A BRIEF BIOGRAPHY
Was Sidi a real 'Sufi Guide'?
A more relevant question to me is, "Was Sidi even a good Muslim?"
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| Sidi's Marriages Sometimes Paired Off Couples of Questionable Compatibility |
After he came to America, beginning in 1994, he became known for aggressive donation-seeking--both directly for his own 'expenses' and indirectly for 'widows and orphans' he purported to support.
He additionally allowed himself to be attached to pyramid schemes promoted by his followers that were later shut down by law enforcement, and alternative health products and 'energy healings' with hefty price tags and of dubious value .
He became increasingly infamous for his rumored liaisons with his female followers. While none of these may EVER be directly verified, in this observer's opinion, "where there is smoke, there is fire".
In Sidi's case, there was a forest fire's worth of smoke.
The accusations are just too numerous and frequent to brush off as intentional fictions.
SIDI'S TROUBLING HISTORY OF MARRYING TOTAL STRANGERS
What IS clear is that he initiated dozens, if not HUNDREDS, of spontaneous 'Spiritual Marriages' among his unmarried followers. And in such a way as he would NEVER have attempted them locally, with Palestinian Muslims.
This 'Spontaneous Marriage' was never a feature of Islam in general nor Sufism in particular.
Though as in many religion traditions and in many traditional cultures, 'arranged marriage' was indeed fully accepted as a practice which assured family support for couple, and usually involved some limited period of courtship so the couple could get to know each other first.
Sidi's marriages were something different. Rarely were any parents or family present. There was seldom any advanced notice. It had a festive, carnival, game show feeling about it.
There was giddy speculation amongst the womenfolk about who Sidi might match with who.
It was kind of like the children's game of 'spin-the-bottle'. Only you didn't just kiss the 'winner'. You married them. For life.
Or else, you realized later that the basis on which you had agreed to marry a total stranger was faulty. Held together by only you and your new partner's hope that Sidi had some 'advanced Spiritual Criteria' for you marriage.
When in fact, given the high ratio of divorce amongst those marriages, the only conclusion which can be reached is that they were completely a coin toss. Random.
I was given the uncomfortable option of marrying one of Sidi's students within a few days of meeting him. And her.
And when I hesitated, Sidi increased the pressure by insisting we take part in a "Garden of Eden" Re-enactment, complete with sexual intercourse.
All, of course, for our own spiritual growth.
And while such an experience, and the fear of missing out on what I assummed was the 'Chance of a Lifetime' to become a disciple of some advanced form of Sufism, led me to ultimately marry this person, it was a difficult pairing.
We couldn't get along. And I couldn't find the spiritual support in Sidi's Teachings that my wife apparently did. Which I did. Though not directly, unfortunately.
My partner, who I will call Aisha, was cultic in the extreme--devoting herself to propagating Sidi's teachings and always on the lookout for new 'brothers and sisters' to recruit and bring to him. We spent every summer at Sidi's house in Jerusalem.
Having given up on Sidi's help, and not feeling strong enough to set forth on another spiritual/psychological course, I ended up surrendering to and being overwhelmed by addictions.
And Aisha divorced me. In 1995.
Sidi could tell stories and promote his views for hours. He actually looked a bit like an Old Testament prophet--with a wide red beard and an air of stoic resolve and intensity.
In America, he found willing lieutenants (see A Tale of Two Sidis), to help publicize and monetize his appearances while promoting their own side-ventures. Ultimately, Sidi was able to attract 100's of disciples in America during the late 1990s and early 2000's.He preached an informal, folksy, and frequently charming gospel of 'The Peace and The Love' and coaxed Westerners to adopt Islamic names, dress, and practices, including animal sacrifice.
What distinguished his teaching was the formerly unheard-of 'Sudden Spiritual Marriage' process that he invariably pursued with his single disciples.
As time went on, he de-emphasized advanced and elite Sufi states of cultivation and seemed more interested in evangelizing the West with the more common, external Religion of Peace--Islam, actually.
When I met Sidi in 1979 in Jerusalem, he was exceedingly quick to initiate me as his murid (disciple)-- even though I had only arrived at his zawiya (residential study center) a few days earlier, and was perilously close to full-blown alcoholism.
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(It's funny, though. The very act of taking 'initiation' DOES make one feel different. And included with it came a new, Arabic 'spiritual name'. Right from the beginning, one changes identity, one begins to role play what one THINKS a good Sufi should be doing, at the moment).
