Spirit's Pipeline into a More Integral Tomorrow

Sheikh Ragip

Robert Frager is the founding President of the Institute of Transpersonal Psychology, and is currently a Professor and the Director of the Spiritual Guidance Program.  He teaches by the title of Sheikh Ragip in the Halveti-Jerrahi order of Sufis, and has a community of students in Redwood City, CA.

Stuart Davis

With eleven full-length albums to his credit, Stuart Davis has carved out a unique wavelength in the musical spectrum. Taking the topics of God, sex and death, and crafting them into inimitable pop songs with lyrical flair and unforgettable hooks, Stuart continues to be one of the great undiscovered singer/songwriters around.

 

 

Written by Colin Bigelow

Robert Frager is a wonderful of example of what it can mean to take a more comprehensive and integral approach to the human experience. With a Ph.D. from Harvard University, Dr. Frager is a practicing psychologist and the founding President of the Institute of Transpersonal Psychology. As a practicing student of Sufism for over two decades, Dr. Frager is also Sheikh Ragip of the Halveti-Jerrahi order of Sufis in Redwood City, CA.

Years ago, Stuart Davis was lucky enough to stumble upon Sheikh Ragip and his community of students, and this conversation is a wonderful rekindling of that relationship. Stu comments that he has missed the unique gifts of the Sufi perspective, and asks what it has been like to be a Sufi teacher in a post-9/11 world.

As Sheikh Ragip explains, not too much has changed in terms of the day-to-day life of his community, but 9/11 did expose just how much confusion and ignorance there is about Islam in general, particularly in the West. "We all tend to say 'Islam' as though it's a single entity, and it's not monolithic at all... and from an integral point of view, I can't separate, in some sense, Islam from the cultures that interpret it. It is not as though there is a 'pure Islam' out there...."

An integral approach to spirituality would certainly agree that it is impossible to separate any form of religion from the culture in which it is appearing. And just as there is no "pure Islam" out there, there is likewise no "pure Christianity," no "pure Judaism," no "pure Buddhism," and so on. The only "timeless" truth that is shared within, or between, traditions is unmanifest Spirit, Godhead, Ayn, Dharmakaya, etc. But in the world of manifestation, how one understands and interprets unmanifest Reality evolves over time.

There may be the "original interpretation" of Mohammed, Christ, Abraham, or Buddha, but that doesn't make it "pure" or "eternally true for all peoples at all times." The great gift of post-modernity is its understanding that all interpretations are context dependent and culturally situated, and therefore the moment you open your mouth to proclaim the eternal Truth that grace has bestowed upon you, you are using a relative vehicle to express an absolute reality. This isn't a problem unless one isn't aware of that distinction, and then things get muddled and contradictory extremely quickly.

Sheikh Ragip and Stu go on to explore the relation of states and stages of consciousness in the Sufi tradition. As Sheikh Ragip explains, there is a distinction between hal and maqam. Hal are often intense, inspiring state experiences of love, bliss, or formless absorption, but they always fade. Maqam are stable levels of attainment that reflect true growth, maturity, and steady access to those states as a result of spiritual practice.

An ongoing investigation at Integral Spiritual Center is how states, state-stages, and structure-stages relate. The great wisdom traditions cover the first two well (e.g., the states of hal and state-stages or levels of maqam), but are ignorant of the last (e.g., the structure-stages or levels discovered by researchers such as Lawrence Kohlberg, Jane Loevinger, Robert Kegan, and Clare Graves).

A truly integral spirituality incorporates all three. It includes the profound insights of the contemplative face of Islam, and then looks to those enlightened leaders within the tradition to help find more integral forms of Islam, and thus help it find a more meaningful place in the modern and postmodern world.

As Sheikh Ragip shares, a spiritual teacher is like a section of pipe leading back to the original Source of all spiritual wisdom, "and it's my job not to leak, so something can flow through me without getting lost." As we think you'll agree, not only does this wisdom flow through him uncorrupted, but Sheikh Ragip is helping bring Sufism into a more integral tomorrow. We are deeply honored to have Dr. Frager/Sheikh Ragip as a guest, and we think you'll deeply enjoy his humor, modesty, and multifaceted intelligence....