From tariqas-approval Tue Oct 10 01:47:06 1995 Received: by world.std.com (5.65c/Spike-2.0) id AA11912; Tue, 10 Oct 1995 11:45:35 -0400 Received: from tymix.tymnet.com by world.std.com (5.65c/Spike-2.0) id AA11869; Tue, 10 Oct 1995 11:45:33 -0400 Received: by tymix.Tymnet.COM (4.1/SMI-4.1) id AA15911; Tue, 10 Oct 95 08:45:28 PDT Received: from antares by tymix.Tymnet.COM (in.smtpd); 10 Oct 95 8:45:27 PDT Received: from kirin.Tymnet.COM by antares.Tymnet.COM (8.6.5/UCB) id IAA22982; Tue, 10 Oct 1995 08:45:26 -0700 Received: by kirin.Tymnet.COM (5.x/SMI-SVR4) id AA01509; Tue, 10 Oct 1995 08:47:06 -0700 Date: Tue, 10 Oct 1995 08:47:06 -0700 From: mmoore@antares.Tymnet.COM (Michael J. Moore) Message-Id: <9510101547.AA01509@kirin.Tymnet.COM> To: tariqas@world.std.com Subject: Pleasure X-Sun-Charset: US-ASCII Sender: tariqas-approval@world.std.com Precedence: bulk Reply-To: tariqas Status: RO X-Status: Congratulations Lily. 'Pleasure' is a difficult word. There are many different kinds of pleasure externally, however, they are all grafts on the same root. As for 'sexual repression', I don't believe there is such a thing. There is sexual diversion, and diversion in the wrong direction is peversion. That which we call libido, or sexual energy, is holy energy being channeled through the sexual function. This is the way I see it; others may have a different idea. -Michael- From tariqas-approval Tue Oct 10 01:47:49 1995 Received: by world.std.com (5.65c/Spike-2.0) id AA14069; Tue, 10 Oct 1995 11:48:25 -0400 Received: from lafn.org by world.std.com (5.65c/Spike-2.0) id AA14023; Tue, 10 Oct 1995 11:48:21 -0400 Received: by lafn.org id AA04038 (5.65c/IDA-1.4.4 for tariqas@world.std.com); Tue, 10 Oct 1995 08:47:49 -0700 Date: Tue, 10 Oct 1995 08:47:49 -0700 Message-Id: <199510101547.AA04038@lafn.org> From: an525@lafn.org (Ivan Ickovits) To: tariqas@world.std.com Subject: [an525@lafn.org: Kab pt 1] Cc: cherags-l@sandelman.ocunix.on.ca Sender: tariqas-approval@world.std.com Precedence: bulk Reply-To: tariqas Status: RO X-Status: This is part one of a four part article re Kabbalistic perspectives re Adam(First human) and Adamah (Earth). Hope it is of some interest. iF not just flush away. Raqib in Santa Monica This item is part of the Academy of Jerusalem proceedings. If you wish to comment or receive further related material, contact us by email at yrusalem@actcom.co.il WORLD, ADAM AND ADAMAH{*} by Dr. Yitzhak I. Hayutman, Cybernetician and Urban Planner Dean of Research & Development, The Academy of Jerusalem. INTRODUCTION This paper presents the Biblical story of the formation of Adam as the appropriate myth for our times, the age of scientific and technological development, of the population explosion, of the urbanization of humankind, when urbanization is changing the face of the earth, and a time where the whole global ecology is likely to change due to human intervention. The meaning of "appropriate myth" is to present the great wisdom inherent in the Biblical story, wisdom which can guide humankind facing hard decisions. The conventional claim, in view of the great changes of our time, is that the Biblical story is obviousely irrelevant to our times and that we no longer need myths since our lives are guided nowadays by scientific truths. Scientific geology, for instance, shows that the age of the universe is many billions of years and even life on earth are about three and a half billions of years old. In Darwin's time there where public trials about this issue, and even nowadays the US courts are sometimes called to decide which version of the creation of the world should be taught in scholls, the evolutionist or the creationist. Tp my mind, the debate and criticism are irrelevant because they are based on the most simplistic notions of the concept of Time, World, and Humankind, whereas these concepts in the (Hebrew) Biblical story. especially as understood and interpreted in the Jewish tradition of the Midrash and the Kabbalah, are far more sophisticated than those of the disputants from both camps. I shall try to present these three concepts as they are implied from the Jewish tradition in light of the knowledge and reality of our time. TIME One of the superstitions that were adopted as aid for scientific development since "the Enlightenement" and persists almost to the present is that there exists uniform and unidirectional time, from an (almost) infinite past to an infinite future in which the present moment is just an infinitsimal marking point. Research in the history of ideas shows that this type of time is a fairly recent invention and that during moman history there were other notions of time. Also modern philosophy (e.g. Bergson's) knows much more complex and rich concepts of time. I shall present just one example of the folly of the prevalent concept: Let's say that I want to be "really scientific" and characterise the present instant, I shall thus not say that the year is 1992 for the birth of Jesus (a wrong account in any event) or that it is "tashnab" (or 5752 years) to the account of creation (see below) but, say, that it is the 9,375,19unting. This event was "discovered" in a certain year. In the 70's, the age of this event was a certain number of billions of years, whereas almost each year of further astronomic observations adds quite a few millions of years to its age. Thus he who wants to be precise about the age of the universe should relate to "the age of the universe in 1960" versus "the age of the universe in 1980", and the difference will amount to billions of years. One can make many more additions to this paradox. Logment stabilized. It is thus possibile to immediately deduct about 2/3 of the purpurted period because of this inner contradiction. If we go on to examine the terms logically, we shall observe that "year" (shana) is a human term which is indeed connected to the circulation of the earth around the sun, but even more with the human proclivity to count one's own years by this natural clock. Animals surely do not count their age, and human counting is an evidence to our seld- consciouseness as persistentme was invented? The force of habit and the routine of thought will claim that there obviousely was. I can only ask the reader to repeat asking this seemingly simple question, like a Zen koan, untill (s)he finds, probably with a sense of wonder and even enlightenement - that something basic has changed in his/her mind. If you have never thought about this paradox before, it is fairly certain that this enlightenment will not come at once and that the question may seem ridiculous at first - but I plea with question and answer and acquisition of understanding, in other words with development, is an essentially different time from the cyclical time of the yearly seasons or of birth and death of exemplars. Over the generations, hundreds and thousands of systems of counting history were used, be they based on thesome cosmological cyclical system or on an historical consciouseness of some event since which, according to the particular teaching, another kind of human history begins. The great cosmipe is of a liberation from the world - Nirvana. -- q k -- q k From tariqas-approval Tue Oct 10 09:23:40 1995 Received: by world.std.com (5.65c/Spike-2.0) id AA00987; Tue, 10 Oct 1995 13:23:42 -0400 Received: from emout04.mail.aol.com by world.std.com (5.65c/Spike-2.0) id AA00973; Tue, 10 Oct 1995 13:23:40 -0400 Received: by emout04.mail.aol.com (8.6.12/8.6.12) id NAA25466 for tariqas@world.std.com; Tue, 10 Oct 1995 13:23:40 -0400 Date: Tue, 10 Oct 1995 13:23:40 -0400 From: Jinavamsa@aol.com Message-Id: <951010132339_40895860@emout04.mail.aol.com> To: tariqas@world.std.com Subject: Re: Pleasure Sender: tariqas-approval@world.std.com Precedence: bulk Reply-To: tariqas Status: RO X-Status: hello Michael, Maybe you're talking about internal process below. Otherwise, certainly many people (and not only women) take it that there has been massively pushed sexual repression, as when a man rapes a woman and then she is stoned by the community, or killed by her family to reestablish family honor. (That's just one type of example. I'm sure we can all, unfortunately shall I say?, add and add to this.) Internally speaking, then, can there be sexual repression? In your terms, with which I agree -- may I add that *all* energy is holy??? -- [holy] libido is [holy] organismic energy focused at the second chakra, at least initially; ... perhaps sexual repression would be when, first, there is bodily energy which happens to be flowing through the genital area, or second chakra if you prefer, --- and, then, thoughts arise to bring on embarassment or shame, and then a firm intervention (by this one person being imagined) brings about a shift from this sort of experience of [holy] energy. I agree that there is both sublimation, = a shift of [holy] sexual energy away from a sexual focus, and sexualization, = a shift to a sexual focus - as we in the West know all too well, where a woman walking down the street in a flowing way is "inviting it" ... in peace, Jinavamsa In a message dated 95-10-10 11:55:44 EDT, you write: >Congratulations Lily. >'Pleasure' is a difficult word. There are many different kinds of pleasure > externally, however, they are all grafts on the same root. >As for 'sexual repression', I don't believe there is such a thing. > There is sexual diversion, and diversion in the wrong direction is >peversion. >That which we call libido, or sexual energy, is holy energy being channeled > through the sexual function. >This is the way I see it; others may have a different idea. > >-Michael- From tariqas-approval Tue Oct 10 09:37:03 1995 Received: by world.std.com (5.65c/Spike-2.0) id AA26802; Tue, 10 Oct 1995 14:37:03 -0400 Received: from UNiX.asb.com by world.std.com (5.65c/Spike-2.0) id AA26745; Tue, 10 Oct 1995 14:36:59 -0400 Received: from sle3.asb.com (sle3.asb.com [165.254.128.73]) by UNiX.asb.com (8.6.9/8.6.9) with SMTP id OAA00408; Tue, 10 Oct 1995 14:37:03 -0500 Date: Tue, 10 Oct 1995 14:37:03 -0500 Message-Id: <199510101937.OAA00408@UNiX.asb.com> X-Sender: f_haddad@unix.asb.com Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" To: tariqas@world.std.com From: f_haddad@unix.asb.com (Fouad Haddad) Subject: [2] Adam and Eve Cc: mateens@sybase.com X-Mailer: Sender: tariqas-approval@world.std.com Precedence: bulk Reply-To: tariqas Status: RO X-Status: [2] Adam and Eve ================ The Trial of Adam and Eve Excerpt from Shaykh Hisham Kabbani's <>, KAZI 1995. 