From: "The Tawasin of Mansur al Hallaj"
Al Hallaj became notorious in his own day for a number of views envisioned as heretical, and would eventually be executed for an ecstatic idea, "I am Truth!" I mention this because the meaning of certain words is largely influenced by who says them, and in this case, it's important to note that al Hallaj was ... well, al Hallaj.
- "The Doctrine of Imam Mansur al-Hallj", from Al-Qushayri's Risala Ila Al-Sufiyya, translated by Dr. G. F. Haddad
- "Medieval Sourcebook: Mansur al-Hallaj: Sayings", from Fordham University and the Internet Medieval Source Book.
- "Mansur al-Hallaj", biography from ThelemicKnights.
- "Husayn ibn Mansur al-Hallaj", biography from Sufimaster.org (Sidi Muhammed Press)
The Ta-Sin of Understanding also reminds us of a basic truth, of which there are few, about the religious process itself:
see: "Universal Law of Gravitation"
Now, what's important to this idea in the present exploration is the simple fact that r is always changing, as the Universe is ever-expanding, and no object or tangible composite is changeless. So you can certainly run the equation to describe your relationship to an object, but the approximations of measurement might well hide the variations in the result so that you might not notice when you run the equation again with current data that the result has changed ever-so-slightly.
This idea is presented for its analogous value only. In an ideological arena, such as the theosophic, the changes are not necessarily quantifiable by any simple science--e.g. one we've discovered yet. The problem is that whether or not you accept the idea, you are always learning, always growing, always changing. Even those who, by the standards of a mediocre Rush song, choose not to decide continue to acquire, accommodate, and assimilate information. If you are capable of reading these words it's true. Trust me, if you cannot acquire, accommodate, and assimilate information, you are not capable of actually reading the words, or even knowing that they exist.
And we must remember that we are always learning, growing, changing. As our psychological, spiritual, and intellectual dimensions change, so do our relationships with our surroundings and the nature of our interactions with others. If this seems a sweeping idea, consider it simply in terms of two simple ideas about human communication and behavior:
(1) You can "change your mind", your regard, your opinion, your condition; this is demonstrable simply by the idea that one can get angry or annoyed at another when they were not only moments before.
(2) There are some things you can't "take back". You know those words, those moments of hatred and revulsion that still whisper and haunt the edges of conscience.
The effects of what has happened in the past, and of what is happening in the present, influence one's perception and interaction with the future as it becomes the present, and also influences one's expectations of the future.
Which brings us to a practical consideration that should be accounted for in any debate of a religious concept. Any who may have attained the religious idea of perfection might not remain to tell the tale. The aspirant attains, the relationship between the person that was the aspirant and the goal itself has changed into a new form, perhaps something more definite. And when the idea is a metaphysical, psychospiritual Union, well, therein lies a problem with communication. Perhaps those who have truly met God at some point reside in the asylums.
We mundane humans cannot know what lies on the other side of the mysterium. What understanding brings, what it implies, we cannot know. What it teaches is, in its own right, nebulous. For what Union takes place? The moth to the flame, the human to the idea?
Conceptually, this is what Jesus was for. After all, even the seekers don't know what it is they seek. The critics can only criticize the search, not the goal. For none who have gone into the mysterium have reported back, so to speak, and we should no more expect them to than the moths should expect their flame-dancing fellow to return to their dimension of existence and therefore understanding. The conditions have changed. And Jesus, conveniently, is asserted to not suffer this problem. From the mysterium he came, and to the mysterium he returned after telling us what he could. So goes the myth.
Faith is as nihilistic as its rejection. Why else does myth hold that the world must end according to this or that end-story of the triumph of faith? Because nobody can write what comes beyond; the religious expectation is of those things which defy experience and expression, the culmination of hope and the defeat of fear. An existence without fear? Not part of the human experience; everybody has a price, or else we'd push our own extinction. Why not throw oneself into the flame just to find out what's on the other side? ("Whatsamatta? Chicken?")
And since nobody can imagine an existence without fear that makes any kind of sense ... well, what does come after the end? We are equally as ignorant of the end of all things as we are of God, and, daresay, ourselves. That's why death and apocalypse are viewed as abysmal: they are the last bastions of the unknown, they are by certain regards anthropomorphizations of ignorance.
The whole thing speaks a basic assertion of truth, but that end part is actually something I feel the need to remind people of.
