of them, mixed groups were not allowed in Sufi 'Dhikr's' or 'Remembrances', which could range from quiet and very extended recitation of the name of 'Allah', to various iterations of 'Sufi Dancing.'  

These usually involved relatively small groups of men, say 10 to 100, linking arms and moving back and forth while intoning phrases like 'There is no God but God' or 'Forgive me, Allah'.

This form of communal worship had very much attracted me in my early days, and I still sometimes do it as a non-Muslim, as a sort of universal prayer to an unknown Higher Power.

As someone pointed out, 'Islam has never had a Reformation.—at least not in the same way Christianity had. Many of its loudest recent advocates want to harken back to earlier days when one Caliph ruled the entire Muslim World, without considering how impossible that would be in the era of the modern nation-state.

On the other hand, I found that most Muslims were PERSONALLY hospitable, virtuous, and self-effacing.  They were usually attentive to morality and anxious not to displease God with any moral lapses. (Though their 'leaders' sometimes forgot their Friday School lessons.)

Anyway...At that point, I didn't really understand how Sufism and Islam were integrally connected, and one really didn't think of having one without the other if one was living in most Islamic countries.  

It was only with the rise of Wahhabism in Saudi Arabia that Sufism came to be seen as an 'innovation' or 'shirq'.  The same word is used for 'polytheism' or 'assigning Partners to God'--the worst-- and I mean THE VERY WORST --SIN a pious Muslim can commit!!

It's a tension/misunderstanding that still exists today where one finds Wahhabi-oriented groups in Pakistan regularly committing suicide bombings at the tombs of Sufi Saints.  At sites like those, which, until recent times, had also existed on the Arabian Peninsula, pious Muslims had venerated saints for centuries, not seeing much distinction between the 'auwliya' or 'saints' of Islamic Sufism and the original Companions of the Holy Prophet Muhammad.

The same sort of people who brought down the  Twin Towers on 9/11 are still today committing the same kind of horrors against their own fellow Muslims of a slightly different persuasion.

I was well aware that Islam had had a golden age where it was the repository of wisdom and books of Western Civilization, which were lost in the chaos following the fall of Rome and the subsequent dark ages in Europe.  

At that time, Islamic Civilization was a "Glittering City on a Hill."  It was said that every book ever written was on hand in the famous Library of Alexandria in Egypt.  It was the Prophet, after all, who said, "Seek knowledge, even if it be in China.")

So, while I would put down on questionaries for several years that my religion was 'Muslim,' I didn't explore the outside religion very much at all.  In contrast, Sidi obviously took it as a feather in his cap that he had created some Western Muslims   I think it gave him and the observing locals a sense of pride that former Christians were coming to Jerusalem and converting to Islam.

This subtle tension between Nurideen and Sidi evidently continued, which is also reflected in this epitaph Nurideen wrote about Sidi, which can be found on Durkee's website here: 

http://greenmountainschool.org/slides/in-memory-of-a-great-shaykh-in-memory-of-a-long-long-friendship/

To me, it's a prime example of trying to put lipstick on a pig. Although he tried, he couldn't say Sidi was beyond reproach. I noticed this frequently.

Here are some quotes some that piece:

...I decided to give a straight talk on Islam as such, not as an adjunct to contemporary life in America or as a side issue of Sufism, but as a determining factor in how a human being was supposed to live their life according to Allah, and his prophet peace, beyond him and his family.

When the time came, I gave my talk, which lasted an hour. Allowed time for questions but nobody saw fit to ask me anything, so I returned to my room in the hotel where I was staying and where the conference was being held. I had just settled in when there was a knock on the door, and three of the organizers and students of Sheik Mohammed were there. I invited them in though I didn't exactly know them but had seen them in the company at the conference. 

After a few minutes of small talk, the person, a doctor, who seemed to be the principal person in the group said,

"We liked your talk, but we have to tell you we can't sell this on the basis of Islam."