7:20: "Then Satan whispered to them that he might manifest unto them that which was hidden from them of their shame, and he said: Your Lord forbade you from this tree only lest ye should become angels or become of the immortals." The inhabitants of heaven are more honorable than human beings. Adam and Eve's seduction shows that they knew this and wished to become like the angels. However, because they were also inhabitants of Paradise, and knew that obedience has to be completely for their Lord, Satan was not able to persuade them to eat from the tree. Their angelic powers were too high to blind them and they were resisting Satan's urge to disobey God. They were experiencing and feeling the taste of the heavenly life and had no inkling for something outside their grasp. When Satan saw that he could not convince them to eat from the tree, he approached them from another angle. Adam and Even were the father and mother of humanity: God mentioned that He taught Adam all the names. These "names" included those of his entire posterity. Adam was carrying in his loins the totality of the seeds of his descendants. Since Satan himself carried an angelic power (he was among the angels though not an angel himself), he knew the sercret of the seeds embodied in Adam's loins. He therefore penetrated the loins of Adam and aroused in those seeds the yearning to eat of the tree and become angels, but in a deceiving way. These seeds moved the bodies of Adam and Eve to extend their hands and eat of that tree without their will. The cause of their downfall from the heavenly life to the earthly life was the action of their children. It is impossible for an inhabitant of heaven to disobey God as they are carrying an angelic power which makes them constantly busy with the obedience of God. It is therefore not Adam and Eve who disobeyed but their children in them. Were Adam and Eve to stay in Paradise, they would be neither disobedient nor distinguished. When they fell on earth they were yearning to their home as a person in exile or on a trip. Such yearning is the desire to be angelic and God accepted their yearning from them. He put death over them as a place of trial in order for them to know that disobedience is not accepted in Paradise. That is why death for pious people is the first sign of returning to Paradise and getting one's angelic power back so as never to repeat the mistake committed by all Adam's children in his loins another time. It was enough suffering for all mankind to be disconnected from their angelic power for a period of time. They had to live on earth and could reach their destined states in Paradise only by means of that power. When Adam and Eve fell to earth they cried in prostration to their Lord for forty days. They were not crying for themselves but for the sake of their children and in order to protect them from heavenly punishment and minimize their difficulties and sufferings on this earth. Adam and Eve never raised their head from prostration until God spoke to them and said: "O Adam and Eve, enough! I have forgiven you and your children but I have appointed for them a short life on this earth with a delicate mixture of love and hatred, pleasure and pain, peace and conflict, beauty and ugliness, knowledge and ignorance. Whoever achieves the balance and choses right will be living a heavenly life on earth and will be connected with the angelic powers of Paradise. He will be a light for human beings and guide them on the right path." From tariqas-approval Tue Oct 10 09:37:40 1995 Received: by world.std.com (5.65c/Spike-2.0) id AA27688; Tue, 10 Oct 1995 14:37:57 -0400 Received: from UNiX.asb.com by world.std.com (5.65c/Spike-2.0) id AA27643; Tue, 10 Oct 1995 14:37:53 -0400 Received: from sle3.asb.com (sle3.asb.com [165.254.128.73]) by UNiX.asb.com (8.6.9/8.6.9) with SMTP id OAA00417 for ; Tue, 10 Oct 1995 14:37:40 -0500 Date: Tue, 10 Oct 1995 14:37:40 -0500 Message-Id: <199510101937.OAA00417@UNiX.asb.com> X-Sender: f_haddad@unix.asb.com Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" To: tariqas@world.std.com From: f_haddad@unix.asb.com (Fouad Haddad) Subject: Re: On Surat al-Kawthar X-Mailer: Sender: tariqas-approval@world.std.com Precedence: bulk Reply-To: tariqas Status: RO X-Status: Jinavamsa wrote: >dear Fouad, >thank you for this post re Surah 108. Would you be able to share any other of >the commentaries on al-Kawthar? >Is it ever seen in Sufi teachings (or traditional Islam) as a way of talking >about consciousness and the experiences of consciousness, rather than as a >place one might get to after death? Yes -- a) in Rumi, for example, where it means spiritual perfection in a human being with reference also to verse 17:70, "Verily We have honored the children of Adam" and to the hadith "But for you (O Muhammad)..." Chittick writes: "The uniqueness of man's situation is expressed in a famous saying of God related by the Prophet. Again, although God is addressing the Prophet himself, Rumi understands the saying to refer to man in tyhe state of spiritual perfection: "But for thee, I would not have created the heavenly spheres." Rumi interprets the following Koranic verse, also addressed to the Prophet, in a similar manner: "Surely We have given thee abundance" (108:1)... "[Rumi, Mathnavi 3574:] The crown of *We have honored* is upon your head, the collar of *We have given thee abundance* around your neck..." >From William Chittick, <> (Albany: SUNY Press, 1983) p. 63-64. b) in Qashani, a commentator of Ibn `Arabi, who wrote in his Koranic commentary: "The Kawthar is the gnosis of Manyness (kathra) through Uniqueness (wahda) and the science of Divine Oneness (tawhid) and contemplation of unity in multiplicity itself." <> (Beirut ed., 1968) 2:861. Regards, Fouad Haddad Naqshbandi-Haqqani Foundation URL: http://www.best.com/~informe/mateen/haqqani.html [in 9 languages] >thank you. >in peace, >Jinavamsa > > >In a message dated 95-10-05 20:04:12 EDT, you write: > >>Subj: On Surat al-Kawthar >>Date: 95-10-05 20:04:12 EDT >>From: f_haddad@unix.asb.com (Fouad Haddad) >>Sender: tariqas-approval@world.std.com >>Reply-to: tariqas@world.std.com >>To: tariqas@world.std.com >>CC: msa@htm3.ee.queensu.ca >> >>ON SURAT AL-KAWTHAR (ABUNDANCE) >>=============================== >> >>[Koran 108] >> >>Pickthall: >> >><>So pray unto thy Lord, and sacrifice. >>Lo! It is thy insulter (and not thou) who is without posterity.>> >> >>The following is a translated excerpt from the Tafsir (Commentary) of >>al-Khazin (d. 725 H.) on this surat in <> al-matba`a >>al-`amira, 1320 H. 6:580. >> >>Al-Kawthar is a river in Paradise (al-Jannat) which God gave to >>Muhammad, Blessings and Peace be upon him (s). It is said also that the >>Kawthar is the Glorious Qur'an. Also: prophecy, the Book, and wisdom. >>Also: the abundance of his followers and Community. Also: abundant good >>(al-khayr al-kathir), as Ibn `Abbas has explained. Abu Bushr relates >>the latter from Sa`eed Ibn Jubayr, who related it from Ibn `Abbas. Abu >>Bushr said: "I told Ibn Jubayr: Some people say that it means a river in >>paradise. He replied: the River in Paradise is part of the abundant >>good which God gave him." >> >>The linguistic root of Kawthar is "faw`al" which denotes abundance. The >>Arabs named "kawthar" everything which came in abundance, or in great >>numbers, or of superlative value and importance. >> >>It is said that the "kawthar" also means the abundant favors which God >>gave all creation. And all these explanations enter into God's gifts to >>the Prophet (s), which are: prophecy (nubuwwa), the Book (al-kitab), >>wisdom (hikmat), knowledge (`ilm), intercession (shafa`at), the Pond or >>Watering-Place in Paradise (al-hawd al-mawrud), the Praiseworthy Station >>(al-maqam al-mahmud), an abundant following, Islam and its proclamation- >>and-ascendancy (izharihi) over all religions, victory over his enemies >>and a great number of conquests in his own time and after it, until the >>Day of Resurrection. >> >>And the best explanation concerning the Kawthar is the one on which the >>majority of scholars concur, namely that it is a river in Paradise, as >>was made clear in the Traditions (hadith). >> >>Muslim relates on the authority of Anas: "As we were behind the Prophet >>(s) on a certain day he nodded off awhile. Then he raised his head and >>smiled. We said: What made you smile, O Messenger of God? He said: A >>surat was revealed to me previously (anifan). He then recited: >> >>Bismillah ir-Rahman ir-Raheem >> >>Inna a`taynaka al-Kawthar >>Fa salli li rabbika wa anHar >>Inna shani'aka huwa al-abtar, >> >>then he said: Do you know what is the Kawthar? We replied: God and His >>Messenger know best. He said: Verily it is a river (nahrun) which my >>Lord of Might and Majesty has promised me, a great good (khayrun >>kathirun), it is a pond (hawd) where my Community shall drink, and its >>vessels number as the stars in heaven. I will see someone grieving (in >>deprivation of it) and I will say: O my Lord, he is one of my Community! >>And God will say: Don't you know what he has brought after you?" >> >>Bukhari relates on the authority of Anas: "The Prophet (s) said: When I >>was brought up to heaven (on the Night of ascension) a river was shown >>to me encompassed with spacious domes of marble. I said: What is this, >>O Gabriel? He said: This is the Kawthar which your Lord has given you, >>and its river-banks are musk." >> >> >>Blessings and Peace on the Prophet of Overabundance, his Family, and his >>Companions. >> >>Fouad Haddad >>Naqshbandi-Haqqani Foundation >>URL: http://www.best.com/~informe/mateen/haqqani.html [in 9 languages] From tariqas-approval Tue Oct 10 11:15:00 1995 Received: by world.std.com (5.65c/Spike-2.0) id AA26749; Tue, 10 Oct 1995 15:15:03 -0400 Received: from mail06.mail.aol.com by world.std.com (5.65c/Spike-2.0) id AA26720; Tue, 10 Oct 1995 15:15:01 -0400 Received: by mail06.mail.aol.com (8.6.12/8.6.12) id PAA01793 for tariqas@world.std.com; Tue, 10 Oct 1995 15:15:00 -0400 Date: Tue, 10 Oct 1995 15:15:00 -0400 From: Jinavamsa@aol.com Message-Id: <951010151500_120569360@mail06.mail.aol.com> To: tariqas@world.std.com Subject: Re: [2] Adam and Eve Sender: tariqas-approval@world.std.com Precedence: bulk Reply-To: tariqas Status: RO X-Status: This passage grabbed my attention. Given the conclusion reached, the reasoning below sounds almost like a reductio ad absurdum argument (although I suspect there are other fallacies and curious presuppositions lurking here somewhere): ... Poor children, to be blamed for something before they even existed to do what they are being held responsible for! (as if children didn't do enough mischief on their own!) ... which is not to discuss whether having a bite from a given tree is good or bad.... may all have their yearning for knowledge and their humanity honored in peace, Jinavamsa In a message dated 95-10-10 14:48:27 EDT, you write: > It is impossible for an inhabitant of heaven to disobey God as >they are carrying an angelic power which makes them constantly busy with >the obedience of God. It is therefore not Adam and Eve who disobeyed >but their children in them. From tariqas-approval Tue Oct 10 11:15:03 1995 Received: by world.std.com (5.65c/Spike-2.0) id AA26833; Tue, 10 Oct 1995 15:15:08 -0400 Received: from emout06.mail.aol.com by world.std.com (5.65c/Spike-2.0) id AA26764; Tue, 10 Oct 1995 15:15:04 -0400 Received: by emout06.mail.aol.com (8.6.12/8.6.12) id PAA05022 for tariqas@world.std.com; Tue, 10 Oct 1995 15:15:03 -0400 Date: Tue, 10 Oct 1995 15:15:03 -0400 From: Jinavamsa@aol.com Message-Id: <951010151501_120569368@emout06.mail.aol.com> To: tariqas@world.std.com Subject: Re: On Surat al-Kawthar Sender: tariqas-approval@world.std.com Precedence: bulk Reply-To: tariqas Status: RO X-Status: thank you Fouad for these citations. so much beautiful information! peace unto all, Jinavamsa In a message dated 95-10-10 14:52:57 EDT, you write: > >>dear Fouad, >>thank you for this post re Surah 108. Would you be able to share any other >of >>the commentaries on al-Kawthar? >>Is it ever seen in Sufi teachings (or traditional Islam) as a way of talking >>about consciousness and the experiences of consciousness, rather than as a >>place one might get to after death? > >Yes -- a) in Rumi, for example, where it means spiritual perfection in a >human being with reference also to verse 17:70, "Verily We have honored the >children of Adam" and to the hadith "But for you (O Muhammad)..." > >Chittick writes: > >"The uniqueness of man's situation is expressed in a famous saying of God >related by the Prophet. Again, although God is addressing the Prophet >himself, Rumi understands the saying to refer to man in tyhe state of >spiritual perfection: "But for thee, I would not have created the heavenly >spheres." Rumi interprets the following Koranic verse, also addressed to >the Prophet, in a similar manner: "Surely We have given thee abundance" >(108:1)... > >"[Rumi, Mathnavi 3574:] The crown of *We have honored* is upon your head, >the collar of *We have given thee abundance* around your neck..." > >From William Chittick, <Rumi>> (Albany: SUNY Press, 1983) p. 63-64. > >b) in Qashani, a commentator of Ibn `Arabi, who wrote in his Koranic >commentary: > >"The Kawthar is the gnosis of Manyness (kathra) through Uniqueness (wahda) >and the science of Divine Oneness (tawhid) and contemplation of unity in >multiplicity itself." > ><> (Beirut ed., 1968) 2:861. > >Regards, > >Fouad Haddad >Naqshbandi-Haqqani Foundation >URL: http://www.best.com/~informe/mateen/haqqani.html [in 9 languages] > > From tariqas-approval Tue Oct 10 06:45:58 1995 Received: by world.std.com (5.65c/Spike-2.0) id AA18207; Tue, 10 Oct 1995 16:46:12 -0400 Received: from homer23.u.washington.edu by world.std.com (5.65c/Spike-2.0) id AA18021; Tue, 10 Oct 1995 16:46:05 -0400 Received: by homer23.u.washington.edu (5.65+UW95.09/UW-NDC Revision: 2.33 ) id AA93911; Tue, 10 Oct 95 13:45:59 -0700 X-Sender: lilyan@homer23.u.washington.edu Date: Tue, 10 Oct 1995 13:45:58 -0700 (PDT) From: Lilyan Ila To: tariqasnet Subject: Re: Pleasure In-Reply-To: <9510101547.AA01509@kirin.Tymnet.COM> Message-Id: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Sender: tariqas-approval@world.std.com Precedence: bulk Reply-To: tariqas Status: RO X-Status: Dear Mike Thank you, although I'm not sure what I'm being congratulated for. By sexual repression I meant the socialized tendency to be ashamed of one's sexuality. Is this what you meant by diversion? I find it very funny that people have a hard time accepting that the Prophet (pbuh) may have meant simply "I enjoy women, perfume and prayer", and feel obliged to make excuses for him as regards the former two! wasalaam Lily From tariqas-approval Mon Oct 9 04:01:57 1995 Received: by world.std.com (5.65c/Spike-2.0) id AA22712; Tue, 10 Oct 1995 20:22:29 -0400 Received: from diamond.sierra.net by world.std.com (5.65c/Spike-2.0) id AA22688; Tue, 10 Oct 1995 20:22:27 -0400 Received: from LOCALNAME ([204.94.232.136]) by diamond.sierra.net with SMTP id AA14070 (5.67b8/IDA-1.5 for ); Mon, 9 Oct 1995 11:02:54 -0700 Message-Id: <199510091802.AA14070@diamond.sierra.net> X-Sender: frank@sierra.net X-Mailer: Windows Eudora Version 1.4.5 Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Date: Mon, 09 Oct 1995 11:01:57 -0700 To: tariqas@world.std.com From: frank@sierra.net (Tanzen Frank Gaude) Subject: Re: think i can help you Sender: tariqas-approval@world.std.com Precedence: bulk Reply-To: tariqas Status: RO X-Status: Hello, abdul ghani (all here)! >book titled ISLAMIC SUFISM by capt. wahid bakhsh rabbani..there is a >subheading titled : science surrendering to sufism that discusses sufism >and the new physics...not complicated reading really but very deep in >its implications. >let me know if you are interested and i will, inshallah, write it for you and >the others on the net. Yes, yes, abdul, please... post it... very interested... here in the High Sierras of California. Peace be with you! As-salaam aleikhum! Shalom aleichem! Namaste! tanzen From tariqas-approval Tue Oct 10 11:48:23 1995 Received: by world.std.com (5.65c/Spike-2.0) id AA11362; Tue, 10 Oct 1995 21:48:38 -0400 Received: from lafn.org by world.std.com (5.65c/Spike-2.0) id AA11337; Tue, 10 Oct 1995 21:48:35 -0400 Received: by lafn.org id AA00894 (5.65c/IDA-1.4.4 for tariqas@world.std.com); Tue, 10 Oct 1995 18:48:23 -0700 Date: Tue, 10 Oct 1995 18:48:23 -0700 Message-Id: <199510110148.AA00894@lafn.org> From: an525@lafn.org (Ivan Ickovits) To: tariqas@world.std.com Subject: Kab pt 2] Sender: tariqas-approval@world.std.com Precedence: bulk Reply-To: tariqas Status: RO X-Status: Part two of this series: More optimistic system, like of the "Christian and the Moslem calendar are also disappointing: was the world really already saved some two thousands years ago, as the Christian dogma claims? or does each year since Mohamad left his birth place and his father's house, over forteen centuries ago, in order to propagate the message of Allah, increase the pride of Islam and its hope for a better world? While the 75th anniversary celebrations to the Octo is "davka" the particular system used officially in the State of Israel which is meaningful and appropriate - even for all humankind. The Hebrew calendar which is used in Israel assumes that almost six thousand years ago happened some event - which we call "the creation of the world" - since which it makes sense to make an account of history. The most basic event from which it is possible to count history is, as hinted above, the very "invention of time". It is only from the moment that time exiveral pre-requisits are needed. There is a need for consciousness of: 1. Personal death (but this is something which Neandarthal man apparently had and perhaps even some animals have). 2. Belonging to humankind, or at least to an inclusive culture. 3. Possibility of demise of this culture. For these, there is a need for a memory which is beyond individual human life. There is a need for a system of script that endures. My claim, to which I shall return later, is that the important type of inscr the initiaton of historic consciouseness to be the time that cities were built, or rather since cities were built and became ruins were forgotten and then rebuilt. The ancient Jericho, for example, was built about 9000 "years" ago, and got ruined and rebuilt several times. By this historic calendar we can regard as "history" a period of several thousands of years, whereas the periods preceding it would be labelled "prehistory". This has indeed been the accepted concepts for several hundreds of yearording to the Book of Genesis humankind was wiped from the face of the earth (in the flood) and soon after this united again to build a city and a tower, event which even the Lord of the universe deemed significant. It is worth, therefore, to regard the Biblical concept of the process of the creation of a world, namely a concept which is already several thousands years old and to reach a better understanding of the meaning of that "world" which was created then and how it changes throughout history. ho executes, i.e. writes a paper today, executes something which might have formed in his mind during years of thinking, which in turn is done on the basis of a nervous system which evolved during millions of "years". Similar arguments abound in the Kabbalah, which regards Creation, Formation and Making as completely different accounts). The first of the two stories emphasises the issue of "the six days" - an orderly progression which leads to the creation of a creature called "Adam". In the secontypes of olam: Olam Haze (This World) versus Olam Haba (Coming World - see below). The world-olam which has formed a few thousands of years ago is, apparently, Olam Haze - This World - which is bound to pass, to be replaced by Olam Haba - the Coming World. The meaning of history, according to out sages of blessed memory, is the passage from another kind of Olam-world. Judaism invests huge efforts in fixing the characteristics of Olam Haba witin Olam Haze. The Shabbat (Sabbath), for example, is conment within Olam Haze and it finishes, as it logically should, with the question of what is the duration of these arrangements, namely, what is the duration of Olam Haze. The answer (Tr. Sanhedrin 97, p.1) is that this Olam endures for six thousand years and is divided into three periods: Two thausand years of "Tohu, chaos or wonder (until Abraham who recognized the Creator and came with an answer to the wonder), Two thousand years of Torah (until the fixing of the Mishna, c. 3rd century CE) and twoion - the theories of Franz Rosenzweig and Martin Buber, distinguished European pilosophers who were, however, steeped in the Jewish tradition. "Olam" ( ) is a word derived from the root "A.L.M" ( ), and a sister word to "Ta'aluma" (mystery). The primal stuff from whic the world was created, formed or made is hiden (ne'elam) from us. The great mystery, as was already argued, is the meaning and purpose of human existence. History is the chronicle of the attempts to solve this mystery. When ttocosmos" and there is a future world, that we know not what will its characteristics be, and we live in the cosmic middle age which is, in Jewish tradition, Olam Haze. Rosenzweig describes the transition between the protocosmos and the prevailing cosmos in cultural and psychological criteria, and gives a reasonable image of the future world and of the endeavour to realize it, which he regards as the purpose of Jewish existence{1} The books of Martin Buber, and especially his seminal work "I-and-shes between two types of human existence which are characterised by two kinds of relationship: "I-Thou" and "I-It". Taking exception to the way Buber's originally German book was translated to Hebrew, I propose that what he calls "it" is what is in Biblical and Modern Hebrew "Ze" to denote "that", and denotes a form of distancing and alienation. From the alienated relationship between self and other or self and environment grows an alienated world. It is possible to point at different types of alie of is teachings to our time is that he has shown that the other relationsip, the relationship of direct acceptance, a relation of "I-Thou" is essentially no different to different objects and is the same relation to another person, to the world of animals and of plants and also to God who is, in essence, "the Eternal Thou". -- q k -- q k From tariqas-approval Tue Oct 10 14:55:00 1995 Received: by world.std.com (5.65c/Spike-2.0) id AA24182; Wed, 11 Oct 1995 00:55:09 -0400 Received: from island.amtsgi.bc.ca (Island.islandnet.com) by