Migration to the Spiritual Land of Peace

Part I: Introduction

• The Coronation

For years, normality has been stretched nearly to its breaking point, a rope pulled tighter and tighter, waiting for a nip of the black swan’s beak to snap it in two. Now that the rope has snapped, do we tie its ends back together, or shall we undo its dangling braids still further, to see what we might weave from them?…

Covid-19 is like a rehab intervention that breaks the addictive hold of normality. To interrupt a habit is to make it visible; it is to turn it from a compulsion to a choice. The phenomenon follows the template of initiation: separation from normality, followed by a dilemma, breakdown, or ordeal, followed (if it is to be complete) by reintegration and celebration. Now the question arises: Initiation into what? What is the specific nature and purpose of this initiation? The popular name for the pandemic offers a clue: coronavirus. A corona is a crown. “Novel coronavirus pandemic” means “a new coronation for all.”

Already we can feel the power of who we might become. A true sovereign does not run in fear from life or from death. A true sovereign does not dominate and conquer (that is a shadow archetype, the Tyrant). The true sovereign serves the people, serves life, and respects the sovereignty of all people. The coronation marks the emergence of the unconscious into consciousness, the crystallization of chaos into order, the transcendence of compulsion into choice. We become the rulers of that which had ruled us. The New World Order that the conspiracy theorists fear is a shadow of the glorious possibility available to sovereign beings. No longer the vassals of fear, we can bring order to the kingdom and build an intentional society on the love already shining through the cracks of the world of separation. Read more: The Coronation with Charles Eisenstein

• Modern man is ignorant about his own ignorance

see also:“I can’t Breathe” is the expression of the Crisis of the modern world.

• The Migration to the Spiritual Land of Peace  is an universal theme to find Wisdom.

In all religious of the world we find the quest to Sincerty and Uprightness and is part of the Unanimous tradition. the search for the now apparently forgotten meaning of Tradition and the significance of the perennial philosophy needs to be  pursued with an ever—increasing sense of urgency in the highly materialistic West. see The Unanimous Tradition: Essays on the essential unity of all religions a  Tribute to Ananda Coomaraswamy

At Sacred Web Conference 2006 on Rediscovering the Sacred in our Lives and in our Times,. HRH The Prince of Wales in a 16-minute long, specially-videotaped address for the Conference. The video and text of the address are found here: Prince Charles’ speech and Prince Charles’ video

This wisdom was told not only in all the spiritual Traditions of the world, but surely by all the Prophets from the birth of Adam ( see the Tales of the Prophets) till the Last prophet Mohammed(a.s.)( see MUHAMMAD THE MESSENGER OF ISLAM His Life & Prophecy)

This wisdom is still told and used every day with the stories the Lifes of the saints in the Christian tradition-( see  the Golden Legend) and the liturgical calendar that indicates the dates of celebrations of saints , or the Lives of the Saints in the Orthodox Church. For the lives of the Sufi Saints  in the Islamic Tradion look also The Tadhkiratu ‘l-awliya – the” Memoirs of the saints” by Attar, Farid al-Din, d. ca. 1230  .Or look to The Naqshbandi Sufi Way: History and Guidebook of the Saints of the Golden Chain.

• “Rebel in the Soul”

But to start our Migration to the Spiritual Land of Peace – Exercise, we look  at an old text  known as papyrus 3024 from the Berlin Museum, known  as “Man arguing with his Soul” or the “Rebel in the Soul” we can perhaps study one of the earliest accounts of the confrontation with the ego.

 – Rebel in the Soul: An ancient Egyptian dialogue between a Man and his Soul

This controversial text, that was meant for initiates at the threshold of the Ancient Egyptian Inner Temple, speaks to us with intriguing relevance to the problems of today. Taking the form of a dialogue between a man and his soul, this sacred text explores the inner discourse between doubt and mystical knowledge and deals with the rebellion and despair of the intellect at a crucial stage of spiritual development.
The first complete and consistent translation of the Berlin Papyrus 3024, which is thought to be nearly 4,000 years old:

“The man’s soul tells him that men of greater value than he have suffered from the world, and advises him to gain an insight from his attitude and search to overcome his despair.

It is An Egyptian temple text, related with the God IAI, an aspect of the Solar God, the stubborn donkey. It shows the intellectual rebellion of our Ego.

“The stubborn, passionate, long-suffering ass is the perfect natural symbol of our rational personality. It bears, like the ass, the weight of all our suffering, and carries us through life. It is stubborn, selfish and refuses to go where we think we best…

Carrot and stick:

….Yet paradoxically, it is the same stubborn ass, and only the ass, that can carry the Rebel to salvation; mounted upon the ass, man is mounted upon his own rebellion. The ass is the father of all rebels, but also the carrier of redemption.”

In Ancient Egypt, Iai, the Great Ass, is the aspect of the Sun God with Ass’s ears.  This is Osiris in his listening state; listening equalled wisdom to the Ancient Egyptians. The Book of the Gates depicts the progression of the sun through the night. The Twelve Hours of Night are depicted as regions of the Underworld. Each region is an Hour, and each Hour has its gate through which to pass. To pass, we must know the name of the gatekeeper, or guardian.

This is the same as identifying the layers of egos we each have within – an ego is what others might call one of the deadly sins, Pride, Envy, Greed…all those different aspects of the personality that can prevent us from progressing through the gates or stages of spiritual development.  When we look inwardly at the aspects of our personality that rule or affect our lives, we need to recognise what is affecting our spiritual progress; if we learn to use it wisely and become its master, instead of it being master over us, we then recognise the Guardian of that Gate – can name the Guardian, and can “pass through the Gate”. Consciousness moves from Gate to Gate.

In the argument with his Soul, the man is bargaining for the right to die because he can no longer face the suffering of living in this world without his mentor. In Ancient Egypt, it was believed that a man and his Soul would be judged together in the afterlife; the Soul can make appeals on his behalf.  So the man is arguing with his Soul to persuade it that killing himself is the correct thing to do, as he wants it to accept his reasons, and agree with him so that it will stay with him after death and make favourable appeals. However, his Soul has other ideas..

“I spoke to my soul that I might answer what it said:

To whom shall I speak today?

Brothers and sisters are evil and friends today are not worth loving.

Hearts are great with greed and everyone seizes his or her neigh­bor’s goods.

Kindness has passed away and violence is imposed on everyone.

To whom shall I speak today?

People willingly accept evil and goodness is cast to the ground everywhere.

Those who should enrage people by their wrongdoing

make them laugh at their evil deeds.

People plunder and everyone seizes _his or her neighbour’s goods.

To whom shall I speak today?

The one doing wrong is an intimate friend and the brother with whom one used to deal is an enemy.

No one remembers the past and none return the good deed that is done.

Brothers and sisters are evil

and people turn to strangers for righteousness or affection.

To whom shall I speak today?

Faces are empty and all turn their faces from their brothers and sisters.

Hearts are great with greed

and there is no heart of a man or woman upon which one might lean.

None are just or righteous and the land is left to the doers of evil.

To whom shall I speak today?

There are no intimate friends

and the people turn to strangers to tell their troubles.

None are content and those with whom one used to walk no longer exist.

I am burdened with grief and have no one to comfort me.

There is no end to the wrong which roams the earth.

When we consider the age of this text, from  XII Dynasty  Egypt (approx 1991-1783 BC), we can see that the nature of the woes and troubles of humankind have changed very little.

The man’s soul tells him that men of greater value than he have suffered from the world, and advises him to gain an insight from his attitude and search to overcome his despair.  It tells him some allegorical stories – the first being the “mythical field of transformations”; both the field AND the plough are to be found within man. The field is the ground; the earth, where the soul of the man dwells, and is to be cultivated by the ploughman – the man must “cultivate” himself.

The harvest is what is then offered back to the soul. The “harvest”, what is left of the man after his life, is in dangerous hands if left uncultivated. It is exposed to a “storm from the North” said to indicate the Head (Reason); the storm is consciousness threatened by intellectual rebellion.
The man at this point in the story, when his Rebel/ego is arguing for survival, is not yet ready to let the wisdom of his heart rule his intellect, and this is symbolised by the crocodile. The man’s heirs, in the story he is told by his soul, are eaten by a crocodile whilst still in the egg, before they are fully formed, before they have lived, and will never realise their potential. See The Rebel in Soul by Bika Reed

• Brueghel : the apocalypse within

The Fall of the Rebel Angels or The Archangel Michael Slaying the Apocalyptic Dragon, Dulle Griet or Mad Meg, and The Triumph of Death.All three panels are again the same overall size. The link is provided by the Apocalypse.

see also Analyse of the 3 paintings here

Notwithstanding the “predilection of his age for symbolism and allegory”, the eulogy of Ortelius that Bruegel ‘depicted many things that cannot be depicted’, the search for hidden truths, and the idea that this artist was deliberately obscure and cryptic, considering the dangers inherent in being openly critical, a degree of circumspection is only to be expected. With these three works, here we also have Bruegel’s major excursion into the world of Jheronimus Bosch. The first, the Rebel Angels, was at one time attributed to Bosch, the formal language of the second, Dulle Griet, is distinctly reminiscent of Bosch and the third, the Triumph of Death, has all the apocalyptic power of Bosch – and more; a landscape of death, one where the promise of redemption and resurrection is absent. God is nowhere to be seen. Or is it more we, our ego denies the existence of God?

Is the Message of Brueghel more like this:  There is no God … But God?  Recognising the eternal struggle in the soul of man between the sinful earthly being or nature, dominated by earthly wisdom, and the divine nature of God,Brueghel asks us a total submission.

The 1560s was no time for children’s games. Amused by each of these spectacles of humanity, people miss the underlying seriousness of Bruegel in everything he does. Bruegel transports us back over four centuries to a time when everyone looks to be having fun. Where did all the good times go? Within 50 years of this painting the European world appears to be have been struck by an epidemic of depression that plunged young and old into months and even years of morbid lethargy and relentless terrors. We seem to have been living with it ever since. The decline in opportunities for traditional pleasures is later reflected in John Bunyan’s march to a life free of fun. In Pilgrim’s Progress carnival is the portal to Hell, just as pleasure in any form, sexual, gustatory, convivial, is the devil’s snare. It seems that while the medieval peasant enjoyed the festivities as an escape from work, the Puritan embraced work as an escape from terror.

Progress came with a price. The new world had not yet made a Faustian pact with the Devil to gain its brilliant advances in science, exploration and industry but it had swept away some of the traditional cures for the depression that those achievements brought in tow.

But still, the old world had its own demons to fight. As visitors to the museums where this group of three pictures hang, smile, laugh even, and check those inventories of activity, the link between laughter and spirituality goes unnoticed.

The ability to laugh can help us through the best and worst of times. Its importance for our spiritual wellbeing is generally neglected.