However, historically speaking, I think Sidi's pace was rather rushed.
It should have been my first clue that 'all was not right' in the state of Sidi's Order.
I had, at that point, little attraction to either Sufism or Islam. Though I had studied Islamic history for a couple of quarters and taken a year of Arabic in college, such 'qualifications' came more from a desire to study one ancient religious tradition intensively than from a personal interest in Islam.
Personally, I was more inclined towards the mystical sides of Buddhism, Hinduism, and/or Christianity--all of which I had actively practiced at some point.
In any case, I went along with Sidi's Islamic 'initiation' because of the powerful 'cinematic' quality of the situation -- here I was, at that moment, rather a lonely, depressed, and alcoholic single guy shuffling thru life without a purpose.
Suddenly, I found myself a new and welcomed member of an international spiritual community on the Mount of Olives near Jerusalem, walking the hills and olive groves that Jesus did. Listening to the periodic braying of donkeys, as well as the majestic Calls to Prayer booming down the Biblical valleys five times per day.
Within a short walk were all the attractions of the Holy Land itself--the Garden of Gethsemane, the Church of the Holy Sepulcher, the splendid Dome of the Rock, the Wailing Wall.
The environs seemed designed to promote remembrance of a time when God manifested on Earth thru his Prophets. And, especially for Christians, the Prophet/Savior Jesus.
Is it any wonder that I fell under the sway of an Islamic Imam who seemed cut in the mold of one of those Prophetic figures--albeit a more recent version?
Moreover, he was always cordially attentive to all Westerners who came to him. He built people up with kind words and encouragement. He was clearly the Supreme Authority of his household, and out in the world people deferred to him, though he didn't seem to be about his own ego, but rather to be in the tiring business of enforcing adherence to Islamic principles--as well as to ministering to his own fuqara of both Eastern and Western disciples.
Though it was my impression that the Palestinian crew of Sufi disciples diminished over the course of several Intifadas and the re-Islamification in more puritanical terms which took place in Palestine in response.
Gone were the 'liberated' women I used to see 'shamelessly' going about their affairs in Western dresses. Back came the veils and full-length chadors--more or less as a political statement against rising Zionist expansion and violence.
In any case, a few days after my initiation, Sidi paired me off with a single Canadian mother who, with her daughter, was also studying in the zawiya.
His demand that we marry as totally unexpected as it was authoritative and demanding. And though I felt slightly guilty or ungrateful to say 'no' -- it just didn't feel appropriate to me.
Also, my soon-to-be-partner, whom I'll call here Aisha*, seemed hesitant as well.
What shocked me even more was what followed:
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After Aisha and I returned to our respective North American countries, we carried with us the question of whether we should follow thru with Sidi's commandment/suggestion that we marry.
Eventually, albeit without considerable uncertainty, we did.
And as a result, our lives were inevitably focused on Sidi/Islam/Sufism, although I still felt internally unconvinced about what my place was within the religion.
I was certainly far from comfortable asserting the superiority of Islam over other faith traditions. Rather, I clung to the idea that being a 'Sufi' allowed me to 'pass' on acceptance or rejection of 'outside' Islam.
Particularly concerning such issues as to whether Islam was the 'true religion' of mankind. As well as the issue of whether the Torah and/or the New Testament had been 'changed' where they expressed ideas not in accordance with the Koran--the actual death and Resurrection of Jesus being perhaps the most important of those.
I tended to validate the Western scholarly opinions which had dominated my limited study of Islam--rather than the pious Islam of Sidi and others; that Muhammad had the final say about everything, even though Muhammad was illiterate and had limited exposure to Christian and Jewish scriptures and ideas.
Increasingly, I began to notice that Sidi dropped his emphasis on the Sufi path and preached a more standard version of Islam to Americans, while also practicing a few Sufi rituals such as 'dhikr' once 'disciples' had taken his hand.
(This is confirmed in a eulogy Sheik wrote him--congratulating and thanking him for being one of the biggest proselytizers for Islam in America. It was ironic to me, as Nurideen Durkee was instrumental in the foundation of the Lama Foundation, which notably published the initial version of BE HERE NOW in 1970, by the beloved teacher Ram Dass). http://greenmountainschool.org/slides/in-memory-of-a-great-shaykh-in-memory-of-a-long-long-friendship/).