world.std.com (5.65c/Spike-2.0) id AA24169; Wed, 11 Oct 1995 00:55:07 -0400 Received: from i4.islandnet.com by island.amtsgi.bc.ca with smtp (Smail3.1.28.1 #1) id m0t2tC0-0005VCC; Tue, 10 Oct 95 21:55 PDT Message-Id: Date: Tue, 10 Oct 95 21:55 PDT X-Sender: dynamics@islandnet.com (Unverified) X-Mailer: Windows Eudora Version 1.4.4 Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" To: tariqas@std.com From: dynamics@islandnet.com (Jabreil Hanafi) Subject: Your Prayers Sender: tariqas-approval@world.std.com Precedence: bulk Reply-To: tariqas Status: RO X-Status: A My Dearest Brothers and Sisters, I am being confronted with a tremendous moral challenge. Without going into the story I request your prayers. The seriouness of the matter involes a battle which feels overcomming. I require now more than ever strength, faith, and wisdom and the ability to maintain the type of sobriety which will have me choose not to be seduced by distration or temptation. I am clear that Allah never extends a challenge which we are not capable of finding success with. I am also certain that I am powerless and need now more than ever to surrender to Allah. Please extend your prayers for me through the balance of this year. Love Jabriel. ----------------------------------------- Jabriel Hanafi Dynamics Unlimited Suite 806 327 Maitland Victoria B.C. V9A 7G7 Voice (604) 384 6629 Fax (604) 380 9909 From tariqas-approval Wed Oct 11 01:31:23 1995 Received: by world.std.com (5.65c/Spike-2.0) id AA28444; Wed, 11 Oct 1995 11:29:51 -0400 Received: from tymix.tymnet.com by world.std.com (5.65c/Spike-2.0) id AA28421; Wed, 11 Oct 1995 11:29:49 -0400 Received: by tymix.Tymnet.COM (4.1/SMI-4.1) id AA04865; Wed, 11 Oct 95 08:29:43 PDT Received: from antares by tymix.Tymnet.COM (in.smtpd); 11 Oct 95 8:29:42 PDT Received: from kirin.Tymnet.COM by antares.Tymnet.COM (8.6.5/UCB) id IAA08839; Wed, 11 Oct 1995 08:29:41 -0700 Received: by kirin.Tymnet.COM (5.x/SMI-SVR4) id AA01644; Wed, 11 Oct 1995 08:31:23 -0700 Date: Wed, 11 Oct 1995 08:31:23 -0700 From: mmoore@antares.Tymnet.COM (Michael J. Moore) Message-Id: <9510111531.AA01644@kirin.Tymnet.COM> To: tariqas@world.std.com Subject: Re: Pleasure X-Sun-Charset: US-ASCII Sender: tariqas-approval@world.std.com Precedence: bulk Reply-To: tariqas Status: RO X-Status: > From tariqas-approval@world.std.com Tue Oct 10 13:46:58 1995 > X-Sender: lilyan@homer23.u.washington.edu > Date: Tue, 10 Oct 1995 13:45:58 -0700 (PDT) > From: Lilyan Ila > To: tariqasnet > Subject: Re: Pleasure > Mime-Version: 1.0 > > > Thank you, although I'm not sure what I'm being congratulated for. By > sexual repression I meant the socialized tendency to be ashamed of one's > sexuality. Is this what you meant by diversion? > Lily The congratulations are for your baby. By diversion, I was refering to the idea that sexual energy could be directed towards higher consciousness. This is of course the concept of kundalini. There are those men who will avoid sex, even though it be halal, because of the idea that this reduces spiritual energy. Even in American sports, it was a one time believed that having sex before 'the big game' would reduce one's performance. My understanding is that scientific studies have shown no such corralation, and that the effect was most likely due to missing the required sleep. My own personal, subjective, study also agrees with the scientific results. Perhaps I am just not 'attuned' to the energy in question. Also, I wonder about the Islamic nature of the idea of kundalini and chakras? Isn't this more of a Hindu invention? Did the Prophet ever speak about such things? -Michael- From tariqas-approval Wed Oct 11 09:46:19 1995 Received: by world.std.com (5.65c/Spike-2.0) id AA15815; Wed, 11 Oct 1995 13:46:56 -0400 Received: from alfred.ccs.carleton.ca by world.std.com (5.65c/Spike-2.0) id AA15757; Wed, 11 Oct 1995 13:46:50 -0400 Received: from superior (superior.ccs.carleton.ca) by alfred.ccs.carleton.ca (4.1/SMI-4.0) id AA12825; Wed, 11 Oct 95 13:46:39 EDT From: ccscon35@ccs.carleton.ca (Rizwan Mawani) Received: by superior (4.1/Sun-Client) id AA22713; Wed, 11 Oct 95 13:46:19 EDT Message-Id: <9510111746.AA22713@superior> Subject: Taoism and Islam To: tariqas@world.std.com Date: Wed, 11 Oct 95 13:46:19 EDT In-Reply-To: ; from "Fred Rice" at Oct 7, 95 4:59 am X-Mailer: ELM [version 2.3 PL11] Sender: tariqas-approval@world.std.com Precedence: bulk Reply-To: tariqas Status: RO X-Status: > > Taoism seems very nature-based, using nature as a role-model for life. > This message is also contained in the Qur'an. The Qur'an says, in > many passages, that the various phenomena of nature are the signs, > or "ayat", of God. This word "ayat" is the same word used for the > verses of the Qur'an. The implication is that you can study nature > and read it like a book, and learn from it, and get closer to your > Creator through it, just as you can study the verses of the Qur'an. > Taoism seems to me to be an embodiment of this aspect of the Qur'an's > teachings, which is also emphasized in some Sufi teaching. Thus, > personally, I believe the essence of Taoist teachings is actually also > contained in the Qur'an. (This "sacred" aspect of nature has also > been written about by Seyyed Hossein Nasr, in some of his books like > "Man and nature" and I think there may also be a chapter on it > in his book "Islamic life and thought.") > Wa-salaam brothers and sisters, For added similarities between Taoism and Islam, one might want to also check out "The Tao of Islam" by Sachiko Murata. It's quite comprehensive, and predominantly focusses on Ibn Arabi with a bit of Rumi infused into it. The locus of the book talks about balance, not only with nature, but also balance in human relations. Quite interesting reading. Regards Rizwan -- ================================================================= Rizwan Mawani email: rmawani@chat.carleton.ca Carleton University ak395@freenet.carleton.ca Ottawa, Ontario, Canada Anthropology/Religion III (613) 736-7521 ================================================================= From tariqas-approval Wed Oct 11 05:48:16 1995 Received: by world.std.com (5.65c/Spike-2.0) id AA06205; Wed, 11 Oct 1995 15:48:20 -0400 Received: from homer27.u.washington.edu by world.std.com (5.65c/Spike-2.0) id AA06180; Wed, 11 Oct 1995 15:48:18 -0400 Received: by homer27.u.washington.edu (5.65+UW95.10/UW-NDC Revision: 2.33 ) id AA19794; Wed, 11 Oct 95 12:48:16 -0700 X-Sender: lilyan@homer27.u.washington.edu Date: Wed, 11 Oct 1995 12:48:16 -0700 (PDT) From: Lilyan Ila To: tariqas@world.std.com Subject: congrats In-Reply-To: <9510111531.AA01644@kirin.Tymnet.COM> Message-Id: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Sender: tariqas-approval@world.std.com Precedence: bulk Reply-To: tariqas Status: RO X-Status: Thanks - my baby is 7 years old now! (the other 2 are almost 10 and 20 years) Lily From tariqas-approval Wed Oct 11 06:20:24 1995 Received: by world.std.com (5.65c/Spike-2.0) id AA06134; Wed, 11 Oct 1995 16:21:22 -0400 Received: from lafn.org by world.std.com (5.65c/Spike-2.0) id AA05924; Wed, 11 Oct 1995 16:21:10 -0400 Received: by lafn.org id AA01856 (5.65c/IDA-1.4.4 for tariqas@world.std.com); Wed, 11 Oct 1995 13:20:24 -0700 Date: Wed, 11 Oct 1995 13:20:24 -0700 Message-Id: <199510112020.AA01856@lafn.org> From: an525@lafn.org (Ivan Ickovits) To: tariqas@world.std.com Subject: [an525@lafn.org: Kab pt 3] Sender: tariqas-approval@world.std.com Precedence: bulk Reply-To: tariqas Status: RO X-Status: ================= Begin forwarded message ================= From: an525@lafn.org (Ivan Ickovits) To: TansenMuni@aol.com Cc: an525@lafn.org Subject: Kab pt 3 Date: Sun, 01 Oct It is common nowadays to think that alienation is a phenomenon which keeps growing in the present "modern" period, and that in the past people lived in greater amity and mutuathe Atztec kingdoms for example). Since I regard the God of Israel as the Lord of the universe, I find significance also in the fact that the recognition of the Lord increases through the march of history (since also Islam and a great portion of Christianity believes in essentialy the same One Deity), even though the personal and direct relating is possibly weakening. The most crucial question is perhaps the amount of alienation in inter-human relation and the recognotion of each person as a brothernion, to the emergence from the "Olam Haze" state of alienation to "Olam Haba"(world to come) is that each human being receives any other one as "welcome". OLAM HABA The weakness of most utopias and ideologies is that it is easy for them to describe and analyze the shortcomings of this world, but it is difficult to describe the alternative, which is not a simple theoretical and schematic reversal of the faults. Such a description is not very convincing as a theoretical construct and generalnot so convincing for the contemporary reader. But it is the very basic quality of Olam Haba - precisely that it is the world of the Coming, of that which is palpably present in front of you and is acknowledged, of that which is not alien; it is this quality which is so concrete ("mamash") - this is the very quality of concretness. All the Biblical visions about the end of days are derived from prophecy and revelation, and the phenomena of revelation is the very thing, I believe, which characterizedrpersonal and intercultural understanding. It feels stronger than the ongoing routine acquaintance, which lacks the thrill of revelation. Understanding is the reaching of the recognition of the similarity and unity which is beyond (the acknowledged) differences and conflicts of Olam Haze/this world, whic is the place where the primal unity and identity have disappeared and each phenomenon seems like a separate entity. The explicit identification of Olam Haba with understanding is made, in Jewish standing is thus a quality of Olam Haba and her penetration into Olam Haze is through the quality of "Tvunah" (the Malkhut of Binah, roughly "intelligence") which aloows to build understandings. The contemporary universe of images gives more respect to technology and physics than to metaphysics, and it is therefore good to indicate the physical phenomena which seem to parallel the state of Binah. I refer to phenomena of synchronization and coherence, especially in laser beams whose light does notout further input of information (e.g. a mathematical formula) and therefore hardly requires further energy input. It is true that a coherent domain of understanding requires first input of time and effort in thinking and learning, but when the understandings have been acquired, it is easy to master the domain of understandings and move smoothly from topic to topic. Required is a time of confrontation with different topics which may seem a-priory as unrelated to each other, or even as conflictinew word "Mashiah" (Messiah), much as in English, as "Massiah", namely "generator of conversation" - then the scheme of the sages about the process of Olam Haze will fit exactly the notion of building Olam Haba as a world-wide