Brueghel used the personnage of “Dulle Griet’ to express this kind of stubbornness  as the stubborn donkey of the Egyptian papyrus from 4000 years ago. It shows the intellectual rebellion of our Ego.

Modern Man with all his “economical grow- energy” knowledge and scientifical research based on rebellion against his Soul, wants to find (without his soul) the solutions to all the problems he createdand  is landed in an apocalyptic “theather” prophesying the complete destruction of the world.

Man as stubbornness of the intellectual rebellion of our Ego so acting  as “Whore of Babylon” discribed in the Book of Revelation.

Only by killing earthly wisdom and the lusts and properties in his soul would man enable Christ to be reborn within himself and be united with God, thereby restoring that `oneness’ referred to at the beginning of the Theologia Germanica: 

• “Sin is selfishness:Godliness is unselfishness:A godly life is the steadfast working out of inward freeness from self:To become thus Godlike is the bringing back of man’s first nature”.

• Christ as Child in the Heart of the true believer.

What does love look like?
It has the hands to help others.
It has the feet to hasten to the poor and needy.
It has eyes to see misery and want.
It has the ears to hear the sighs and sorrows of men.
That is what love looks like.

Saint Augustine

In the 5 cirkels is written: “Gave van Barmhartigheid“: Gift of Mercy , “Gave van Genade’: Gift of Grace, “Gave des Levens” ( in the heart): Gift of Life, ” Gave van Medelijden”: Gift of Compassion, “Gave van sterkte“: Gift of strength.

• The Spiritual Message of Bruegel for our Times

Bruegel’s Philosophical Circle

Bruegel the man – as opposed to his paintings – remains more or less invisible to history. There is nothing written by him and, with one exception – Abraham Ortelius’ remarks in his Album Amicorum which will be discussed below – there is nothing by his contemporaries that provides a glimpse into his intellectual, psychological, philosophical or spiritual outlook. But those with whom he is known to have associated are among the most brilliant and outstanding men of their time; many of them were men of renown in the world. The writers, artists and religious thinkers whose names are linked with Bruegel were men of the humanist movement who, inwardly at least, rejected the politics and dogmatic rigidities of conventional religion in favour of a search for such philosophical and mystical truths as can be approached through methods of contemplative spirituality.

Like the gnostics before them they cultivated the art of complete inner freedom from conventions and preconceptions. Outwardly, like Lipsius, they could maintain the appearance of conformity, even if lightly. Others like Niclaes, the founder of the House of Love, more openly declared themselves ^„filled with God‟ and set themselves up as teachers, though Niclaes himself encouraged his followers to disguise their innermost convictions and let themselves be counted among the Church’s faithful.( A practice known as Nicodemism, a position whereby Christians could hide their dissenting beliefs while conforming to mainstream religious rituals).

Theirs was a form of gnosticism in that they gave priority to the action of knowledge granted by the Spirit over the disciplines of conformity to church regulations. It can be argued that they were students of esoteric Christianity and heirs of the Perennial Philosophy. Read more here

• Mutiny of the Soul

Depression, anxiety, and fatigue are an essential part of a process of metamorphosis that is unfolding on the planet today, and highly significant for the light they shed on the transition from an old world to a new.

When a growing fatigue or depression becomes serious, and we get a diagnosis of Epstein-Barr or Chronic Fatigue Syndrome or hypothyroid or low serotonin, we typically feel relief and alarm. Alarm: something is wrong with me. Relief: at least I know I’m not imagining things; now that I have a diagnosis, I can be cured, and life can go back to normal. But of course, a cure for these conditions is elusive.

The notion of a cure starts with the question, “What has gone wrong?” But there is another, radically different way of seeing fatigue and depression that starts by asking, “What is the body, in its perfect wisdom, responding to?” When would it be the wisest choice for someone to be unable to summon the energy to fully participate in life?

The answer is staring us in the face. When our soul-body is saying No to life, through fatigue or depression, the first thing to ask is, “Is life as I am living it the right life for me right now?” When the soul-body is saying No to participation in the world, the first thing to ask is, “Does the world as it is presented me merit my full participation?” Read More Here

• The Spiritual Land of Peace:
  

Look and behold: there is in the world a very unpeaceable Land and it is the wildernessed land wherein the most part of all  impenitent and ignorant people do dwell and in which is, the first of all needful for the man; to the end that he may come to the Land of Peace and the City of Life and Rest. ( from Terra Pacis  by Hendrik Niclaes of the Family of Love,)

The same unpeaceable land has also a City, the name of which they that dwell therein do not know, but only those who are come out of it, and it is named Ignorance.

The “Dulle Griet” as “whore of Babylon” ,  in the land of Ignorance by Brueghel:

Dulle griet is the representation of the  Whore of Babylon living in a land of Ignorance.

The Whore of Babylon in the The Apocalypse Tapestry of Angers

The Whore of Babylon or Babylon the Great is a symbolic female figure and also place of evil mentioned in the Book of Revelation in the Bible. Her full title is stated in Revelation 17 (verse 5) as Mystery, Babylon the Great, the Mother of Prostitutes and Abominations of the Earth.

The word “Whore” can also be translated metaphorically as “Idolatress“.^[1] The Whore’s apocalyptic downfall is prophesied to take place in the hands of the image of the beast with seven heads and ten horns. There is much speculation within Christian eschatology on what the Whore and beast symbolize as well as the possible implications for contemporary interpretation.

Dulle Griet is the model of modern man’s  Rebellion  against his soul and  Anger against it. How can Dulle Griet find  a way to calm her anger?

She can looks in  the mirror and see herself,making more “selfies”, so  seeing more anger as the portait of vanity of Hans Memling shows us. The lady see only more vanity  The message of Memling is in his Triptych of Earthly Vanity and Divine Salvation  focuses on the idea of “Memento mori,” a Latin phrase that translates to “Remember your mortality.” Memling’s triptych shockingly contrasts the beauty, luxury and vanity of the mortal earth with images of death and hell. In the time of Breughel and in our times  the message is  that  Vanity is not the solution. see: Nothing Good without Pain: Hans Memling”s earthly Vanity and  Divine Salation

All Is Vanity by Charles Allan Gilbert (September 3, 1873 – April 20, 1929)

The phrase “All is vanity” comes from Ecclesiastes 1:2 (Vanity of vanities, saith the Preacher, vanity of vanities; all is vanity.

Don’t change the world in hopes of changing yourself,

change yourself so the world changes because of you.

• In this land of Ignorance, for the food of men, there grows neither corn nor grass.

The people that dwell therein know not their original or first beginning;  neither do they know from whence, or how, they came into the same. And moreover then, that they are altogether blind, and blind-born.

The forementioned city, named Ignorance, has two Gates. The one stands in the North, or Midnight, through the which men go into the city of darkness or ignorance.

This gate now, that stands to the North, is very large and great, and has also a great door, because there is much passage through the same; and it has likewise his name, according to the nature of the same city.

Foreasmuch as that men do come into Ignorance through the same gate, therefore it is named Men Do Not Know How to Do. And the great door, where through the multitude do run is named Unknown Error; and there is else no coming into the City named Ignorance.

The other gate stands on the one side of the City, towards the East or Spring of the Day, and the name is the Narrow Gate, through the which, men travel out of the city and do enter into the Straight Way which leads to Righteousness.

Now when one travells out through the same Gate, then does he immediately espie some Light, and that same reachs to the Rising of the Sun.

Here the symbolism, taking up the theme of the ‘bread of life’, i.e. spiritual nourishment, employs the images of ‘corn’ and ‘seed’ whose esoteric meaning was discussed earlier and which will be met again in the paintings by Bruegel of the Harvest and the   Ploughman (Fall of Icarus).

The importance of spiritual nourishment – or rather the lack of it – is discussed in the section dealing with the Peasant Wedding Feast( in construction) (Marriage at Cana) where the lack of wine is shown to correspond, by rhetorical imitation, with famine imagery in the Old Testament where the sense is that of ‘famine for the word of God’.

‘Landscape With The Fall of Icarus.‘ It is the only painting Bruegel did with a non-Biblical mythological subject. W.H. Auden’s poem ‘Musee des Beaux Arts’ describes it:

About suffering they were never wrong,

The Old Masters: how well they understood

Its human position; how it takes place

While someone else is eating or opening a window or just

walking dully a long; …

In Bruegel’s Icarus, for instance: how everything turns away

Quite leisurely from the disaster; the ploughman may

Have heard the splash. the forsaken cry,

But for him it was not an important failure; the sun shone

As it had to on the white legs disappearing into the green

Water; and the expensive delicate ship that must have seen

Something amazing, a boy falling out of the sky.

Had somewhere to go and sailed calmly on.

The painting shows Icarus, barely discernible, already submerged but for his legs. The ploughman in the foreground, the fisherman with his back to us, the shepherd leaning on his crook staring at the blank sky , his back to Icarus, the ship sailing away from Icarus to the horizon as the tones of earth and water fade toward the splashing pastels of a setting sun on the horizon, all underline Bruegel’s comment on the folly of human ambitions.

He had , as other Northern intellectuals, been familiar with Erasmus’ The Praise of Folly and the tradition of the “fool literature’ of the time, especially Brandt’s ·Ship of Fools’ (The Narrenschiff, 1494).

The painting represents a rendering of the German proverb: ‘No plough comes to a standstill because a man dies.’ As such, it establishes a continuity of myth and the times, but rather than make the event tragic he makes it inconsequential next to the mundane pursuits at hand. We come upon the actors in tableau , frozen as in a movie still about to come into action; the splash frozen too – creates a tension but one soon to be exhausted and consumed by the natural splendor of the sunset.

Here the painter has produced an eidetic effect: he has captured the event’s meaning while at the same time debunking its grandiosity.

The mundane elements of work and subsistence capture our attention, until as an afterthought we notice pale Icarus about to disappear. All of this is cradled in nature so that the painting becomes a pageant of indifference with a sense of cosmic irony. It is the scale of nature which makes the scene great though the actors in both harmony and tension with nature are unaware of the forces at work.

Hence, Bruegel’s ‘throwing away of the title ,’ a technique borrowed from the mannerists whom this painting debunks as well. Here Bruegel has entered a controversy over the desirability of Italian painting that raged among Flemish painters at the time. The realism of the Flemish plowman, anticipating in style and flavor Thomas Hart Benton’s rural apotheosis, the barely discernible corpse in the wooded area in the left middle ground , the theme of the fall, and the fragile make-believe classicized buildings moving toward the horizon to which all goes and from which everything comes, all point to a rejection of the hegemony of classicism, the debunking (relativizing) of mythologies superimposed from the outside, and an identification with indigenous Netherlandish elements represented by the peasantry.

• SACRED ECONOMICS with Charles Eisenstein

Sacred Economics traces the history of money from ancient gift economies to modern capitalism, revealing how the money system has contributed to alienation, competition, and scarcity, destroyed community, and necessitated endless growth. Today, these trends have reached their extreme—but in the wake of their collapse, we may find great opportunity to transition to a more connected, ecological, and sustainable way of being.