In fact, I don't recall very much back-and-forth between Sidi and myself on matters spiritual. He usually came down to the zawiya after coming home from work and having had dinner. It never occurred to me to ask specific questions. I just sort of 'basked' in Sidi's aura. THAT was the point, for me. And that is about as far as I really went with it. Other than reading mystical Sufi writers and doing dhikr with Aisha occasionally.
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| Sidi Also Married an American Many Decades Younger |
Sidi was always trying to marry off single newcomers to his sect almost immediately--as soon as someone of the opposite sex could be found. It became almost a rite of passage.
I was surprised one afternoon, sitting in one of Sidi's sons home in Marin County, to meet a young woman in Western attire who was introduced as Sidi's 'wife'.
At first, I thought it was a joke. She was very young-late 20's to early 30's. She looked intense, intellectual, and VERY GAY!
I was told, later, that she liked Sidi and was sort of flattered by his attention to her. But she did not appear to be trying to be Sufi or Muslim. She certainly wasn't bothering to cover her head.
It looked more like she was a graduate student or Peace Corps volunteer in the middle of a experiential, experimental, multi-cultural living situation rather than anything resembling the usual new devotee--falling over themselves to try and get all the new cultural nuances right.
To his credit, Sidi evidently brought her back to the family complex in the Middle East and shared his bedroom with her there. I wonder what happenned to her.
Although one pretext for the Spiritual Marriages in general was that the proposed partnership was part of the 'work' of honing one's ego by virtue of daily living with a marriage partner, in reality there was an expectation that this was one's 'soul mate'.
In my view, these were tools to keep the new partners focused on the one personality factor they DID share--that of being Sidi's disciples. It kept them dependent on HIM.
He was lampooned, even by some of his own family, for shamelessly foisting himself off on female Western disciples--although it should be said no named former disciple has been willing to come forward on this account.Returning to my own experience, I can absolutely testify that Sidi took the unusual step of encouraged me and his Canadian disciple 'Aisha' to marry just days after we'd met and, failing that, to have sex with each other in the same room as him. And that that sexual contact took place several nights in a row.
This was a breach of morality that had no parallel in Islam OR Sufism. At the time, we interpreted it as a kind of 'accelerated' spiritual teaching' that Sidi, with his presumed Higher Authority as a Sufi Guide of the Highest Degree was allowed to generate.
As time went on, and the fissures between Aisha and me grew and the hoped-for Spiritual Transformation based on our marriage did NOT take place, my suspicions grew that Sidi was operating more as a free-lance, rogue, and morally bankrupt human being than as a representative of any religious tradition.
Moreover, the person I married, at his recommendation, did so, I believe, not out of any special love for me but as an agent of Sidi's to assist in my transformation into an elevated, transformational Beloved for her with whom we would complete some ultimate Work with each other.
The false sense of intimacy with each other that Sidi created thru suddenly sexualizing our relationship was, upon later reflection, a brutal invasion of our individual psychologies.
I believe Sidi used the 'tool' of marriage to cement individuals as adherents to him and/or to Islam. It stands to reason that if two people that knew nothing about each other suddenly found themselves married off--then they would devote their time to the one characteristic they shared--membership in Sidi's fuqara.
Aisha initially chaffed at living an 'ordinary' married life with me in California. She was more comfortable with Sidi in Jerusalem than ANYWHERE in the West. I'm not sure she really wanted to marry me, or anybody. But as someone who was wildly committed to Sidi's way, she could hardly refuse him on this point.
Moreover, when she DID leave me, it was after Sidi had given initiation to a man named Ali, who later showed up in the house I shared with my Aisha under the guise of a mere 'follower', but who nonetheless surreptitiously advised and comforted my former wife as she divorced me and moved away with our two young children.
(I had my own troubles with fidelity, at the time, as well. We weren't very good at communicating as a couple. Rather, Aisha always referred EVERYTHING to Sidi. I'm not sure whether divorcing me was something he actually allowed her to do, or something he appeared to oppose in public but cared little about in private).
None of which Sidi seemed to care to forbid, despite my desperate pleadings, and despite his reputation as a 'Divorce Court Judge' famous for keeping marriages together, at least in Palestine. Sidi did not publicly demand that Ali stop 'dating' my wife.
It was a mystery to me why. Until I finally came to the conclusion that, by this point, Sidi had personally abandoned most of his Islamic scruples when it suited his other goals.