domain of understandings. First there is the stage of Tohu, or of wondering, later a stage of Torah, instruction, in wich guidance is needed; and only then a stage of conversation in which there is autonomic navigation in the domain of knowledge until complete mastery, that is uf the world-Olam and in the sixth and final stage appears the creature called Adam{3}. According to what we have posited before, Olam Haze was formed almost six thousand years ago, a state of wondering about the mystery of the meaning of human existence. We shall better understand the process of the penetration of Olam Haba into the alienated world of Tohu, Olam Haze, if we understand the nature of this "Adam". ADAM It is entirely possible that the physical origin of the human race was from tull of lapses and contradictions) are wasting their energy in vain. The Bible heralds, no less that Nitzsche's Zaratustra, the appearance of a new human being, and that is the one called "Adam". This Adam is, in one aspect, all of humankind connected together as a single superorganism. Adam differs from the anthropoids at least to the extent that the ants or the bees differ from mere insects. Biology identifies over a million species of insects, and the potential intelligence of all of them is limit dawn of the periods of "Olam Haze" as constituent of the civilizations which are developing towards the state of "Olam Haba" which is a stable and enlightened planetary civilization. The image of the anthill and its comparison to the human city may raise objection and worry that the unification of humankind to some man-like giant will lead to uniformity and the loss of human uniqueness. A partial answer to this worry is in a better understanding of the anthill and the removal of its prevalent nadition, a big enough city which is worth living in is defined by there being ten "Batlanim" (literally "idle fellows"), namely people who do not have to work for their sustenance and can dedicate their days to the study of the Torah for its own sake. Psychologist A. Maslow, who studied human development to its peak, found that the most well developed humans (those who really merit the name "Adam") and who have the most universal outlook are really the most individualized and unique. Also our sag, and that the greatness of the Lord is in that each child of Adam was minted in God's stamp and formed in God's image, and each child of Adam is different from any other one. The very word "Adam" has a multitude of meanings. Adam means both the individual person and the whole of humankind without any exception. The sages also expounded that the source of the word is from the faculty of imagination: "Adameh le'Elyon" (I shall resemble the High Lord - Isiah 14:14). The human person, and the human us hope, the more that civilization draws near to Olam Haba. In fact it is the increase of the number of people who merit the name "Adam" which brings the Olam Haba into Olam Haze. The interdependence of human "Yahadut"{4}, both of personal individuality and of the joining together of all humankind, is conceivable in contemporary consciouseness, in which individual and society are often regarded as contradictory and exclusive. The mystery of Yahadut entailed in the word "Adam", which is both a forms - including detailed landscapes of whole (simulated) "planets". When the equation of the Mandelbrot Set is calculated in a computer which displays the whole pattern graphically, there is derived a figure quite reminiscent of the sitting Buddha, an image well known in Asian art. When concentrating on a small section of the pattern and instructing the computer to calculate it in great resolution - there appears (especially if the section is from the border area of the great figure), we shall gedmon" (Primal Adam) which indeed resembles the human figure - "the Image of God" - with its various details. The most common representation of this pattern is "the Tree of the Sephirot" (also called "the Tree of Life") which resembles not the sitting Buddha but the erect human form ("Homo Erectus" in the terminology of the paleontologists to one of the humanoid phenomena). The important principle is that this is not a physical pattern but a balanced system of spiritual attributes. To reach the stature degenerate cases of the whole Kabbalistic pattern. This implies that the current scientific description of man and society reaches only "up to the belt", and does not reach "the heart of the whole human person", and certainly not to the brain of this "Adam" which is definitely in the domain of "Olam Haba". () The paleontologist and mystical Christian Teilhard de Chardin tried in his own way to describe the future common brain of humankind, the pruduct of the whole planetary civilization, as ten billion people (about twice the current number). He too claims that they will all be interconnected via the best computerized communication technoloy, as well as via telepathic connections which at present we find difficult to conceive. -- q k -- q k From tariqas-approval Wed Oct 11 12:52:12 1995 Received: by world.std.com (5.65c/Spike-2.0) id AA14150; Wed, 11 Oct 1995 16:52:14 -0400 Received: from mail04.mail.aol.com by world.std.com (5.65c/Spike-2.0) id AA14126; Wed, 11 Oct 1995 16:52:12 -0400 Received: by mail04.mail.aol.com (8.6.12/8.6.12) id QAA12970 for tariqas@world.std.com; Wed, 11 Oct 1995 16:52:12 -0400 Date: Wed, 11 Oct 1995 16:52:12 -0400 From: Jinavamsa@aol.com Message-Id: <951011165204_42038248@mail04.mail.aol.com> To: tariqas@world.std.com Subject: Re: [an525@lafn.org: Kab pt 3] Sender: tariqas-approval@world.std.com Precedence: bulk Reply-To: tariqas Status: RO X-Status: hello all, This is the third time, in three rather diff. contexts, within two weeks that I've come across Mandelbrot (which I thought was a little hard cake, quite delicious) and not a man, Benoit B. Mandelbrot, who is a contemporary mathematician/physicist, I believe, and who writes in French. He works in what is called chaos (or catastrophe) theory. So, re Mandelbrot fractals and the Mandelbrot set described below, is there anyone who knows what this formula amounts to, or, more directly, how such an equation can be downloaded into a computer, to see what is being described below???? thank you for any help here, in peace, Jinavamsa In a message dated 95-10-11 16:28:32 EDT, you write: >When the > equation of the Mandelbrot Set is calculated in a computer which > displays the whole pattern graphically, there is derived a figure > quite reminiscent of the sitting Buddha, an image well known in > Asian art. When concentrating on a small section of the pattern > and instructing the computer to calculate it in great resolution - > there appears (especially if the section is from the border area > of the great figure), we shall gedmon" (Primal Adam) which indeed > resembles > the human figure - > "the Image of God" - with its various details. The most common > representation of this pattern is "the Tree of the Sephirot" (also > called "the Tree of Life") which resembles not the sitting Buddha > but the erect human form ("Homo Erectus" in the terminology of the > paleontologists to one of the humanoid phenomena). The important > principle is that this is not a physical pattern but a balanced > system of spiritual attributes. To reach the stature > degenerate cases of the whole Kabbalistic pattern. This implies > that the current scientific description of man and society reaches > only "up to the belt", and does not reach "the heart of the whole > human person", and certainly not to the brain of this "Adam" which > is definitely in the domain of "Olam Haba". From tariqas-approval Wed Oct 11 14:38:10 1995 Received: by world.std.com (5.65c/Spike-2.0) id AA08917; Wed, 11 Oct 1995 18:38:36 -0400 Received: from alfred.ccs.carleton.ca by world.std.com (5.65c/Spike-2.0) id AA08892; Wed, 11 Oct 1995 18:38:33 -0400 Received: from superior (superior.ccs.carleton.ca) by alfred.ccs.carleton.ca (4.1/SMI-4.0) id AA00512; Wed, 11 Oct 95 18:38:29 EDT From: ccscon35@ccs.carleton.ca (Rizwan Mawani) Received: by superior (4.1/Sun-Client) id AA09618; Wed, 11 Oct 95 18:38:10 EDT Message-Id: <9510112238.AA09618@superior> Subject: Re: many paths, One Goal To: tariqas@world.std.com Date: Wed, 11 Oct 95 18:38:10 EDT In-Reply-To: ; from "Steven Finkelman" at Oct 7, 95 1:06 am X-Mailer: ELM [version 2.3 PL11] Sender: tariqas-approval@world.std.com Precedence: bulk Reply-To: tariqas Status: RO X-Status: Steven Finkelman writes: > > > the lazy man's guide to enlightenment states, > "Enlightenment doesn't care how you get there" > > God is god as god is. > ishk allah mabood l'allah > I am god remembering god. > > To Paraphrase Coleman Barks, in the tv show with bill moyers: > To draw a distinction is to limit the heart, Limiting the heart limits > the ability to act in the world. > > The rest is all concepts, the problem with concepts is that they are > concepts, imagination. words lie. > > Love in through and over all, > Hal > AriLeib > As-salaam Brothers and Sisters, if you AriLeib, or someone else in the group has a transcript of the Moyers-Barks Interview, I would most appreciate it. If someone could even summarize it, I would be most grateful. Rizwan PS. Thanks for today's Quote of the day, Natalie -- Quote of the day: "When doing a great deed, dilligently rely on a good friend. A fire may burn a mighty forest, but it needs its friend -- the wind" The Buddha ================================================================= Rizwan Mawani email: rmawani@chat.carleton.ca Carleton University ak395@freenet.carleton.ca Ottawa, Ontario, Canada Anthropology/Religion III (613) 736-7521 ================================================================= From tariqas-approval Wed Oct 11 08:44:47 1995 Received: by world.std.com (5.65c/Spike-2.0) id AA13010; Wed, 11 Oct 1995 18:45:13 -0400 Received: from lafn.org by world.std.com (5.65c/Spike-2.0) id AA12892; Wed, 11 Oct 1995 18:44:58 -0400 Received: by lafn.org id AA05158 (5.65c/IDA-1.4.4 for tariqas@world.std.com); Wed, 11 Oct 1995 15:44:47 -0700 Date: Wed, 11 Oct 1995 15:44:47 -0700 Message-Id: <199510112244.AA05158@lafn.org> From: an525@lafn.org (Ivan Ickovits) To: tariqas@world.std.com Subject: { Kab pt 3} Sender: tariqas-approval@world.std.com Precedence: bulk Reply-To: tariqas Status: RO X-Status: Greetings Jinavamsa et al.: I am not sure of the exact mathematical formulation, sice it must vary from picture to picture, but conceptually as far as I know, it is the continuous struggle of the edge of the creation trying to achieve perfection. Specifically in the context of a six sided snowflake with regualr six way symmetry and with a triangular edge, the picture is that each side of the two furthest projected develop a finer triangular protrusion, ad infinitum. Other more complex pattterns still come to some simple arc or straight line at the edge, and this edge behaviour continues to be reproduced at smaller and smaller levels, to infinity. THis methodolgy can find a mathematical representation defined by