This book is about how the money system will have to change—and is already changing—to embody this transition. A broadly integrated synthesis of theory, policy, and practice, Sacred Economics explores avant-garde concepts of the New Economics, including negative-interest currencies, local currencies, resource-based economics, gift economies, and the restoration of the commons. Author Charles Eisenstein also considers the personal dimensions of this transition, speaking to those concerned with “right livelihood” and how to live according to their ideals in a world seemingly ruled by money. Tapping into a rich lineage of conventional and unconventional economic thought, Sacred Economics presents a vision that is original yet commonsense, radical yet gentle, and increasingly relevant as the crises of our civilization deepen. Read online here

• Landscape with Charon Crossing the Styx

 Paradise : Eternity (out of time)                              Hell: infinite stasis (time frozen)

                Purgatory: Here and Now, in time and space, a dynamic time, dedicated to change and transformation

“in Hell there is no time, there is only infinite stasis; in Paradise there is no time, but rather the dynamic over-abundance of eternity; only in Purgatory is there time,because only here is there the possibility of change and growth”.

• At the the cross road  of Y , Migration is a form of Purgatory

Paul A. Camacho in his paper ” Educating Desire: Conversion and Ascent in Dante’s Purgatorio” asks our attention “Why the Purgatorio? As first-time readers discover with surprise in the closing cantos of Dante’s Inferno, Hell is defined primarily by stasis. Where there is motion in Hell, it is only the tormented self-circling of a will that cannot love anything beyond itself. Hell is the place that Dante scholar Peter Hawkins has memorably described as “repetition-compulsion, an endless replay of the sinner’s ‘song of myself.’” It is certainly true, as Dante saw, that conversion requires an underworld itinerary: we can no overcome the drive to get what we mistakenly think will bring us happiness through intellectual understanding or sheerwill-power alone. But to journey throug hHell as Dante would have us do,one must experience one’s sin and failure without getting trapped in it; and this means one must face all the darkness in oneself without becoming entombed by fear, despair, or gawking fascination. This is a heavy task for anyone, let alone for the average undergraduate. By contrast, Purgatory is, in Hawkins’ words, “dynamic, dedicated to change and transformation. It concerns the rebirth of a  self free at last to be interested in other souls and other things .” It is fruitful to dwell in Purgatorio with students because it is in Purgatory that we now reside. I mean this: in Hell there is no time, there is only infinite stasis; in Paradise there is no time, but rather the dynamic over-abundance of eternity; only in Purgatory is there time,because only here is there the possibility of change and growth. If we read the Commedia to learn how to love better here and now, in this world, it is the Purgatorio that will provide the blueprint.”
In Cantos 17 and 18 of the Purgatorio, Dante’s Virgil lays out a theory of sin, freedom, and moral motivation based on a philosophical anthropology of loving-desire. As the commentary tradition has long recognized, because Dante placed Virgil’s discourse on love at the heart of the Commedia, the poet invites his readers to use love as a hermeneutic key to the text as a whole. When we contextualize Virgil’s discourse within the broader intention of the poem—to move its readers from disordered love to an ordered love of ultimate things—then we find in these central cantos not just a key to the structure and movement of the poem ,but also a key to understanding Dante’s pedagogical aim. With his Commedia, Dante invites us to perform the interior transformation which the poem dramatizes in verse and symbol. He does so by awakening in his readers not only a desire for the beauty of his poetic creation, but also a desire for the beauty of the love described therein. In this way, the poem presents a pedagogy of love, in which the reader participates in the very experience of desire and delight enacted in the text. In this article, I offer an analysis of Virgil’s discourse on love in the Purgatorio, arguing for an explicit and necessary connection between loving-desire and true education. I demonstrate that what informs Dante’s pedagogy of love is the notion of love as ascent, a notion we find articulated especially in the Christian Platonism of Augustine. Finally, I conclude by offering a number of figures, passages, and themes from across the Commedia that provide fruitful material for teachers engaged in the task of educating desire. Read more here

• Note: Al GHAZALI ON JIHAD AL-NAFS [FIGHTING THE EGO] )

Meaning of nafs: It has two meanings.

First, it means the powers of anger and sexual appetite in a human being… and this is the usage mostly found among the people of tasawwuf [sufis], who take “nafs” as the comprehensive word for all the evil attributes of a person. That is why they say: one must certainly do battle with the ego and break it (la budda min mujahadat al-nafs wa kasriha), as is referred to in the hadith: A`da `aduwwuka nafsuka al-lati bayna janibayk [Your worst enemy is your nafs which lies between your flanks. Al-`Iraqi says it is in Bayhaqi on the authority of Ibn `Abbas and its chain of transmission contains Muhammad ibn Abd al-Rahman ibn Ghazwan, one of the forgers].

The second meaning of nafs is the soul, the human being in reality, his self and his person. However, it is described differently according to its different states. If it assumes calmness under command and has removed from itself the disturbance caused by the onslaught of passion, it is called “the satisfied soul” (al-nafs al-mutma’inna)… In its first meaning the nafs does not envisage its return to God because it has kept itself far from Him: such a nafs is from the party of shaytan. However, when it does not achieve calmness, yet sets itself against the love of passions and objects to it, it is called “the self-accusing soul” (al-nafs al-lawwama), because it rebukes its owner for his neglect in the worship of his master… If it gives up all protest and surrenders itself in total obedience to the call of passions and shaytan, it is named “the soul that enjoins evil” (al-nafs al-ammara bi al-su’)… which could be taken to refer to the ego in its first meaning.

From the beginning of our entrance into the school of Sufism, we have been taught about the seven levels of being. These seven levels are like grades in any educational system which one must pass through in order to graduate. In our system, however, evaluations are made by a Higher Authority than the teacher.

Passing and failing grades are made known through real dreams, through the interpretation of which the teacher gives new responsibilities and duties to the seeker. But what is most important is that the seeker himself should be able to realize his own states so that he can live up to the next level to which he aspires. Obviously, first it is necessary that he be conscious, aware of his character and actions, and be sincere in looking at himself. But it is also necessary to thoroughly know the characteristics of each level, especially the level in which he is presumed to be, and the next level, in which he hopes to be. Read The Seven Levels of Being

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• To Become a “Refugee”: Emigration to Sincerity or “uprightness” of Love
  

To Become a “Refugee” means to make a migration to Sincerity or to the“uprightness” of Love.

What the Emigration to Sincerity demands of us

• Emigration: Historical Hijra

Starting from a narrow family-tribal environment Prophet Muhammad (pbuh) underwent 13 years of hardship and torment in Meccan society; with the immigration (Hijra) to Medina, a new stage began. This stage, if one takes into consideration the time that it took all religions to spread, is the starting point of one of the fastest religious developments in recorded history. In this sense, when one speaks of the Hijra one is not merely speaking of a journey from Mecca to Medina, or the starting point of a calendar; one is speaking of a new start for humanity.

The Hijra is symbolic of changing those conditions that cause problems and that clash with ideals and beliefs, as well as the search for new opportunities.

The Hijra, as is expressed in a variety of verses, was extrication from a difficult and stressful situation with the aim to widen the belief and the ideals, and a search for new possibilities and new places. From this aspect, the Hijra is not something that was realized as part of a certain process or a completed historical event in the life of Muslims. The Hijra is symbolic of changing those conditions that cause problems and that clash with ideals and beliefs, as well as the search for new opportunities. Thus, the Hijra, which includes certain preconditions, is a moral duty and responsibility for every individual.

Prophet Muhammad placed the Hijra in the minds and hearts of the Islamic community with a hadith (Prophetic tradition) that expresses two basic interconnected matters.

The first is a general principle which, in particular, is considered to be one of the reference points in the evaluation of laws for Islamic jurists. This principle is connected to intentions in behavioral values, as it is the intention that gives behavior direction. As we know the Hijrawas the first and most important social movement of the young Islamic society.

• Migration

As is to be expected with all social movements, it is only natural that there were people who had different intentions when participating in the emigration led by Prophet Muhammad. Prophet Muhammad drew attention to this situation and stated that those who performed the same action received different responses, each according to their intention. The matter expressed in the hadiths is concerned with a Meccan Muslim who had joined the emigration and come to Medina to marry the woman he loved. The ruling that Prophet Muhammad gave concerning this person can be considered to be a universal principle compulsory for all Muslims to take into account when performing an action.

Prophet Muhammad said: “Actions are according to intentions, whoever emigrates to Allah and His Prophet, that emigration is to Allah and His Prophet, whoever emigrates to marry a woman, his emigration is to marry a woman...” The idea of actions and behavior being judged according to intention is the clearest and most immutable rule that stands against those who desire to hide their personal or prosaic intents behind ideals and virtues.

The most important principle to learn from the Hijra is the constant observation of intention. In particular, Sufis consider the constant observation and control of intent to be a basic principle for attaining ikhlas (sincerity). From this aspect, Sufism can be considered to be a total investigation and interrogation of intention.

• Goethe and his poem “Hegir” : Hijra

When one speaks of the Hijra one is not merely speaking of a journey from Mecca to Medina, or the starting point of a calendar;  but one is  also speaking of a new start for humanity. And Johann Wolfgang von Goethe make his Hijra, his emigration and take refuge in Islam. He became a “Refugee”.

The Hijra is symbolic of changing those conditions that cause problems and that clash with ideals and beliefs, as well as the search for new opportunities.

In this caravan poem, Goethe gives us a picture of the restless nomad existence which early Arabian poetry had enabled him to envision.

The whole “West-East Divan” is shot through with something of this nomadic restlessness. Already in the first great poem entitled “Hegir” the poet alludes to Arabian life and traditions. He is a True Pelgrim. He turns to the wisdom of the Sufis as Hafiz.

His own “Hedschra” is an inteliectual emigration to a simpler state of existence which seems to him to be purer and righter than his own immediate world.

Thus he calls out to himself:

“Hegira”

North and South and West are quaking,

Thrones are cracking, empires shaking;

Let us free toward the East

Where as patriarchs we’ll feast:

There in loving, drinking, singing

Youth from Khidr’s well is springing.

Seeing rightly, seeing purely,

There I’ll penetrate most surely,

To the origin of nations,

When on earth the generation

Heard God’s words with human senses,

Heedless of their formal tenses.

• With the help of Al Khidr, St George, St Christopher and the Holy Refugees

Al Khidr : The Spiritual “greenness”:

Khidr is not an abstract mystical figure, but an archetype of something essential within us. ‘The Green One’ images a natural aspect of our divinity, something so ordinary that we overlook it. To follow the way of Khidr is to awaken to our own natural state of being with God and with life. In this natural state of being we know how to respond to the real need of the moment. Read more

St George and Al kidhr;

At first sight there seems to be little connection between Elijah, George and Khidr, apart from the fact that in the Middle East they are frequently associated with the same place by different religious traditions. Is it then a simple case of overlapping traditions, Jewish, Christian and Muslim, all of whom focus on the Holy Land as part of their own heritage and take Abraham as their forefather?

