Dharma Exchange

"God has no religion." - Mahatma Gandhi

I would really like to learn a bit more about the Sufi tradition. What is it about? What is its intent and direction? I know very little and only hear intriguing references in talk and books... I can get the historical facts and high level overview from Wikipedia . But it would be interesting to discuss how it compares or contrasts to Buddhism. What is its definition of God? Is there a path and what is its goal?

A fundamental point of departure for any spiritual work seems to me to get clear on what the relationship between me, the individual, the separate sense of self, and a broader spanning realm of that which is beyond me is. Pretty much from the start, I reject the notion of a Creator that is separate from me, but has built me in some sense to some spec and sits there and makes the rules. The whole concept of the "man with the big white beard" that comes to judge you seems deeply inapplicable. In this sense, I reject the dualism between God and us humans as it is portrayed certainly by Christianity and other main religions. Even more so the idea of some institution which represents God and his will and has some sort of enforcement order to fulfill seems so fundamentally flawed. This brings us to an atheist point of view, basically rejecting any form of spirituality, only subscribing to matter and measure as the yard stick for any discussion. This materialism reduces the spark of...