Wisdom Of The Heart Quotes

“There is within the human heart a quality of intelligence which has been known to surpass that attributed to the human mind.”
― Aberjhani, Splendid Literarium: A Treasury of Stories, Aphorisms, Poems, and Essays

“Hammered into the Heart
In the Sufi tradition light and knowledge are reflected from heart to heart. The heart is the organ of the higher consciousness — the consciousness of the Self. Spiritual teachings can be reflected or impressed directly into the heart, bypassing the limitations of the mind. . . . A further part of the Sufi training is to bring the mind into the heart, the mind 'hammered into the heart' as the Sufis say, so that the teachings given to the heart can be assimilated into everyday consciousness. A mind that has been brought into the heart can understand the ways of oneness, which are often paradoxical, sometimes even nonsensical, to the rational self.”
― Llewellyn Vaughan-Lee, Light of Oneness

“On the Day of Judgment no one is safe save the one who returns to God with a pure heart. (Quran)

Surely in the breasts of humanity is a lump of flesh, if sound then the whole body is sound, and if corrupt then the whole body is corrupt. Is it not the heart? (Prophet Muhammad )

Blessed are the pure at heart, for they shall see God. (Jesus )”
― Hamza Yusuf, Purification of the Heart: Signs, Symptoms and Cures of the Spiritual Diseases of the Heart

“Sufis describe the heart as a mirror which the wayfarer polishes and polishes with aspiration and
inner work, until no imperfection remains. Then the mirror of the heart can reflect the true light of
the Beloved.”
― Llewellyn Vaughan-Lee, Travelling the Path of Love: Sayings of Sufi Masters

“As Thomas Merton correctly observes, “Sufism looks at man as a heart. . . . The heart is the faculty by which man knows God”, and so the supreme aim in Sufism is nothing else than “to develop a heart that knows God”. In the words of Rumi, “I have looked into my own heart; it is there that I have seen Him; He was nowhere else.” This leads Martin Lings to observe in his book What is Sufism?, “What indeed is Sufism, subjectively speaking, if not ‘heart-wakefulness’?”. Illustrating this, he quotes al-Hallâj: “I saw my Lord with the Eye of the Heart.” The Hesychast tradition of the Orthodox Church, for its part, speaks repeatedly of “prayer of the heart”, of the “discovery of the place of the heart”, of the “descent from the head to the heart”, and of the “union of the intellect (nous) with the heart”. (p. 5)
– Kallistos Ware, Chapter 1: How Do We Enter the Heart?”
― James S. Cutsinger, Paths to the Heart: Sufism and the Christian East

“The heart governs and reigns”, state the Macarian Homilies: it is the dominant element in our total human structure, the controlling power. It governs and reigns, more specifically, “over the whole bodily organism”: it is in the first place a corporeal organ, located in the chest, which acts as the physical center of the human being; when our heart stops beating, we die. Yet this is not all. The Homilies go on to say that the heart rules also over the “thoughts”, and that “there in the heart is the intellect”. The heart is not only the physical but the psychic and spiritual center. The Greek word
used here for “intellect”, nous, signifies not only the reasoning brain but also, more fundamentally, a higher faculty of intuitive insight and mystical vision. Elsewhere in the Macarian Homilies it is stated that the nous within the heart is like the eye within the body; in other words, through the use of the intellect within the heart we do not merely reach conclusions by means of discursive
argumentation, but the intellect enables us to see the truth in a direct and unmediated manner. The heart in which the intellect dwells is thus the faculty with which we think, both in a rational and a suprarational way. It is both the seat of reasoning intelligence and also, on a higher or deeper level, the place of wisdom and spiritual knowledge (gnosis). (p. 13)”
― James S. Cutsinger, Paths to the Heart: Sufism and the Christian East

“„The heart governs and reigns”, state the Macarian Homilies: it is the dominant element in our total human structure, the controlling power. It governs and reigns, more specifically, “over the whole bodily organism”: it is in the first place a corporeal organ, located in the chest, which acts as the physical center of the human being; when our heart stops beating, we die. Yet this is not all. The Homilies go on to say that the heart rules also over the “thoughts”, and that “there in the heart is the intellect”. The heart is not only the physical but the psychic and spiritual center. The Greek word used here for “intellect”, nous, signifies not only the reasoning brain but also, more fundamentally, a higher faculty of intuitive insight and mystical vision. Elsewhere in the Macarian Homilies it is stated that the nous within the heart is like the eye within the body; in other words, through the use of the intellect within the heart we do not merely reach conclusions by means of discursive argumentation, but the intellect enables us to see the truth in a direct and unmediated manner. The heart in which the intellect dwells is thus the faculty with which we think, both in a rational and a suprarational way. It is both the seat of reasoning intelligence and also, on a higher or deeper level, the place of wisdom and spiritual knowledge (gnosis). (p. 13)”
― James S. Cutsinger, Paths to the Heart: Sufism and the Christian East