Certainly there is a view which suggests that Khidr is to Muslims what Elijah is to Jews, in respect of them both acting as initiator to the true believer, and which in itself is testimony to attempts to find common ground between the three traditions. Read more here

Prayer of Intercession to Saint George:

Faithful servant of God and invincible martyr, Saint George; favored by God with the gift of faith, and inflamed with an ardent love of Christ, thou didst fight valiantly against the dragon of pride, falsehood, and deceit.

Neither pain nor torture, sword nor death could part thee from the love of Christ. I fervently implore thee for the sake of this love to help me by thy intercession to overcome the temptations that surround me, and to bear bravely the trials that oppress me, so that I may patiently carry the cross which is placed upon me; and let neither distress nor difficulties separate me from the love of Our Lord Jesus Christ. Valiant champion of the Faith, assist me in the combat against evil, that I may win the crown promised to them that persevere unto the end.

St Christopher:

With the help of St Christopher we make the Migration, Crossing from the Land of Ignorance to the Spirittual Land of Peace

St. Christopher prayer:

O Glorious St. Christopher you have inherited a beautiful name, Christ-bearer, as a result of the wonderful legend that while carrying people across a raging stream you also carried the Child Jesus. Teach us to be true Christ-bearers to those who do not know Him. Protect all of us that travel both near and far and petition Jesus to be with us always. Amen.

Read more here about the great martyr St Christopher

• The Refuge: Pilgrimage

To Become a “Refugee” means to make a migration to Sincerity or to the“uprightness” of Love.

Man as stubbornness of the intellectual rebellion of our Ego  /        The  Twice Born Man

The Refuge: Pilgrimage to Reconciliation with his Soul

The Choice:

Man as “Whore of Babylon”                                                         The  Twice Born Man

The Refuge: Pilgrimage

The Freedom of  choice of the “Refugee”:

We are not the first generation to know that we are destroying the world, many communities and civilisations collapsed before us.  But  we could be the last that can do anything about it, not with the vanity of  earthly knowledge and so called democratic solidarity and wisdom here on earth  as this commercial of WWF wants to convince us, but with asking humbly the help of Divine Wisdom so realising in us the image of the man who painfully transcends his material ego: The birth of his soul. It is a test. It’s time to decide! 

• The Soul That Does not Live in God is not Alive

Spring makes red and white flowers appear on the trees,

But the spring that is the origin of colors is colorless.

Understand what I have said, and give up all talk;

Run to the Origin without color and unite yourself to it.

Annihilate yourself before the One Existence

So that thousands of worlds leap out of you

And your pure existence flames out of itself

And goes on and on birthing different forms.

Of course, none of these forms will last.

Happy is the one who knows this mystery!

Happy is he who gives his life to know this!

He leaves this house for another far more radiant.

You cannot understand this mystery through reason;

The Way to Knowledge winds through suffering and torment.

If you do not feel pain, you do not look for healing.

The soul that does not live in God is not alive.

She seems like a soul, but does not deserve the name:

She has not been made alive by the Beloved.

The soul is given life by the four-elements

Like a lamp that burns through the night:

The light is from oil and wick, it is not eternal.

While the oil exists, the lamp burns, but then goes out.

The one made alive by God will never die.

He lives through God and not through gold or bread.

God is the Light, the Eternal Source of Lights.

The Light is causeless, as is His fiery radiance.

Like gold, God’s value comes from His pure, perfect essence.

Sultan Valad

Part II – Exercise:

• The Rest on the Flight into Egypt of the “Holy Refugees”

The Rest on the Flight into Egypt is a subject in Christian art showing Mary, Joseph, and the infant Jesus resting during their flight into Egypt. The Holy Family is normally shown in a landscape.^[1]

The subject did not develop until the second half of the fourteenth century, though it was an “obvious step” from depictions of the “legend of the palm tree” where they pause to eat dates and rest; palm trees are often included.^[2] It was a further elaboration of the long-standing traditions of incidents that embellished the story of the Flight into Egypt, which the New Testament merely says happened, without giving any details .The single New Testament account, in Matthew 2:14, merely says (of Joseph): “When he arose, he took the young child and his mother by night, and departed into Egypt”.^[8] This account was embellished in various early New Testament apocrypha, which added various legendary incidents. Late medieval accounts continued to add detail, in particular the Vita Christi of Ludolph of Saxony, completed about 1374, just a few years before the time that the first artistic depiction of the Rest is found. This includes a description of Mary breastfeeding, which is found in Meister Bertram’s Grabow Altarpiece, the first known painting.^[9] Ludolph also mentions the journey passing “through dark and uninhabited forests, and by very long routes past rough and deserted places to Egypt”,^[10] setting the tone for the great majority of the landscape settings throughout the history of the depiction, though the trees usually clear sufficiently to allow a distant view. The Rest on the Flight into Egypt of the “Holy Refugees” give us all the elements to meditate on our path  to migration.

• Migration of the “Refugee”

• Pilgrimage as a Theme for the “Refugee”
  

Therefore we who are pilgrims in this world—for we have no permanent city, but we seek one that is to come—if we have within ourselves in a spiritual sense the things that those pilgrims had, the Lord will be a companion on our journey.

The Exercises themselves can be seen as an interior pilgrimage, a structured journey with times of consolation, when the way seems clear, alternating with others of desolation, where the exercitant seems to be in the wilderness. Moments of isolation and reunion follow one another.

Follow the Bird:

Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? Matthew 6:26

Be quiet as the child Moses , trust the basket/ coffin and follow God:

“Do you have a right to be angry about the vine?”

1 But Jonah was greatly displeased and became angry. 2 He prayed to the LORD, “O LORD, is this not what I said when I was still at home? That is why I was  so quick to flee to Tarshish. I knew that you are a gracious and compassionate God, slow to anger and abounding in love, a God who relents from sending calamity. 3 Now, O LORD, take away my life, for it is better for me to die than to live.” 4 But the LORD replied, “Have you any right to be angry?” 5 Jonah went out and sat down at a place east of the city. There he made himself a shelter, sat in its shade and waited to see what would happen to the city. 6 Then the LORD God provided a vine and made it grow up over Jonah to give shade for his head to ease his discomfort, and Jonah was very happy about the vine. 7 But at dawn the next day God provided a worm, which chewed the vine so that it withered. 8 When the sun rose, God provided a scorching east wind, and the sun blazed on Jonah’s head so that he grew faint. He wanted to die, and said, “It would be better for me to die than to live.” 9 But God said to Jonah, “Do you have a right to be angry about the vine?”       “I do,” he said. “I am angry enough to die.” 10 But the LORD said, “You have been concerned about this vine, though you did not tend it or make it grow. It sprang up overnight and died overnight. 11 But Nineveh has more than a hundred and twenty thousand people who cannot tell their right hand from their left, and many cattle as well. Should I not be concerned about that great city?” JONAH IV

DIVINE Mercy had warned and preserved the great city of NIneveh, but the narrow-hearted prophet Jonah was disappointed and angry. He would rather his consistency had been maintained, although a whole people had perished. He had gone to the outside of Nineveh. He made a small booth to shield him from the hot rays of the sun, and watched and waited to see what would be the fate of the city. The day was hot, and the prophet vexed, fretful, and weary. After one day thus spent, during the night there grew up a plant of the melon or calabash kind, with green wide-spreading leaves, and this gave an agreeable shelter to the prophet for another day. Another night came, and as it passed into morning the gourd, so grateful to the heat-harassed prophet, was seen to have lost its vigour; it was blighted by a worm, and no longer lent its pleasant shade. It was dead. Fainting beneath the breath of the hot wind, the prophet wished to die. He was disappointed and forlorn; he could see no use in his life. He was despairing, and sighed to quit his post. Like many a weary soul deficient in faith, he had not yet learned submission and confidence, and pined and prayed that his toil and his life might end, as if He who gives our life, and saves our future, did not best know the time, place, and way in which to draw it to a close. Read more here

Gourds were a sacred symbol among Abraham’s Habiru (Hebrew) people. They represented fertility, new life, the arousal of God (whose emblem was the sun), and the rising of the sun in the east. Gourds carved into cedar decorated the inner sanctuary of the temple.

The house, that is, the nave in front of the inner sanctuary, was forty cubits long. There was cedar on the house within, carved in the shape of gourds and open flowers; all was cedar, there was no stone seen. 1 Kings 6:18

Gourds also decorated the bronze sea, a circular basin which held a supply of water for ritual use.

Now he made the sea of cast metal ten cubits from brim to brim, circular in form, and its height was five cubits, and thirty cubits in circumference. Under its brim gourds went around encircling it ten to a cubit, completely surrounding the sea; the gourds were in two rows, cast with the rest. It stood on twelve oxen, three facing north, three facing west, three facing south, and three facing east; and the sea was set on top of them… 1 Kings 7:24

In the story of Jonah, the LORD prepares a gourd plant to shelter Jonah. This pleases Jonah, but a worm destroys the plant. The gourd represents the new life to be enjoyed by the people of Ninevah after repentance and deliverance from destruction. The worm is Jonah’s bitterness that his enemies should be saved, just as he feared, knowing that the LORD is gracious and merciful.

The LORD said, “Do you have good reason to be angry?” Then Jonah went out from the city and sat east of it. There he made a shelter for himself and sat under it in the shade until he could see what would happen in the city. So the LORD God appointed a plant and it grew up over Jonah to be a shade over his head to deliver him from his discomfort. And Jonah was extremely happy about the plant.… Jonah 4:4-6

Anger (Ira) by Brueghel

The gourd is a solar symbol. As it matures, the gourd swells. It is a reference to the Creator God whose emblem, the sun, swells as it rises in the morning. There is a connection to the ancient Egyptian root bn, meaning to swell, and to the the Proto-Dravidian root brih, which means to swell or enlarge. The Egyptian word for the rising sun is wbn, and that which is enlarged or swollen to its limits is designated by the reduplication bnbn.

•  The City of Idols
  

In Pseudo-Matthew (ch. 22-24) when the family arrives in Egypt in a city called Sotinen all the idols in the land fall to the ground and shatter, whereupon that city’s governor and people are so impressed that they come to believe “in the Lord God through Jesus Christ.” There are similar accounts of this incident in The Arabic Gospel of the Infancy of the Savior (¶10-11), the Speculum Ecclesiae (837) and the Golden Legend (#10), and we see it illustrated from time to time in the art (example).

• Why You Should Not Idolize All People:

Don’t change the world in hopes of changing yourself,

change yourself so the world changes because of you.

