Each image painted on the canvas of existence
is the form of the Artist himself
Eternal Ocean spews forth-new waves.
Waves we call them; but there is only the sea.

Every time you hear in a Sufi poetry something that talks about God being every where or one seeing God in everything or being inside oneself or being hidden and visible at the same time, be afraid, be very very afraid. For you are being fed something that seems so beautiful and so pure and so innocent, yet is something that can tear the very fabric of Iman that Quran worked very hard to teach. I am hardly the person with any knowledge or position to name names but as a conscientious Muslim I must oppose this idea and anyone who spreads it. This disease has spread through majority, and when I say that I mean Majority, of the Sufi sects and followers out there. Its enchantment deceived a few and their unquestionable following preserved it for eternity. 

If there has been one crime that humanity has committed since its beginning, its Shirk, it is mixing God with the things that aren't worthy of being God and worship.

LA ILLAHA ILLALLAH (Nothing worthy of worship except God)

This is the creed that makes you a Muslim. Notice the wording, Ilah in Arabic means something that is worthy of worship, not just a god, but that which should be worshiped. God is careful to tell you that he wants undivided and exclusive rights on being worshiped. This must not be shared with anyone or anything. Full Stop. If you do that you will incur the worst wrath of God.

If anything Satan has always been mindful of this fact and has understood it well. He knows that to keep human beings in God's perpetual wrath, he must deviate them from this fundamental principle. He must make every effort to confuse and convolute this idea and cause them to deviate from the unity and exclusiveness of worship to God. He has succeeded many many times and continues to do so.

Wahdat ul Wajood means that there is 'nothing except God', not that there is nothing worthy of worship except God, but 'nothing except God'. Mushrikeen in the time of Prophet Muhammad (SAW) were not Christians or Jews, but pagans, those who worshiped nature and believed that everything was God and God was in everything. Hence everything became worthy of worship and everything gained some place in the hierarchy of worship. If the ultimate was God, that needed to be worshiped, then He was manifest in everything and part of everything and hence could be worshiped through things or idols or people for that matter. God was everywhere, not metaphorically but literally.

Unfortunately this idea suffers from the same malaise. I have read many arguments regarding how these things are not the same, but they are, when you boil them down to their essence. There will be a lot of confusing philosophizing and layers and layers of reasoning to justify that it is different but the more complex it gets, the simpler the answer becomes, they are the same.

The beauty of truth is in its simplicity. When people go to lengths to prove that something as simple as Tawheed is not that simple, beware that something is wrong. Allah said that he has made the Quran simple and He gives examples so that people may understand. But people are hell bent on making it complex and beyond understanding just so that they can push their faulty ideas and not to have to change.

If you'll bear with me, I will state the explanation given by people (mostly Sufis) on how these things are different. It is a 'causal' relationship. God being the first cause. The idea is that God has existed forever and everything else exists because God exists. Hence everything's existence is causally dependent on God. So, to the keen eye (replace Sufi who has reached Irfaan) everything becomes transparent and even non-existent because it is hardly there on its own. Hence the only thing there is God. My only objection is, why doesn't God say so in the first place? Because he does not. This is a very tricky escape from the pantheistic (pagans) unity. It takes you to the level of mental unity from physical one of the pagan's. But if you ask the simple question, Is there 'anything' beside God? (notice it is anything and not something God like or worship worthy) The answer comes No from them! Why then should I buy the imaginative causal unity?

People (Sufi followers) object that this is a misunderstanding and it arises because one has tried to understand this concept without a Murshid or teacher. Well the Truth (Haq) should sustain, like God, on its own accord without someone making it the truth! The fundamental problem with saying that someone will establish that truth is that someone will establish THEIR truth. Once you make the assumption that you need someone for it, it stops being objective. You find yourself trapped in the vicious circle, that to find the truth you must accept someone but to accept someone you must know if they are true! Hence you already sacrificed all objectivity and sealed your fate that if wrong you will stay wrong forever and that's how all bad ideas ensure their survival. If they open themselves to question and objective reasoning they don't stand a chance. God Himself did not ask you to just believe in Him, but to be reasonable and look around and decide if it this is mere Coincidence!

