Contemporary French brotherhood against the soul of Sufism

Times are hard in France, Muslims are less and less accepted there, which is why it seems more and more unacceptable to us this temptation to desert this world turned upside down by the proponents of a certain Islam, and in particular , that of Brotherhood Islam. If the Sufi soul concentrates on the testimonycontemporary French brotherhood constructs, for its part, not a free, lucid and courageous soul but a soul ever more dependent on the group, which generates a herd instinct that (sometimes) undermines fraternity and calls for people to escape from the world.

We often forget to remember that the brotherhoods (zawaya) arose at the time of the decadence of Muslim civilization, around the 13^th century, even if this fact must be qualified somewhat. It was then a matter of “saving the furniture” after the sack of Baghdâd by the Mongols. This movement to create traditional brotherhood circles was therefore not an ascending moment but rather a descending one.

Criticism of Muhammad Iqbal of an obsolescence of initiation methods in the face of the modern mind, which no longer understands them, came to remind us of the need for a critical analysis of the approach of brotherhood circles. The Sufi soul to be found is the one that allows the progress of consciousness and which fights valiantly against the rebellious Promethean soul.

So, in our day, when the future offers a multitude of possibilities, which disturbs our psychological comfort which is used to seeing the world as stable, what should we remember? Do we have a survival kit?

“Prayer,” writes M.Burgelin, “is not the entire religion…but it constitutes its center”; the Prophet (sbl) said it well before, recalling that “the call (which is nothing other than prayer) is the heart of worship”.
Stick to your ritual obligations (the 5 pillars) at all costs even if prayer is at the center. Omar had aptly advised us to stick to our strict duties (wajibate) during difficult times and to add our wishes to do more (nawafile) in times of ease.
Work on your lucidity (basira) through the courage of asceticism (tazkiya). The renunciation (zouhd) of all sensible attractions is not a call for the material impoverishment of Muslim societies; poverty can lead to disbelief. Excessiveness (follow my gaze), on the other hand, is condemned without reservation by the Koran. Renunciation is rather an incentive to return to one's center by ceasing to be inattentive to God; “our soul is too full of the noise of the world” (social networks have shattered the little that remained of the Muslim soul which returns even more disordered).
French brotherhood is reduced to “bon chic bon genre” scouting. As Gaston Berger clarified, “each man advances towards God with his nature and in his own style. Individual differences are more important here than the variety of traditions.” A group initiation will always result in failure, because the spiritual journey is and will remain eminently personal.
Nurretin Ahmet Topçu, is a Turkish thinker from the 20^th century that we wish to resurrect being the thinker of Action through the work of Hallaj. In his thesis “Conformism and revolt” presented at the Sorbonne in 1934, recalled that in the heart of every Muslim lies the sleeping Sufi soul but that he does not despair of seeing in the near future “his children, taking up the tradition of his mysticism” to lead “always the holy war against the tyranny of their own instincts and against the cruelty of tyrants…”.

If there is a “Sufi consciousness” in France, its proponents will have to, like our ancestors, provide concrete personal and social solutions which help the individual “to obtain this life and this transforming knowledge”, as the said Topçu, and to “thus acquire the power to determine oneself”.