This is the mistake of the west, in its morally bankrupt history and its many notable figures it has come to idolise just about any person who has achieved something in life, while people should be acknowledged for their work that is different from placing them in a position to nurture your society from, the west is clearly lacking insight into the implications of raising people of questionable morality above them, or not, its leaders may perfectly understand who they want you to emulate and its results.

• A Meat Stall with the Holy Family Giving Alms

It concerns the Netherlandish artist Pieter Aertsen, a religious painter. When the sacred figurative art began to be contested and destroyed by an extreme Protestant iconoclasm, he changed his residence town and converted his works into genre scene. Very strange ones, indeed, since a scrupulous spectator can discern small holy scenes dissimulated in the background.

His Butcher’s Stall with the Flight into Egypt or A Meat Stall with the Holy Family Giving Alms, which we have in two copies (1551; Uppsala University Art Collection and North Carolina Museum of Art, Raleigh) is the most ever disconcerting “Flight into Egypt”.

Rather than versus a certain religious confession, it looks the cryptic protest of an autonomous art, against whatever human foolishness and violence.

Terra Documentary 2015

A visually stunning documentary that reflects human’s relationship to other species on Earth as humanity becomes more and more isolated from Nature.

What, when adopted by Aertsen, might appear an expedient, became a full invention in the works of his nephew Joachim Beuckelaer. He depicted two “Flights into Egypt”. Now in the Rockox House at Antwerp, the former is more traditional.

In the latter, titled The Four Element: Earth. A Fruit and Vegetable Market with the Flight into Egypt in the Background (1560; National Gallery, London), the author develops his uncle’s lesson into a not less striking allegory.

In the composition, we have three levels: a still life, in the foreground; some figures of peasant women and men, in the middle; a country landscape, with the detail of the Holy Family on a bridge across a stream, in the rear on the left. Despite all, between nature and humankind the sacred mystery survived as a subdued link. That is an anomalous example, of what is conventionally called “inverted perspective”. If we consider it well, not a few things on earth do not happen otherwise…

This “inverted perspective” changes the traditional wisdom of man and it opens the door to the modern perpective of earthly knowledge and wisdom being cut off from his Divine Source.

Patinir, Pieter Aertsen, Brueghel were living in the same period and try to find a way to show us what was wrong in their society: Vanity of earthly knowledge

In Revelation Vanity is represented by the Whore of Babylon. On earth this woman here represents all the pride of the world, all the temptations that we are constantly confronted with in our daily lives and to which we often succumb or the woman with the venom of the earthly senses (the serpent), but nature’s love (the earth) comes to her assistance.

In Chapter 13 the beast from the sea is depraved evil come to kill all virtues in the human heart. It derives its strength from the dragon, the poison of earthly wisdom, while the beast with two horns like a lamb and speaking like a dragon is hypocritical earthly holiness in the flesh which prevents the simple soul from’praying to God (the mark on the right hand or the forehead). The number of the beast is the whole of humanity.

Babylón is interpreted as the confusion of earthly senses; the Whore is false earthly wisdom, her golden jewels hypocritical holiness and the cup fuIl of abominations the carnal appetites.

The beast with seven heads is the evil caused by earthly knowledge and wisdom and its rule on earth; its seven heads are the doctrines of earthly wisdom and the seven kings are personal vindictiveness under the guise of holiness.

Ego rules the world: Anti-“God”, Anti-“Humanity”, Anti-“Nature

The story of the Tower of Babel (like that in The Suicide of Saul, Bruegel’s only other painting with an Old Testament subject) was interpreted as an example of pride punished, and that is no doubt what Bruegel intended his painting to illustrate. Moreover, the hectic activity of the engineers, masons and workmen points to a second moral: the futility of much human endeavour. Nimrod’s doomed building was used to illustrate this meaning in Sebastian Brant’s Ship of Fools. More about the tower of Babel here

There is a real reason Muslims deliberately follow a sunnah and only raise in esteem above them saintly people, it is because you imitate those you idolise, you make them the vision you take from spiritually in hopes that your society as a whole maintains a moral standard.

In the Gospel of Thomas Jesus says: “Whoever finds the meaning of these words will not tate (spiritual) death.” He said to them, “You examine the face of heaven and earth (the outward, the physical), but you have not come to know the one who is in your presence, and you do not know how to examine the present moment (your reality, your stateof your soul).”

Our civilization is in decay. Because we have blown-up our ego. Cosmic Balance has been disturbed. The painting “Dulle Griet”of the great painter Bruegel express very clearly the Crisis of Modern man and his Rebellion against his Soul:

….In the Spiritual Land of Peace:

In the Spiritual Land of Peace all the Idols are becoming “petrified” converted into stone through a suddenly process of disintegration. This process in your mind can sometimes go slowly, sometimes quikly…

Near the Virgin we see a clolapsed statue of a Idol , above the ball we can see two little feet on it..

… It depends of the sturburness of our Ego, the Donkey.

In the Spiritual Land of Peace, the donkey, our ego is quiet, he submits totally to the “Holy Refugee” and  eats the “Greenness” of the spiritual field of the Land watered by the Eternal Water of Life….

…He is even smiling…

It depends also how we feed our  Reason, here reprensented by Joseph, ( meaning ‘to add; to increase”). Reason is the capacity of consciously making sense of things, applying logic, and adapting or justifying practices, institutions, and beliefs based on new or existing information. The original Greek term was “λόγος” logos, the root of the modern English word “logic” but also a word which could mean for example “speech” or “explanation” or an “account” (of money handled). As a philosophical term logos was translated in its non-linguistic senses in Latin as ratio.

Hildegard of Bingen says  in her commentary on the Prologue of St John:

“In the beginning was the Word( Logos) , and the Word was with God, and the Word was God” John 1-1

“For we are the image of God, Hildegard tells us, and if we wish to see God we need look no further than our souls and bodies, ourselves and our neighbors.”

Few of us have been blinded by the reverberating light of Christ or seen the shimmering form of Lady Wisdom spinning her cosmic wheel. But then, we do not need to: For we are the image of God, Hildegard tells us, and if we wish to see God we need look no further than our souls and bodies, ourselves and our neighbors. “God willed that his Word should create all things, as he had foreordained before the ages. And why is it called a Word? Because with a resounding voice it awakened all creatures and called them to itself.” In the same way, human beings, formed in the Creator’s likeness, are inescapably creative, for we work with our hands and command with our voices. “What was made in the Word was life”: Like our Creator, we too live by the works that we create. By our making, we reveal ourselves to ourselves, and, what is more, we reveal God to one another. God’s rational word echoes in our speech, his praise resounds in our songs, and his creativity is declared in our creations.

“The living Light that made us is the singing Word that took our flesh; he made us because we were eternally his and he wished to be revealed as ours. We are his mirrors, his marvels, his fellow workers, and the work of his hands.” Read HILDEGARD’S COMMENTARY ON THE JOHANNINE PROLOGUE

This word is to compared to the Islamic expression “kun faya Kun”

Kun (كن) is an Arabic word for the act of “manifesting“, “existing” or “being” and consisting of the letters Kaph and Nun (letter). In the Qur’an, Allah commands the universe to “be” (“kun!” كن!), so that it is (fa-yakūnu فيكون).

Kun fa-yakūnu has its reference in the Quran cited as a symbol or sign of God’s mystical creative power. The verse is from the Quranic chapter, Surah Ya-Sin. The context in which the words kun fa-yakūnu appear in the 36th Chapter, verse number 82:

Does man not consider that We created him from a [mere] sperm-drop – then at once he is an open disputant? And he presents an (argument of) likeness for Us and forgets his own creation. He asks (in confusion): “Who will give life to the bones when they are disintegrated?” Say: “He will give life to them Who brought them into existence at first, and He is cognizant of all creation.” He Who has made for you, from the green tree, fire. and then from it you kindle (fire). Is not He Who created the heavens and the earth able to create the like of them? Yes Indeed! and He is the Superb Creator (of all), the Ever-Knowing. Surely His Command, when He wills a thing, is only to say to it: Be! and it is!” Therefore glory be to Him in Whose hand is the Kingdom of all things, and to Him you shall be brought back.

“Be, and it is” (كن فيكون kun fa-yakūnu) is a phrase that occurs several times in the Qur’an, referring to creation by Allah. In Arabic the imperative verb be (kun) is spelled with the letters kāf and nūn.^[1]

•  The Miraculous Wheat Field 
  Among these is the story of the miraculous field of wheat, which sprang up instantly to a height sufficient to hide the Holy Family from Herod’s pursuing troops.

According to this legend, when Herod’s soldiers question peasants about when the Holy Family passed, they respond truthfully that it was when they were sowing the wheat, which is now full height. What the soldiers do not know is that at the very recent passing of the Holy Family, the freshly sown wheat had suddenly and miraculously grown.

A perfect example of “kun faya Kun”: “Be! and it is!”

Jung coined the word “synchronicity” to describe “temporally coincident occurrences of acausal events.” In his book Synchronicity: An Acausal Connecting Principle, Jung wrote:

How are we to recognize acausal combinations of events, since it is obviously impossible to examine all chance happenings for their causality? The answer to this is that acausal events may be expected most readily where, on closer reflection, a causal connection appears to be inconceivable.

In his book Synchronicity: An Acausal Connecting Principle, Jung wrote^:

…it is impossible, with our present resources, to explain ESP, or the fact of meaningful coincidence, as a phenomenon of energy. This makes an end of the causal explanation as well, for “effect” cannot be understood as anything except a phenomenon of energy. Therefore it cannot be a question of cause and effect, but of a falling together in time, a kind of simultaneity. Because of this quality of simultaneity, I have picked on the term “synchronicity” to designate a hypothetical factor equal in rank to causality as a principle of explanation.

• The Massacre of the Innocents
  

In the New Testament, the Massacre of the Innocents is the incident in the nativity narrative of the Gospel of Matthew (2:16–18) in which Herod the Great, king of Judea, orders the execution of all male children two years old and under in the vicinity of Bethlehem

• The Innocents be called innocents for three reasons.

First, by cause and reason of life, and by reason of pain, and by reason of innocence.

 By reason of life they be said innocents because they had an innocent life. They grieved nobody, neither God, by inobedience, nor their neighbours by untruth, nor by conceiving of any sin, and therefore it is said in the psalter:

The innocents and righteous have joined them to me.

The innocents by their life and righteousness in the faith, by reason of pain, for they suffered death innocently and wrongly, whereof David saith:

They have shed the blood of innocents by reason of innocency.

That they had, because that in this martyrdom they were baptized and made clean of the original sin, of which innocence is said in the psalter:

Keep thou innocency of baptism and see equity of good works.

A world that has seen children fall victim to genocide and young male prisoners in the Balkans and Africa systematically massacred lest they someday swell the ranks of fighters cannot find the story of Herod’s deeds at Bethlehem unbelievable. A government’s fury unleashed indiscriminately on a village and the surrounding countryside, a family escaping to become political refugees in a foreign land: these are very modern images, or perhaps ageless ones.

‘Receive, we pray, into the arms of your mercy all innocent victims;

and by your great might frustrate the designs of evil tyrants

and establish your rule of justice, love and peace.”

Massacre of the Innocents (Bruegel)

Having compared the figure dressed in black at the centre of the Massacre of the Innocents in Vienna to portraits Duke of Alba,  critics concluded that there is a peculiar and compelling likeness between the two. Consequently, they concluded that Bruegel placed a recognisable portrait of Alba in the Massacre to draw analogies between the biblical Herod’s hubris, who ordered the execution of all the babies in Bethlehem following the birth of Christ, and the Habsburg dynasties’ similarly pitiless efforts to retain a Catholic grip on the Low Countries.

Furthermore, although the original Massacre has suffered extensive overpainting done between 1604 and ’21, these are unlikely to have altered the appearance of the horseback figure because this campaign was targeted at disguising the bodies of the murdered babies.

In our time the secular celebration of Christmas, which begins to wind down immediately after Christmas Day and is definitely over by January 1, is a week of vacation, of partying and shopping for bargains.

Instead, the Church turns our attention in the days after Christmas to teaching us something else, that Christmas is not a happy fairy tale, although there is a happy ending in the Resurrection.  During the octave of Christmas (the time between Christmas Day and the feast of Mary, Mother of God on January 1) the Church reminds us that faith in the Child born in Bethlehem has consequences.   She invites us to consider some of those martyrs who have surrendered their lives in devotion to Christ. 

On December 26^th the Church celebrates the feast of the first Christian martyr, St. Stephen, killed shortly after the Pentecost, while the Church was still a small group of disciples in Jerusalem.   On the 27^th we celebrate the feast day of the Evangelist John, who survived martyrdom to die of old age.  On December 29^th we celebrate the feast of St. Thomas Becket, murdered in his own cathedral because of a dispute with King Henry II over the proper roles of Church and State.  And on December 28^th the Church celebrates the feast of the very first martyrs, the baby boys of Bethlehem, killed at the order of Herod the Great in his attempt to kill a potential rival: The Massacre of the Innocents

The Holy Innocents – Nearly Forgotten Baby Martyrs

Golden Legend – History of the Holy Innocents

–  The Parable of the Tares:

The Parable of the Tares (also known as the Parable of the Weeds, Parable of the Wheat and Tares, Parable of the Wheat and Weeds, or the Parable of the Weeds in the Grain) is a parable of Jesus which appears in Matthew 13:24-13:30. The parable relates how servants eager to pull up the tares were warned that in so doing they would root out the wheat as well and were told to let both grow together until the harvest. According to the interpretation supplied in Matthew 13:36-13:43, the parable’s meaning is that the “sons of the evil one” (the tares or weeds) will be separated from the “sons of the kingdom” (the wheat) at “the end of the age” (the harvest) by angels. This is usually taken to refer to the separation of the unsaved sinners from the saved believers during the Last Judgment. A shorter, compressed version of the parable is found without any interpretation in the apocryphal Gospel of Thomas.

Analysis

The word translated “tares” in the King James Version is ζιζάνια (zizania), plural of ζιζάνιον (zizanion). This word is thought to mean darnel (Lolium temulentum),^[2][3] a ryegrass which looks much like wheat in its early stages of growth.^[4] Roman law prohibited sowing darnel among the wheat of an enemy,^[4][5] suggesting that the scenario presented here is realistic.^[6] Many translations use “weeds” instead of “tares”.

A similar metaphor is wheat and chaff, replacing (growing) tares by (waste) chaff, and in other places in the Bible “wicked ones” are likened to chaff.

The word “zizanie” in French designates a discord and a disagreement between people or in a group. “semer la zizanie” = to sow discord.
Example: Everything was going well until Bertrand came to sow discord.
Synonyms: scramble, discord, division, clash, disagreement, misunderstanding

An eschatological interpretation^[6] is provided by Jesus in Matthew 13:36-13:43:

Then Jesus sent the multitudes away, and went into the house. His disciples came to him, saying, “Explain to us the parable of the darnel weeds of the field.” He answered them, “He who sows the good seed is the Son of Man, the field is the world; and the good seed, these are the children of the Kingdom; and the darnel weeds are the children of the evil one. The enemy who sowed them is the devil. The harvest is the end of the age, and the reapers are angels. As therefore the darnel weeds are gathered up and burned with fire; so will it be at the end of this age. The Son of Man will send out his angels, and they will gather out of his Kingdom all things that cause stumbling, and those who do iniquity, and will cast them into the furnace of fire. There will be weeping and the gnashing of teeth. Then the righteous will shine forth like the sun in the Kingdom of their Father. He who has ears to hear, let him hear.

— Matthew 13:36-43, World English Bible

•  – We come back to the Rebel in the Soul: An Ancient Egyptian Dialogue Between a Man and His Destiny

“The man’s soul tells him that men of greater value than he have suffered from the world, and advises him to gain an insight from his attitude and search to overcome his despair.

 It tells him about  the “mythical field of  transformations”

…both the field  AND  the plough are to be found within mankind.

The field is the ground – the earth, where the soul of the man dwells, and is to be cultivated by the plougher.

The harvest is what is then offered back to the soul. The “harvest”, what is left of the man after his life, is in dangerous hands if left uncultivated.

It is exposed to a “storm from the North” said to indicate the Head.. the storm is consciousness threatened by intellectual rebellion.

This mythical field of transformation,  Become the place of theophany.

 It ‘is what Rumi calls the spiritual resurrection: “The Universal Soul is in contact with the part of the soul and the latter has received from her a pearl and she puts it in her bosom. Due  to  this touch of her bosom, the individual soul has become pregnant, like Mary, of a Messiah ravishing the heart. Not the messiah who travel by land and sea, but the Messiah who is beyond the limitations of space! So when the soul has been fertilized by the soul of the soul, then the world is fertilized by such a soul .

More info about Rebel in the Soul: An Ancient Egyptian Dialogue Between a Man and His Destiny , Translation by Bika Reed here

• The best example of the Plougher is St George the Martyr

George is said of geos, which is as much to say as earth, and orge that is tilling. So George is to say as tilling the earth, that is his flesh. And St. Austin saith, in Libro de Trinitate that, good earth is in the height of the mountains, in the temperance of the valleys, and in the plain of the fields. The first is good for herbs being green, the second to vines, and the third to wheat and corn.

Thus the blessed George was high in despising low things, and therefore he had verdure in himself, he was attemperate by discretion, and therefore he had wine of gladness, and within he was plane of humility, and thereby put he forth wheat of good works.

Or George may be said of gerar, that is holy, and of gyon, that is a wrestler, that is an holy wrestler, for he wrestled with the dragon.

Or George is said of gero, that is a pilgrim, and gir, that is detrenched out, and ys, that is a councillor. He was a pilgrim in the sight of the world, and he was cut and detrenched by the crown of martyrdom, and he was a good councillor in preaching. Read more here

• Asking St George his Intercession, protection

he Prayer to Saint George directly refers to the courage it took for the saint to confess his Belief before opposing authority:

Prayers of Intercession to Saint George:

Faithful servant of God and invincible martyr, Saint George; favored by God with the gift of faith, and inflamed with an ardent love of Christ, thou didst fight valiantly against the dragon of pride, falsehood, and deceit.

Neither pain nor torture, sword nor death could part thee from the love of Christ. I fervently implore thee for the sake of this love to help me by thy intercession to overcome the temptations that surround me, and to bear bravely the trials that oppress me, so that I may patiently carry the cross which is placed upon me; and let neither distress nor difficulties separate me from the love of Our Lord Jesus Christ. Valiant champion of the Faith, assist me in the combat against evil, that I may win the crown promised to them that persevere unto the end.

O God! You are the Bestower of favours. No one has favour over You. O Possessor of Majesty and Nobility, You are the One Who constantly bestows His bounties. There is no deity other thanYou. You are the One who grants safety and refuge to those that seek it and to those in fear.  We ask You to remove all tribulations, those that we know and those that we do not know and those about which You know more, for truly You are the Most Mighty, the Most Generous. ( From the Prayer on  Bara’a Night )

look here Celebrations of St George’s Say all over the world  

and the Patronages of Saint George all over the world

• The iconography of dragon slaying

The iconography of dragon slaying. To begin with, one must observe that in this Christian iconography, the dragon is not dead but is rather being transfixed by the weapon of the saint. The young Knight is the ideal, noble, and perfect man whose hospitality and generosity would extend until he had nothing left for himself; a man who would give all, including his life, for the sake of his friends.

The Lady, representing his Soul, is looking at him and keep a leach in her handand attached to the dragon, but  is not affected by the dragon of the ego. When the Knight succeeds they shall be reunite again on the path of Love and Wisdom.

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On the ground to the left of the psalmist is a mother suckling her child (verse 2).

To right and left are groups of the Israelites ( verse 3). The right-hand group is armed

“ Like a weaned child smiling to its mother,  weaned is my soul.”

“What is the good if Mary gave birth to the Son of God 2000* years ago, if I do not give birth to God today? We are all Mothers of God, for God is always needing to be born.” – Meister Eckhart (14^th century German mystic) *adapted for present day

“I must be the Virgin and give birth to God.” –Angelus Silesius (17th century German mystic)

What does it mean to birth the holy in our own lives? In times of great uncertainty and suffering, how might be we bearers of the divine?

What wisdom does Mary, as the face of the sacred feminine in the Christian tradition, offer to us?

Each of us is called to participate in bringing God to birth in the world. We each hear our own annunciations and invitations to enflesh the sacred creative call of our hearts in service to others. The season of Advent invites us into a profound reflection on this invitation and the movement toward birthing as well as offer us archetypal themes that call us to take our creativity seriously.

This is the call of our times: to birth the holy in the midst of our lives, wherever we find ourselves. This is not something that waits until we have more time or space or money. We birth the holy right here, right now.

Birthing is a messy process with lots of unknowns along the way. Birthing the holy demands that we release control and let the journey take us where it will. This is a practice of cultivating trust in the organic unfolding of my life. If I make space to listen to the deep desires of my heart and I follow those, not knowing exactly where they will take me, I find myself being led to beautiful and exhilarating landscapes.

We hear of “birthing pains” because there is a physical and spiritual stretching apart as we make way for unleashing new life into the world. The poet David Whyte writes “What you can plan is too small for you to live.” The real adventure of life begins when I release my own plans and allow myself to birth what is being brought forth within me.

During this time that we wait for God’s coming enfleshed, we are called to pay close attention to our dreams, those nighttime visions that come to show us something new. An angel appeared in a dream to Joseph to tell him to wed Mary even though she was already pregnant. We listen for what holy invitations are being whispered to our own hearts that might seem hard to believe in the scrutiny of daylight.

