Image: “Neobyzantine Tryptich” by Christina Varga
“There are numerous important terms known in the Islamic languages for which the Chinese [Muslim] authors had to find equivalents. What should be done, for example, with the word Allah? In Persian, the word is part of everyday speech, though people are just as likely to use the Persian equivalent (khudâ).
But there is no equivalent in Chinese. According to Tazaka, to render the concept of God Muslims used “heaven” in the Tang period (616-907) and both “heaven” and “Buddha” in the Sung dynasty (960-1279).”
- Chinese Gleams of Sufi Light by Schiko Murata
“Allah is not found here or there.
In fact, Allah is just an expression.
A name for humanity perfected,
possessing twenty attributes.
Buddhism and Islam are never different,
The colours are two, but the expression is one”
- from the words of Ki Ageng Pengging, around 1500 CE, Java
“Buddha spoke to me: `In this palace here man is brought to fall, it is a place of trial to him. Only the one who is brave and steadfast can leave this station behind.
And behind it you can find the peak of non-being.
But the one who will let himself get captured by delightful and charming things, he will slide down into an abyss of suffering, grief and sadness.
This here is only the paradise of wishes and desires; beyond it lies the station of nonbeing.
This here is a nest filled with uselss imaginations, a guesthouse destroying each of its guests by torture.
After this you will reach the garden of true joy and freedom, the world void of any imaginations and illusions, the place of unity and truth.”
- from the Amak-i Hayal of Sahbenderzade Ahmed Hilmi, an Ottoman mystic, written in 1908 CE
“In 1995, I accompanied Dr. Tirmiziou Diallo, the hereditary Sufi religious leader of Guinea, West Africa, to Dharamsala to meet with His Holiness. In the days prior to the audience, Dr. Diallo and I discussed further the meaning of “people of the Book.” He felt it refers to people who follow the “primordial tradition.” This can be called the wisdom of Allah or God, or as I suggested to him in Buddhist terms, primordial deep awareness. Thus he readily accepted that the primordial tradition of wisdom was revealed not only by Moses, Jesus and Mohammed, but also by Buddha. If people follow this innate primordial tradition and wisdom, they are “people of the Book.” But if they go against this basic good and wise nature of humankind and the universe, they are not “of the Book.””
- from A Buddhist View of Islam by Alexander Berzin
