The Murshid is Everywhere

I was reading Hazrat Inayat Khan's teachings on initiation and discipleship and came across the following passages. It is a blessing to be able to look back on my life and see how often the windows of knowledge and inspiration were open when there was an openness to learning and a free flow of love between two beings. Very often this is how spiritual transmission manifests and is communicated, from one heart to another; with the former playing the role of the messenger. Spiritually, we learn most from those we are open to, those that we love.

If a person does not become enlightened, then one can find the explanation by watching the rain. It falls upon all trees, but it is according to the response of those trees that they grow and bear fruit. The sun shines upon all the trees, it makes no distinction between them. However, it is according to the response that the trees give to the sun that they profit by its sunshine. At the same time, a mureed (student) is very often an inspiration to the murshid (teacher). It is not the murshid who teaches, it is God who teaches. The murshid is only a medium, and as high as the response of the mureed reaches, so strongly does it attract the message of God.

The mureed can be inspired, but he can also cease to inspire. If there is no response on his side, or if there is antagonism or lack of interest, then the inspiration of the murshid is shut off; just like the clouds which cannot produce a shower when they are above the desert. The desert affects them; but when the same clouds are above the forest, the trees attract them and the rain falls.