Comments on Technology of the Heart: The Gaze of Love is Something Else

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2011-09-30T21:13:42.305+06:00

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2011-09-29T03:27:45.696+06:00

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2011-09-22T21:52:05.773+06:00

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James, How to read the Quran? Read the Quran, don...

2010-03-07T04:06:09.216+06:00

James,

How to read the Quran?
Read the Quran, don’t just quote it.

In January 2010, you stated in your comments about the Quran,
“Yet, for me, that was the point at which the piece 'lost it'”.

Whether you quote the Quran or you don’t, I don’t care. However, I do emphasis commitment. To find “delight and sweetness” in the Quran, we
need to make commitment to it because mere quotes from the Quran do not mean commitment or convictions. You “lost it” because you merely quote the Quran. I found “delight and sweetness” in the Quran because I am a Committer and a Submitter. Make commitment. Dig deep.

You need to ponder this: “Some people asked a Sufi, “What is the strangest thing you have encountered in your travels?” He told them, “Khidr came to meet me and sought my company, but I was afraid that it would spoil my trust in God alone.” Another Sufi was asked, “Is there anyone here with whom you would be close?” “Yes,” he said. He stretched out his hand to his copy of the Koran and placed it against his heart. “This.” With this meaning they recited,
Your book is my strength; it does not leave my couch, And in it is healing for that which I conceal”. (2)

You need to read The Quran like this:

“Al-Ghazali, in his Ihay, tells about a person who said: I read the Quran but did not find sweetness in it. Then I read it as if I was hearing it from the Prophet, blessings and peace be on him, while he was reciting it to his Companions. Then, I moved to a stage further and read the Quran as if I was hearing it from Jibrail while he delivered it to the Prophet, blessings and peace be on him. Then God brought me to a further stage---I began to read it as if I was hearing from the Speaker”. (1, p. 43).

“Such feeling will imbue you with a delight and sweetness that will make your inner self fully enveloped by the Quran”. (1, 43).

It is time you take Sufism that is alive which is based on Allah, Quran, and Muhammad.

Sufism without Allah, Quran, and Muhammad is dead. That is the reason you have “lost it”.

Ya Haqq! Ya Adl! Ya Salam!

Ya Alam al Huda! Ya Sayfullah! Ya Misbah!
Ya Ta Ha!

AV

AV is hanging on Quran 18:65
AV for AQM-Sufism/Against Sufism w/o AQM
Sufism w/o AQM = Suffocationism (Death/
Spiritual Death

1. Way to the Quran by Khurram Murad, Copyright 1990.
2. Sufi Book of Spiritual Ascent, Translated by Rabia Harris and Edited by Laleh Bakhtiar. (www.jerrahi.org).

Yes, "life is telling us" each and every...

2010-03-06T01:43:34.316+06:00

Yes, "life is telling us" each and every moment, right now and right here. And to remain now and here, you need to remain utterly centered within you, James, utterly and "personally" centered in your individuality, your inner being. To remain a crystallized and centered individuality you can only if you do not project yourself on me (in this particular case) by trying to prove me wrong at any price. I am preaching no special teaching or promoting private agenda, I am claiming neither right nor wrong, I am simply non - dual, though utterly myself, but your ego is bothered. It is bound to be so. When you have not yet discovered your own inner center, when you have not yet completed your being, you feel annoyed by people who know themselves.

Your discussion has nothing to do with the origina...

2010-03-06T00:29:34.268+06:00

Your discussion has nothing to do with the original post. Both of you are promoting your agendas. One is obsessed with Shah and the other with Rajneesh. It would be better if you would broaden your sources.

AV says, “Authentic Sufism is based on Allah, Quran, and Muhammad”. Anything other than that
is not Sufism.

Ya Haqq! Ya Adl! Ya Salam!

Ya Alam al Huda! Ya Sayfullah! Ya Misbah!
Ya Ta Ha!

AV

AV is hanging on Quran 18:65
AV for AQM-Sufism/Against Sufism w/o AQM
Sufism w/o AQM = Suffocationism (Death/
Spiritual Death

No, James, I have never claimed Myself capable of...

2010-03-05T23:53:19.504+06:00

No, James,

I have never claimed Myself capable of awakening You. Awakening is your own authentic responsibility towards yourself.
The same way my enlightenment is my own responsibility and you should not worry about me being enlightened.
As far as my comments in here, they are my own experiencing and sharing of my being with you. When one shares one's conscious being like me, one is not creating any karma for oneself, but acting as a pure mirror of what is in front. You cannot blame me, the mirror, for mirroring what is in front, in your case,it is not even you, but the veil of your mind projections, which my conscious being mirrors. Truth can never be called malice.
But your waitress story can, because you meant it to harm me.
You are not yet aware of a simple law of existence - when you intend to harm, you only harm yourself.

Dear James, I am what ever God wants me to be. B...

2010-03-05T22:38:17.635+06:00

Dear James,

I am what ever God wants me to be.
But one thing I keep wondering: Why do you think you are a Sufi?:)
A real Sufi is never full of malice.

