The Nekbakht Foundation is a non-profit foundation dedicated to preserving and disseminating the teachings of Pir-o-Murshid Inayat Khan (1882-1927). The secretariat of the foundation is located in The Netherlands, and its archives are in Suresnes, France, where Pir-o-Murshid Inayat Khan lived for the last five years of his life.
Inayat Khan was born into a family of gentlemen musicians in Baroda (now Vadodara), Gujerat, India, on July 5, 1882. He was reared in a Muslim household, but a very open one (some Hindus were part of the family, and Inayat was even sent to a Hindu school as a child). He showed early proficiency at music, and while still in his teens he began teaching at his grandfather's music school, the Gayanshala. He also started to travel to take part in the musical competitions sponsored by various Maharajas, many of which he won, collecting gold medals. He sang in the dhrupad style and accompanied himself on the vina, the ancient Indian musical instrument said to have been created by Lord Shiva. His ultimate success came when, still in his early 20s, he was named Tansen of India by the Nizam of Hyderabad, the highest honour to which a musician could aspire. Having achieved all he could in his chosen profession, Inayat turned his attention to spiritual training. His family had a long association with Sufi teachings, and eventually he found a murshid (Sufi guide) of the Chishti lineage, Abu Hashim Madani. During his three years under Murshid Madani's direction, he made very rapid progress, and when the Murshid was dying, he gave Inayat specific instructions to go to the West to make known his music and spread the wisdom of Sufism.
On September 13, 1910, therefore, Pir-o-Murshid Inayat Khan left Bombay for New York, accompanied by his younger brother Mahboob and his cousin Ali. They found the means to live and travel by accompanying the famous dancer Ruth St Denis. During this early period, Inayat also met an American young woman, Ora Ray Baker, who soon became his wife, and who bore him four children; the oldest, Noor-un-nisa (1913); the second, Vilayat (1916); the third, Hidayat (1917); and finally Khair-un-nisa (1919).Pir-o-Murshid travelled widely, not only in America, but also in England, France, and Russia, before the outbreak of World War I. During the war he and his family were restricted to England, and he began to give classes and take more personal pupils. When the war was over, he moved his family to France, and established the headquarters of his movement in Geneva (then seat of the League of Nations). He travelled extensively in Europe, and even returned to the United States in 1923 and 1926 for widely-noted lecture tours. In 1922, he and his family took up residence in a fine house just outside of Paris, in Suresnes, where there was also a lecture hall and an orchard. During the summers that followed, he held Summer Schools of three months, during which he lectured on a wide variety of subjects relating to religion and spirituality. These lectures, as well as those he gave while he travelled the rest of the year, form the basis of The Complete Works of Pir-o-Murshid Hazrat Inayat Khan, the large editorial project undertaken by the Nekbakht Foundation, caretaker of the principal archive of Pir-o-Murshid's teaching. After the Summer School of 1926, Pir-o-Murshid Inayat Khan made his first trip back to India, accompanied only by a secretary. After a short time there, he was taken ill and died, at age 44, on February 5, 1927. His tomb, known as the Dargah, is in the Nizamuddin West area of Delhi, and has become an object of pilgrimage as well as a centre for social welfare.
Pir-o-Murshid Inayat Khan's work has been extensively published, but in highly edited versions which often lose the flavour, if not the substance, of his teaching. The Complete Works of Pir-o-Murshid Hazrat Inayat Khan have been undertaken in the belief that complete and accurate records of exactly what he said will prove invaluable to scholars and editors who wish to make new editions which are more authentic. When Pir-o-Murshid Inayat Khan died in 1927 he had several thousand followers in Europe and America. His work has been carried on by a number of individuals and organizations, among which are the International Sufi Movement, the Sufi Order International, the Sufi Ruhaniat International, Sufi Contact, and the Sufi Way of Action. The Nekbakht Foundation is an independent organization which seeks to preserve the teachings of Pir-o-Murshid Inayat Khan as given.
Pir-o-Murshid Inayat Khan and his family took up residence in the spring of 1922 in Fazal Manzil, a large house in Suresnes, France, a near suburb just west of Paris. One of his secretaries, Sakina Furnée, bought a small house across the street in order to be easily available for dictation, and Pir-o-Murshid Inayat Khan would come there every afternoon when he was in Suresnes. That same house now contains the records of Pir-o-Murshid Inayat Khan's lectures and other teachings, gathered by Sakina Furnée throughout her life. After her passing in 1973, Munira van Voorst van Beest took up residence and continued organizing the papers. She first assembled and published the "Biography" of Pir-o-Murshid Inayat Khan (actually mostly auto-biography), and then began work on an integral, chronologically presented scholary edition comparing available manuscripts. During her lifetime four volumes in the series The Complete Works of Pir-o-Murshid Hazrat Inayat Khan appeared. After her passing in 1990, work on the series has continued, with a volume appearing in 1990 and another in 1996. A further volume is now ready (1924 I) and is expected to be available in 2004.
The following are the volumes which have been completed and are available
(For prices and shipping information please consult Omega Publications in New Lebanon, New York, USA: www.omegapub.com)
Complete Works of Pir-o-Murshid Hazrat Inayat Khan, original texts:
Lectures on Sufism: