beauty has two faces

Philosophical Reflections

Selections from ‘if i could write’

Ramadan letters that can be read

at Christmas or on any other day

●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●

Love

To love someone means to see the beauty of the Divine in someone. Who then, should we not love? Love by loving, not by thinking about love, nor by meditating upon it. Love everyone and everything to reach the heart of love, and the heart of the heart of love. Love naturally, not artificially. Love creates turbulence, turbulence necessitates communication – communication pacifies love. Love once generated is inextinguishable. It is the cause of creation, the source of life.

The need to express itself is inherent in everything. It is only when we start to bear the fruits of the gifts we have, that we become what we should be. If a tree looked like an orange tree but bore no oranges, would we call it an orange tree? The first orange tree only became an orange tree when it bore oranges. Then other trees became orange trees by bearing oranges. So too, we become human finally when we bear the fruit of being Divine!

Loving someone

Never be offended by someone’s failure to love you. None of us can ever love God as He loves us. Yet He is not offended by our failure to love Him. The very reason for our creation is His desire to love and to be known through our love. Ultimately, through each of us, He knows Himself; through both our expression of love as well as our withholding of love, through both our positive behaviour (reflecting what He is) and our negative behaviour (reflecting what He is not). The more complete our understanding, the less likely it is that we will live a life of anger and conflict. And know too that God is always just. No act of God causes us to lose the light He has given us! We lose it through our own actions when we give in to fear, greed, or envy, or fall victim to other spiritual maladies. Returning to God, we will find the light still there, its brightness reflecting the quality of our return.

How we would know if what we feel is love

Love is about giving, not receiving. Love is a creative power. It compels one to proclaim its existence. Love heals, makes complete. Love bears fruit. Since it is a Divine gift, the fruit it bears is Divine. Human consciousness is transcended, and Divine consciousness revealed.

Progressive loving

Decreasing our love of the lower increases our love of the higher, which decreases our love of the lower, which increases our love of the higher – this continues until we reach the highest realm of love. Effectively to reach a higher love we need to forego a lower love – loving and foregoing love again and again until we are one with the highest love.

Healing others

Heal others by loving them. But do not love others because you want to heal them. If you love others because you want to heal them you will inevitably stop loving them when you start to believe, for some reason or other, that you are unable to heal them or come to the conclusion that they are ‘incapable’ of healing.

How we see others discloses our own vision

What we see in others reflects what we are – seeing others as unworthy reflects our own unworthiness. At the highest level of being we would see a Divine consciousness everywhere. Seeing the Divine in human beings does not mean that flawed human beings become flawless. It simply means we are able to see beyond the human to the Divine, regardless of whether others are able to honour the Divine within themselves.

Our failing to see the Divine within others is as great a failing as their own in failing to honour the Divine within themselves. It is this very humanity we possess and the failings of humanity that should lead us to a vision that is overwhelmed by Divine Essence.

Those who oppress others ultimately oppress themselves and must be helped through our love. But our love will only flow if we believe there is more to the oppressor than we see on the surface. If we see only an oppressive action, the only remedy we will find is a reaction that counters the oppressor using the only ‘language’ we believe he or she ‘speaks’ or understands.

Yet the desire for justice must always be combined with the need for mercy. Only justice and mercy combined result in the attainment of real peace. Without justice, oppression will continue, and this is untenable. But without mercy, the Divine within the oppressor would be done an injustice by the oppressed, who would now be the ‘oppressor’. The more we see the Divine in ourselves, the more we will see the Divine in others.

Trespassing on someone’s sacred inner space

Sometimes we are invited into the hearts of others – into their deepest selves by virtue of their allowing us to interact with them. While there, we may wander into a sacred inner space, and see something we perceive as a weakness or flaw in their nature. When this happens, we should consider ourselves trespassers and feel ashamed of ourselves – as we would feel if we were guests in someone’s home and had walked into a bedroom and seen the vulnerability of the host. We should not reveal what we have learnt even to our own deeper selves, let alone reveal what we have learnt to anyone else – considering the shame of having come by this knowledge as a result of violating someone’s sacred inner space.

Darkness

Darkness only arises to us (in us); never to God (in Him). His seeking to know Himself takes place not in Him (as Him) but in Him, as ‘us’. Therefore for us (for the shadow in us) enlightenment is not essential (neither possible nor required), as a shadow can never become light. While for Him, a shadow can never arise (through us) as His light can never be or become a shadow.

