Githekas for Mureeds
Series I
by
Murshid Samuel L. Lewis
(Sufi Ahmed Murad Chisti)
Table of Contents
Series I
Number 1. On the Worship of Kali
Number 3. On the Use of Condemnation
Number 4. On Spiritual Experiences
Number 5. Intoxication and Sobriety
Number 9. The Shadow of the Sudra
Given by Samuel L. Lewis (Khalif) at Kaaba Allah, June 15, 1930.
Toward the One, the Perfection of Love, Harmony, and Beauty,
the Only Being, United with All the Illuminated Souls
Who Form the Embodiment of the Master, the Spirit of Guidance.
Githeka Series I: Number 1
The worship of Kali has been looked upon as degrading and yet it may be asked whether there may be some form of spirituality hidden behind this worship. If one were given a picture of Kali upon which to concentrate, no doubt the true answer would come, just as it came to Sri Ramakrishna. This may not always be necessary or desirable unless one has a great feeling of horror or a great feeling of devotion toward this Goddess.
Kaaba Allah is no doubt very beautiful but if one walks around with bent head, one would see the ants and bugs crawling along the ground, and find many weeds and a very steep hill to climb. This person would not notice the sun and could not perceive the beautiful trees and flowers, and might be totally unaware of the marvelous scenery in the surrounding country.
In the same way one may study Kali. Beauty is veiled and Beauty is revealing. God comes in the form of Beauty, but the Beauty is veiled, even as the Buddhist say, Nirvana is hidden in Samsara. Yet in a certain sense it is true that Kali and the World Mother are the same and that Kali is our own Mother Nature—the apparent horrid Goddess with bleeding knife and the sublime Mother are the same! It means that only through test and trial and sorrow can we realize the highest Beauty.
This is seen in nature in the struggle for existence and self-preservation. It is through the extinction of base forms that the higher forms have evolved, and it is by purifying the dross within ourselves that the gold is discovered. So the bloody knife of Kali is the same as the spear of Apollo, the sword of Siegfried and the club of Hercules. It is the Divine Will manifesting in the lower creation.
Jesus Christ has said that we must be purified by fire and by the Holy Spirit. That Holy Spirit is the same as Kali, Who is the all-pervading breath. It is pain and not pleasure which may lead to the freedom of the soul. So the more one studies, the more one will come to realize that whatever her outer appearance, Kali is not the ugly, but the painful, and it is through the experience of pain one finally arrives at peace. In this way, through contemplation of their Goddess, many Hindus, many Bhaktis, have partaken of Bliss.
Toward the One, the Perfection of Love, Harmony, and Beauty,
the Only Being, United with All the Illuminated Souls
Who Form the Embodiment of the Master, the Spirit of Guidance.
GithekaSeries I: Number 2
“In peace thou shalt bring war and in war thou shalt attain peace.” Sometimes in peace one brings war, and this is like a physician who injects a serum or medicine into a patient, or may give some food like goat’s milk; then the good and bad germs, so to speak, fight within the body, or there is some chemical action which results in a fever or inflammation, but after that the person becomes better. This is war, but the object is peace.
You are all physicians who may be sent to purify the world and because of the evil in the world, even war may be necessary at times. Sufism is not passivism and He Only Is at Peace Who Is Constantly at War With Evil. Just as one individual has this struggle within himself, to overcome the self and achieve righteousness, so has collective humanity this same struggle.
Those on the path of God are the healers of the world, and those who desire to become healers and serve God will learn to control the vibrations and elements. When this is accomplished, it is most important to be ever responsive to Diving Command, to bring war when war is necessary and to affect a peace when there is the need, even as the prophets of old. So the warriors for the Cause of God are the Peace-Makers of the world. Thus it has been said of Jesus Christ: “The Son of God goes forth to war,” and at the same time he is called “Prince of Peace,” and both these terms may be applied to him and both may be correct.
Then there are those who come to bring peace in the midst of war. A parent may have two sons who always quarrel and no amount of kindness or reasoning will stop them; they want to fight. So the parent will not forbid those sons from fighting, but sometime will butt their heads together and both will suffer. After a time they will learn that it is to the advantage of neither to battle one with the other.
