Streams of Love...

The great teachers of humanity become streams of love.

Bowl of Saki, April 15, by Hazrat Inayat Khan

Commentary by Pir-o-Murshid Inayat Khan:

Forgiveness is a stream of love which washes away all impurities wherever it
flows. By keeping this spring of love, which is in the heart of man, running,
man is able to forgive, however great the fault of his fellow man may seem. One
who cannot forgive closes his heart. The sign of spirituality is that there is
nothing you cannot forgive, there is no fault you cannot forget.

The great personalities who have descended on earth from time to time to awaken
in man that love, which is his divine inheritance, have always found an echo in
innocent souls rather than in great intellects. Man often confuses wisdom with
cleverness, but a man can be clever and not wise, and by cleverness a person may
strive and strive, and yet not reach God. It is a stream, the stream of love,
which leads towards God. ... Law has no power to stand before love; the stream
of love sweeps it away. When the woman accused by everyone was brought before
Christ, what arose from the heart of the master? The law? No, it was love in the
form of mercy and compassion.

In correcting a mureed of his faults it is not the intellect that is of much
use. It is the pouring out of the stream of love which can wash away the stains;
closing one's eyes to their faults, forgiving them, and yet correcting them with
all tolerance, gentleness, and humility; making before them all things natural,
nothing too horrible, but showing them the picture of a better life and thus
drawing them toward that which is ideal and beautiful. When the teacher finds
that the mureed is wrong he will not tell him that he is wrong, but will show
him what is right.

The great teachers and prophets, and the inspirers of humanity of all times have
not become what they were by their miracles or wonder-workings; these belong to
other people. The main thing that could be seen in them was their loving manner.
... One may ask: How to cultivate the heart quality? There is only one way: to
become selfless at each step one takes forward on this path, for what prevents
one from cultivating the loving quality is the thought of self. The more we
think of our self the less we think of others.

There is no greater magnetic power than love. Its magnetic power is very great.
It changes a person's voice, his heart, his manner, his form, his movement, his
activity, everything becomes changed. What a difference between water and rock;
that smoothness and that liquid state of being, the rise and fall of the surface
of the water compared with the rigidity of the rock! The great teachers of
humanity become streams of love. It is the first sign of the sage or holy man
that he himself becomes love. His voice, his feeling, his presence, everything
makes one realize that there is something open in him which we do not find in
everybody; this something is his deep love.