Luv is the Fire

Love is the fire that burns all infirmities. ... By criticizing, by judging, by looking at wickedness with contempt, one does not help the wicked or the stupid person. The one who helps is he who is ready to overlook, who is ready to forgive, to tolerate, to take disadvantages he may have to meet with patiently.
http://wahiduddin.net/mv2/XIV/XIV_5.htm

Oh My God

One of my favorite relatives forward an email with a certain prayer and a picture of a white man with long hair and men standing all around him at the end of it....

Normally I just delete this type of email, without responding, but this time I couldnt help but give it a moments thought...I know my relative believes that this person is a representaion of a God...but I still find myself finding it difficult to buy into the 'god' theories....

As much as my mind would luv to accept into a 'god', I find my heart still declining...I do know that a Divine Being exist inside of me, and everything else for that matter...but if I take this being out and make it into a 'god-head' over me, and not apart of me, then I feel myself heading back to agnosticville...

This is a topic I usually dont discuss, but have been wrestling with for years...I was raise to think that God was there when I pray, fast, or go to the Mosque...but any other time, I couldnt even tell you where God was...Was God there when I was sick, probaly not, I wasnt thinking about him so why would he be there....was God there when I did something bad, when I cheat, lie or steal...nope God wasnt there...God was only there when I felt like I needed him...

I questioned if a God was closer to me than my jugular vein, then how come God seem so far away, and only made special visits at certain times... sorry, but this God didnt seem anymore special to me than any of the other Gods...so enventually I stop talking to him...taking him into consideration for everything I did....

I realized this God like all the others, powers were limited, and stop just above the door, in the intricate designs hovering over our heads, and the dried ink that stained the book that was read in a language that I couldnt understand....

Yep, this God couldnt do no more or no less than his rivals who stood on pedastals, or drawn into pictures...

After my agnostic spell started to wear off, I felt the need to talk to someone....lucky for me all I had was the God that I was brought up to believe in...needless to say that didnt last long, because I still felt that God was too limited....

And then something dramatic happended. My eyes and ears opened up. Whenever I ask myself a question I got an answer. Whenever I 'wish' for something it happend. Whenever I went searching for something it was revealed to me...And most importantly whenever I needed the Truth, it was made known to me....

I dont remeber exactly the day when I stopped praying to a God, and started worshipping the Divine in me....but from that moment on till now, I know that whenever Im sick, the Divine is there, whenever Im doing good or bad, the Divine is still around...whenver I pray, meditate, chat, sing, dance, kiss, talk, be silent, sleep, awake, make luv, the Divine will alway be there...because the Divine is a part of me....it exist in everything...it is everywhere because everything is everywhere...

May you be reminded in the Divine in You

You shall see him smiling

Have I spoken this day of aught else?

Is not religion all deeds and all reflection,

And that which is neither deed nor reflection, but a wonder and a surprise ever springing in the soul, even while the hands hew the stone or tend the loom?

Who can separate his faith from his actions, or his belief from his occupations?

Who can spread his hours before him, saying, "This for God and this for myself; This for my soul, and this other for my body?"

All your hours are wings that beat through space from self to self.

He who wears his morality but as his best garment were better naked.

The wind and the sun will tear no holes in his skin.

And he who defines his conduct by ethics imprisons his song-bird in a cage.

The freest song comes not through bars and wires.

And he to whom worshipping is a window, to open but also to shut, has not yet visited the house of his soul whose windows are from dawn to dawn.

Your daily life is your temple and your religion.

Whenever you enter into it take with you your all.

Take the plough and the forge and the mallet and the lute,

The things you have fashioned in necessity or for delight.

For in revery you cannot rise above your achievements nor fall lower than your failures.

And take with you all men:

For in adoration you cannot fly higher than their hopes nor humble yourself lower than their despair.

And if you would know God be not therefore a solver of riddles.

Rather look about you and you shall see Him playing with your children.

And look into space; you shall see Him walking in the cloud, outstretching His arms in the lightning and descending in rain.

You shall see Him smiling in flowers, then rising and waving His hands in trees

One thing is True

One thing is true: although the teacher cannot give the knowledge, he can kindle the light if the oil is in the lamp.

Bowl of Saki, by Hazrat Inayat Khan

Commentary by Pir-o-Murshid Inayat Khan:

No one can give spiritual knowledge to another, for this is something that is within every heart. What the teacher can do is to kindle the light which is hidden in the heart of the disciple. If the light is not there, it is not the fault of the teacher. There is a verse by Hafiz in which he says, 'However great be the teacher, he is helpless with the one whose heart is closed.' ...

In ancient times, the disciples of the great teachers learned by a quite different method, not an academic method or a way of study. The way was an open heart. With perfect confidence and trust they watched every attitude of the teacher, both towards friends and towards people who looked at him with contempt. They watched their teacher in times of trouble and pain, how he endured it all. They said how patient and wise he had been in discussing with those who did not understand, answering everyone gently in his own language. He showed the mother-spirit, the father-spirit, the brother-spirit, the child-spirit, the friend-spirit, forgiving kindness, an ever-tolerant nature, respect for the aged, compassion for all, the thorough understanding of human nature. This, also, the disciples learned, that no discussion or books on metaphysics can ever teach all the thoughts and philosophy that arise in the heart of man. A person may either study for a thousand years, or he may get to the source and see if he can touch the root of all wisdom and all knowledge. In the center of the emblem of the Sufis there is a heart; it is the sign that from the heart a stream rises, the stream of divine knowledge.

from http://wahiduddin.net/mv2/X/X_2_2.htm