length of the straight lines sya partitioned to one third of the original and each edge having one sixth the linear dimension, etc. I believe scientific american or some such had an article some years ago which was fairly accessible without much mathematical smoke. But conceptually, it is very beautiful and elegant and takes on the flavor of a wazifa such as Hayy where life struggles at the edge for greater completion or elements of beauty. Love and Hayy to all Raqib in Santa Monica > >hello all, >This is the third time, in three rather diff. contexts, within two weeks that >I've come across Mandelbrot (which I thought was a little hard cake, quite >delicious) and not a man, Benoit B. Mandelbrot, who is a contemporary >mathematician/physicist, I believe, and who writes in French. He works in >what is called chaos (or catastrophe) theory. > >So, re Mandelbrot fractals and the Mandelbrot set described below, is there >anyone who knows what this formula amounts to, or, more directly, how such an >equation can be downloaded into a computer, to see what is being described >below???? >thank you for any help here, >in peace, >Jinavamsa > >In a message dated 95-10-11 16:28:32 EDT, you write: > >>When the >> equation of the Mandelbrot Set is calculated in a computer which >> displays the whole pattern graphically, there is derived a figure >> quite reminiscent of the sitting Buddha, an image well known in >> Asian art. When concentrating on a small section of the pattern >> and instructing the computer to calculate it in great resolution - >> there appears (especially if the section is from the border area >> of the great figure), we shall gedmon" (Primal Adam) which indeed >> resembles >> the human figure - >> "the Image of God" - with its various details. The most common >> representation of this pattern is "the Tree of the Sephirot" (also >> called "the Tree of Life") which resembles not the sitting Buddha >> but the erect human form ("Homo Erectus" in the terminology of the >> paleontologists to one of the humanoid phenomena). The important >> principle is that this is not a physical pattern but a balanced >> system of spiritual attributes. To reach the stature >> degenerate cases of the whole Kabbalistic pattern. This implies >> that the current scientific description of man and society reaches >> only "up to the belt", and does not reach "the heart of the whole >> human person", and certainly not to the brain of this "Adam" which >> is definitely in the domain of "Olam Haba". > > > > -- q k From tariqas-approval Wed Oct 11 15:55:59 1995 Received: by world.std.com (5.65c/Spike-2.0) id AA03581; Wed, 11 Oct 1995 20:55:57 -0400 Received: from UNiX.asb.com by world.std.com (5.65c/Spike-2.0) id AA03561; Wed, 11 Oct 1995 20:55:55 -0400 Received: from sle5.asb.com (sle5.asb.com [165.254.128.75]) by UNiX.asb.com (8.6.9/8.6.9) with SMTP id UAA04373 for ; Wed, 11 Oct 1995 20:55:59 -0500 Date: Wed, 11 Oct 1995 20:55:59 -0500 Message-Id: <199510120155.UAA04373@UNiX.asb.com> X-Sender: f_haddad@unix.asb.com Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" To: tariqas@world.std.com From: f_haddad@unix.asb.com (Fouad Haddad) Subject: [1] Noah's Angelic Light X-Mailer: Sender: tariqas-approval@world.std.com Precedence: bulk Reply-To: tariqas Status: RO X-Status: [1] Noah's Angelic Light ======================== Excerpt from Shaykh Hisham Kabbani's <>, KAZI 1995. 23:24: "But the chieftains of his (Noah's) folk, who disbelieved, said: This is only a mortal like you who would make himself superior to you. Had God willed, He surely could have sent down angels. We heard not of this in the case of our fathers of old." Noah was born with the light of prophets on his forehead. God created that light before Adam and He caused it to pass from one generation of prophets to the next until the Seal of Prophets, Muhammad. After he received the prophecy Noah preached for nine hundred years. The angelic light in him shone forth and even the animals and stones were praising God when they saw him. Yet Noah's people were so stubborn that he succeeded in calling only eighty persons to the true faith, among them three of his sons. In the end Noah was fed up and he asked God to be relieved from the task of constantly calling in vain. God accepted Noah's request and decided to send the Great Flood as a trial for human beings. When the command came for Noah to build the ark, he asked for instructions and God sent him Gabriel to teach him how to build it. Gabriel ordered the angels of safety to collect the best timber for a ship to resist the Waters of Wrath. The angels brought Noah a pile of wood and timber from the cedar-trees of Lebanon which were later used to build the Temple of Solomon. They placed the wood in front him. The pile was so great that from whatever point of Noah's country one looked at it, that pile always seemed to cover the sky above one's head. Noah took one splinter of that pile and from it began to build a huge ark. Never before had a ship been built in that country. Noah's country did not meet the sea or any other great body of water. His people scoffed at him, saying: "A ship in the middle of a plain!" and: "How should there be a flood in this country which hasn't even seen rain in so many years?" Gabriel instructed Noah how to piece together the hull of the ship with one hundred and twenty-four thousand planks. On each of these planks was inscribed the name of one of the one hundred and twenty-four thousand prophets who were to appear from the beginning of creation to the end of times, starting with Adam. God created an angel to safeguard and insure the soundness of each plank even after it had been incorporated into the ship. This was done to show that God protects his creation with his beloved ones among the angels and the prophets. From tariqas-approval Wed Oct 11 11:35:30 1995 Received: by world.std.com (5.65c/Spike-2.0) id AA00054; Wed, 11 Oct 1995 21:36:06 -0400 Received: from lafn.org by world.std.com (5.65c/Spike-2.0) id AA29986; Wed, 11 Oct 1995 21:36:01 -0400 Received: by lafn.org id AA16811 (5.65c/IDA-1.4.4 for tariqas@world.std.com); Wed, 11 Oct 1995 18:35:30 -0700 Date: Wed, 11 Oct 1995 18:35:30 -0700 Message-Id: <199510120135.AA16811@lafn.org> From: an525@lafn.org (Ivan Ickovits) To: tariqas@world.std.com Subject: Re: [1] Noah's Angelic Light Sender: tariqas-approval@world.std.com Precedence: bulk Reply-To: tariqas Status: RO X-Status: Interesting that Malchizedek the old man who initiated Abraham was identified by jewish esotericists with Shem the son of Noach. > >[1] Noah's Angelic Light >======================== > {deleted stufff} -- q k From tariqas-approval Thu Oct 12 13:08:19 1995 Received: by world.std.com (5.65c/Spike-2.0) id AA03700; Thu, 12 Oct 1995 09:34:44 -0400 Received: from studm.hrz.uni-siegen.de by world.std.com (5.65c/Spike-2.0) id AA01308; Thu, 12 Oct 1995 09:31:23 -0400 Received: by studm.hrz.uni-siegen.de (5.65/DEC-Ultrix/4.3) id AA18339; Thu, 12 Oct 1995 12:08:20 +0100 From: gassner@studm.hrz.uni-siegen.de (gassner) Message-Id: <9510121108.AA18339@studm.hrz.uni-siegen.de> Subject: female ulama To: tariqas@world.std.com Date: Thu, 12 Oct 1995 12:08:19 +0100 (MET) X-Mailer: ELM [version 2.4 PL23] Content-Type: text Content-Length: 321 Sender: tariqas-approval@world.std.com Precedence: bulk Reply-To: tariqas Status: RO X-Status: Assalamu alaikum! Who knows or already read books or articles from female ulama? I would like to have a list of publications of the female ulama as well as i am interested to get a list about publications from female muslims in general. Either in English, French, German or (worst case to me) Arabic. maa salama Saleh From tariqas-approval Thu Oct 12 06:01:25 1995 Received: by world.std.com (5.65c/Spike-2.0) id AA05416; Thu, 12 Oct 1995 10:01:27 -0400 Received: from dns.worldweb.net by world.std.com (5.65c/Spike-2.0) id AA05400; Thu, 12 Oct 1995 10:01:25 -0400 Date: Thu, 12 Oct 1995 10:01:25 -0400 Message-Id: <199510121401.AA05400@world.std.com> Received: from line167.worldweb.net by dns.worldweb.net with SMTP; Thu, 12 Oct 1995 10:03:08 -0400 (EDT) X-Sender: jmccaig@worldweb.net X-Mailer: Windows Eudora Light Version 1.5.2 Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" To: tariqas@world.std.com From: James McCaig Subject: Re: female ulama Sender: tariqas-approval@world.std.com Precedence: bulk Reply-To: tariqas Status: RO X-Status: At 12:08 PM 10/12/95 +0100, you wrote: Have you looked into our bookstore. There is an interesting book about Noor un Nissa Khan, the daughter of Inayat Khan and a heroine of World War II. She is th only woman ever to be awarded both the French Croix de Guerre and The George Cross from UK. Warm regards >Assalamu alaikum! > >Who knows or already read books or articles from female ulama? >I would like to have a list of publications of the female ulama as well >as i am interested to get a list about publications from female muslims in >general. Either in English, French, German or (worst case to me) Arabic. > >maa salama > >Saleh > Maharaj James McCaig | Sufi Center of Washington Brotherhood/Sisterhood Representative | Keepers of Sufi Center Bookstore United States | http://guess.worldweb.net/sufi jmccaig@worldweb.net From tariqas-approval Thu Oct 12 00:15:44 1995 Received: by world.std.com (5.65c/Spike-2.0) id AA16729; Thu, 12 Oct 1995 10:16:03 -0400 Received: from lafn.org by world.std.com (5.65c/Spike-2.0) id AA16674; Thu, 12 Oct 1995 10:15:58 -0400 Received: by lafn.org id AA22920 (5.65c/IDA-1.4.4 for tariqas@world.std.com); Thu, 12 Oct 1995 07:15:44 -0700 Date: Thu, 12 Oct 1995 07:15:44 -0700 Message-Id: <199510121415.AA22920@lafn.org> From: an525@lafn.org (Ivan Ickovits) To: tariqas@world.std.com Subject: Kab pt 4 Sender: tariqas-approval@world.std.com Precedence: bulk Reply-To: tariqas Status: RO X-Status: Part 4 for you perusal. The number he quotes, ten to the tenth power{6}, proves for Russel a most wonderful number which constitutes the threshold for the emergence of new levels of complexity in creation. An elementary living cell is made of about this number of atoms. The cortex houghts, and perhaps all the perenial philosophical questions till now will provide him/her (?) educational games of the kindergarten stage. Russel continues to treat this wonder-number - this is also the number of stars in the galaxy and the expected number of galaxies in the universe. Probably these will provide a vast playground for the Adam of Olam Haba in which we all may have a share. What is interesting for us at the present moment is the convergence between this world view and the Biblicatate at about the middle of the twenty-second century C.E. The interesting fact is that this date is precisely the end of the six thousand years period of the Olam Haze accourding to the Jewish calendar. ADAM AND ISRAEL This essay presented a universal outlook derived from the tradition of Israel. But if one studies the concept of man in Jewish tradition may be disappointed to see much Jewish chauvinism mixed with the universal message. Alongside the