Who are those boys and who is the parent? We see this today in a certain sense with the Arabs and Hebrews of Palestine who are both the children of Abraham in the worldly sense, and the children of God in the spiritual sense. It may be necessary that both be chastised, yet through this chastening they may become reconciled, which is most important. Or perhaps the Sufis or others may be called upon to intercede and harmonize them as the Sufis have in Iraq, even in this time.
But whatever method brings results, if it be the will of God that determines it, that is the right method. So in the end peace will come. If it is for the Cause of God, even in war you may bring peace and even in peace you may bring war. Amen.
Toward the One, the Perfection of Love, Harmony, and Beauty,
the Only Being, United with All the Illuminated Souls
Who Form the Embodiment of the Master, the Spirit of Guidance.
GithekaSeries I: Number 3
It cannot strictly be said that one is never to judge or condemn. What is most necessary is to observe the will of God to do it. Your brother or sister on the path to God you may not judge, but you may be required to judge the world. Not that the world is full of wickedness, but that the world is full of disease. So it is as a physician especially you may be called upon to diagnose the troubles of the world, and yet this may be called judging.
If you say, such a one is good or great, you do no good. Only God is good, only God is great. It is not wrong to admire persons, scientists, artists, or leaders in government, business and industry for it is only through admiration you can assimilate unto yourself whatever virtues they possess. But the spiritual person does not stop there; he admires their qualities and looks to Allah Who is the Source of those qualities. As soon as you make somebody your ideal you place a veil between yourself and Allah, unless that ideal be regarded as a stepping-stone toward Allah.
There is a stage in spiritual development called fana-fi-Sheikh during which period one has a spiritual teacher for a human ideal. This culminates in what is called tasawwuri Murshid, wherein one is attuned to the mental, moral and spiritual qualities of a Murshid, a perfected soul. So if you specially admire anybody in the world cultivate discrimination; it may be as wrong to admire wrongly as to judge falsely.
How can this be? Because in condemning you see the faults and attribute the faults to man, which is so but in admiring you may attribute the virtues to man which in reality belong to God. The truth is that man is the author of evil whereas God is the Author of Goodness, so one may not be so far from the truth in judgment than in senseless praise. This does not mean not to admire all that is fine in the world, but both to admire and to praise God.
Some say: “I see God behind this one and that one;” what is the proof that they see God? Until one has seen God in reality, one can not so speak in authority. For them it may be God and for such it may not be wrong, but after entering upon the path to God, “thou shalt not take the name of the Lord Thy God in vain.”
There is a Spiritual Hierarchy of Holy Ones. When one has united with that Hierarchy he understands the condition of the world. As you advance on the Path, greater spiritual responsibility is placed in your hands. You may be charged with the well-being of a district. If there is some evil there and you say: “I must not judge, I must not criticize,” then if a plague or evil comes you cannot escape responsibility.
Nevertheless God called Lot from Sodom when it was condemned, so the true servant will not suffer in calamity, if he has faithfully obeyed the dictates of the Lord. Sometimes by warning one may avert evil, just as Jonah did in the case of Nineveh, although he did not wish to act. Then the people repented and returned to God; if he had not warned they would not have repented. This was more important than anything else—that they turn to Allah. Spiritual inaction would have brought destruction while action in the name of God, even with force and the use of condemnation, brought salvation.
Spiritual persons do protect the territory around them. Sometimes this is from overcoming the evil in themselves, but sometimes also by fighting the evil in the world about. The Message is for the whole of humanity and as Jesus Christ has said: “I send ye forth as sheep in the midst of wolves; be ye therefore wise as serpents and harmless as doves.”
Toward the One, the Perfection of Love, Harmony, and Beauty,
the Only Being, United with All the Illuminated Souls
Who Form the Embodiment of the Master, the Spirit of Guidance.
Githeka Series I: Number 4
The first lesson about spiritual experience is that all come by Grace of Allah. Of course there is a great difference between a dream caused by some form of excitement or indulgence and a spiritual dream, the former being on a much lower plane than the other. There are many kinds of dreams which may be interpreted variously.