2:164 (Asad) Verily, in the creation of the heavens and of the earth, and the succession of night and day: and in the ships that speed through the sea with what is useful to man: and in the waters which God sends down from the sky, giving life thereby to the earth after it had, been lifeless, and causing all manner of living creatures to multiply thereon: and in the change of the winds, and the clouds that run their appointed courses between sky and earth: [in all this] there are messages indeed for people who use their reason.

52:35 (Y. Ali) Were they created of nothing, or were they themselves the creators?

Secondly, it is said that it is a matter of experiencing rather than knowing by learning. Well then my question would be, what established guarantees do you have from God regarding your experiences and their interpretation? None, zero, zilch! Experiencing God may definitely bring its own enlightenment and amplification of Iman but as far as knowing the Truth is concerned, it ends where God tells you what it is! And if you say that God told you the truth, then unfortunately I don't have the permission to take this truth from anyone except the Prophets that God chose for the purpose. Especially when I was told that today the religion has been made complete and chosen for me!

It is such a sad fact that the mesmerizing and enchanting beauty of the idea of being one with God has blinded people form He actually asked. He never said we could have the knowledge to know who God really is. If we could ever do that then we would need at least as much knowledge as He Himself, which unfortunately is not possible. Then why run after things that he has not made for us? Why burden yourself with this? He asked Iblis to do something and Iblis declined based on his own knowledge and reasoning, rather than obeying God as He ASKED. With things that God would like to burden us he has left for us to find. But with things he does not need our efforts He has explained on His own and asked us to stick to it! Angels made the same mistake of splitting hairs on what God had specified but apologized immediately:

2:30 (Asad) AND LO! Thy Sustainer said unto the angels: "Behold, I am about to establish upon earth one who shall inherit it." They said: "Wilt Thou place on it such as will spread corruption thereon and shed blood -whereas it is we who extol Thy limitless glory, and praise Thee, and hallow Thy name?" [God] answered: "Verily, I know that which you do not know."

I would like to leave you with words of God, where He clearly says that there is He the creator and others the created. It is only He that deserves worship, but as far as existence goes, there are many. So please stick to that and be as spiritual as you like.

10:3 (Asad) VERILY, your Sustainer is God, who has created the heavens and the earth in six aeons, and is established on the throne of His almightiness, ^[6] governing all that exists. There is none that could intercede with Him unless He grants leave therefor. ^[7] Thus is God, your Sustainer: worship, therefore, Him [alone]: will you not, then, keep this in mind?

For God knows best.

 

Further study:

Sufi Metaphysics

What is unity of being

Ibn e Arabi

Ibn e Taymiyya

Wahdat al-Wujud: a fundamental doctrine in Sufism

Socrates is my favorite philosopher, some said he was the "ugliest man". Consider the time he lived in, the athens that worshiped beauty. Just look at the all those stone sculptures of the time and try to understand how much they appreciated physical beauty. They even had a god for it.

It is said that one of the students of Socrates showed a picture of him to a face-reader called Zopyrus. He could  tell about  the qualities  and character  of  people by just looking at them. When he saw the picture of Socrates, he was obviously appalled and said to the guy that this person (Socrates) was a sensualist. A person of low morals and no scruples. A man driven by "ferocious lust" and physical appetite. A man with fierce temper and violent emotions. A man who was greedily looking to experience the life of the senses. He didn't know who Socrates was and the student silently laughed at the description, knowing Socrates was the complete opposite.

He came back and narrated the description to Socrates and to his surprise, Socrates agreed completely. He too recognized himself to be a sensualist and said that he spent a lifetime learning how not to be one and transform all that energy into something good. Cultivating character. Learning to be just. Knowing that he knew nothing. Pursuing truth.