universal description of Adam sometimes ad. I feel thus compelled to add a few words in an attempt to resolve this objection. The very fact of upholding the Biblical story which is very important for the destiny of humankind these days, a story which claims that there exists a divine plam to create an enlightened and unified Adam-humankind, gives significance to that human collectivity - first a family, then an assembly of trivbes and then a nation - which is responsible for the preservation of this story and of monotheism and to their ir many shortcomings. Also today, the people called Israel are not the paragons of virtue, and perhaps on the contrary, the very "Messianic complex" which we all carry within us makes us have guilt feelings that we are not so good. Our enourmous self-criticism, which is probably unparalleled among the nations of the world, and the blames the nations level at us when they catch us in our failures are in fact a testimony that even today there are expectations, both by ourselves and by the others, to bd. The burden is oppressing and hard to carry, just as it is difficult to carry "the yoke of the Kingdom of Heaven", and many have have dropped out of it - for if not there would have been as many Jews as there are Chinese. Precisely many of those who dropped out but still carried in them the unique Jewish tradition have greatly influenced humankind. In this century there was a huge influence to the ideas of Marx (who was accused of having "A Talmudic mind"), Freud and Einstein (and I find that th is generally that of the first generation to assimilate whereas the second generation loses its distintiveness and is hardly able to contribute to humankind. Te response of Herzel and of Modern Zionism was understood by many Israelis, including intellectuals, as an attempt to become like the other nations, and people made "a case for normalcy". But this is sheer folly. More and more we discover that the situation{7 or providence placed us thus that we cannot survive unless we exemplify through ourond all the many shortcomings, this is a marvelous process which posits the most interesting model for the formation of the new Adam from the many nations and cultures upon the face of the Adamah. The problems in the absorption of the exiles are so many, that perhaps only now one can begin to see the potential model it is for all humankind: if we shall indeed become a model society and have a contribution to make to humankind. There are amongst us many peopple who, precisely because they may wantent facets of the same process in which all the nations of the earth will be blessed, as was promised to Abraham (Gen. 12:3 & 22:18). One clear achievement that Zionism has already accomplished is the revival of the use of the Hebrew language. This may seem as a chauvinistic achievement, of the type that limits the possibility of the unification of humankind. But in fact inherent in this is the possibility to amplify our contribution to humankind, not least because knowledge of Hebrew gives us wortion of the immense riches of meaning of the scriptures. The ecological awareness that this essay strives for (see next section) and the Biblical understanding neccessary for it, which the essay aims at, are not available to them. Unless I was writing Hebrew, I would not have hit upon these meanings either. This example is only one of literally millions of contributions that we can make to the world if we get to understand well our heritage, the teachings of the scriptures, the Talmud and the Kabbames gathered and joined together. The account in tractate Sanhedrin perhaps does not interest the many who no nothing about the Talmud. I shall move to discuss another parallel account of history, which apparently lies at the base of the six thousand years account in tractate Sanhedrin, but wich is bsed on the Story of Genesis (that any one who reads it in the original and not in translation can find that, like most of the Hebrew Bible, the story of Genesis is not written in past tense but in (proph art God{9}, Thou . Based on this sentence the interpreters concluded that, at least in matters of the creation of Olam or the passage from Olam to Olam, a "day of the Lord" is like a thousand of our years. This identification is found in many places in the Kabbalah and also in Christian sources (Peter __:__, Augustine). The next step that the Kabbalists take is that each of the six days described in the Book of Genesis refers to a thousand a pedantic assumption of a day as exactly one thousand years this period started in 1240 C.E. became manifest in 1740{10} and will last till 2240. With some effort, one can find meanings in these dates (the year of the appearance of the Book of the Zohar, the beginning of the end of the exclusive reign of the Catholic church, the beginning of the articulation of the world by European colonialism etc.), but perhaps there is no need to be so meticulous. It is quite clear that we are now in a new era wead her (kivshuha{11})" is realized in the present time when all human places of residence are getting connected by roads (kvishim). Unlike the other animals (apart from the social insects as ants and termites) - the human being does not live in a natural environment but in a man-made environment which is more cultural- symbolic than physical. But the greatest changes yet are the technological changes. Quantitatively, the industrial processes entail the production of immense amount of refuse tha bring upon both humankind and the Adamah immense perils and opportunities, and it is precisely at this stage that the Biblical story about Adam, the Garden of Eden and the Trees therein, and the expulsion of Adam and the cursing of the Adamah becomes again most significant. We find in the Talmud two versions of the course of that sixth day of the formation of Adam, detailed by the hour. The important point is that according to these two versions, the case of the Tree of Knowledge and the expulsieader is not aware of it, that the story of the formation of Adam in Genesis is not told in past tense! It is written in an "inverted future" tense which can be read as past tense, but not neccessarily. Whether at the time that a book of the Torah was found at the time of King Yoshiyah or nowadays, it is possible to read the text also in future tense. This is a prophetic story about a historical pattern which is getting realized over the years, and the most dramatic passage is still ahead of us in twhich harm the Adamah, joint decision of all humankind are required. It is not enough that one civilized nation will decide for moral reasons to abstain from whale hunting, when other nations will only jump in on the spoils. Also the production of toxic and harmful materials, like the materials that are suspected to destroy the Ozon layer which tempers the ultraviolet radiation which hits the earth, is a humankind-wide action. Every year we learn about new dangers caused by unbalanced and unaware hut the accepted and arbitrary notions of good and bad but another knowledge, a more ecological knowledge which is probably derived from the counsel of the the Tree of Life. The elucudation of the type of awareness which is needed for our times is very pressing and it is probably wrong to enter further technological and industrial developments (such as nuclear reactors) before Adam reaches more consciouseness. According to this approach, the main environmental-ecological challenge is in the developip. In summary, the Biblical story of Genesis prepares us to the need of such a dialogue. The semantic connection of "Adam" and of "Adamah" is specific to the Hebrew version of the scriptures and points at the possibility that the Adam would spoil the Adamah and their destiny would become cursed. NOTES * Paper appeared originally in Hebrew in Mudaut (Consciouseness) Number 29, June 1988. 1. To the reader who is interested in a summary of Rosenzweig's philosophy and his long book, I woed "The World of Action" (Olam ha'Asiya) and "the World of Formation" (Olam haYetsira). 3. Though in the Kabbalistic interpretation of Genesis, especially in the Kabbalah of the holy ARI, the anthropomorphic pattern of Adam appears as primal pattern before the creation. 4. A neologism which is a legal Hebrew derivation of the abstract noun of the word "Yahad" ( ), meaning "together", and thus "togetherness". This word has clear phonetic association both with "Yahid" ( ) - an individual (th There are even special shops for fractal paraphernelia (e.g. "Strange Attractions" in west London). 6. It is interesting to note here the connection to the ten Sephirot of te Kabbalah. It is also noteworthy that some mathematical theories for the great unifying theory for all physical forces and phenomena find need to use ten-dimensional descriptions. 7. In Hebrew "Makom", which is literally "place", but is also one of the Names of the Lord "who is the place of the Olam and the Olam is not Hws from over 140 countries. 9. The original Biblical divine name there is "El" which means "might" and, literally, "direction towards". This is the appelation that indicates the divine intentionality and directionality that existence is predicated upon, directionality from Olam Haze to Olam Haba. 10. The Jewish account, in following Genesis "and there was evening and there was morning - one day" counts the day as beginning in the evening and thus in an incubation period with the action at the second half, since sunrise. -- q k -- q k From tariqas-approval Thu Oct 12 08:50:25 1995 Received: by world.std.com (5.65c/Spike-2.0) id AA18686; Thu, 12 Oct 1995 13:50:34 -0400 Received: from UNiX.asb.com by world.std.com (5.65c/Spike-2.0) id AA18650; Thu, 12 Oct 1995 13:50:31 -0400 Received: from sle1.asb.com (sle1.asb.com [165.254.128.71]) by UNiX.asb.com (8.6.9/8.6.9) with SMTP id NAA09590 for ; Thu, 12 Oct 1995 13:50:25 -0500 Date: Thu, 12 Oct 1995 13:50:25 -0500 Message-Id: <199510121850.NAA09590@UNiX.asb.com> X-Sender: f_haddad@unix.asb.com Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable To: tariqas@world.std.com From: f_haddad@unix.asb.com (Fouad Haddad) Subject: [2] Noah's Angelic Light X-Mailer: Sender: tariqas-approval@world.std.com Precedence: bulk Reply-To: tariqas Status: RO X-Status: [2] Noah's Angelic Light =3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D Excerpt from Shaykh Hisham Kabbani's <>, KAZI 1995. God places within creation itself the causes and effects of salvation and the road to Paradise. God saves His beloved servants time and again with the arks of salvation brought by the angels. In times of disasters, plights, wars, famines, and great depressions, angels never fail until today to bring help and relief for those who ask. The following story illustrates this. The year is 1982, in Beirut, Lebanon, the jewel city of the Middle East which Westerners used to describe as "the Switzerland of the Middle East." It is the middle of the Lebanese crisis. Local tyrants are fighting each other and shelling the city with over three hundred rockets a minute