In any form of vision the mureed should notice what part he plays, whether witness or actor, or whether he may not be both, and any other conditions. As actor he may become identified with the experience and sometimes one may by this means distinguish between the dream which is a reflection of the past and one which is a premonition of the future. The Sufi is careful never to lose himself in the experience but to regard each event as a possible sign from God. Any mureed may be chosen of God at any time.
Now as to witnessing something which at the same time is your experience. Very often one is made to take the place of someone else; sometimes this may be to take the place of a person who would not be recognized, sometimes to veil something or it may be for oneself. Yet while one goes through a condition the state does not belong to one, you are not completely identified with it for you seem to be seeing yourself.
There is often a danger in calling the one you see in a vision yourself. It is like the actor who wishes to remain the character he has been portraying in a play, after he has left the stage. In the play he has been carrying an umbrella in a storm; he does not go to his dressing room, but goes about in life carrying that umbrella to protect himself from storms that do not exist, so sunlight will not reach him. So one must be careful in the interpretation of dreams and visions.
Sometimes one sees oneself when it is meant to be oneself, and yet one may not be entirely identified with the similitude. In that case it is possible that a mureed may not attribute the condition to oneself and therefore it is always wise to consult a spiritual teacher, and in some cases keep a diary of dreams and experiences.
There are also occasions when the vision is clear and one may see a symbol or have some greater experience. Each condition has its purpose, and in each the Light of God has taken form and one is blessed, whether the vision comes with horror or in beauty. For all mystical states (Ahmal), depend upon just two things: the Grace of Allah (to whom be all praise) and one’s own capacity for receptivity.
Toward the One, the Perfection of Love, Harmony, and Beauty,
the Only Being, United with All the Illuminated Souls
Who Form the Embodiment of the Master, the Spirit of Guidance.
Githeka Series I: Number 5
This spiritual lesson is on the subject of Intoxication and Sobriety. Intoxication is that state wherein the talib is so rapt in his mystical condition that it becomes more important than the rest of life, and Sobriety is that mystical condition wherein one is not rapt, one is not in a state of rapture, no matter how often one in blessed by Allah. This does not mean that the experience of the intoxicated and the sober is different; it is the effect which is different. Intoxication and Sobriety are determined by their effects.
Sobriety is generally considered as superior to Intoxication by most, but not all Sufis. Among the Naqshibandis who specialize in Symbolism, the path of Sobriety is maintained, and among the Maulavis and others, ecstasy is encouraged; among the Chistis both forms of training are used, although Sobriety is held the better.
All paths that lead to God are good. If one enters ecstasy and finds God, that is good; if one stays sober-minded throughout life and does not find God, he may not be far advanced in his evolution. The more one becomes interested in music, poetry and Zikr, the greater the probability for experiencing the condition of Intoxication (waid).
Our blessed Pir-o-Murshid was trained in all the schools of the Eastern Sufis. He learned all methods and discovered that sometimes some are better and at other times others are preferable. By whatever path you come to Allah, that is the best for you. If you feel closer to God by drinking the Divine Wine of ecstasy Intoxication is best, and if you feel closer to God in a condition of equanimity and repose, sobriety is best. It is not the road which counts, but the Goal.
It is well for each mureed to understand this and not to consider either the practices or class work of another. Some may be far ahead in esoteric studies and have few experiences; others may come close to God even before taking Bayat. The Gita encourages all roads and says: “To him ever attached to Me, worshipping Me in Love, I give that Union with Knowledge by which he comes to Me.” This is the best path, which ends in love for, and self-surrender to the Only Being.
Toward the One, the Perfection of Love, Harmony, and Beauty,
the Only Being, United with All the Illuminated Souls
Who Form the Embodiment of the Master, the Spirit of Guidance.
Githeka Series I: Number 6
The subject of Harmony is most important. Suppose there was no leader to the orchestra and all tuned to the bass drum which has no pitch and every instrument would be in harmony with that bass drum, but when two instruments played together, there would be discord.
