The Magus
It is a strange characteristic of mystical matters that very often the things which are the most obviously ‘esoteric’ are often the furthest from it (many things with the label ‘Sufi’ attached included - from traditional orders to non-traditional newsgroups for example) and conversely, many things which have no apparent connection with Sufis or developmental work are in fact of this nature.
I have known of this contention for a long time since reading it first in the works of Idries Shah but it was still difficult for me to accept. After pondering a while, I concluded that perhaps this was the case in order that one might develop the capacity to ‘see beyond appearances’ and indeed, this is one of the functions of Sufi teaching stories. Later, I spoke about this to a friend of mine Aubrey Wolton who also knew Shah and he told me that Sufis do not use that name any more and that the teaching must be found ‘elsewhere’.
Where this ‘elsewhere’ actually is, it is not my intention to discuss but, by definition, it is not where one would expect to find it and (if one is not to be a literalist) may even be something other than what one expects if and when one does. Perhaps it is even an ‘attitude’ one may develop that enables one to extract the Sufi content from anything and everything in life. Be that as it may, there are numerous things in life which I believe have developmental content minus any form of overt mystical or Sufi projection - the book Life of Pi is one of them and so is another book I thought it might be interesting to look at, John Fowles’s The Magus
.
As Fowles’s book is much older than Pi and perhaps less read now, I thought it would be good to give a rough outline of the work rather than a review. I am totally useless at this sort of thing so have delegated this task to my good friend Mr X - to whom gratitude of sorts is due for forwarding me the subject matter below - this also has the added benefit of being manifestly nothing to do with me!
The Magus
It is a strange characteristic of mystical matters that very often the things which are the most obviously ‘esoteric’ are often the furthest from it (many things with the label ‘Sufi’ attached included - from traditional orders to non-traditional newsgroups for example) and conversely, many things which have no apparent connection with Sufis or developmental work are in fact of this nature.
I have known of this contention for a long time since reading it first in the works of Idries Shah but it was still difficult for me to accept. After pondering a while, I concluded that perhaps this was the case in order that one might develop the capacity to ‘see beyond appearances’ and indeed, this is one of the functions of Sufi teaching stories. Later, I spoke about this to a friend of mine Aubrey Wolton who also knew Shah and he told me that Sufis do not use that name any more and that the teaching must be found ‘elsewhere’.
Where this ‘elsewhere’ actually is, it is not my intention to discuss but, by definition, it is not where one would expect to find it and (if one is not to be a literalist) may even be something other than what one expects if and when one does. Perhaps it is even an ‘attitude’ one may develop that enables one to extract the Sufi content from anything and everything in life. Be that as it may, there are numerous things in life which I believe have developmental content minus any form of overt mystical or Sufi projection - the book Life of Pi is one of them and so is another book I thought it might be interesting to look at, John Fowles’s The Magus
.
As Fowles’s book is much older than Pi and perhaps less read now, I thought it would be good to give a rough outline of the work rather than a review. I am totally useless at this sort of thing so have delegated this task to my good friend Mr X - to whom gratitude of sorts is due for forwarding me the subject matter below - this also has the added benefit of being manifestly nothing to do with me!