Sheikh Hisham Kabbani @ The Melbourne Theosophical Society

On 2 December, the Melbourne Theosophical Society hosted a public talk by Sheikh Hisham Kabbani of the Naqshbandi Haqqani tariqa, which was part of his second visit to Australia (the first being in 2009). The Sheikh also brought his family along.

The MC's introduction (young members of the Sheikh's family in the foreground!)

Getting the microphone ready

Expounding a point (Ali Elsayed at immediate left)

The audience included his Australian-based murideen, members of the society, and various interested individuals. Sheikh Kabbani made a humorous entrance as he grabbed a handful of sweets from a bowl near the MC's podium and threw it into the crowd, in a move too fast for my camera finger to capture. Preceding his talk, Ali Elsayed performed several qasidas in his rich voice, assisted by a trio of backup drummers.

After the performance, Sheikh Kabbani began his talk in earnest, dealing with the subjects of the importance of having a spiritual guide, and how to cultivate one's spirituality in a hostile modern environment. Notable memories included his account of talking to a psychologist one day who advocated the daily counting of one's own good deeds. Sheikh Kabbani agreed somewhat with this concept, but emphasised the concept of counting one's bad deeds, as self-reflection biased in favour of the former often just serves to feed one's ego. He also exhorted the audience to practise regular meditation, using the analogy of the mind as a computer - uploading too much results in a crash which must be balanced by downloading (he possibly meant to use the words 'upload' and 'download' the other way around, but hey....), which is the use of meditation. Often when he mentioned the Prophet's name (s.a.w.), he would stand up from his seat in respect, also taking the audience with him!

I had the opportunity to ask him a question at the end. I wanted to know his opinion about I felt the use of the term 'Sufism' in lieu of 'tassawuf' contributed to the popular perception of  'Sufism' as a fringe sect of Islam, rather than its most central and profound science. The Sheikh mentioned in his reply  how 'Sufism' was essentially a western term. He said that tassawuf didn't have a name in the earliest history of Islam, but was a concrete reality, citing as an example the Ahl al-Suffa (People of the Bench/Platform), a group of poor Muslims who spent their days in constant worship, who for this purpose the Prophet Muhammad (s.a.w.) actually allocated a corner of his mosque to.  He illustrated his point in a pithy statement, which essentially was that tassawuf used to be 'a reality without a name', but these days is 'a name without a reality'. He further stated the role of certain Muslim reform movement/s of the modern era (whose oil money and political and media influence far outstripped their actual status as a heterodox minority) in potraying tassawuf as a deviant practice. However, he also mentioned how these reformers are having difficulty getting out of the mess they created, citing as an example how a certain Wahabist newsletter/paper actually tried to assert that Muhammad ibn Abdul Wahab practised tassawuf himself!

After answering my query the Sheikh finally took his leave, although not without having a woman or two from the audience apparently coming up to him to take bayat (Suleiman's note 12/12/10: my bad, apparently it wa just babies getting blessed)! Although I would have relished the opportunity to pick the Sheikh's brain further, the event was a valuable privilege which I was glad to take part in.