Quotessence
Home / Authors / Seyyed Hossein Nasr
Seyyed Hossein Nasr

Seyyed Hossein Nasr Quotes

Professor

Filter quotes by topic

AllIslamSpiritualIslamicWorldHumansProphetSufiSufismAlsIfs

Famous Seyyed Hossein Nasr Quotes

“In the field of medicine, if you're sick you need a doctor. A doctor has already studied how to deal with your ailments, and human beings are imperfect. There any many ailments of the psyche and the soul that need to be treated, and the serious murshid, or spiritual master, is also really a doctor of the soul: a person who can heal the wounds of the soul in the same way as a medical doctor takes care of our physical problems.”

IfsWayNeedsHumansPersonsSoulProblemCareSpiritualHuman BeingsDealsFieldsSeriousMastersDoctorsSickMedicineTake CareMedicalWoundsHealTreatedImperfectAilmentsSpiritual MastersMedical Doctor
Author:Seyyed Hossein Nasr
Create image

“In Islam, we believe that it is God himself who is the ultimate guide - Al Hadi - one of the names of God is Al Hadi, the Guide. But at the same time, God has provided within the Islamic revelation the possibility of spiritual guidance through human beings, because then everyone can have direct access to God.”

BelieveHumansSpiritualNamesHuman BeingsPossibilityDirectUltimateIslamGuidesAccessGuidanceIslamicRevelationsAlsSpiritual Guidance
Author:Seyyed Hossein Nasr
Create image

“If you want to make a decision in life on what to do, but if you're trying systematically, through spiritual practice, through meditation, through the invocation of the name of God, to walk closer and closer in this life to Him, you need someone to guide you. And God has made it possible in Islam for this guidance to exist.”

IfsWantNeedsTryingMadeSpiritualNamesDecisionWalksPracticeMeditationIslamGuidesMade ItThis LifeGuidanceSpiritual PracticeInvocation
Author:Seyyed Hossein Nasr
Create image

“The Quran mentions the story of Moses and Khidr [a prophet mentioned in the Quran who guided Moses on a revelatory journey], a famous story, in which Moses represents sort of the external understanding of the religion and Khidr represents the inner spiritual understanding of the religion. Moses went on a journey with Khidr and Khidr said, "I will not accept you unless you stop questioning things," which from an external point of view seems strange, but inwardly is very meaningful. This is exactly the question of spiritual guidance.”

SaidStoriesSeemsSpiritualUnderstandingViewsAcceptingJourneyStrangePoint Of ViewMeaningfulGuidanceProphetQuestioningMosesQuranVery MeanSpiritual GuidanceVery Meaningful
Author:Seyyed Hossein Nasr
Create image

“There is no religion in the world where there is a possibility of spiritual development outside of the context of that religion. This is only a modern invention. For example, Christian mystics were also Christians. They also went to Church and followed Christian laws. Hindu mystics were practicing Hindus; they didn't kill cows and have steak. They follow the Hindu laws and so on and so forth down the line and Sufism is no exception.”

WorldChristianSpiritualLawChurchLinesModernExamplePossibilityDevelopmentInventionExceptionCowsSufismSteakSpiritual Development
Author:Seyyed Hossein Nasr
Create image

“There is an idea that you can take the spiritual teachings of a religion outside of a religion and practice them; these ideas are brought forward. That appears to be easy. You can say, "Oh, well. I don't have to bother about not eating pork, and not drinking wine, and all you have to do is read the beautiful poetry of Rumi and talk about wine, women and song. Or something like that." This kind of attitude. This is the antipode of the other attitude which says Islam is nothing but throwing bombs, it has nothing to do with internal or inward purification.”

WellsKindIdeasBeautifulSpiritualSongEasyAttitudePracticeTeachingEatingWineDrinkingIslamBotherBombsInternalsThrowingInwardPorkPurificationOh WellDrinking WineSpiritual TeachingBeautiful PoetryAntipodes
Author:Seyyed Hossein Nasr
Create image

“Al-Hallaj has a special destiny. He came at a time when worldliness, the luxury, were inundating the Islamic world. His function was to act as kind of an antithesis to this, and he paid for it with his life, and he was very happy to do so. He smiled as he went to the executioner. That was done because it shook the conscience of the Islamic peoples of that time. But the vast majority, the vast, vast, vast majority of Sufis, they have not met the destiny of al-Hallaj. They have spoken about reaching "the Truth" and there is nothing dangerous about it.”

WorldKindDoneDestinySpecialDangerousMetsConscienceFunctionPaidMajorityLuxuryIslamicReachingAlsVery HappySufiAntithesisExecutionersWorldliness
Author:Seyyed Hossein Nasr
Create image

“Look at Senegal, about 90% of the Muslims in Senegal are Tijani or Qadiri Sufis. Among them, they have very great teachers who have written poems about al-Hallaj, and they have not been killed. In fact, it's Sufism that brought Islam through all of Senegal, right under our noses the last couple of centuries. And you can go down the same line through Indonesia and Malaysia.”

LooksFactsLastsLinesTeacherWrittenCenturyCoupleIslamNosesAlsSufismSufiIndonesiaGreat TeacherMalaysia
Author:Seyyed Hossein Nasr
Create image

“How did the Turks become Muslim? They became Muslim through the Sufis. The Arabs never conquered the Turks. There were people in early Islam who were speaking like Hallaj, who spoke about the Truth, about reaching the Truth, about being one with the Truth, and not only they were not killed, but they were great heroes of their own culture, and there is a university in Turkey named after one [Sufi Saint.]”