Socrates - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Socrates

From John Godfrey Saxe (1816-1887)

A Hindu Parable

It was six men of Indostan
To learning much inclined,
Who went to see the Elephant
(Though all of them were blind),
That each by observation
Might satisfy his mind.

The First approached the Elephant,
And happening to fall
Against his broad and sturdy side,
At once began to bawl:
"God bless me! but the Elephant
Is very like a wall!"

The Second, feeling of the tusk
Cried, "Ho! what have we here,
So very round and smooth and sharp?
To me 'tis mighty clear
This wonder of an Elephant
Is very like a spear!"

The Third approached the animal,
And happening to take
The squirming trunk within his hands,
Thus boldly up he spake:
"I see," quoth he, "the Elephant
Is very like a snake!"

The Fourth reached out an eager hand,
And felt about the knee:
"What most this wondrous beast is like
Is mighty plain," quoth he;
"'Tis clear enough the Elephant
Is very like a tree!"

The Fifth, who chanced to touch the ear,
Said: "E'en the blindest man
Can tell what this resembles most;
Deny the fact who can,
This marvel of an Elephant
Is very like a fan!"

The Sixth no sooner had begun
About the beast to grope,
Than, seizing on the swinging tail
That fell within his scope.
"I see," quoth he, "the Elephant
Is very like a rope!"

And so these men of Indostan
Disputed loud and long,
Each in his own opinion
Exceeding stiff and strong,
Though each was partly in the right,
And all were in the wrong!

Moral:

So oft in theologic wars,
The disputants, I ween,
Rail on in utter ignorance
Of what each other mean,
And prate about an Elephant
Not one of them has seen.

Reference

In apparently part two of this series, I'll tell you about what I think is Plato's contribution to 'The Matrix'. Plato needs no introduction himself so I'll just go ahead and introduce you to his 'Allegory of the cave'. This allegory is described in book seven in Plato's most famous work, The Republic. In 'The Republic' Plato describes his utopian world where the philosopher and only the philosopher is eligible to be the king or the ruler. Not because the philosopher is the most intelligent person, but because, the philosopher has climbed the highest levels of consciousness and has freed himself shackles of base desires and the overcome the mirage of a life ordinary people live. He is a man of character, who lives by his ideals and dies by them and has no interest in gaining power or fame or wealth. He and only he makes the most just ruler.

In the allegory, Plato tells the story of a set of people who are chained to chairs in a very dark cave. These people are trapped to such an extent that they cannot even turn their heads and they are facing a wall. Immediately behind them, there is a raised platform, where other people walk and go about their work. Behind them burns a fire and because of that fire shadows are cast on the wall where the trapped people are facing. These people have been here all their lives, watching the shadow go about their lives, different shadows doing different things. This is all they know of.

Plato mostly wrote dialogs. This allegory too is a dialog between his teacher, Socrates, and Galucon, who is a young man inclined towards the pleasures of life. Plato describes to him that from the trapped prisoners one of them escapes. When he looks towards the light, the light of the sun, it is very harsh on him. He climbs up the cave towards its mouth dazed by the strong light. Slowly he gets aquatinted with it and finds out that the world he lived in was not really the world. At first, he only understands the shadows well because that's what he was familiar with. Then, with time, he learns about other things.

He returns to the cave to his people and is rejected by them because they cannot see his point and are only familiar with the shadow world. They compete with each other in following the shadows and he just finds it useless, knowing the reality of their actions. He is not a man interested in this shadow world, now fully aware of its reality. The prisoners believed themselves to be free as well. The felt they were aware of the reality too, the  reality of shadows, of a world they grew up to appreciate and accept.

According to Plato, reality cannot be taught to anyone. Just like the escaped prisoner had to face the harsh light, slowly learn to differentiate shadows from reality, everyone, who wishes to attain realization, must go through the harsh and toilsome process.

Allegory of the cave

Wikipedia: Allegory of the cave

Wikipedia: Plato

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