I was very much taken aback by this and told them I wasn't selling anything in any case but I was asked to come and give a talk and I did so, and they should take it up with sheik Mohammed. We're selling what were they selling I wondered later I understood that they were talking about the University of spiritual healing

This question, though not enunciated by Sheik Mohammed, colored all my relationships all my relations to his group from then on to greater and lesser degrees...

In the course of time I heard from Sheik Mohammed again and he asked me if I would come and teach Arabic with a view to reading Qur'an. He told me that he was in the process of creating a Shidhilli center in Northern California and there was a building which he was planning a mosque, and I could teach in it, and there were rooms above it as it used to be an old hotel, where I could stay with my family while we were teaching

It was with that invitation that I spoke to him about the event of the previous year and told him that the only way I would come and teach there was to give was for him to give me a judge that I had come to teach Arabic and Quran. I didnt want to be involved in selling anything, I would just come with my helpers and do that. I did

This work continued at the center in California, and other places as well, for a number of years, and many people learn to read Arabic and the Quran, Ohamptulillah. He broadened my teaching to include salot, its language, its reasons and rules etc, as he said it would be easier for the people to understand this from someone of their own language and country rather than someone from a different culture. I did this and was happy to be of help. At this point, in addition to working with the group in California, I was asked to come to the group at the Farm of Peace in Pennsylvania, and to speak with them along the same lines, which I did

One afternoon when he and I were talking, we spoke about Ramadan and he brought up the idea of l'tikaaf, where during the last 10 days of that month people stay in and around the mosque. He asked me if I could somehow find a time to come and lead that, including night time readings of the Quran and other classes by me and my family. We did this a number of times, and in that time, paradoxically, our relationship group was both deeper and more distant. There was a lot that simply was left unsaid and was based upon a subtle unspoken understanding that had elements of both agreement and disagreement on the ways and means to advance the objective of explaining Islam and Sufism.

So began In my life a search which was mainly internal, although had external edges to it, to find the Imam of the Time. This had the effect of functionally. This had the effect of functionally taking me away from Sheik Mohammed and his work of bringing Islam to a cadre of mainly middle-class white Americans. With results that for many reasons, not the least of which was his refusal to discuss the matter, we grew apart, and though have always deeply appreciated his work comment and all he has done for the good of so many people, I ceased to be involved.

I don't think there are any of the  Shaikhs who have come to America, or even those born here, who have had such an effect on bringing ordinary Americans to Islam, and into the Islam of peace and spirituality that they have been able to integrate into their lives, opening their hearts and minds to Allah and his service.

I feel sorry that Nurideen, despite an impressive, multifaceted, and extremely serious personal history of Islamic studies in Medina, Saudi Arabia, and Al-Azhar in Cairo,was still fundamentally unsatisfied with his life because he had not met the Qutub of his time—or so this document would indicate.

In the epitaph, Nurideen was obviously ambivalent about the 'Second Generation' that had begun to follow Sidi and were concerned that Sidi's message was 'too Islamic' as to be 'unsaleable' to the Western audiences to whom they were 'selling' Sidi's Sufism to.

I have never met any of the 'Next Generation' group myself, but from looking at their materials and hearing about them secondhand, I judged that they were more interested in using Sidi as a figurehead than a Sufi Sheikh in the traditional sense.

However, I have noticed how artfully these folks manage to bridge the gap between Islam, Sufism, and New Age Healing Modalities.  I make no claims as to their relative sincerity or not.

One might accuse Nurideen (RIP) of overlooking much about Sidi's behavior. Reading between the lines and knowing about many of the controversies surrounding Sidi, Nurideen decided to count how many 'converts to Islam' Sidi had made.

However, to me,  he made the inexcusable choice not to directly address the charges against Sidi that had already been circulating for many years.

Instead, he tried to conveniently distance himself after agreeing to be part of Sidi's entourage in one instance and not so in another. And ultimately copping out in this uneven epitaph-- Leaving all who had suffered at the effect of Sidi to fend for or blame themselves.