Indeed, the credit for spread of Islam across the Indian sub-continent should go to the Sufis, who took religion literally to the door-step of the people. As Dr Amjad Parvez, who reviewed Ghaffar’s loves’ labour of four volumes (each of 427 pages) in the Daily Times, said Sufi saints used the love of Heer and Ranjah as a metaphor of love between man and God.  

The book is part of ‘Within Reach’ series aimed at bringing back into focus the Punjabi Sufi poetry by making the enchanting verses available to the present convent educated generation at home and in neighbouring countries where the Sufi saints are revered by people from all walks of life and all religions.

The book is timely too. Only on July 2, the shrine of Lahore’s patron saint, Data Gunj Baksh (11th century) was attacked by two suicide bombers as hundreds gathered as usual for their prayers and to pay homage to the Sufi saint. Attacking the shrine meant attacking the spirit of Lahore, since the city is also known as ‘Data –ki-Nagri’ (Data’s abode).

The Thursday attack that had left some forty dead and at least 150 injured is not an isolated instance. In recent months and years, militants have been attacking places of worship and religious congregations.

Though the targets of attack generally have been Ahmediyas and Christians, Sufi shrines also have come to face the ire of the Taliban Jihadis of all hues particularly in the Northwest Frontier Province (NWFP) – the home to many revered Sufi saints like Rahman Baba and Mian Umar Baba.

Islam practiced in Pakistan and in neighbouring India and Afghanistan is, indeed, not the orthodox Islam that came to the region but ‘Folk Islam’ which is a synthesis of the ‘import’ and the local cultural ethos. Sufi saints took Islam to a higher plane with their message of love, tolerance, inclusiveness and universal brotherhood.

Hindus then and now are drawn to the Sufi shrines for the simple reason that the Sufis offered a way out of the rigid caste system, traditions and spiritual rigmarole with their emphasis on the path of piety for salvation.

No surprise, therefore, nowhere in the world except in Pakistan and India, the dargah and mazaar of Muslim saints are visited by people of all faiths with a prayer on their lips.     And in the words of Muzaffar Ghaffar, a Sufi is esoteric and aspires for and preserves to rid his adherents of egotism, greed, anger, lust and delusion, including self-delusion. Sufiism stands for making the individual subservient to the order of nature, which is the will of God.

Like the Gurdwaras, the Sufi shrines are open to all particularly the poor; they serve as shelter to many homeless. And food (‘langar’) is distributed free to all who gather at the shrine on the eve of Friday.

The origin of Heer Ranjha story remains shrouded in medieval mystery. The author who has undertaken painstaking research traces the tale to the 13th century Persian literature and says that it became a part of popular folklore in Punjab from the 15th century. He gives credit for this to Sufi saints like Shah Hussain (1538-1599) and Khawaja Ghulam Farid (1839-1901).

The Jihadist Islam, which has been gripping Punjab in recent months, is a manifestation of the influence of the Taleban and the al Qaeda both directly and through their local clones. The sectarian violence unleashed by them is destroying the very soul of the country by deeming music and mystical dance, which are a norm at the Sufi shrines, to be heretical and a divergence from pure Islam.
 
That the state of Pakistan and its American supporters are instrumental in the appearance of Taliban in the first place make the attacks on Shias, Ahmediyas and lately on Sufi shrines a sad commentary on Pakistan in the 21st century.

Unfortunately, neither Islamabad nor its patron saints in the western capitals appear to realize that a Taliban is always bad and there can be no good or bad Taliban when the Taliban’s goal is capturing state power to usher in a medieval rule.