Dear James, If you happened to be the face of God...

2010-03-05T21:06:58.596+06:00

Dear James,

If you happened to be the face of God, you wouldn't have confronted me.
The problem with you, James, is that you have identified yourself with your prejudiced mind full of ideals and beliefs, all mind projections. The real face of God in you is your innermost core being, which I can clearly see, but you, yourself, have neglected. That is what I mean by seeing the real face of God by the inner eyes. When you identify yourself with the instrument God has given you to serve you, your mind, you belittle yourself, you make yourself from infinite and eternal into limited and temporary.
And mind feels always threatened when somebody like me talks to your inner being and tries to awaken you. For mind it means end of his domination. That is why mind feels compelled to confront, to protect itself and its mind stuff.

Dear James, You say: "However the point that...

2010-03-05T20:35:30.159+06:00

Dear James,

You say: "However the point that I have been trying to make, Aliya - in these and previous comments - is that there is only ONE Reality. Inner and outer, 'subjective' and 'objective', it is all "He".

This One reality is called God, indeed, or Tao, or No-thingness or many other names. For me this reality is just "isness" or better say it"suchness". Things are the way they are and names are of no importance, because any name will fall short for the indefinable and unknowable. However, this one Ultimate reality, the only true really real Reality is SUBJECTIVITY only, it is the being, within and without. The objects, the objective world is what East has called "maya", illusory. The objective world appears to be, only, and it depends very much on the way you have chosen to perceive it or define it. Or as Hazrat Inayat Khan defines it: "The man filled with the knowledge of names and forms has no capacity for the knowledge of Truth."
You can really know names and forms, the objective world only if you have reached your inner center of being, where is the abode of Allah, the source of all existence, "the One God, the Eternal, the Only Being; None exists save He".(Hazrat Innayat Khan)
It is true that "Withersoever you turn, there is the Face of God" [2:115]. But can you really see this face, James, with your prejudiced mind full of borrowed knowledge? To see the real face of God in each and everything you need the inner eyes, pure and innocent. And you can look through those inner eyes of yours only if you have purified yourself in deep meditations and inner connectedness with your center of being, not before that. And for that you have to "Shatter your ideals on the rock of Truth.", as Hazrat Innayat Khan points it out. Especially when you have so falsified ideals about Sufis. Sufis know very well and have experienced the ultimate enlightenment, the union with the Beloved. That is why they "can be as aware of the Infinite presence of God in the midst of a business meeting as he or she can in a cave in the Himalayas." Referring to your misplaced remarks about you and You, you can know about it only when you have experienced the truth yourself and have become the truth yourself.

When the appearance of self is dispelled the Prese...

2010-03-05T18:52:45.135+06:00

When the appearance of self is dispelled
the Presence of Love is revealed.

or put another way ~

When the illusion of separateness is dispelled
the Light of Oneness is revealed.

~

Love
knows nothing of the lover and the beloved
I or you
the illusion of duality.

~

No inner
No outer
No other
No self

Hereness
Nowness
Oneness
Love

2010-03-05T16:46:20.225+06:00

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Dear James, Knowing internal reality, subjectivit...

2010-03-05T13:18:35.578+06:00

Dear James,

Knowing internal reality, subjectivity can in no way be compared to the knowledge of outer reality, of the objectivity of the materiality. To know of Earth is flat or spherical you can by having access to information stored by others.
To know about "It is that there is only One, Unique, Absolute, Infinite Existence" you can only by your own experiencing of the Truth. Truth is never second hand, never borrowed by others' quotations or writings about. You, yourself have to become the truth. Or as Bülent Rauf says it: "It must be more than an idea".
Even if somebody tells you the truth of the inner reality, it is his own truth, his own experience and for you it immediately becomes a lie. Because you have not lived this truth yourself, you have not experienced it yet. At the most you can imagine about it or you can philosophize about it. The true encountering of Allah is the most intimate and alive experiencing ever and it can only happen between you and You

The comments herein are utterly wondrous. "T...

2010-03-04T21:00:20.283+06:00

The comments herein are utterly wondrous.

"There is only One, Unique, Absolute, Infinite Existence apart from which there is not."

"He shows you He is yourself, then bit by bit He shows you how He is all that there is."

"He shows you He is you, then shows you (Himself) that all else is Him."

I am reminded of these two poems ~

A SUFI HYMN TO AWARENESS

Neither subject nor object, neither seer nor seen,
Awareness is a flame which glows into itself.

For those who have the eyes, for those who wish to see,
it opens its heart and shows into itself.

Neither here nor there, its home is nowhere.
Like a wind it blows and blows into itself.

Beginning with each drop of Creation,
it soon becomes a river that flows into itself.

From where does it come and to where does it go?
Like a breath it comes and goes into itself.

To nothing does it submit, 'cause nothing's other than it.
To itself it bows, as it bows to itself.

LOVE

They think love needs an object of love,
a man, a women or a thing.

In their love there are always two,
a lover and a beloved.

They do not know that love is present
only when there is no two.