That bass-drum is the negative person who gets along with everybody, gives in to everybody, serves everybody, and thinks he is doing good. He avoids controversy and when it arises does not know how to act. He has told the violin player he is right and the horn player he is right, but does not know how to harmonize them, he cannot supply the note or notes to produce a consonant chord, no he is quite useless. Instead of bringing peace, he brings war. He interprets “resist not evil” to mean that every act must be allowed to pass and that to judge it as evil is itself wicked. By his attitude he does nothing but cause more disharmony than any other person.
Then there is the person who is like the kettledrum which is tuned—let us say—in F. It is tuned in some one note. To get into harmony with it, all other instruments would have to tune to F and this would give a monotonous result. Even though such a note might harmonize with C and A, it would not leave much scope for melody and brightness. Such a life would be a gloomy life. This is reflected in the Gregorian music: the life in the era when that music predominated was dull, the scale was not complete, and this was reflected in all aspects of life. There was a rude form of harmony, but lack of freedom in melody.
Then there are transposing instruments like the clarinet, which may be tuned in different manners. It is like a loquacious person who goes on talking regardless of the wishes of others. If it is just a little out of tune, it is all out of tune and nothing but discord arises. A person of this kind thinks he is supplying melody, but there is no rhythm and no continuity, no beats and no rests.
So to tune living instruments there must be a leader and it is the Ideal which leads, the leading I, which becomes the I-deal. In each activity there may be something around which to tune. For that reason all become attuned to a spiritual leader in the inner life. Each is like a violin or some stringed instrument; all are tuned to A, so to speak—the note of the Murshid—so all have this note correct and then the other stringed are correctly tuned.
Then the violin which has tuned its E, A, D and G, meets the horn in F. The spiritual person makes every endeavor to produce harmony, but what is most necessary is to have harmony, attunement with God. Therefore instead of changing one of his strings to F, which would put his instrument out of tune, he endeavors to show the horn player how to transpose his music, to alter his life. Then not only will the strings remain in the right key, but that horn player could enter the orchestra and add to the tone colors.
Such a horn player is like the psychic. If you are negative to the psychic, you may be led far astray, even further astray than the psychic. But if you control the situation and are firmer then the psychic you will not only escape any harm, you may be able to help that person very much.
By being firm and even harsh with the psychic you change his pitch. The psychic, by becoming attuned, does not lose any psychic faculties or capacities. Rather are they greatly increased. The Holy ones are not especially opposed to psychism—they are especially opposed to disharmony and discord, and the self-willed psychic is perhaps the most discordant of persons. They often spread enmity and disorder without knowing it. They sometimes break up friendships by their very presence.
Therefore the mureed is instructed how to guard himself against the evils of psychics and psychism and the best way is to keep attuned to your Pir-o-Murshid(a) at all times.
Toward the One, the Perfection of Love, Harmony, and Beauty,
the Only Being, United with All the Illuminated Souls
Who Form the Embodiment of the Master, the Spirit of Guidance.
Githeka Series I: Number 7
The point of view of the Sufi differs from that of another, and it is often thought right to agree with another to bring Harmony. Agreement is right if it brings harmony, but a question may be asked: does harmony necessarily result from agreement with another?
The truth is that a Sufi’s point of view is not always a personal point of view. When a Sufi sees from two points of view, it may be that these are God’s point of view and man’s point of view. Now God’s point of view is always the same, and yet unlimited and all-inclusive, while man’s point of view is limited and subject to change. So when the Sufi agrees fully with another, if he does not keep this in mind, he might end with no point of view. Therefore merely to abandon one’s own point of view is to become a zero, a cipher, and then one would be, perhaps, in a worse condition than the average man.
The Sufi method is to agree so far as possible without confirming another in his error. When you agree with another in whole or in part, he becomes more pliant to your ideas. If you agree entirely with him, he may say: “So-and-so who is a very spiritual person agrees with me, so I must be right.” In this case that person may become further convinced in his error and others may say: “Those Sufis claim to be wise and yet they uphold erroneous and dangerous beliefs.” So as you advance more care is needed to guard your speech as it is easier to make enemies by wrong speech than by wrong act or through mental uncertainty.