Knowing something by knowing its opposite

We know that we can only know something by knowing its opposite. Light has no meaning without darkness, good is irrelevant without bad. How was God to know Himself if there was nothing other than Himself? How could He know He was light, love, grace – when all that existed was Him and nothing but Him?

God therefore ‘created’ man as His ‘shadow’ with His qualities and their ‘opposites’. But in reality, since there can be no opposites, we are in essence essentially Divine, and the opposites nothing but (God’s) imagination – Rumi says that ‘the universe is a strand of thought in the mind of God’.

We became human (were created) when God loved us (conceived us in His mind). And we become Divine when, in loving Him, we give up seeing our existence as separate from His, preferring to see ourselves as existing ‘within’ Him; effectively preferring Him to ourselves. In order to be known, to love and to be loved, God had to imagine the existence of something ‘other than Himself’. He had to ‘give up’ something precious (at least in His imagination), that He alone exists. But as we only exist in His mind, no one really ‘exists’ besides Him.

God, knowledge and time

The highest form of knowing is loving, and the highest form of loving, dying. Wanting to know Himself, God loved ‘other than Himself’; ‘died’ in His imagination, to live in ‘man’. But ‘living’ in us, He ‘killed’ the object of His imagination; His love became Him (again). He became (remained) as He was before He was ‘other than He was’. In the instant of living ‘other than He was’ He knew Himself as He was; and ‘man’ died as himself and became ‘other than himself’ forever.

Love

The sky, the sea, the earth, the mountains, the rivers, the trees, are all manifestations of Divine love. They are not just formed by love, not just created because God loves or because of His love, but are themselves revelations of love – in fact we can say they are love. Everything we see, feel, touch, hear, is (His) love. We see His love, we feel His love, we touch His love, and we hear His love. That is all we ever do – from morning until evening, waking or sleeping, from birth until we die.

A manifestation of God’s love is also at the same time a manifestation of His light. And if His love can be seen as a mountain then strength is an aspect of love and love an aspect of strength. But strength is also an aspect of justice and justice of strength. Similarly, the sky is a manifestation of love in its purity, the earth, of love in its forgiving softness and a tree, of love in its protectiveness. So not only is everything in creation a manifestation of love but it is also simultaneously a manifestation of light, justice and every quality of the Divine, and every quality of the Divine is an aspect of every other quality of the Divine.

Loving God

In the physical world of separateness He is in every rock, tree, plant, animal, man, woman and child. He is in everything we see, and yet nothing we see is Him. As only He knows Himself, if we were Him we would not know we were Him because we would (then) not be us (to know Him). If we were not Him we would not know Him, and not know that we were not Him. So He ever remains who He is. And we ever remain knowing and unknowing; known and unknown.

Explaining profound truth

A profound image often loses many facets of its light in an explanation. The image ceases to function as a mirror in the process. The explanation may be compared to the make-up used by someone who is naturally beautiful seeking to be beautiful through the use of make-up. Or it may be compared to being asked by a beautiful person: tell me I am beautiful. And you reply: look at the mirror – it reveals how beautiful you are. And the person persists: tell me why I am beautiful. And you answer: look at the mirror – it reveals why you are beautiful. And the person remonstrates: but you are not answering my question! And you respond: but I created the mirror for you to show you how beautiful you are – and to reveal different facets of your beauty whenever you look into it!

The Self

God can best be known within you. But beware: the more there is of you in ‘you’ the less there will be of the Divine in you. If you empty your heart of yourself, it will be filled by the Divine. The problem of the self is that it is ‘nothing’, but cannot think of itself as ‘nothing’. If the self were to think of itself as ‘nothing’ it would be safe from evil, as evil cannot influence ‘nothing’. It can only affect ‘something’. In reality evil has no control over us. Its chains are as powerless as chains around a cloud. Therefore we should not believe it has control over us. It has absolutely none except what we consciously give it. Evil has no power whatsoever over the true self, the spirit of the Divine within ourselves.

Assume you are the descendant of a Prophet!

if we could trace our lineage back to a spiritual personality we love and respect, would that change how we feel about ourselves or the way we see the world and see others? If we were indeed descendants of a Prophet, would we remain as we are? Or would we try to be better?

And if we know God to be the source of love, mercy and grace, should not this cause us to become better human beings? We lose so much by seeing ourselves as less than we are, and our behaviour follows suit – the easiest and most natural downward spiral there is. Yet the upward spiral is equally easy and more natural!

