Thursday, April 11, 2024

On Prayer

 

“Prayer is the greatest virtue, the only way of being free from all sin.”

- Bowl of Saki

There are many virtues, but there is one principal virtue. Every moment passed outside the presence of God is sin, and every moment in His presence is virtue. The whole object of the Sufi, after learning this way of communicating is to arrive at a stage where every moment of our life passes in communion with God, and where our every action is done as if God were before us. Is that within everyone's reach? We are meant to be so. Just think of a person who is in love: when he eats or drinks, whatever he does, the image of the beloved is there. In the same way, when the love of God has come, it is natural to think of God in everything we do.


Prayer is a great virtue and is the only way of being free from all sin. In prayer a man reaches the Spirit of God which is all-powerful and ever-forgiving; and the power of prayer opens the doors of the heart in which God, the All-Merciful resides.


There are many different feelings which have their influence upon men, and give joy and exaltation; but there is none greater and more exalting than that of offering our faults and weaknesses before God and asking His pardon with true repentance and humility. No ethics, no philosophy, can give greater joy than this, which is sincere devotion to God; and the deepest joy is his who knows best how to humble himself before God. The proud man, ignorant of greatness of God, and of His all-sufficient power, does not know this exaltation, which raises the soul from earth to Heaven.”


-Hazrat Inayat Khan

Monday, January 1, 2024

New Year Resolutions

 Arhatic Alchemy

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

We are here already, 2024. Let us all make a firm resolve on this day to live by the principles of Ageless Wisdom. Let us work together towards the spirit of cooperation, harmony, compassion & goodwill.


Torkom Saraydarian once said,


“The sign of spiritual progress is to have a new life, a new beginning every morning. Every day you can improve your consciousness, relationships, relationships, goals, labor, and ways and means of doing things. You see a new meaning in every event, object, and person.”


-Torkom Saraydarian New Beginnings

@grevkafi

Those serious aspirants who are ready to take firm responsibility for this year can find the following resolutions helpful.


“They are resolutions with which to open the new year that it may in truth bring us closer to wisdom and understanding. Therefore let us consider these resolutions as listed below:


1. Unto that Self which is within me and is the source of all, I send those greetings which the body can send unto the source of itself and pledge that this year I shall serve this spirit within myself with my heart, my mind and my hand-not to the glorification of matter but that all the world may know the reality of spirit.


2. As the spirit in man is a friend of all things, one with the spirit of all things, knowing neither foe nor friend, kith or kin, race or creed, I shall emphasize this during the coming year through that personality which is the finite manifestation of the infinite. I shall harm no living thing during this year but shall seek communion with that spirit in all living things which is the universal solvent of inharmony.


3. My relationship with my brother man this year shall be based upon my own intrinsic realization of right and not upon their attitude to me. It shall make no difference to me how I am treated, for during this year I shall only do good, express charity, live fraternity, and follow the doctrine of non-resistance. I shall neither resist evil nor accept it but shall remain in poise while others are in turmoil.


4. No word of dissatisfaction, of criticism or of destructiveness shall be launched into the world this coming year from me. I shall meet and receive all things in the spirit of charity and will accept those responsibilities which the world gives me in peace, in poise and in placidity, no matter how hard my lot nor how sad my life.


5. I shall be clean in thought, word and action; in body, mind and soul; and nothing shall defile the temple of the living God within me; either that which goeth in or that which cometh out, but both shall be acceptable in the sight of the most high.


6. My voice shall not be raised in anger nor my words be quick in tone or harsh in meaning but shall be in perfect peace unto all things, realizing the fundamental unity of all life and that diversity is nature's illusion.


7. This year I shall labor. Every day something useful must be standing when night falls to show that today has not been in vain. Someone shall smile who has not smiled before, someone shall be glad who is sad, someone shall be richer who was poor, each day that I am spared in this world of men.


8. Unto my younger brothers I also pledge in the spirit of helpfulness all that I have and am, that each year will come closer to realization of the oneness of all living things.


9. Unto those foes with whom my life has been beset, those thoughtless ones who have grieved me of ten, those friends who have been untrue, those of my own flesh and blood who have been false to me-to all these this year I send greetings that, while they may be false to me, I shall never be false to them. That one Power in the universe which is the basis of all bases and the cause of all causes-to that I renew the bond which is so easily broken by the thoughtlessness of life that I may each day be true and come closer to the ideals which I know but which the weakness of the flesh so seldom gives expression to. Brother, beast and God-all three of these in nature shall realize my realization of unity for I shall live this year to serve those who alone have the power to reward in spirit and in truth.


Let us this year take unto ourselves these resolutions, build them into that eternal part of ourselves which was before the world was and shall be when oblivion dissolves all things.”


-Manly P Hall; The All Seeing Eye Vol 2 No 3