What It Means - Day 293

Where Is the Door to the Tavern

What is the door to God?

In the sound of a barking dog,

In the ring of a hammer,

In a drop of rain,

In the face of

Everyone

I see.

Hafiz

OK, I guess I'm in a bit of a Hafiz phase as we pass into the New Year.  In the Quran we are reminded that God is closer than your jugular vein. Since the time of the Enlightenment we've accepted the notion of God as the Great Clockmaker, a separate being who wound up the world and stepped away from it. Instead, isn't God simply everything and everyone? Of course, that sounds more like a a Hindu or Buddhist concept, and as Muslims we're sometimes so afraid of associating anything with God that we can also place God as a distance (even considering our admonition about God being closer than your jugular vein). Why does God have to be the OTHER? If you say that all of these things - a barking dog, a drop of rain, the face of everyone - are in submission to God, why can't they be a door to God as well?

What It Means - Day 292

I Have Learned So Much

I

Have Learned

So much from God

That I can no longer

Call

Myself

A Christian, a Hindu, a Muslim,

A Buddhist, a Jew.

The Truth has shared so much of Itself

With me

That I can no longer call myself

A man, a woman, an angel,

Or even pure

Soul.

Love has

Befriended Hafiz so completely

It has turned to ash

And freed

Me

Of every concept and image

My mind has ever known.

Hafiz

I know that many mainstream Muslims are somewhat suspicious of the Sufis - and we've discussed how Seyyed Nasr is more than a little suspicious about popular translations of Rumi or Hafiz or the other Sufi poets - but I love many of them, and they played a profound role in my path to Islam. This poem, especially, is one that speaks to me. It wasn't until I converted to Islam, and truly began to study it, that I began to understand the universality of all religions (making our centuries of internecine conflict all the more tragic).

Erik E

I'm just taking the opportunity to post a picture of my most excellent friend Erik, who traveled with Cyndi and me to Jordan on the Thanksgiving trip. As I've often opined, I should really hate him because he's better than me at absolutely everything, but he's such a great guy I can only love him. Here he is in the Bedouin camp on Thanksgiving morning prepping for the camel ride.

The pensive, faraway look of the novelist he is.

What It Means - Day 291

You know, as I've proposed before, for a person who doesn't care enough of about their faith I certainly spend a lot of time reading, studying and reflecting about it. Here are the books that dominate the window sill (which passes for a bookshelf in my office) behind my desk. One of the things that I love about my faith is that it opened up an entire new world of thought and study, which, I'm pretty certain, is what my Imam thought was the only thing I was interested in before I converted. Of course, I suppose I should be using some of this time to actually learn Arabic, but there are worlds within worlds which seem more important to me.

What It Means - Day 290

"There is no creature that crawls upon the earth, nor bird that flies upon its wings, but that they are communities like yourselves - We have neglected nothing in the Book - and they shall be gathered unto their Lord in the end."
Quran 6:38

We have visited the sixth surah, al-An'am, "The Cattle," before.  This particular passage is interesting for many reasons, especially the notion that, quoting Nasr, "nonhuman creatures have a relationship with God that is in some ways analogous to that of human beings." (p. 352) So, animals have their own communities - or ummah. If this is true, Nasr proposes, then, "If all creatures enjoy such a relationship with their Creator and were created to praise Him, then it cannot be assumed that human beings along enjoy the right to ethical treatment and consideration in His religion." Islam has a very strong ecological streak, and this also includes the notion of treating animals kindly and respectfully. On one of the spirit possession ceremonies in Zanzibar a chicken was killed during the performance, and afterwards the participants gathered around the body to pray. The chicken had died inappropriately and with no prayer said before to mark its passing, so you could see the genuine distress in the manner of their response.

The Little Easy - or the Big Uneasy.

And a New Year begins, and I'll try and put aside some overwhelming sadness and think about adventures that life may still hold.  Here's another picture my brother Eric unearthed. I think it's me, my sister Lisa, and my Mom in New Orleans. My guess is that I was around four at the time, which would have made my sister two. My mom is almost smiling, which for her was about as rare as one of my own.

Today, inshallah, I'll be heading out on the Trip of Mystery. Hopefully it will be an epic time, and help me turn the corner.

Even then I was the King of New Orleans.

What It Means - Day 289

"And when God said, 'O Jesus son of Mary! Didst thou say unto mankind, "Take me and my mother as gods apart from God/"' He said, 'Glory be to Thee! It is not for me to utter that to which I have no right.'"
Quran 5:116

This verse is drawn from the fifth surah, al-Ma'idah, here rendered as "The Table Spread." We've visited this surah several times. It includes one of the two miracles that Muslims associate with Jesus that are not known to Christians, one of which gives its name to the surah. That said, the point is made, once again definitively, that miracles associated with Jesus do not mean that he is the son of God, but rather miracles occurred because God can do whatever God wants to do. Here Jesus makes it clear that not only is he not the son of God, he would never claim to be the son of God. Sometimes these passages in the Quran are read by non-Muslims as being criticisms of Jesus when, on the contrary, nothing could be further from the truth. Instead the classic Muslim argument is that assigning this status or even this claim to Jesus is an insult to both God and to Jesus.