God comes into the world through dreams of daring to break through perceived boundaries. We need the grace of Advent’s darkness to receive them. Mary walks alongside of us as the carrier of a lamp, as the opening to wisdom and grace, as the one who was called to say yes.

• The ‘dying to oneself’ in order to be ‘reborn from above’

[The Pilgrim) perceiving that these abominations of desolation do stand in the place where Gods Holy Beeing ought to stand [must] immediately flie out of the same and submit himself under the obedience of Love, and not have any regard any more to the Knowledg of Good and Evil, nor to Boasting of the Knowledge, nor to Assured Knowledg, nor to Presumption, nor yet to Unfaithfulness. [And thus he frees himself from] bondage to Bitterness, the king of that detestable land. From In TERRA PACIS  by Hendrik Niclaes of the Family of Love,

(The Pilgrim) must at the end of his journey find himself altogether turned about.

Hendrik Niclaes is making it quite clear that there can be no half measures for seekers on the spiritual path. To be ‘altogether turned about’ is nothing less than the ‘dying to oneself’ in order to be ‘reborn from above’ that is taught in all traditions. He refers here to the necessarily arduous methods of spiritual work, symbolized in the text as ‘the Compass’, ‘the Cross’ and ‘Patience’. As “The Rest on the Flight into Egypt” , the “rest” place is  a place where  the dead people are buried. The word cemetery (from Greek κοιμητήριον, “sleeping place”. It is the place of Transformation where the “old man” is left behind and the “new man” is born.

Psalm 130

Song to the twinkling heights,

Out of the deepest darkness clangs my cry for You, O Eternal One:

 Master, hear my voice! Lend Your benevolent ear to my call for mercy.

 If You would not pay the debt , Yah  my Master, Who would be exalted?

 For from You comes the outstretched hand of forgiveness, for which every one trembles with fear.

 My soul awaits in hopes of waiting for the Eternal, .

 And in His Word is my desire.

 My soul expects the Master,

More than before dawn ,the guards expect dawn.

 Thirst for the Eternal, Israel

For becoming one with the Eternal is full grace,

And union with Him complete redemption.

Only He Delivered Israel from All His Iniquity!

• The Twice Born Man

Born again, or to experience the new birth, is a phrase that refers to “spiritual rebirth”, or a regeneration of the human spirit.

The term is derived from an event in the Gospel of John in which the words of Jesus were not understood by a Jewish pharisee, Nicodemus.

Jesus replied, “Very truly I tell you, no one can see the kingdom of God unless they are born again.” “How can someone be born when they are old?” Nicodemus asked. “Surely they cannot enter a second time into their mother’s womb to be born!” Jesus answered, “Very truly I tell you, no one can enter the kingdom of God unless they are born of water and the Spirit.”

— Gospel of John, chapter 3, verses 3–5, NIV

The final use of the phrase occurs in the First Epistle of Peter, rendered in the King James Version as:

Seeing ye have purified your souls in obeying the truth through the Spirit unto unfeigned love of the brethren, [see that ye] love one another with a pure heart fervently: / Being born again, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible, by the word of God, which liveth and abideth for ever.^{[1 Peter 1:22-23]}

Here, the Greek word translated as “born again” is ἀναγεγεννημένοι (anagegennēménoi).^[9]

Dvija

Dvija (Sanskrit: द्विज) means “twice-born” in ancient Indian Sanskrit.) The concept is premised on the belief that a person is first born physically and at a later date is born for a second time spiritually, usually when he undergoes the ritual of passage that initiates him into the wisdom of Life.The term also refers to members of the three varnas in the traditional Hindu social system, or social classes — the Brahmins (priests and teachers), Kshatriyas (warriors), and Vaishyas (merchants) — whose Sanskara of Upanayana initiation was regarded as a second or spiritual birth.

Read more here

Note: Twice Born Man  is to be find in the African Tradition as Ubuntu: Ubuntu (Zulu pronunciation: [ùɓúntʼù])^[1] is a Nguni Bantu term meaning “humanity.” It is often translated as “I am because we are,” or “humanity towards others,” or in Xhosa, “umntu ngumntu ngabantu” but is often used in a more philosophical sense to mean “the belief in a universal bond of sharing that connects all humanity.

Traditional education system, still in use in our time by the Xhosa, where Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela was born to the Thembu royal family in Mvezo can help to revover our humanity as the  Rites of passage used fort he youth

In his remarkable book, Clyde Ford restores to us the lost treasure of African mythology, bringing to life the ancient tales and showing why they matter so much to us today.

African myths convey the perennial wisdom of humanity: the creation of the world, the hero’s journey, our relationship with nature, death, and resurrection.  From the Ashanti comes the moving account of the grief-stricken Kwasi Benefo’s journey to the underworld to seek his beloved wives.  From Uganda we learn of the legendary Kintu, who won the love of a goddess and created a nation from a handful of isolated clans.  The Congo’s epic hero Mwindo is the sacred warrior who shows us the path each person must travel to discover his true destiny.These and other important African myths show us the history of African Americans in a new light–as a hero’s journey, a courageous passage to a hard-won victory.  The Hero with an African Face enriches us all by restoring this vital tradition to the world. Here free downoad.

• The Virgin Mary and the Lime Tree

The Virgin Mary is often represented asThe woman clothed with the sun, and with the moon under her feet in Chapter 12 of Revelation. As Bruegel and the Family of Love see it:  She is the love of God.
We find her often associated with the Lime tree.The lime tree was traditionally a sacred and magical tree. Lime trees were often found at three-way junctions. Mostly these places were old cult places that later became Christianized and in which a little chapel was hung.In other places one finds the lime as a court tree, the tree under which the  Vierschaar sat.

A Vierschaar is a historical term for a tribunal in the Netherlands. Before the separation of lawmaking, law enforcement, and justice duties, the government of every town was administered by a senate (called a Wethouderschap) formed of two, three, or sometimes four burgomasters, and a certain number of sheriffs (called Schepenen), so that the number of sitting judges was generally seven. The term Vierschaar means literally “foursquare”, so called from the four-square dimensions of the benches in use by the sitting judges. The four benches for the judges were placed in a square with the defendant in the middle. This area was roped off and the term vierschaar refers to the ropes.The Dutch expression “vierchaar spannen” refers to the tightening or raising of these ropes before the proceedings could begin. (Accompanied by the question whether the sun is high enough, ‘hoog genoeg op de dag‘, since the practice stems from the Middle Ages when these trials were held outdoors.) Most towns had the Vierschaar privilege to hear their own disputes, and the meeting room used for this was usually located in the town hall. Many historic town halls still have such a room, usually decorated with scenes from the Judgment of Solomon.Later it has been tranmsformed in great and impressive buildings as The Palace of the Dam in Amsterdam

The lime tree was the symbol of civil liberty and often we see lime trees as liberty trees in the village centers.We know from the annals that the dukes of Brabant took their oath under a lime tree. The lime leaf represents truth and sincerity and many countries have a linden tree or linden leaf in their shield.This is the case, for example, in the Czech Republic. In former Prussia, the lime blossom was the national flower. Linden was also known as a witch tree. In the popular belief, witches, nymphs and ghosts hid in the bark and in the armpits. It was considered dangerous to go past old lime trees during the night, because then one could be ridden by a witch.That is why they used to hang chapels and they became “chapel trees” that the evil powers no longer had any control over. In chapel trees, deceived girls came knocking nails while under the effigy of the Blessed Virgin pampering and blaming their ex-lovers. This form of fetishism is called “nailing”.

As the oak is the symbol of strength, courage and fame, the linden symbolizes desire, love and tenderness. It is therefore not difficult to understand that the linden tree is the Mary tree par excellence and so many statues of Mary and Mary shrines are situated in or in the vicinity of a linden tree.

It is not just that this chapel is called “Our Lady under the Linden”. The linden is a sacred tree associated with the goddess. In the Dutch language, linden is female. Strangely enough, this is also the only tree that is female with us. Anyway, in Norse mythology, the linden tree was dedicated to the goddess Freya (there is a reason that there is a linden tree on the Kattenberg in Heiloo) and among the Slavic peoples to the love goddess Krasogani. In legends and fairy tales, the lime tree is considered to be the home of the white or wise woman. Romantic poets felt that this tree once had a religious significance. Often a lime tree stood near a well in the middle of a village. It was once the center of folk festivals. Many madonna statues are made of the soft lime wood. Sometimes Mary figurines are attached to a lime tree. So the linden is connected to Mary, our Lady, with the Goddess.

This custom is still alive as we see in Uden ( the Netherlands)

• “Onze Lieve Vrouw ter Linde” –Our Dear  Lady under  the Linden in Uden ( the Netherlands)

“Our Lady of the Linden returns to its roots in Uden. Next month, a lime tree will be planted near the Crosier Chapel in Uden, depicting Mother Mary. Just like before”. May 2019

With the tree and the statue, the chapel community honors the basis of the Maria worship in Uden. This is exactly where the centuries-long worship of Mother Mary in Uden started. As early as the thirteenth century, a Virgin’s chapel stood here. Initially no more than a statue in or near a lime tree – hence the lime tree – but documents from 1358 show that there is already an Osse pastor who keeps this chapel.
Pilgrimage:
The worship of Mary really takes off when the Kruisheren are driven from Den Bosch and in 1648 decide to build a monastery in Uden. Initially this is on the Veghelsedijk, the monastery where the Birgittinesses still live, later they move to what is now the Kruisheren chapel and the monastery.Centuries ago people from all over the country go on a pilgrimage to Uden:People from all over the country, as far as Amsterdam, go on a pilgrimage to Uden. In its heyday, there are seventy processions per year, in 1786 30.000 pilgrims are given Holy Communion. The fact that at least nine miracles are attributed to OL Vrouw ter Linde will certainly have contributed to this. The annual holiday of OL Vrouw ter Linde is on October 23.The original statue of OL Vrouw ter Linde is housed at the Museum of Religious Art in Uden for security reasons. That is the famous wooden, gold-colored statue from circa 1520. The museum also shows all kinds of gifts that pilgrims have given to Mary over the centuries. The stone statue of OL Vrouw ter Linde, dating from 1400-1500, is located in the vault of the Heritage Center of Dutch Monastic Life in Sint Agatha.

With the tree and the statue, the chapel community honors the basis of the Maria worship in Uden. This is exactly where the centuries-long worship of Mother Mary in Uden started. As early as the thirteenth century, a Virgin’s chapel stood here.In the time of Bruegel the Lime tree was branding:In 2019 the Lime Tree and The Virgin Mary as Love of God come again to live!Prior to the blessing, there was a celebration of the Eucharist in the chapel that revolved around the great importance of Mary as a “humble but strong woman.” Everybody was happy with the return of the tree as it stood in front of the chapel for centuries and which resulted in well-attended pilgrimages to Uden.
The new tree is the great achievement of artist Ine van Grinsven. She also made replicas of the famous statue of the Virgin Mary. One was placed at the roots of the tree when it was planted in February. The other is attached to the trunk and, if it is good, will be absorbed by the trunk as ever, the original.
The tree of faith, a 50-year-old lime tree, is made up of three layers: the bottom layer symbolizes all people together, the second layer the group of leaders – from politicians and artists to priests – and in the top God the almighty.