For instance, in a discussion on Reincarnation, it is easy to agree and then you may ask a question. You may ask the other person what is meant by soul, spirit, body, death, Karma and other terms and you may gradually bring him towards the light.
There are two purposes in agreement, two kinds of agreement—one is when the other person is right or you feel he is right; the other when you have a purpose and you see the means of changing an erroneous opinion into a correct one by first agreeing with it, or else you find it is useless to disagree. Of course there are some people who are stubborn as rocks; with them you can do nothing.
Someone may say: “I find joy in drinking whiskey, I want to drink whiskey, I would like every one to drink whiskey.” You do not believe in the whiskey, so what do you say? You do not believe in the whiskey but you agree in wishing him joy and join him in wishing everybody happiness; so long as you agree in the joy you have a basis for discussion. Then you may convince him sometimes that there are better means than whiskey in producing joy.
By being discriminate as to agreement or disagreement one will find the wisest course in each act in life.
Toward the One, the Perfection of Love, Harmony, and Beauty,
the Only Being, United with All the Illuminated Souls
Who Form the Embodiment of the Master, the Spirit of Guidance.
Githeka Series I: Number 8
Light and Heat are two aspects of the same energy and these are represented in the Arabic words Nur and Naar. Light may be called the Urouj or upward aspect and Heat the Nasoul or downward aspect of Fire; Fire itself is the Jelal aspect of Universal Energy.
Vibrations from the higher to the lower planes take the form of Light. When they strike a field of denser vibrations, when they reach a grosser plane, heat is formed. Universal Energy, considered as the fire of Love, is always warm, but it is the change of rate of vibration which produces heat. This is a universal law, true on all planes.
When man lights a fire, it is the opposite aspect to the Creation by God. Man’s fire changes gross vibrations into fine ones and moves upward; God’s fire creates gross vibrations from fine ones. On the earth plane this process is called contraction, which comes with coldness, but even in freezing heat is involved, the heat being transformed into some other energy.
When the soul enters the body, light is also changed to heart which circulates the blood and circulates with the blood to all parts of the body. As one grows older, some heat escapes from the body and coldness comes with age unless one is able through the breath to maintain an equilibrium. Through rhythm of the breath both heat and magnetism are maintained within the body. This produces real health for it conserves spiritual power within the body. It is through this preservation, with purification, that the body becomes the temple of God.
Fire has always played an important part in religion, especially in the ancient Vedic religion. Because it changes vibrations to a finer state, it is employed by the Yogis for this purpose. The fire of Hell or Naar is nothing but the alchemical process by which the gross vibrations which have been accumulated through selfishness are removed from the finer bodies. As the mind plays an important part in accumulating these accretions, it is necessary to purify it with fire and this fire is called Naar.
But when purification has been accomplished, that same energy manifests as Light, and when Light or Nur appears, we find heaven. Therefore Heaven and Hell have the some relationship to mental energy as Fire and Light to Universal Energy, whether considered from the physical or spiritual point view.
Toward the One, the Perfection of Love, Harmony, and Beauty,
the Only Being, United with All the Illuminated Souls
Who Form the Embodiment of the Master, the Spirit of Guidance.
Githeka Series I: Number 9
As a sermon the full title of this address would be “Let not the Shadow of the Sudra fall upon the Brahman,” and the discussion entails a consideration of what is meant by Sudra and what is meant by Brahman.
When it is said that India is a land of contrasts, it may be said with equal truth that the land of the commentator is also a land of contrast, a contrast to the conditions in India, for no one country has preserved an absolute form by which the superstitions, customs and beliefs of another peoples can be measured and found wanting or not wanting. India, it is true is “backward” in many directions, and at the same time the Indian peoples have preserved so much mysticism.
It is not caste that is wrong, but its abuse. And what does varna or caste mean? It means color, and not so much color of race, but color of psychological temperament. An angry person presents a fiery temperament and the color of red; a phlegmatic person presents another condition and another color. In common parlance we associate words with moods and think nothing more of it, and in this we are decidedly inferior to the Aryans of India who have not only associated words with moods, but thought a good deal about it.
