Rabia (Rabi'a Al-'Adawiyya): I am fully qualified to work as a doorkeeper, and for this reason:

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I am fully qualified to work as a doorkeeper, and for this reason:

by Rabia (Rabi'a Al-'Adawiyya)
(717 - 801) Timeline

English version by
Charles Upton

Original Language
Persian/Farsi

I am fully qualified to work as a doorkeeper, and for this reason:
What is inside me, I don't let out:
What is outside me, I don't let in.
If someone comes in, he goes right out again.
He has nothing to do with me at all.
I am a Doorkeeper of the Heart, not a lump of wet clay.

-- from Doorkeeper of the Heart: Versions of Rabia, Translated by Charles Upton

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Themes

Heart

Recommended Books

	Doorkeeper of the Heart: Versions of Rabia, Translated by Charles Upton
	Early Islamic Mysticism: Sufi, Quran, Miraj, Poetic and Theological Writings (Classics of Western Spirituality), by Michael A. Sells
	First Among Sufis: The Life and Thought of Rabia Al-Adawiyya, the Woman Saint of Basra, by Widad El Sakkakini
	Love Poems from God: Twelve Sacred Voices from the East and West, Translated by Daniel Ladinsky
	Muslim Women Mystics: The Life and Work of Rabi'a and Other Women Mystics in Islam, by Margaret Smith

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