“The heart is the center of the human microcosm, at once the center
of the physical body, the vital energies, the emotions, and the soul,
as well as the meeting place between the human and the celestial
realms where the spirit resides. How remarkable is this reality of the heart, that mysterious center which from the point of view of our earthly existence seems so small, and yet as the Prophet has said it is the Throne (al-‘arsh) of God the All-Merciful (ar-Rahmân), the Throne that encompasses the whole universe. Or as he uttered in another saying, “My Heaven containeth Me not, nor My Earth, but the heart of My faithful servant doth contain Me.”
It is the heart, the realm of interiority, to which Christ referred
when he said, “The kingdom of God is within you” (Lk 17:21), and it is the heart which the founders of all religions and the sacred scriptures advise man to keep pure as a condition for his salvation and deliverance. We need only recall the words of the Gospel, “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God” (Mt 5:8)

[…]

In Christianity the Desert Fathers articulated the spiritual, mystical, and symbolic meanings of the reality of the heart, and these teachings led to a long tradition in the Eastern Orthodox Church known as Hesychasm, culminating with St Gregory Palamas, which is focused on the “prayer of the heart” and which includes the exposition of the significance of the heart and the elaboration of the mysticism and theology of the heart. In Catholicism another development took place, in which the heart of the faithful became in a sense replaced by the heart of Christ, and a new spirituality developed on the basis of devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus. Reference to His bleeding heart became common in the writings of such figures as St Bernard of Clairvaux and St Catherine of Sienna. The Christian doctrines of the heart, based as they are on the Bible, present certain universal theses to be seen also in Judaism, the most important of which is the association of the heart with the inner soul of man and the center of the human state. In Jewish mysticism the spirituality of the heart was further developed, and some Jewish mystics emphasized the idea of the “broken or contrite heart” (levnichbar) and wrote that to reach the Divine Majesty one had to “tear one’s heart” and that the “broken heart” mentioned in the Psalms sufficed. To make clear the universality of the spiritual significance of the heart across religious boundaries, while also emphasizing the development of the “theology of the heart” and methods of “prayer of the heart” particular to each tradition, one may recall that the name of Horus, the Egyptian god, meant the “heart of the world”. In Sanskrit the term for heart, hridaya, means also the center of the world, since, by virtue of the analogy between the macrocosm and the microcosm, the center of man is also the center of the universe. Furthermore, in Sanskrit the term shraddha, meaning faith, also signifies knowledge of the heart, and the same is true in Arabic, where the word îmân means faith when used for man and knowledge when used for God, as in the Divine Name al-Mu’min. As for the Far Eastern tradition, in Chinese the term xin means both heart and mind or consciousness. – Seyyed Hossein Nasr (Chapter 3: The Heart of the Faithful is the Throne of the All-Merciful)”
― James S. Cutsinger, Paths to the Heart: Sufism and the Christian East

“The heart is the center of the human microcosm, at once the center of the physical body, the vital energies, the emotions, and the soul, as well as the meeting place between the human and the celestial realms where the spirit resides. How remarkable is this reality of the heart, that mysterious center which from the point of view of our earthly existence seems so small, and yet as the Prophet has said it is the Throne (al-‘arsh) of God the All-Merciful (ar-Rahmân), the Throne that encompasses the whole universe. Or as he uttered in another saying, “My Heaven containeth Me not, nor My Earth, but the heart of My faithful servant doth contain Me.” It is the heart, the realm of interiority, to which Christ referred when he said, “The kingdom of God is within you” (Lk 17:21), and it is the heart which the founders of all religions and the sacred scriptures advise man to keep pure as a condition for his salvation and deliverance. We need only recall the words of the Gospel, “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God” (Mt 5:8)

[…]

In Christianity the Desert Fathers articulated the spiritual, mystical, and symbolic meanings of the reality of the heart, and these teachings led to a long tradition in the Eastern Orthodox Church known as Hesychasm, culminating with St Gregory Palamas, which is focused on the “prayer of the heart” and which includes the exposition of the significance of the heart and the elaboration of the mysticism and theology of the heart. In Catholicism another development took place, in which the heart of the faithful became in a sense replaced by the heart of Christ, and a new spirituality developed on the basis of devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus. Reference to His bleeding heart became common in the writings of such figures as St Bernard of Clairvaux and St Catherine of Sienna. The Christian doctrines of the heart, based as they are on the Bible, present certain universal theses to be seen also in Judaism, the most important of which is the association of the heart with the inner soul of man and the center of the human state. In Jewish mysticism the spirituality of the heart was further developed, and some Jewish mystics emphasized the idea of the “broken or contrite heart” (levnichbar) and wrote that to reach the Divine Majesty one had to “tear one’s heart” and that the “broken heart” mentioned in the Psalms sufficed. To make clear the universality of the spiritual significance of the heart across religious boundaries, while also emphasizing the development of the “theology of the heart” and methods of “prayer of the heart” particular to each tradition, one may recall that the name of Horus, the Egyptian god, meant the “heart of the world”. In Sanskrit the term for heart, hridaya, means also the center of the world, since, by virtue of the analogy between the macrocosm and the microcosm, the center of man is also the center of the universe. Furthermore, in Sanskrit the term shraddha, meaning faith, also signifies knowledge of the heart, and the same is true in Arabic, where the word îmân means faith when used for man and knowledge when used for God, as in the Divine Name al-Mu’min. As for the Far Eastern tradition, in Chinese the term xin means both heart and mind or consciousness. – Seyyed Hossein Nasr (Chapter 3: The Heart of the Faithful is the Throne of the All-Merciful)”
― James S. Cutsinger, Paths to the Heart: Sufism and the Christian East