Besides color, personal atmosphere is the other consideration in caste. Suppose a child was born to a man who was a government official—a lawyer or a tax collector—who has married the daughter of another government official. He would be raised in a certain atmosphere; he would breathe in that atmosphere from his birth and his whole life and character would be affected by it. It might not be entirely moulded by it, but it would be affected by it. If in later years he decided to obtain a social service position, as in China or the western countries, or to become an official, as in other countries, his whole life has prepared him for it. But should he decide to become a doctor or a merchant, he would have to escape from his environment.
As life is very difficult to begin with, one of the ideas behind caste is not to increase that difficulty. Just as there are dominant and recessive qualities in plants and animals and man from the physical aspect, so there are those from the psychological aspect. If we wished to produce red flowers, and if we wished a tall race, we should be very careful to keep the blood pure. Many people, who express the greatest objection to caste and favor intermingling, are unaware that there are many, many races, which by various means have controlled the condition of the offspring to a degree which is not realized by a surface examination (e.g. exogamy).
Now while caste was determined in part by race, and more by occupation, it was chiefly because of the psychological element that it was seen to be advantageous to fix it to a certain degree. Thus people of a fiery disposition make good soldiers, excellent policemen and tax collectors, and the best rulers and lawyers; so it was the people of this type who constituted the Kshetrya caste. People who were of the type we call today introverts or idealists or dreamers or devotees, whose minds soared, make the best teachers and moral leaders and artists and from these the Brahman caste was formed, who served as the links between Heaven and earth.
There were other people whose conditions were subject to rise and fall, who entered trade, who moved from place to place, who were best fitted for business men, for artisans and merchants and skilled labor, where individuality was important and these formed the Vaisya caste, and finally there were those who lived close to earth and served others and these were the Sudras.
Now it was not the Sudras that were the lowest, but the offspring of mixed castes and to understand this we must first examine the elements themselves. Pure earth is clean, pure water is clean, pure fire is clean, pure air is clean. When we mix water with earth we have mud, which is unclean, but pure earth is clean and sand is used by many peoples for lavation. Pure water is clean, but ice absorbs gases and when we drink ice water we have the gases in it and it is not so healthy, and when the earth element is in the water, we have the “hard water” which is not good either.
While pure air is clean, when we mix the earth element with it we have dust and when we mix the water element with it we have fog and in Pittsburgh and London we have both the earth and water elements mixed in the air with the heavy fogs. When we mix earth with the fire element we have smoke and when we mix water with the fire element we have steam. All this shows that the mixture of elements is impure and prevents us from living a normal life.
Now the theory of caste consists of nothing else but to apply the same principles which we find true in physics to psychology. So when the Hindus say the Chandala, who is the offspring of the Brahman (air) mother with the Sudra (earth) father, I should say he was like lava which is useless. Lava is the most amorphous form of the earth element. In the same way the offspring of a Kshetrya mother (fire) with a Sudra (earth) father would give us the hot, dry soil of the desert which is useless, but has one advantage over the lava, in that it is flat and one can travel over it if needs be.
When this is studied carefully it can be seen that it is just as bad for the Sudra class as for the Brahman or Kshetrya class to be contaminated by admixtures, and when this is fully understood we shall find the same principles hold not only physically and psychologically but on all planes.
For instance, while a person is born of a certain temperament, there are rhythms of the year which bring the changes of the season, and there are changes in the hours of the day and in the breath, so that at one time or another each element predominates and a moody or sensitive person may react very quickly to these conditions. After a rain when the air is clear, it is a fine time for thinking and when we think, we belong to the Brahman caste at that instant. In the same way when we do business, at that instant we are Vaisyas and when we do menial labor, as with the broom, we are Sudras.
Whatever we do we should concentrate. If one is sent to the store and the mind wanders and one forgets, the Vaisya has been mixed with the Brahman element. The best salesman who concentrates is the pure Vaisya; he sticks to his element. He is often tolerant on other matters, but he concentrates on his business and it is a success. In the same way the artist must look closely at his model, the doctor must carefully watch everything during an operation, and the farmer plowing makes his paths straight and does not then think of other things.