Explaining the spiritual meaning of the Apocalypse Hiël from the Family of Loves says:“For a time the love of God lies hidden in the depraved heart of man (the woman in the wilderness), but it is lighted by the hope of faith (the one thousand two hundred and sixty days) until it reaches the heavenly sun of God’s righteousness.

…..Finally, when the heart of man (God’s temple) is opened in heaven and the hidden bond of God (the ark) is seen and felt in the soul, the earthly nature will tremble as if stricken by an earthquake and a tempest will destroy all earthly senses, lusts and thoughts”.

Our dear Lady Ter Linde

For centuries you have smiled at us, O Lady of Our Lady,

and you never tire of listening to those who trust you;

Everyone is welcome here with his sorrows, his pains and his worries;

you are always ready with your comfort from the early morning.

The little child, whom you tenderly bear, turns his face to us,

and when you ask, give to everyone the riches of His blessing;

with his little hand it shows us the book of comfort and peace,

the glad tidings of our saints of God Mercies.

We kneel before your mild throne of reverence and trust;

Obtain  from your dear Son why we beg, Lady: questioning and forgiveness,

O Mother full of mercy; remember us by the divine Child resting in your arms.

How shall we you, Sweet Mother, thank you for all your goodness,

which revives joy and hope, for the salvation of the sick;

We may always find protection in distress and pain for you;

Hear us who are your children,

O Lady of the Linden.

Part III – Traditional wisdom:

• Man and His Becoming according to the Vedanta

Man and His Becoming according to the Vedanta is Guénon’s central exposition of traditional metaphysics, companion to his other two great works in this genre: The Symbolism of the Cross  and The Multiple States of the Being. Guénon held that Hinduism embraces the most ancient, profound, and comprehensive expression of traditional metaphysics we possess, which can in some ways function as a key to every other traditional form, and this work has been called the first reliable exposition of Hindu metaphysics in any Western language. Before Guénon, the West’s image of Hinduism was a hodge-podge of translated scriptures lacking traditional commentary, fragments of doctrine reported by Jesuits and other missionaries, random impressions of merchants, imperialists, and adventurers, unreliable Eurocentric constructions of the orientalists, and the fantasies of the Theosophical Society and their ilk. To this day, Man and His Becoming remains one of the best (if not the best) expositions of the doctrines of the Vedanta, an exposition entirely free from the modernizing and Westernizing tendencies that first infiltrated the Indian subcontinent under the British Raj, and have not yet abated. This text is a veritable bible of traditional metaphysics and anthropology. In his Studies in Hinduism and Introduction to the Study of the Hindu Doctines, Guénon treats historical and cosmological aspects of Hinduism in further detail. Read here

see more at The Reign of Quantity and the signs of our times

•  Similarity between The Family of Love and Sufism
  

In our daily life we come up against situations that we cannot overcome in our own strength, or with our own wisdom. We need a strength and a wisdom that comes from Above, that comes from Beyond, that comes from Another outside of us and yet rises up from within us.“Do you not know that to whom you present yourselves slaves to obey, you are that one’s slaves whom you obey, whether of sin leading to death, or of obedience leading to righteousness?” This transformation – sometimes called rebirth – is maybe difficult to achieve and costs a man dearly because it takes place in opposition to everything he values in material life;but that is an illusory life which he mistakes for the other.The seeker of truth begins to see the contradiction between what he is at present and what he is called to become and, seeing this, he cannot avoid suffering. If he has the courage to continue and if, in spite of suffering and other difficulties, he remains on the true path, he will eventually come to what tradition refers to as ‘dying to oneself’ – in Sufism, ‘die before you die’  We find the same principle in Islam and Sufism :  “la ilaha illallah ” : “there is no God but God” , it is part of the Shahada.

The Shahada has been traditionally recited in the Sufi ceremony of dhikr (Arabic: ذِکْر‎, “remembrance“), a ritual that resembles mantras found in many other religious traditions.

Sufism is the way of purifying the heart from bad manners and characteristics under the guidance of a Sheikh.

What is a Sheikh?

A Sheikh is someone who has inherited what the prophets brought and who is authorized to convey these teachings and secrets to those who take his hand as teacher. A true Sheikh is the one that has mastered his lower self’s bad characteristics through devotion and sincerity towards His Lord. For that reason he is able to guide his students to mastery of their own lower selves, opening the way to reach unlimited potential of their spiritual realities. Read more here

The Protection and the significance of Al-Khidr  in the Sufi tradition:

Khidr  is associated with the water of life. Since he drank the water of immortality, he is described as the one who has found the source of life. He is the mysterious guide and immortal saint. Sometimes the mystics would meet him on their journeys. He would inspire them, answer their questions, rescue them from danger, and, in special cases, invest them with the khirqa, which was accepted as valid in the tradition of Sufi initiation.

In Sufic tradition, Khidr has come to be known as one of the afrād, those “who receive illumination direct from God without human mediation.”

He is the hidden initiator of those who walk the mystical path, like some of those from the Uwaisi Tareeqah. Uwaisis are those who “enter the mystical path without being initiated by a living master.” Instead, they begin their mystical journey either by following the guiding light of the teachings of the earlier masters, or by being “initiated by the mysterious prophet-saint, Khidr.” Read more here

Khidr is not an abstract mystical figure, but an archetype of something essential within us. ‘The Green One’ images a natural aspect of our divinity, something so ordinary that we overlook it. To follow the way of Khidr is to awaken to our own natural state of being with God and with life. In this natural state of being we know how to respond to the real need of the moment. Read more

If we look to this world mandala ( the Basis frame of the Kalachara or “wheel(s) of time”

We can say that the 4 colors represents the 4 Traditional Races: red: Indian Tradition, yellow: Chinese traditon, Whithe: Western Tradition anb Black: African Tradition.

The Green Spot in the center represents the “Greenness” of the Living Breath, the Water of life, the water of Immortality of the World Soul.

As an active force, it acts under the directives of the Soul, and quadrature is the underlying structure of its modus operandi. Although it functions by means of the four generative principles, only two of these are active. This is because it is subject to the Soul’s determination, Ibn ‘Arabï explains, and the Soul has only two faculties: the theoretical and the practical. So Nature’s two active instruments come from the Soul’s inherent dual structure. They work together: the Soul provides knowledge, and Nature acts.

This reflects the understanding that the natural laws governing worldly existence alone cannot explain the reality of things. The laws of nature constitute the object of the science of causes (‘ilm al-asbâb), whereas the inner meanings can only be accessed through the science of realities (‘ilm al-haqâ’iq).

Nature’s two active principles are heat and cold. Heat causes dryness, and cold causes moistness. Dryness and moistness are thus passive outcomes in relation to heat and cold. They are also in opposition just as are heat and cold. Heat negates cold, and dryness negates moistness; hence they cannot naturally mix. Their contrasting qualities, however, enable a particular pattern of productive synthesis, wherein quadrature remains the underlying order. Active and passive forces of Nature join in four possible combinations only, producing the four natural elements: fire, air, earth, and water.

The active-passive interaction applies to the Pen and the Tablet as well, as both are subject to the ruling of the grand Nature.

The Pen represents the essential, active pole of manifestation, and the Tablet represents the substantial, passive pole.

The Pen, as the “cosmic refraction” of the primordial word, embodies the triplicity of the creative command “Be!”; whereas the Tablet, as the cosmic book, actualizes the command, materializing the quadrature of the arkân—fire, air, water, and earth.

The Pen corresponds to the productive triplicity of formation, whereas the Tablet corresponds to the designative quadrature of proliferation.

A reported prophetic tradition says that the first thing God created was the Pen, whose length equaled the distance between heaven and the earth.

He then created the Tablet, whose length extended between heaven and earth, and its width stretched from east to west. Read more here

The four humours and their corresponding qualities.

Humoral theory, also known as humorism or the theory of the four humours, was a model for the workings of the human body. It was systemised in Ancient Greece, although its origins may go back further still. The theory was central to the teachings of Hippocrates and Galen and it became the dominant theory in Europe for many centuries. It remained a major influence on medical practice and teaching until well into the 1800s.

The Green spot in the center represents the Greenness of the water of Life,  sustaining the “Living Breath”, this  Wisdom was kept by the Masters of Wisdom and still used till now. And it is what Hildegard of Bingen call  Viriditas – the greening power of the Divine –

• THE MASTERS OF WISDOM OF CENTRAL ASIA

Between the tenth and the fifteenth centuries of the Christian Era, muchof the inhabited world passed through a period of convulsions which shattered and scattered the ancient cultures and gave birth to the modern age. The chief visible cause was the irruption of hordes of Goths and Tartars, Turks and Mongols from Central Asia into the decaying empires of China, India, Baghdad, Byzantium and Rome.

The Masters did not spring from nowhere. Before they appeared there was already a powerful stream of spirituality flowing in these regions. According to tradition, Selman the Persian, who was the first convert from the Magian religion to Islam and one of the close companions of the Prophet, belonged to the tradition which goes back at least as far as Zoroaster, who spent the latter part of his life at Balkh six hundred years before Christ. Read more here

– Khwajagan

“O People! From east to west, from north to south, try to be thankful servants for your Creator, that He created us and granted us endless favors here and Hereafter. And Almighty Allah is asking to be honored. He Almighty honors dominions of honors with no limits and He likes that His servants honor their Creator. They are not going to give anything, but He likes His servant to say, shukr Yaa Rabbee, “Thanks O my Lord!” That is an honor from weak servants to the Lord of Heavens, but He likes it. If an ant says, subhaanAllah yaa Rabbee, “Glory for You, my Lord,” He is happy and He likes it. That point we must learn, know, and teach, that every good word, good action, and good effort makes our Lord happy with us.O People! Whole religions are based on this principle from the beginning of Mankind, from Adam, peace be upon him, who called Rabbuna, Rabbuna! Allah Almighty likes His servants to call on Him, Yaa Rabbana, “O our Lord, O our Creator!” Therefore, He likes to change every thing on Earth, that means Mankind in particular, for every other thing”. Read more here

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Khatm-ul-Khwajagan

In the Naqshbandi Order, the daily awrad and the weekly congregational dhikr, known as Khatm-ul-Khwajagan, are important principles which the murid must not leave. The Khatm-ul-Khwajagan is done sitting with the Shaykh in congregation. This is held once a week, preferably on Thursday night or Friday, two hours before sunset. The Khatm-ul-Khwajagan is of two categories: Read more here