Visions of Allah, Part One

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Visions of Allah, Part One

 

VISIONS OF ALLAH, Part One

 

By James Bean

 

Copyright May, 1997, Maine Well-Being Press

 

The great Sufi mystic Rumi once said, " If you are seeking, seek us

with joy, for we live in the kingdom of joy. Do not give your heart

to anything else but to the love of those who are clear joy, do not

stray into the neighborhood of despair. For there are hopes: they are

real, they exist -- do not go in the direction of darkness -- I tell

you: SUNS EXIST!!! "

 

The mystical utterances of Rumi and other great Sufi Masters speak

directly to the heart. They encourage us to see the hidden Light, to

discover Divine Secrets, to perceive the Way that lovers can find

their Beloved. The Sufis, through their poems and ecstatic

revelations are attempting to share their Secrets with the world, or

at least with those discerning souls who find their words to be not

only nice poetry, but something much more -- soul-expressions coming

from lovers caught up in the divine bliss of a higher reality.

 

Every grain of sand in the desert is a mirror; amidst Your

infinite reflections, Your mad lovers are lost. " (Sant Darshan

Singh, " Love At Every Step " )

 

The poet-mystics speak of a spiritual reality that exists just beyond

the perception of the five senses. Though the physical body is a kind

of " veil " that eclipses the Light of the inner Sun from our vision,

nevertheless we can, even now during this life, have access to this

other existence. The Persian classic, " Divine Flashes, " by

Fakhruddin 'Iraqi says:

 

The lover seeks the Vision in order that he might pass away from

existence; he knocks on the Door of Nonexistence, for there he was

once at peace. There he was both seer and seen, both viewer and

viewed. Coming to be, he became the veil of his own sight and was

deprived of the Vision. His existence is merely a screen to hide

this sight.

 

In order for humans to " knock on the Door of Nonexistence " (regain

the spiritual Vision we once enjoyed as souls before time

began) 'Iraqi encourages us to understand ourselves in a new way and

begin to contemplate the Other World with another kind of sight, a

type of seeing that is unveiled when we temporarily abstain from the

five senses.

 

Know yourselves: a cloud drifting before your Sun.

Cut yourselves off from your senses and behold your Sun of

Intimacy.

 

Iraqi is describing here the process of meditation practiced in

numerous mystical traditions of the east and west. In order to obtain

the Vision, the seeker 1) closes their eyes and stops paying

attention to the outer world for awhile, and 2) discovers inner

spiritual seeing and hearing, the inner senses of the soul which are

able to contemplate heavenly realities.

 

If this screen -- which is you -- is struck from before your eyes,

the Beloved will find the Beloved, and you will be entirely

lost. Then you will hear with the Ear of your Heart. That Mystery,

so long concealed is at last opened, the darkness of your night at

last bathed in dawn! (Fakhruddin 'Iraqi, " Divine Flashes, " Paulist

Press, a volume in the " Classics of Western Spirituality Series " )

 

Rumi put it this way, " Listen, open a window to God and begin to

delight yourself by gazing upon Him through the opening. The business

of love is to make the window of the heart, for the breast is

illumined by the beauty of the Beloved. Gaze incessantly on the face

of your Beloved! Listen, this is in your power my friend! "

 

Within our grasp is the ability to regain the Vision of our soul and

the Communion with our Beloved Allah; both reside together in the

mystical garden, the paradise of the spiritual world. Though the

material sphere acts as a dense layer of overcast skies obscuring our

vision of what lies beyond, Masters have revealed the Secrets of

obtaining paradise to anyone who yearns to discover them saying to

their students very much like Rumi did, " This is in your power my

friend! "

 

Love is the name for a continuous restlessness of the heart, this

endless yearning is the symbol of my life. O Irresistible One, may

my heart be the abode of your love; let me become a moth to the

candle of your beauty. " (Sant Darshan Singh, " Love At Every Step " )

 

Visions of Allah, Part One