In the name of Allah, the most beneficent, the most merciful. Praise be to Allah, the One, and blessings and peace be upon Muhammad who is the last prophet of Allah.
What is body: we all know it, and we can touch and see it.
What is spiritual existence: In terms of the life hereinafter, this is our personality that would remain after the death of our physical body.
What is soul: our soul is our present personality or identity that is situated between our body and our spiritual existence.
Our body strongly pulls us towards the earth and spiritual existence towards the heaven. It is the understanding of how body pulls us towards the earth, and spiritual existence towards the heaven, and then taking our soul out of the occupation of our body; that we call it the mechanism of development and actualization of our soul. This is in fact the theme and purpose of this book “Actualization of Soul”.
Rumi describes the spiritual existence of a person giving example of quality of kernel inside the shell of a walnut and the quality of seeds inside the pomegranate. That is, when we shall come out of our biological body frame, we shall see quality of our spiritual existence. Is the kernel inside the walnut of a fine quality? Are the seeds inside the pomegranate red and sweet or dull and sour?
The purpose of writing this book right now in your hand is to create ability in the people enabling them to recognize their present personalities and be aware of negative and positive traits hidden inside their souls. It is only after this recognition that they can move forward to purify, develop and actualize their souls reaching to the desired level of “nafse mutme’inna”, a satisfied and peaceful soul.
This book is based on twenty-seven stories taken from “Mesnevi Maulana Rum” (mercy of Allah be upon him) and encompasses most of the topics that would help any traveler of spiritual path in the purification and actualization of his soul. We pray to Allah to accept our part of the effort in spreading the spiritual beneficence of Hazrat Jalal-ud-Din Rumi (mercy of Allah be upon him) and seek forgiveness for any mistakes we may have inadvertently made in translation, description and arrangement of this book.
Malik Muhammad Usman
