Top 450 Idries Shah Quotes (2026 Update)
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251. “La historia no es generalmente lo que ha sucedido. La historia es lo que algunas personas consideraron significativo.”

— Idries Shah

252. “Do not dwell upon whether you will put yourself into the hands of a teacher. You are always in his hands.”

— Idries Shah

253. “Things which are seemingly opposed may in fact be working together.”

— Idries Shah

254. “Great men are great until they know it. Saints are holy until they know it.”

— Idries Shah

255. “These lecture provide material for the consideration of common factors, in theory and in development, from the viewpoint of the idea of surrender to the Divine Will, reviewing some aspects of the interplay between Christians and Moslems, and introducing material from and about Sufis.”

— Idries Shah

256. “La felicidad de los superficiales: cuando un hombre que ha perdido su asno lo encuentra otra vez.”

— Idries Shah

257. “They have fixed our nutrition and arranged our life-span. More than this, and ahead of this, efforts will not be productive.”

— Idries Shah

258. “The tongue is the best masseur of furrowed brows.”

— Idries Shah

259. “Inheritance and culture obscure people’s higher capacities.”

— Idries Shah

260. “The best player of a game is the watcher – ask him.”

— Idries Shah

261. “Me conviertes en un pecador si me impides darte hospitalidad.”

— Idries Shah

262. “Ten la naturaleza de un derviche; entonces usa con un gorro elegante.”

— Idries Shah

263. “If the father cannot, the son will finish the task.”

— Idries Shah

264. “Be a tiger – if you are ready for a tiger’s problems.”

— Idries Shah

265. “It is as true as anything else which can be spoken to say that all knowledge is really available everywhere.”

— Idries Shah

266. “There is no wisdom where there is no common sense: it cannot under those conditions find any expression.”

— Idries Shah

267. “As with any other specialisation, teaching is a vocation, open only to those who are truly capable of discharging its functions.”

— Idries Shah

268. “A Sufi has a right to be served, but he has no right to demand. Maruf Karkhi of Khorasan.”

— Idries Shah

269. “Greed harms you: generosity helps you. This is why is has been said: ‘Greed is the mother of incapacity’.”

— Idries Shah

270. “One should not pray if that prayer is vanity.”

— Idries Shah

271. “Patience is a garment which has never worn out.”

— Idries Shah

272. “Los milagros, para el Sufi, no son evidentes; son instrumentales.”

— Idries Shah

273. “Take the wheat, not the measure in which it is contained.”

— Idries Shah

274. “A stolen kiss is not easily returned.”

— Idries Shah

275. “The teaching must, of course, work with the best part of the individual, must be directed to his or her real capacity.”

— Idries Shah

276. “You will always have doubts, but only discover them at a useful time for your weakness to point them out.”

— Idries Shah

277. “Si no puedes sentarte en un trono como un rey, sujeta, como un tendero, la cuerda de la tienda Real.”

— Idries Shah

278. “Mejor discutir con un amigo que apoyar enemigos.”

— Idries Shah

279. “Los Sufis sostienen que la experiencia y el conocimiento superior le llegan al hombre o mujer en exacta concordancia con su valor, capacidad, y esfuerzo puesto en ello.”

— Idries Shah

280. “Brave is the thief who carries a lamp in his hand.”

— Idries Shah

281. “I am the Real, for I have not ceased to be real – through the Real.”

— Idries Shah

282. “The teacher works in accordance with the prospects of his students and the possibility of maintaining the community of Sufis.”

— Idries Shah

283. “Everything man needs is in the world.”

— Idries Shah

284. “Study institutions may become visible when the head is more emptied of imaginings.”

— Idries Shah

285. “In a village where everyone has only one leg, the biped will hop about more lamely than anyone else, if he knows what is good for him.”

— Idries Shah

286. “Real generosity is anonymous to the extent that a man should be prepared even to be considered ungenerous rather than explain it to others.”

— Idries Shah

287. “The sort of man who, throwing a stone upon the ground, would miss.”

— Idries Shah

288. “La gente habla de “servicio, esfuerzo, amor, conocimiento”. Pero con el conocimiento sabes lo que es amor, y lo que no lo es.”

— Idries Shah

289. “And Rumi tells us, ‘Soul receives from soul that knowledge, therefore not by book nor from tongue’.”

— Idries Shah

290. “The door of illumination is open to those for whom other doors are closed.”

— Idries Shah

291. “When you get a principle on which everyone is agreed, you get the beginning of complacency and deterioration.”

— Idries Shah

292. “MAGHRIBI: Learning is in activity. Learning through words alone is minor activity.”

— Idries Shah

293. “Sufism is, in fact, not a mystical system, not a religion, but a body of knowledge.”

— Idries Shah

294. “At His door, what is the difference between Moslem and Christian, virtuous and guilty? At his door all are seekers and He the sought.”

— Idries Shah

295. “Have the nature of a dervish: then wear a stylish cap.”

— Idries Shah

296. “Charity has been made into a great virtue only because of the low level of human decency.”

— Idries Shah

297. “Lo que va dentro de una mina de sal se convierte en sal.”

— Idries Shah

298. “A Sufi is one who is not bound by anything nor does he bind anything.”

— Idries Shah

299. “Has it not occurred to you that, conversely, other people do not have your difficulties because they do not react as you do to what happens?”

— Idries Shah

300. “If you forsake a path, it is because you were hoping for conviction from it. You seek conviction, not self-knowledge.”

— Idries Shah