Jelaluddin Rumi was once asked “Is there any way to God nearer than the ritual prayer?” “No” He replied. “But prayer doesn’t consist in forms alone. Formal prayer has a beginning and an end, like all forms and bodies and everything partakes of speech and sound; but the soul is unconditional and infinite. It has neither beginning nor end. The Prophets have shown the true nature of prayers. Prayer is the drowning and unconsciousness of the soul, so that all these forms remain without. At that time there is no room for even Gabriel, who is Pure spirit. One may say that the man who prays in this fashion is exempt from all religious obligations, since he is deprived of his reason. Absorption in Divine Unity is the soul of prayer.
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