And, in the end, though it exactly as heavy toll on me, and I believe our mutual children as well, there was little point in continuing a marriage where one of us wanted ONLY to act as Sidi's publisher and promoter as the primary focus of her life. And, as I believe, in a cultic attachment to Sidi as a manifestation of God Himself.
Aisha preferred the certainty and superiority of her mostly-solitary (delusional?) spiritual life to the vagaries of human relationships. And, as the poverty of her choices of partners (myself, at the time we met, included), indicated, she was more interested in changing other people to fit the mold of her idealized, desired future companions than take on the risk of vulnerable, equal human relationships.
Sidi chose mainly to focus on a vague 'Universal Peace and Love' teaching. Along with donation-seeking, endorsing spurious 'energy healings', promoting pyramid schemes and marrying total strangers who had recently taken initiation with him.
IMHO, Sidi gave up whether moral authority he may have had as a judge in Islamic Palestine, and joined up in a well-worn tradition of American Charlatanry.
Only this time, it wasn't 'Snake Oil' or 'Salvation' that was for sale. It was an Arabized cult of 'Peace and Love' that was driven by Sidi's personality, and the excitement of his presumed Spokesmanship for Allah, and the common adoption of Islamic accoutrement, especially dress.
In another case I personally was in the center of, Sidi collected 'zakat' (2.5% Wealth Tax) from a New Mexican couple. The tax, $10,000, appeared almost immediately to be transferred to one of Sidi's close relatives to buy an interest into a gas station in Northern California.
The couple found out about this and were incensed. Sidi apparently denied it--yet the money appeared. I happened to look up what the Shari'a law is on this question, and in NO CASE is this tax, which is to be intended for the 'poor' to be given to relatives of the collector.
Hence, here was an obvious case of Sidi's corruption.
Beyond that, he collected untold THOUSANDS of DOLLARS from his Western Disciples for various reasons and causes, many of them for 'widows and orphans' back home. Yet, to my knowledge, tax exempt status was never sought for any of these donations.
Or, indeed, was any written accounting of ANY of the money collected by Sidi given to any agency-American, Palestinian or other.
Why not? Tax exempt status likely would have calmed any concerns on the part of benefactors as to who the ultimate benefactors of Sidi's collections were? The tax deductions generated from these generations might have allowed the benefactors to GIVE MORE!
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Tax Deductible status is not impossible to obtain for Palestinian Children, or at least wasn't until very recently. The Middle Eastern Children's Fund has a long-term charitable impact in the area.
If he REALLY wanted to help Middle Eastern Children, Sidi could have avoided making HIMSELF the MIDDLEMAN!!
More likely, Sidi handed off most of the money collected to his relatives already established in the US. Perhaps with the rationale that they were 'the poor' and therefore worthy of the donations from wealthy Americans.
When he died, His Holiness required multiple days of care in the ICU of Marin General Hospital. I'm sure such care was well in the neighborhood of six figures. (I visited him personally there. Although he was comatose at that point.
I'm quite sure none of his followers saw fit to pick up the tab for his care. Just as I'm sure he paid no taxes on the income he received from his followers. But Allah knows best.
It seems to me, if anyone in Sidi's group takes his or her Islam seriously, it is incumbent on them to speak out, or else to admit their own Islam or Sufism to be mistaken or flawed.
What will it be, Brothers and Sisters? Is this person a TRUE REPRESENTATIVE of ISLAM? Who never repented of his violations of the chastity of the women he influenced, or seduced, or (politely) offered to other males?
I'd be more than willing to print any 'comment' below in defense of Sidi on these accounts.
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* Fuqara, plural of 'fakir', meaning 'humble or poor in spirit' . Thus, a 'fuqara' commonly denotes the group of Sufi practitioners pertaining to a given order or Sheik.
*Although we were all given actual Arabic initiatory names, in this blog I've used pseudonyms for the main characters. I'm 'Yunis', my former wife is 'Aisha', my younger daughter is Zooey, older daughter is Theresa, and my Son is Ibrahim.
*The Shandilya Order is one of the largest in the Sufi World, with millions of disciples from Pakistan to Morocco. There are many different lineages within the Order, and there is no centralized authority or 'Grand Sheikh' -- the breathless assertions of many of Sidi's followers to the contrary.
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Fascinating. Thanks for this.
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