Just as if the property of a community is given to one man, it is wrong; or if one man lays hands on charitable foundations which belong to the community, he does wrong; so too to ascribe to the leader or master of a community the results of that community’s labours or the honour and merits resulting from its good works, is wrong-doing both for the community and for the leader or master. Because to do so flatters his egotism and encourages pride. While being the door-keeper, he supposes himself to be the king. He also does wrong to himself. Indeed, he opens the way to a sort of concealed associating partners with God.

Indeed, the colonel cannot claim the booty, victory, and glory belonging to a regiment which conquers a citadel. The master and spiritual guide should not be considered to be the source and origin, but known to be the place of reflection and manifestation. For example, heat and light reach you by means of a mirror. If you forget the sun, and considering the mirror to be the source, are grateful to it instead of being grateful to the sun, it would be crazy. The mirror should be preserved because it is the place of manifestation. Thus, the guide’s spirit and heart is a mirror; it is the place for reflecting effulgence emanating from Almighty God. He is the means of its being reflected to his followers. He should not be ascribed a higher station with regard to the effulgence than that of being the means. It sometimes even happens that a master considered to be the source is neither the place of manifestation nor the source. The follower supposes the effulgences he receives due to the purity of his sincerity, or his strength of attachment, or his concentration on his master, or in other ways, to have come from the mirror of his master’s spirit. Like by means of mesmerism, some people open up a window onto the World of Similitudes by gazing attentively at a mirror, and observe strange and wonderful things in the mirror. But it is not in the mirror; rather by focussing their attention on the mirror, a window opens up in their imaginations outside the mirror and they see those things. It is for this reason that sometimes the sincere student may be more advanced than a deficient shaykh. He returns, guides his shaykh and becomes the shaykh’s shaykh.