And that is only possible
when there is no one.

When the lover has gone back
whence she came.

2010-03-04T16:40:40.608+06:00

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Dear Aliya, Totally agree with you that the phenom...

2010-03-04T10:21:37.721+06:00

Dear Aliya,
Totally agree with you that the phenomena that people often fail to look at and understand God from the Gaze of Love, from the Perspective of Love.

Dear James,
Thanks for your sharing. First of all, its not my inference, its Professor Chittick's presentation. But yes I do agree on the point, but in order to see its truth one has to, again, look from the vantage point of divine reality, from the top, not from the vantage point of veiled ordinary human perspective or from the bottom.

You asked, 'What kind of life can God grant except "His Life"?' He grants His Eternal Life, but do all human being experience that? We don't, because of our veiled perspective. He grants His Life, and exactly for this reason when described about Christ its said, "surely they killed him not, but it appeared to them like that." For this very reason those who truly walk in the path of God the Quran says, "dont call them dead, they are alive, but you understand not."

When its said, 'everything other than God' is correct for those who continue to see 'things other than God'. and i can assure you my friend, we unworthy ones mostly belong to that category and i won't recommend to be so dishonest to deny that reality, even when it exposes the bankrupcy of our spiritual station.

Dear Mo'in,
I liked the discourse very much as well. "The Gaze of Love" allows our heart to recognize and beauty in manifestation. Praises are to Him for that.

Dear Irshad,
Thank you so much for visiting and I am grateful for your inclusion. May Allah's blessings be with you.

It's great that you've taken the trouble t...

2010-03-04T06:00:51.459+06:00

It's great that you've taken the trouble to transcribe portions of Chittick's speech. I hope you don't mind I've updated my post with a link to your transcription. Many thanks.

- Irshaad

Yes, surely so, James. Our inner connection with G...

2010-03-04T00:13:56.744+06:00

Yes, surely so, James. Our inner connection with God is always within us. Even if we forget Allah, He never forgets us. All we have to do is to remember Him. That is why enlightenment is also called self remembering by Buddha, which means remembering the innermost core of the being.
However, to remember God, to awaken for Him, you can only through ceasing to be in your mind stuff and your old personality.
Awakening for God you flower in a totally new individuality, the authentic man, "insaan kamil".

Dear James, You say: "If "there is no t...

2010-03-03T19:14:34.512+06:00

Dear James,

You say: "If "there is no true life but God's Life", then the life we experience must be no other that God's Life."
It is true that our life is given to us by God alone. But still our life is not as true as God life till we realize our inner connection with God, till we start living only through Him and for Him. Sufis are correct that a true God life is when one drops his ego, his "me" and its illusion for separateness from Existence and starts living out of the Divine Totality of God and for It. This is called self - realization or enlightenment, or just self - remembering and has nothing to do with the self of the ego, but has everything to do with God inside of us as our inner most reality.
This realization of God inside is to live a true God life and you can reach there only through love. Because God Himself is Love.

Dear Sadiq, Thank you very much for sharing this ...

2010-03-03T18:35:42.562+06:00

Dear Sadiq,

Thank you very much for sharing this post. I like it very much.

My attention hung on to the early statement by Shams e Tabrizi:

"The flaw is that people do not look at God with the gaze of Love. They look at Him with the gaze of learning, or the gaze of science, or the gaze of philosophy. The gaze of Love is something else."

Thank you.

Kindest wishes,

mo'in

"The flaw is that people do not look at God w...

2010-03-03T13:55:01.366+06:00

"The flaw is that people do not look at God with the gaze of Love. They look at Him with the gaze of learning, or the gaze of science, or the gaze of philosophy. The gaze of Love is something else."
Thank you, Sadiq, for bringing here these beautiful and profoundly insightful words of Shams At - Tabreez. They are so more valid nowadays than in the time of Shams.
Contemporary people have in a great degree lost their connection with their hearts and its ability to love. Contemporary people are so much centered in their head and mind that the only way they can look at existence and God is through their mind definitions and theories, through the scientific approach of the objectivity, but not through the religious approach of their hearts.
Only heart can feel the Quran as a Love Book. And only heart can recognize the love and beauty of Allah Messengers. Because prophets are not ordinary human beings, they have realized Allah beauty and love in themselves and they radiate this beauty and love all around. While alive these prophets attract like magnet many human hearts around them. After they have gone left this Earth, all we keep from the prophets are records about them. But the alive being is no more among us; the bird is no more singing alive songs. Then even if we put a tape recorder in the bird's cage to reproduce the bird's songs, the flavor of the alive being has gone, the beauty and divine love of the divine being is no more. That is why people tend to misinterpret prophets words after they have gone, that is the reason for people to forget the fragrance of love surrounding the prophets while alive. Only the living being can radiate in full God’s love and mercy or as professor Chittick points it out: Love is “too close to Being Itself, because its too close to Reality Itself, beyond our understanding.“
Therefore it is so important to be in the presence of alive God’s messengers, to remain in their beauty and flowering in order to realize your own divine potential.