In the same way the spiritual person endeavors to control his mind and his faculties during concentration and meditation. If you are given a theme or object upon which to concentrate, and your mind wanders to something else—at that moment you lose caste. If you are concentrating and you meditate instead, you have introduced the Brahman into the household of the Kshetrya, and if you concentrate when you should be meditating you have introduced the Kshetrya into the peaceful abode of the Brahman. When your thoughts wander to earthly things in meditation, then it is the shadow of the Sudra which has fallen upon the Brahman, and when your thoughts wander from one thing to another, the Vaisya has entered, but it is the Sudra which is most dangerous.
The purpose of these spiritual practices is to make us Brahmans in the true and highest sense of the term, those who bring Heaven to earth and first this must be done with ourselves. When we enter Purdah we are Brahmans, and at that time we know that not even the shadow of another person must fall upon us; it disturbs us and destroys the magnetism.
The truth is that everyone carries a personal magnetism, and this is often grossly affected by the presence of undesirable or inharmonious people. Sometimes ones has a great inspiration and some one enters the room or hall, and the inspiration is lost, or when doing spiritual exercises, there is an interruption. All this is the shadow of the Sudra falling upon the Brahman.
Therefore purification has been taught in all religions and all mysteries, to keep each element in its proper condition. That is all purification consists of. Whatever one does, one does wholly and fully, and it is better to have a low ideal and live it fully than to have a high ideal and miss it just a little. It is we that make our own ideals, not God Who impresses them upon us. What is necessary is perfection, perfection in the smallest, not necessarily attainment of something high.
The Sufi does not teach many morals, but obedience to the teacher for all and one moral to each, the best for his needs. Until he attains that one simple moral, it is not well for him to try and be everything. When this is understood, each will try to perfect himself alone and not compare himself with anybody else. We are all notes in a Universal Harmony and that harmony is completed when each note is properly attuned.
Verily the whole of life is music, and there is neither low nor high in the sight of God, but the completion of duty (Dharma) is the chief requisite of all.
Toward the One, the Perfection of Love, Harmony, and Beauty,
the Only Being, United with All the Illuminated Souls
Who Form the Embodiment of the Master, the Spirit of Guidance.
Githeka Series I: Number 10
If God is the only Being, is there really an author, an inventor, a creator, a healer? God is in Truth All in all things, but in a certain activity there is Memory absent, and when this memory is absent there no realization, and the thing made regards itself as self-existent.
If there were self-existence there would be no form of death, but unchangeability in all forms, which would produce a monotony and not a harmony in the Universe. God wished to realize Himself in all aspects and this was the cause of Creation but He found that when He projected Himself in certain forms, as creator He could realize the creature, but the creature could not realize the Creator. So he continued His work, which is called Evolution, until He made man, and as man, although creature, can realize the Creator, while still in earthly garb, there was no need for the appearance of higher forms, for as soon as God made a form into which He could enter and at the same time realize Himself, at that instant He had completed the purpose of His creating the Universe. Therefore, man is the purpose of the Universe and God is the purpose of man.
It is said that God made man in His own image, but everything is actually made in some aspect of God’s image. The scientist, the chemist, mixes his materials in various ways to obtain certain products, but all the materials are the materials of the earth-plane. The Science of God may be called Metachemistry or perhaps Alchemy and it has the same relationship to metaphysics as man’s science of Chemistry has to his science of Physics.
In Chemistry the elements are Hydrogen, Oxygen, Nitrogen, the many metals, the whole 92 kinds of atoms which unite in many ways. In Metachemistry the elements are the Sifat of God—His Kindness, Love, Tolerance, Justice, Mercy and all the attributes. If it is asked what relationship have these to Earth, Air, Fire, Water and Ether, the answer is that on the earth-plane, on the material plane, the 92 chemical elements have a certain relationship to the 5, and on the mental plane there are other elements and on the plane of Wahdaniat the Sifat exist as unprojected.
