Publisher's Synopsis
This book is about the biography of a prominent contemporary Sufi mystic Sheikh Ramadan Deeb al-Dimashqi who is a Sea that minds are incapable of sailing in his horizons, and imagination is unable to dive into his depths; yet I want people to know him, though I realize that my depiction cannot satisfy some of the least of his attributes, and my words shall no doubt fail to reach the first degree of high principle, because he combines between the most decent dignities and simplicity and humility, even many people around him probably do not pay attention to his presence, while among the righteous knowledgeable Gnostics he is a shining full moon and bright light, whose gesture is worth the most precious gems, and whose Secret is always surrounded by sanctification. When I met him for the first time, I was confronted with a myriad of surprises; when I entered the guest room in his home in the Mosque of Abu-l-Nour, where he meets students and answers questions from the general people who seek him every day in dozens, so when I entered I thought to a good degree of certainty that I am in the workshop of an electrical engineer, and then I said to myself: No, he must be an electronics engineer, but then I saw other types of different tools that filled the corners of the small room whose walls are also filled with books which includes varieties of books in different languages. Yet I was told that he conducts all such crafts and reads in all these books and references! Then after he welcomed us and exchange some talking, I began to realize as if he knows me very well, no but he seemed to really know me more than I know myself; and he was wisely and ingeniously able to diagnose my complications and explain them to me without letting anybody feel that he was speaking personally about me! I definitely felt, without the slightest doubt, that I was an open book in front of him, and for the first time in my life I realized in practical concrete terms the divine narration that says: "watch the insight of the believer since he looks with the light of God." Thus, not only his shirt and cap are white and his beard is white, but his heart is a white polished mirror in which reflected the light of God which allows him to see. He filled his time with teaching and learning the Koran and hadith, and dedicated himself to the service of people who come to him from all over the cities and countries, for their slight affairs and complicated problems, and they find in him the compassionate Father and Brother, both in worldly matters or in matters of religion; since he is knowledgeable in various sciences of jurisprudence and general affairs of religion, and in medical sciences, as he used to work as physician, and he is expert in electrical engineering and electronics, construction, mechanics, agriculture, and even in the Culinary Arts and foods; he simply does not waste a glimpse of his time but only in science, either learning and teaching. Yet, although he is prominent mystic and expert master in the spiritual sciences, he relies mainly on usual discipline and normal causes. As he was born in 1921, just after the first world war, when Syria was occupied by France, he was unable to follow the usual education program, thus he was illiterate, but he started to take make-up courses at the age of 20 and he took the BSc at the age of 65, and the PhD at the age of 89. Despite his advanced age, he still carries on all his work by his hands, driving every day before dawn from his family house in the countryside to the town center in Damascus to the Mosque of Abu-l-Nour where he performs the prayers and gives many of his weekly preaching sessions and meet all the people who come to seek his advice or help. He has been following this same program for decades, allowing himself only few hours for sleep. Yet he only sleeps by the phone and answers his many students and others who call him from all over the world sometimes not observing the time difference.