Knowing God

Trying to know God under these circumstances can be explained as follows: each of us, through our experience of the Divine within us, becomes the fruit of God (say, an apple, a pear, an orange) as He will be different to each of us. We offer this fruit (of ourselves) to Him to taste, for it is in His tasting of this fruit (through His tasting of ‘us’ as Him) that ‘we’ come to know Him (He comes to know Himself). He understands all that we choose to be of Him (and our experience of Him) more than we do, as only He ultimately understands the experience of love. This is natural as only He loves! And only He is loved!

Affirmation

Say to yourselves whenever you feel the need to reaffirm this: in everything I see, and feel, and hear, and touch, what I am experiencing is simply one form or another of love. So all is beauty whether it appears as beauty or ugliness, all is light regardless of the colour it is packaged in, all is music whether it is audible or inaudible, all is Divine speech whether spoken in words that are comprehensible or incomprehensible, all is movement whether it is visible or invisible, and all is grace whether it caresses the face of the world or leaves a scar on the earth.

Oneness

The way of duality differentiates between the seen and the unseen, the known and the unknown. But the way of oneness sees the Divine in the physical as well as in the spiritual. So it does not matter any more whether we call a fruit a fruit, or a tree a tree, or see them as reflections of the Divine.

Even love, justice and their unity (as represented by the Prophets Jesus, Moses, and Muhammad) can now be understood in a new light. Jesus lives within each of us, as does Moses, and Muhammad. Jesus represents love, the subject of our existence. Moses represents justice, the object of our existence; and Muhammad, their integration, indivisibility, oneness.

So we cannot be muslim unless we perfect our loving of Jesus. And we cannot be muslim unless we perfect our loving of Moses. And indeed we cannot be muslim unless we love all the Prophets who have ever existed.

Criticism

We should not be critical of anyone to please someone who is critical of that person, not let another’s lack of understanding affect our own. If we do, we will be weaker than the others. Even if the criticism is justified the lack of charity cannot be.

If you want to teach someone then say the right amount, to the right person, at the right time, in the right way. Sometimes asking someone to look into his or her heart is like asking a person afraid of heights to stand at the edge of a cliff and look down. And consider this: you may not always be able to teach but you can always learn. If you cannot be the teacher, be the student. And if you cannot be the student perhaps you can be lesson!

Form and formlessness

in attempting to perfect form of any kind (art, poetry, music), we are really trying to get beyond the form. As long as the form exists, imperfection exists. The higher the perfection of the form, the less we are aware of the form itself, and the more we are drawn to the spirit that gave the form life.

Remember: an artist does not only capture the spirit of the landscape in his or her art but his or her spirit in the landscape – a moment of his or her own existence when he or she (himself or herself) is the mountain, the tree, the earth, the sea, the cloud, or the sky.

Seeking to perfect any art form is essentially a seeking of spiritual perfection that can ultimately only exist in another (intangible) form. Good art therefore transports one beyond the artistic medium to something that is essentially spiritual, that is essentially spirit. Beauty is a reflection of the Divine. Knowing beauty we know the Divine. Art ‘crystallises’ beauty and therefore, is indispensable for life.

Freedom

Freedom is indivisible. You cannot compartmentalise and marginalize human beings. There is no freedom for the artist, for example, that is superior to the freedom of the person cleaning the pavement where the artist paints.

Freedom of one kind invariably means lack of freedom of another kind. Freedom to sing one song means loss of freedom to sing or hear another. Freedom goes hand in hand with sacrifice of freedom. In certain circumstances, life may matter more to someone than dignity. In other circumstances, dignity may matter more to someone than life. Freedom is not only about what you can see or hear, but also about a world beyond the senses.

Forgiveness

Unrequited love for another generally causes the one doing the loving great pain. Differentiate this from a spiritual love for another where the one who loves and the one who is loved are indistinguishable, for the source and the goal of the love are the same. Loving means loved. Lover is beloved. Where the self is lost in such love for another there is no self that exists and therefore none that can be hurt.

But what should we do if we are hurt when our love for someone is not returned? We might do well to do what nature does. Nature invariably aborts a foetus to prevent a child from being born with some serious defect. We have no option but to bury the aborted foetus as tenderly as we can. In the same way, we need to bury any pain from a human love that has had to be aborted before it could be fully realised.

But where are we to bury the pain, the hurt, or the anger we feel? To bury the pain, we first need to find a spiritual earth within ourselves. And that spiritual earth is forgiveness! When we bury pain properly in this way, forgiving the person who has hurt us, our love itself is purified and transforms from a human love to a spiritual love, from one that causes us pain to one that brings us joy.

Intolerance

If we consider others to be intolerant or fundamentalist, that might not only mean, as we might be predisposed to thinking, that we are tolerant or liberal. It could also reveal our own intolerance or arrogance or lack of knowledge or understanding of the values of others. If we are intolerant towards people we consider intolerant, does that make us tolerant?

