Searching on this Web Site

Search Engine Examples:

        mind surface heart     (Searches for the individual words mind, surface and heart used together, in any order)

      "mind is the surface of the heart"     (Quote marks are used to specify an exact phrase)

       Jalal*    (Wildcard * matches any number of characters, this example finds Jalal, Jalali, Jalaluddin)

       bat*n  (Wildcard * matches any number of characters, this example finds batin, bateen)

 

Spelling of words on this web site:

Enter a few letters of a word to see how, or if, the word appears on this web site.

Starts with:    Contains:    Ends with:

  

Complete list of all words in the Inayat Khan texts  (Another way to find the spelling of any word)

Sufi Message Glossary   (To help find non-English words)
 

Search only the Spiritual Topics portion of this web site (primarily, but not exclusively, Inayat Khan books and papers):

Note:  Inayat Khan message volume books and related papers can be easily recognized in the search results when a url beginning with http://wahiduddin.net/mv2/  is shown at the end of a search result.

 Standard search...  shows only "best" matches:

 

 
 
Snippet view... shows snippets containing all matches:

 

Search this Entire Site:

  Standard search... shows only "best" matches:

 

  Snippet view ... shows snippets containing all matches:

 

General Tips for using this search engine:

Search for the words or phrases which you want to see in your results. You may search for phrases by enclosing the phrase with quote marks, such as "love, harmony and beauty".  (Note, however, that a quoted search phrase must not contain  any apostrophe, single quote or double quote.)

The usefulness of your search will primarily depend upon your choice of search words.  In general, searching works best for words which are uncommon, and/or when using a known phrase (enclosed in quote marks). The search is not case sensitive, so you can ignore capitalization.

Note that some words, such as love, heart or beauty occur hundreds of times in these volumes. Therefore, in such cases you may receive a very large quantity of search results if you only search for one common word. You will have better results if you search for several words which you want to see near each other, such as:  love harmony beauty.

Try it a few times... it takes some practice to get good results.
 

Additional Search Syntax:

The characters  ", *, +, and - are powerful search modifiers which may be used to fine-tune a search.

This search engine automatically includes alternate spellings and common synonyms. If you want to search for a word exactly as you spelled it (with no synonyms or alternate spellings), put a tilde ~ in front of the word (with no space)

To search for a phrase, or words that must appear immediately next to each other, put the words inside of quote marks. For example, type in the phrase "doors of the heart", click on Search and you will see the context in which Inayat Khan used that exact phrase. When quote marks "       "  are used to specify a phrase that you want to search for,  the search phrase must not contain apostrophe, single quote or double quote marks.

You may use an asterisk as a wildcard to match any number of letters. For example, wh* will match why, where, when, whether, or any other word starting with the letters wh. This feature is often useful when the exact spelling is not known.

You may use a + sign immediately in front of any term to indicate that it  must be included in your results, and you may use a - sign immediately in front of any term that must be excluded from your results.

Searches are not case sensitive, so you may ignore capitalization of all the words.
 

Standardization of Spelling:

The printed volumes of the Sufi Message were prepared by a variety of editors over the years, and contained some inconsistent spelling. For example, some editions used the British spelling colour while some used color, some used Koran while others used Qur'an, and so on. Since searching the text is very difficult with multiple spellings of various words, such inconsistencies have been generally standardized using contemporary American English in this on-line edition, except in scripture and poetry. Specific references to the book called "The Bowl of Saki" remain as "saki", while all other uses of the word have been changed to saqi. For more details about the standardization of spelling, please see the end of the Glossary page.

updated 3-May-2012