raining on both sides, indifferent to the victims. On a very dark day of severe bombing, everyone in our ten-story building is huddled in their apartments praying. Each person hopes to escape with his or her own life. There is no electricity to use the elevator, to watch TV, or even to use the phone or heat the water. People are live minute by minute, running down the stairs to the basement for shelter, and feel lucky if they have stored some bread bought at the bakery during a lull in the bombing. In the middle of this confusion, a lady is screaming in the basement: "I forgot, I forgot!" What did you forget? people around her ask her. But she keeps screaming, "I forgot, I forgot!" all the while tearing her hair by the roots and slapping her cheeks. Meanwhile, the building seems to be swaying left and right from the vibrations of exploding shells all around our neighborhood. Every one is feeling his heart breaking into pieces and his very veins buzzing unbearably, because the kind of rocket that is raining uses a chain of explosions close-packed together, of the type called `anqudiyya or cluster-bomb in Arabic. The overall feeling is that the moment of death has come. Everyone reaches for their children and covers them with their arms, so that they may be taken with them and not leave them alone in death. At that moment, love of mothers for their children shone. So did love of fathers, husbands and wives, and all family members who counted together the moments that remained before they would leave this life. Everyone=7F recited the prayers that he or she knew, busy with his or her own person, engaged in private supplication to God for salvation. The whispering and the chanting of prayer was the only sound other than the sound of exploding shells above us. Nothing broke the gloom of this small basement except a few candles lit here and there, giving us hope like islands of light in a sea of darkness. The intensity of the bombing reaches its peak. The shells have reached us, and we are all going to be shattered to pieces. The building is crumbling like cardboard, and the stones and bricks are heard falling around the streets of the neighborhood, like hail on the head of people on a winter day. In the middle of this rain of stones over human heads, the lady's voice also reached its peak, and she was now heard screaming: "Please! Let someone help my child! Someone help him! He is dying! He has been killed!" But no-one can see who she is referring to, and no-one is able to help her. My sister took some cool water and tried to bring the lady to her senses by throwing water on her face, at the same time she kept asking "where her child was so that she could be rescued." My sister called me: "Come and help me with her." I came and helped, and she said: "Please! I forgot my daughter." Where? "In the tenth floor, in our apartment." My face turned pale. I looked into my sister's eyes, interrogating her without speaking, but she understood that I was telling her: "There might no longer be a tenth floor, or a fifth floor, or even a ground floor over us! Can we even get out of this basement alive?" People huddled around us, and we began to hear knocks on the metal door of the basement. The door was open from outside, three men and two ladies rushed in, shouting to us: "Close it behind us, close it quickly!" They had come at high speed with their car, not knowing where to go until they glimpsed the basement entrance to our shelter. They had jumped out of their car and rushed in for cover. We gave them some water and tried to calm them down from the shock of what they had seen outside. Their faces and clothes were covered with blood as they had been helping transport the wounded and the dead in their car. One of the newcomers said: "The streets are littered with the dead. We don't know who to pick up anymore. Complete buildings have=7F been razed to the ground. It is horror, disaster! I looked in turn at the first screaming lady, and then at the lady who was speaking. I said: - "What about our building?" - "Which building do you mean?" - "This building, our building!" All five newcomers cried out in a confused clamor: - "There is nothing left outside, there is no more building! We saw a ruin of four or five floors' height, that's all that's left!" When the first lady heard this, we thought she was going to go mad or even fall dead. All turned to her with baited breaths, ready to catch her if she fell. But the contrary happened. She seemed to calm down all of a sudden, catching her breath and becoming firm, staring at a corner of the basement. Her face changed colors, from pale to pink, her eyes became full of light, even smiling, and her mouth fell gaping as she said in a whisper: - "O my God -- O my God -- O my God!" Everyone forgot about the shelling. We became oblivious to the apocalyptic thunder outside; instead, there was silence all around us. Every heart suddenly felt this great peace covering us all around, like a big mantle of quiet and rest, taking us to a different place in a short moment. Everyone stared in the direction of the lady's stare, but no-one could see what she was seeing. She stammered: - "O my God! I can see your angels! I can see your helpers with their wings, helping my daughter, they came to help us!" As soon as she pronounced the word "angel," everybody felt a cool breeze, fragrant with an inexpressible perfume of flowers and fresh scents, covering the sulfuric smoke that had been drifting in from outside. The candles went out. An immense light appeared, filling the whole basement and seemingly expanding it infinitely. Everyone froze in their place, unable to detach their gaze from this great cloud of light, staring at the light without the slightest strain, although it seemed many times as intense as the sun itself! Tongues were muted. No-one breathed. An immense peace descended, and all the suffering and shelling of the last few hours was forgotten. The lady was now in a state of happiness, and all anxiety had disappeared from her. "Angels are saving my daughter." She kept repeating this, despite the apparent incongruity of her phrase, because everyone had thought that the building above us had been reduced to rubble and all the lives of those still in it, lost. Yet everyone now firmly believed that anything could happen because of the state we had entered, although anyone hearing this from the outside would consider it nonsense that the lady's daughter could still be alive. My sister looked at me silently begging for some kind of answer. I stared back, eyes wide open, as if telling her: "God is great, He can do anything, even send His guardian angels to heal the wounds of helpless people who supplicate Him." She understood, and the reflection of this message seemed to enter her heart in waves of spiritual energy, now overflowing her heart and reaching the hearts of others all around us. Everyone seemed aware of a special event happening to them, which they had never experienced before in their lives. My sister had been suffering from cancer for several years. A gynecologist by profession, she understood more than anyone else the facts about cancer and the gravity of her situation. She had undergone surgery and many treatments of chemotherapy. Doctors had finally told her that she had but a few months left to live. She was now in pain at the thought of death knocking at her door and about to enter, in addition to the pains of the disease itself and its harrowing treatment. She was looking at me as if trying to ask: "If this visitation is real -- if it is happening that that woman's child is being helped by an angel, and we are seeing something to prove it -- why doesn't the same angel also touch me with his miraculous healing, and save me as other people are being saved?" I understood all this in a moment, and we had not exchanged a single syllable. I felt then and there that my sister was desperately asking, with all her heart, for help. She was trying to reach for the robe of an angel, clutching it in a last-minute attempt to be saved, as if this precious moment might not be repeated again in her lifetime. Something amazing and unexpected immediately followed this silent dialogue: my sister was now gazing at the corner of the basement with the same stare that we had seen on the face of the woman who was missing her daughter. My sister's tongue began to move and stammer involuntarily: "My brother,=7F my brother, an angel is coming towards me! O my God, O my God!" Everyone stared but no-one could see, as the angel was visible only to her, as it had previously been visible only to the woman. Yet the light in the room seemed to multiply again and again. My sister screamed: "He is healing me! The angel is healing me!!" Then she fainted. Everyone was in a dilemma, wondering who to help: the first lady or my sister? But no-one moved, as we were all frozen in our respective places and unable to take it all in other than to say: "God is great." In the middle of this state of confusion and spiritual wonderment, everyone heard a distinct knock on the small metal door of the basement. Yet no-one could move from his place, afraid to lose this state of ecstasy and return to the world of bombs, the noises of war, the smells of fire and gunpowder, and the sight of the dead and wounded. Each one of us felt responsible for opening the door, and yet legs seemed pinned in their places and no-one was moving. Among all these people, two children broke loose from their parents' arms, a boy and a girl, and ran toward the basement door. The parents screamed: "Come back, come back!" but the children were answering: "Angels, angels!" All eyes were on the children, and the parents were unable to move even one inch from their places to catch their children. Everyone's heart stopped at the thought that the children might go out and be hurt by the shelling. Amazement grew tenfold at a new sight: the children were no longer walking on the ground, their feet were now raised one inch above the ground, and they were walking on thin air! Their parents lost their voices and were now questioning their senses. The children took over, as if pitying their parents' loss for words, and said: "Mom, dad, angels are coming to our help. Don't be afraid. They will deliver us." The children must have taken but a moment to reach the door; for everyone else, however, it seemed like a year. What was happening with the children? Were they even the same children anymore, or were they angels in the disguise of children? Who was knocking at the door? As the children were approaching the door, we did not seem to hear knocks anymore, but musical sounds charming our ears and flowing into the air. Wonder, confusion, expectation, suspense: the first lady and her daughter, my sister's sight and her loss of consciousness, the silence, the light, the fragrance surrounding us, the knocking at the door, the children floating on the air and calmly announcing the presence of angels, all this seemed too much for us to understand. (more later insha Allah)