In Creation God compounded these Sifat in various ways, but as they were projected from the Source, the condition darkness appeared, and that is why we find certain animals, such as the lion, in which the Sifat of God, as Courage, may be even greater than in man, but there is the Nufs, which is strong, because as the Activity went far from its Source it forgot; therefore, the lion is less evolved than the man.
In His activity, God discovered that Harmony and Proportion were most valuable and when, after creating many beings in whom the Sifat were not balanced, He created man who contains all the Sifat, as the earth contains all the elements of chemistry, and thus in man is the potentiality of perfection.
Man, having all these elements, is capable of being a god, and has been called a god (as by Jesus Christ) but he neither knows this, nor does he know that he is not apart from the Divine Only Being.
Therefore, he has not only created Nouns and Names, which God granted him the power for, but sometimes he has created pronouns also, which are born from the Nufs, which suppose that things are separate. But as no chem1ical element is apart from the planet with which it is associated, so man is not apart from the Sifat of God, and as the Sifat of God have no existence but are due to the radiation of Zat, as colors are due to the radiation of white light, so man, in truth, has no existence apart from the Zat of God.
Man in his aspect of author or creator forgets this, and claims credit for what is not rightly his. Gold has many uses, but gold is derived from the earth and the earth is given credit for it. After the gold is mined, it may forget its source and appear as money or jewelry and apparently have possession of the mineral world, but no longer retains any idea about it. In the same way, man is mined from God and also has possession of the earth.
But although man forgets God, God Who is Mercy and Kindness does not deprive man of His qualities, the Sifat, for man is these qualities. Therefore, man continues to do, oblivious that it is God that is doing, and it may be said that it is God Who is working in the shadow and God Who is working in the Light.
The Qur’an is not the Word of God, but God-words, the actual author being God. Man, being the Sifat of God, when God projects Himself onto the earth plane, it is in human form, and so man has the highest privilege of this self-realization in an earthly body, which no other creature, either of earth or Heaven has.
The difference between God-words and the Word of God can be explained in noticing that there are three types of authorship. In the first type man is in the shadow, and his will is turned from God; he uses pronouns, and is the slave of the nufs, even though he may be endowed with a fine character and have high ideals. He lacks realization and he writes and signs his name to it. So most of the writing in the world is done in this way and it is false poetry and false prose.
But when man’s intuition is opened, his will is attuned to God, and he is in the stage of the crescent moon. In this stage his will has awakened, but he still uses his own mind, and when he writes, God inspires him and all that he writes is called Inspiration. (This in explained by Fabre d’Olivet in his Pythagoras). This is the type of writing of all the mystics and sages ordinarily; they are inspired. Their will is surrendered to God, but He has permitted them to use their own words and own thoughts, only He determines the road. It is like saying, “You must go north.” So the mystic, whose will has been surrendered, goes north, but he may crawl, walk, run, ride in a vehicle or fly—the method is still in his hands.
When a Messenger of God comes to earth there is another condition. The Messenger has not only surrendered his will, but his mind also, and when he writes, it is veritably God Who is writing, and the Messenger speaks “the words that are put into his mouth,” thinks the thoughts that are put into his mind. If he has any difference from God, it is not in will and not in thought; there may still be a difference in feeling, and this is necessary, otherwise the Messenger would be entirely God and not man at all. If there were not the difference of feeling, the Messenger could not feel with the people where he was born and to whom he had to appear.
This accounts for the difference in the Messages; in the forms in which they have been given. All Messengers have the same will, the same thoughts, the same soul, but in the activity in the heart there is a tuning (on the angelic plane) for a specific purpose, to meet the need of a time.
All the words of these Messengers in this form are not the Word of God, which belongs to Inspiration, but God-words, and while excepting the Qur’an, there is little which can be strictly called God-words, it is not necessary to dispute about it. Man was not ready for God-words until the time of Mohammed. When Christ came man did not even accept man’s words; then later he called Christ God, and this made it possible for him to accept God-words, which came in the Qur’an.
This is a matter for great meditation, and there may be questions but no discussion. As each advances spiritually he will understand its significance in his own heart. Let us give our thanks to God, Who is Mercy and Kindness and withholds no secrets from his children.