PeopleCultureHeroIslamUniversitySaintReachingSpokesSufiTurkeysGreat Hero
Author:Seyyed Hossein Nasr
Create image

“300 years after the rise of Islam there were Zoroastrians in Iran. The Muslim armies never forced people to accept Islam. It was only within Arabia that God ordered the idolaters to have a choice of either embracing Islam or fight against Muslims, because He wanted to remove this terrible idolatry that exited there. But outside Arabia where Islam met Christians, Jews, Zoroastrians and Hindus, they were given a choice by and large. That's why many Christians and Jewish communities survived in the Muslim world, but gradually many of them embraced Islam for different reasons.”

PeopleWorldYearsDifferentReasonWantedChristianChoicesFightingGivenCommunityAcceptingTerribleMetsArmyIslamJewRemoveIranSurvivedIdolatryArabiaMuslim WorldJewish Community
Author:Seyyed Hossein Nasr
Create image

“If you have a billion Muslims, 900 million of them were not brought into Islam by any kind of invasion, but most of them through the Sufis, because human beings are such that they are affected by people of spiritual character. Certainly when they display nobility and hospitality and gentility and love and are not selfish or aggressive, and they are honest.”

PeopleIfsHumansKindCharacterSpiritualHuman BeingsMillionsHonestAnd LoveIslamSelfishBillionsAffectedAggressiveDisplaySufiNobilityHospitalityInvasionGentilityNot Selfish
Author:Seyyed Hossein Nasr
Create image

“It is for Muslim scholars to study the whole history of Islamic science completely and not only the chapters and periods which influenced Western science. It is also for Muslim scholars to present the tradition of Islamic science from the point of view of Islam itself and not from the point of view of the scientism, rationalism and positivism which have dominated the history of science in the West since the establishment of the discipline in the early part of the 20th century in Europe and America.”

WholeAmericaViewsStudyCenturyDisciplinePeriodsEuropeTraditionWestIslamWesternPoint Of ViewIslamicEstablishmentScholarChapters20th CenturyScientismRationalismHistory Of SciencePositivismEurope And America
Author:Seyyed Hossein Nasr
Create image

“The traditional doctrine of man and not the measurement of skulls and footprints is the key for the understanding of that anthropos who, despite the rebellion of Promethean man against Heaven from the period of Renaissance and its aftermath, is still the inner man of every man, the reality which no human being can deny wherever and whenever he lives, the imprint of a theomorphic nature which no historical change and transformation can erase completely from the face of that creature called man.”

MenHumansStillsRealityFacesHeavenUnderstandingHuman BeingsKeysPeriodsCreaturesTransformationHistoricalDenyEvery ManDoctrineTraditionalDespiteRebellionMeasurementEraseRenaissanceSkullsFootprintAftermathHistorical Change
Book:Knowledge and the Sacred: Revisioning Academic Accountability
Create image

“The significance of the vast Islamic scientific tradition for Muslims and especially for young Muslims today is not only that it gives them a sense of pride in their own civilization because of the prestige that science fhas in the present day world. It is furthermore a testament to the way Islam was able to cultivate various sciences extensively without becoming alienated from the Islamic world view and without creating a science whose application would destroy the world of nature and the harmony that must exist between man and the natural environment.”

MenWorldWayGivingTodayAbleYoungNaturalViewsEnvironmentPrideBecomingCivilizationCreatingTraditionHarmonyIslamVariousIslamicSignificanceApplicationTestamentPrestigePresent DayNatural EnvironmentWorld View
Author:Seyyed Hossein Nasr
Create image

“The life of Islamic philosophy did not terminate with Ibn Rushd nearly eight hundred years ago, as thought by Western scholarship for several centuries. Rather, its activities continued strongly during the later centuries, particularly in Persia and other eastern lands of Islam, and it was revived in Egypt during the last century.”

YearsPhilosophyLastsLandCenturyActivityHundredYears AgoIslamWesternEightIslamicEgyptEasternScholarshipPersia
Author:Seyyed Hossein Nasr
Create image

“From it genesis twelve hundred years ago to today, Islamic philosophy (al-hikmah; al-falsafah) has been one of the major intellectual traditions within the Islamic world, and it has influenced and been influenced by many other intellectual perspectives, including Scholastic theology (kalam) and doctrinal Sufism (al-ma'rifah or al-tasawwuf al-'ilmi) and theoretical gnosis ('irfan-i nazari).”

WorldYearsHas BeensPhilosophyTodayPerspectiveMajorsIntellectualHundredYears AgoTraditionIncludingTheologyIslamicAlsTwelveSufismTheoreticalGenesisGnosisScholastics
Author:Seyyed Hossein Nasr
Create image

“Only in the West did a philosophy develop that was not only no longer the love of wisdom but went so far as to deny the category of wisdom as a legitimate form of knowledge. The result was a hatred of wisdom that should more appropriately be called ‘misosophy’ (literarily hatred of Sophia, Wisdom) rather than philosophy.”

ShouldPhilosophyFormResultsHatredWestDenyCategoriesSophia
Book:Religion and the Order of Nature
Create image