We cannot become what we are not by calling ourselves what we would like to be called! That requires much harder work. It requires us to overcome our own prejudices and weaknesses. It requires us to gain a deeper knowledge of others and their values, as our preconceptions may be wrong. We need to reflect on the values of others so that we can appreciate them and even change our own if necessary.

Our ability to see goodness in others is limited by the limits of our own goodness!

Light at the end of the tunnel

Often, when we get into difficulty we say: ‘There is light at the end of the tunnel.’ But there was light at the beginning of the tunnel! So try not to get into the tunnel in the first place. But if you are in it, know that the light you require to get out has existed with you from the beginning.

Relationships

In our relationships, as long as we fail to accord to others respect for their innate capacity for goodness, we will find it difficult to lift our own behaviour towards them above that which we believe they are capable of displaying towards us. It is therefore critical, if we are to uplift our own behaviour towards others, that we believe that the highest capacity for goodness exists within all of us.

How we see others reveals our own inner nature. What we see outside us reveals what exists within us, defines us or limits us. What we find out about the limitations of others is often also precisely how we are found out by our own limitations. It is our inner deficiencies that invariably attract our attention to aspects of the nature of others that irk us.

Love and justice

Our future will not be secure unless our love is demonstrated in our actions as an essential aspect of our understanding of justice; nor will it be secure unless we understand and demonstrate that we consider justice as an essential aspect of our love. Then only will we be able to live a life of peace, with integrity.

When we rethink the meaning of love, we will no longer consider love a weakness that compromises the search for justice and equality. No, it is the very essence of the search for justice, as the highest justice is to recognise oneness, and only with love can we recognise oneness. When we rethink the meaning of justice, we will no longer believe that peace is possible without justice, for justice is the essence of love and not-loving is itself an injustice.

Spiritual responsibility

When speaking about the spiritual, remember that the ability of the listener to understand a spiritual truth depends on his or her own spiritual understanding or maturity. He or she may understand more than we do of what we have just spoken or less! If less, do not be frustrated or annoyed. We would not be annoyed if a child or a frail person could not carry a physical load that was too heavy for them. So why expect others to carry a spiritual load that may be too heavy for them? They may only be able to carry a partial load!

If so, let this be. Do not be anguished by what you perceive they are losing as a result of their lack of understanding. In time they will understand, if that is meant to be. Therefore let things be – speak the truth and move on. If you do not move on, you will limit your own growth.

God, veils and beauty

When God taught us the names of things, He created barriers to our knowing Him as much as He gave us assistance in knowing Him! The barriers or veils are themselves the reason why we strive to remove them. The intellect creates the barriers. Love removes them. But the intellect is wise in creating them! For if there were no hurdles, how would we learn to jump? Just as, if there were no sea, how would we learn to swim?

So let your life be one of loving whatever crosses your path. Encompass it as the sea encompasses everything that falls into it. Love without motive, without seeking or needing recompense. And look for beauty everywhere.

Beauty, love, grace

We find beauty by seeing beauty, we find love by being loving, we find grace by being gracious, we find joy by being happy, and we find life by keeping the spirit within us alive. Being alive to beauty we die to ugliness, being alive to love we die to hate, being alive to grace we die to cruelty, being alive to joy we die to sorrow, and keeping the spirit alive we die to death.

If love were a tree

If love were a tree, hope would be its height, contentment its depth, generosity its width, fortitude its trunk, patience its bark, sincerity the sap, faith its roots, humility its earth, knowledge the sun, compassion its leaves, justice its branches, forgiveness the wind, mercy clouds, altruism rain, graciousness sky, modesty its leaning, resolution its bearing, gratitude its shimmering, trust shade, truth its fruit, and beauty its name.

Living a truly spiritual life

To live a truly spiritual life, think of yourselves in these terms: everywhere is my own spirit. Everything is part of me. Everyone is within me. I do not need to become anything. I am perfect as I am. It is only my consciousness that makes me see myself as different and makes me want to become more than I am. Without such self-consciousness I would be all that I could be. All that I could be already is, without my knowing it. My desire to know me creates veils of knowledge that refract me (split or separate me) and cause me to be reflected as myriad rays of light and darkness. But my foregoing me removes the veils without creating new ones. Otherwise I will forever remain alternating between light and darkness, preferring the one or the other, depending on my state of mind or my needs as they fluctuate from time to time. Foregoing me I no longer have a name for myself or anything else. I simply am.