“All the heart wants is expanding friendship. It is not the kind of friendship that is a social satisfaction and can even lead to dependency and attachment. Rather, it is the friendship of other conscious hearts, who are in that state of remembrance and in that state of coherence and resonance. That's what lifts and heals us. That‘s why Sufis have their dergahs and communities. Sufism is not arranged as an individual tutorial. It‘s not a path for hermits. There may be periods when one benefits from solitude. However, there‘s transformation in friendship. The transformation results from knowing one another and accepting the truth that everything is purposeful. Whoever walks through the door of the Sufi dergah has been invited. We‘re all friends of the Friend. Community is part of the mechanism of transformation. Because Western society is so individualistic, we find ways of avoiding relationship and seek transformation that will occur at our own convenience or according to our own preferences. Sometimes people reach the stage where they say, „I might be better off alone. I think I‘m getting enough of this spiritual stuff that I could do it myself.“ They give up the friction of relationship and the challenge of it, and retreat into their own world. It‘s not usually a healthy sign. However, everyone is free. On this Path, no one is coerced. It‘s not a cult. There‘s no group pressure. If somebody walks away from a Sufi circle, nobody chases after them, except perhaps out of friendship. Sufis don‘t interfere with anybody‘s will. We all have free will. We are happy to find friends who share a common yearning. We are helped and healed by that yearning. We are healed by each other. (p. 27)”
― Kabir Helminski, In the House of Remembering: The Living Tradition of Sufi Teaching

“Many in the West have long proffered that the brain is the center of consciousness. But in traditional Islamic thought – as in other traditions – the heart is viewed as the center of our being. The Quran, for example, speaks of wayward people who have hearts with which they do not understand (7:179). Also the Quran mentions people who mocked the prophet and were entirely insincere in listening to his message, so God placed over their hearts a covering that they may not understand it and in their ears [He placed] acute deafness (6:25). Their inability to understand is a deviation from the spiritual function of a sound heart, just as their ears have been afflicted with a spiritual deafness. So we understand from this that the center of the intellect, the center of human consciousness and conscience, is actually the heart and not the brain. Only recently have we discovered that there are over 40,000 neurons in the heart. In other words, there are cells in the heart that are communicating with the brain. While the brain sends messages to the heart, the heart also sends messages to the brain.”
― Hamza Yusuf, Purification of the Heart: Signs, Symptoms and Cures of the Spiritual Diseases of the Heart

“A sound heart has knowledge and trust, not doubt and anxiety. Shubuhāt alludes to aspects closely connected to the heart: the soul, the ego, Satan’s whisperings and instigations, caprice, and the ardent love of this ephemeral world. The heart is an organ designed to be in a state of calm, which is achieved with the remembrance of God: Most surely, in the remembrance of God do hearts find calm (QURAN, 13:28). This calm is what the heart seeks out and gravitates to. It yearns always to remember God the Exalted. But when God is not remembered, when human beings forget God, then the heart falls into a state of agitation and turmoil. In this state it becomes vulnerable to diseases because it is undernourished and cut off, Cells require oxygen, so we breathe, If we stop breathing, we die. The heart also needs to breathe, and the breath of the heart is none other than the remembrance of God. Without it, the spiritual heart dies. The very purpose of revelation and of scripture is to remind us that our hearts need to be nourished.”
― Hamza Yusuf, Purification of the Heart: Signs, Symptoms and Cures of the Spiritual Diseases of the Heart

“One of the major drawbacks of being severed from the heart is that the more one is severed, the sicker the heart becomes, for the heart needs nourishment. Heedlessness starves the heart, robs it of its spiritual manna. One enters into a state of unawareness – a debilitating lack of awareness of God and an acute neglect of humanity’s ultimate destination: the infinite world of the Hereafter. When one peers into the limitless world through remembrance of God and increases in beneficial knowledge, one’s concerns become more focused on the infinite world, not the finite one that is disappearing and ephemeral. When people are completely immersed in the material world, believing that this world is all that matters and all that exists and that they are not accountable for their actions, they effect a spiritual death of their hearts.”
― Hamza Yusuf, Purification of the Heart: Signs, Symptoms and Cures of the Spiritual Diseases of the Heart

“Dearest heart, meet me, see me and speak with me. Keep your door open, walk with me through the gate. What else is there to truly await?
Turn the key. Unleash your truth and wisdom. Spill out upon me.
Dearest moon, awaken within me, all while I bloom. As the sun shines upon you moon, you too shine upon my Soul.
Heart, we are here and now we walk.”
― Ulonda Faye, Sutras of the Heart: Spiritual Poetry to Nourish the Soul