Al Hallaj became notorious in his own day for a number of views envisioned as heretical, and would eventually be executed for an ecstatic idea, "I am Truth!" I mention this because the meaning of certain words is largely influenced by who says them, and in this case, it's important to note that al Hallaj was ... well, al Hallaj.
- "The Doctrine of Imam Mansur al-Hallj", from Al-Qushayri's Risala Ila Al-Sufiyya, translated by Dr. G. F. Haddad
- "Medieval Sourcebook: Mansur al-Hallaj: Sayings", from Fordham University and the Internet Medieval Source Book.
- "Mansur al-Hallaj", biography from ThelemicKnights.
- "Husayn ibn Mansur al-Hallaj", biography from Sufimaster.org (Sidi Muhammed Press)
The Ta-Sin of Understanding also reminds us of a basic truth, of which there are few, about the religious process itself:
We must remember that our relationship to any thing, person, being, or idea in the Universe changes dynamically. Take a basic concept from high school physics:
see: "Universal Law of Gravitation"
Now, what's important to this idea in the present exploration is the simple fact that r is always changing, as the Universe is ever-expanding, and no object or tangible composite is changeless. So you can certainly run the equation to describe your relationship to an object, but the approximations of measurement might well hide the variations in the result so that you might not notice when you run the equation again with current data that the result has changed ever-so-slightly.
This idea is presented for its analogous value only. In an ideological arena, such as the theosophic, the changes are not necessarily quantifiable by any simple science--e.g. one we've discovered yet. The problem is that whether or not you accept the idea, you are always learning, always growing, always changing. Even those who, by the standards of a mediocre Rush song, choose not to decide continue to acquire, accommodate, and assimilate information. If you are capable of reading these words it's true. Trust me, if you cannot acquire, accommodate, and assimilate information, you are not capable of actually reading the words, or even knowing that they exist.
And we must remember that we are always learning, growing, changing. As our psychological, spiritual, and intellectual dimensions change, so do our relationships with our surroundings and the nature of our interactions with others. If this seems a sweeping idea, consider it simply in terms of two simple ideas about human communication and behavior:
(1) You can "change your mind", your regard, your opinion, your condition; this is demonstrable simply by the idea that one can get angry or annoyed at another when they were not only moments before.
(2) There are some things you can't "take back". You know those words, those moments of hatred and revulsion that still whisper and haunt the edges of conscience.
The effects of what has happened in the past, and of what is happening in the present, influence one's perception and interaction with the future as it becomes the present, and also influences one's expectations of the future.
Which brings us to a practical consideration that should be accounted for in any debate of a religious concept. Any who may have attained the religious idea of perfection might not remain to tell the tale. The aspirant attains, the relationship between the person that was the aspirant and the goal itself has changed into a new form, perhaps something more definite. And when the idea is a metaphysical, psychospiritual Union, well, therein lies a problem with communication. Perhaps those who have truly met God at some point reside in the asylums.
We mundane humans cannot know what lies on the other side of the mysterium. What understanding brings, what it implies, we cannot know. What it teaches is, in its own right, nebulous. For what Union takes place? The moth to the flame, the human to the idea?
Conceptually, this is what Jesus was for. After all, even the seekers don't know what it is they seek. The critics can only criticize the search, not the goal. For none who have gone into the mysterium have reported back, so to speak, and we should no more expect them to than the moths should expect their flame-dancing fellow to return to their dimension of existence and therefore understanding. The conditions have changed. And Jesus, conveniently, is asserted to not suffer this problem. From the mysterium he came, and to the mysterium he returned after telling us what he could. So goes the myth.
Faith is as nihilistic as its rejection. Why else does myth hold that the world must end according to this or that end-story of the triumph of faith? Because nobody can write what comes beyond; the religious expectation is of those things which defy experience and expression, the culmination of hope and the defeat of fear. An existence without fear? Not part of the human experience; everybody has a price, or else we'd push our own extinction. Why not throw oneself into the flame just to find out what's on the other side? ("Whatsamatta? Chicken?")
And since nobody can imagine an existence without fear that makes any kind of sense ... well, what does come after the end? We are equally as ignorant of the end of all things as we are of God, and, daresay, ourselves. That's why death and apocalypse are viewed as abysmal: they are the last bastions of the unknown, they are by certain regards anthropomorphizations of ignorance.
