The first teacher to bring Islamic mysticism to the West presents music’s divine nature and its connection to our daily lives in this poetic classic of Sufi literature.
 
Music, according to Sufi teaching, is really a small expression of the overwhelming and perfect harmony of the whole universe—and that is the secret of its amazing power to move us. The Indian Sufi master Hazrat Inayat Khan (1882–1927), the first teacher to bring the Islamic mystical tradition to the West, was an accomplished musician himself. His lucid exposition of music's divine nature has become a modern classic, beloved not only by those interested in Sufism but by musicians of all kinds. “Inayat Khan says that music is the 'picture of our Beloved' and then draws the picture stroke by stroke from every angle and plane until we see it. He is the only holy man I know who delivers an authentic and inclusive spiritual message from a musical sensibility. He does this rigorously, poetically and spontaneously, until we perceive our own actions as music. Open to any line on any page: you will be opened.”—W. A. Mathieu, author of The Listening Book and The Musical Life

“By the end, the reader will be hard-pressed to deny the truth of the author’s words when he says that music is the miniature of life’s harmony, the language of beauty and the soul, the basis of the whole creation, and the nearest way to God.”—from the foreword by Pir Zia Inayat Khan

“A powerful book of mystical insight for people of all traditions.”—Monos

“Inayat Khan brought one of the strongest and sweetest lineages from India to the West: the music and open heart of Sufism as it blends with Persian poetry and Western intellect. He is a source and a great joy.”—Coleman Barks, author of Open Secret and The Essential Rumi