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The paralel worlds, On earth and in the heavens
1/15/2008 4:12:36 PM
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Good evening friends and readers
I wish to draw for you the beautiful paralel between our material world and the spiritual.
"In this material world time has cycles; places change through alternating seasons, and for souls there are progress, retrogression, and education.
Sometimes it is the season of spring, at another time it is the season of autumn, and again it is the season of summer or the season of winter.
In the spring there are the clouds which send down the precious rain, the muskscented breezes and lifegiving zephyrs; the air is perfectly temperate, the rain falls, the sun shines, the fecundating wind wafts the clouds, the world is renewed, and the breath of life appears in plants, in animals, and in men. Earthly beings pass from one condition to another....The world becomes another world and it attains to a lifegiving spirit. The earth was a lifeless body; it finds a new spirit, and produces endless beauty, grace and freshness. Thus the spring is the cause of new life, and infuses a new spirit. Afterwards comes the summer, when the heat increases and growth and development....and the time of harvest ripens; a seed has become a sheaf, and the food is stored for winter. Afterwards comes tumultous autumn when unwholesome and sterile winds blow, it is the season of sickness, when all things are withered, and the balmy air is vitiated....The fertile green trees have become withered and bare, flowers and fragrant herbs fade away, the beautiful garden becomes a dust-heap. Following this comes the season of winter, with cold and tempests. It snows, rains, hails ,storms,thunders and lightens, freezes and congeals; all plants die, and animals languish and are wretched.
When this state is reached, again a new life-giving spring returns, and the cycle is renewed. The season of spring with its hosts of freshness and beauty, spreads its tent on the plains and mountains with great pomp and magnificence...the spring of the last year returns in the utmost fulness and glory. Such is, and such ought to be, the cycle and succession of existence: such is the cycle and revolution of the material world.
It is the same with the spiritual cycles of the Prophets. That is to say, the day of the appearance of the Holy Manifestations is the Spiritual Springtime, it is the divine splendour, it is the heavenly bounty, the breeze of life, the rising of the Sun of Reality.Spirits are quickened, hearts are refreshed and invigourated, souls become good, existence is set in motion, human realities are gladdened, and grow and develop in good qualities and perfections. Universal progress takes place, and there are resurrection and lamentation; for it is the day of judgement, the time of turmoil and distress, at the same time that it is the season of joy, of happiness, and of absolute attraction.
Afterwards the lifegiving spring ends in fruitful summer. The Word of God is exalted , the Law of God is promulgated; alllThe heavenly table is spread, the holy breezes perfume the East and the West, the teachings of God conquer the world, men become educated , praiseworthy results are produced, universal progress appears in the world of humanity , and the divine bounies surround all things."
The Sun of Reality rises from the horizon of the Kingdom with the greatest power and heat. When it reaches its meridian it will begin to decline and descend, and the spiritual summer will be followed by autumn, when growth and development are arrested. Breezes change into blighting windss, and the unwholesome season dissipates the beauty and freshness of the gardens, plains and bowers. That is to say, attraction and goodwill do not remain, divine qualities are changed, the radiance of hearts is dimmed, the spirituality of souls is altered, virtues are treplaced by vices, and holiness and purity disappear. Only the name of the Religion of God remains, and the exoteric forms of the divine teachings. The foundations of the Religion of God are destroyed and annihilated, and nothing but forms and customs exist. Divisions appear, firmness is changed into instability, and spirits become dead; hearts languish, souls become inert, and winter arrives; that is to say, the coldness of ignorance envelops the world and the darkness of human error prevails. After this comes indifference, disobedience, inconsiderateness, indolence, baseness, animal instincts and the coldness and insensibility of stones. It is like the season of winter when the terrestial globe, deprived of the effect of the sun, becomes desolate and dreary... there will be death and non-existence.
When the season of winter has had its effect, again the Spiritual Springtime returns and a new cycle appears. Spiritual breezes blow, the luminous dawn gleams, the divine clouds give rain, the rays of the Sun of Reality shine forth, the contingent world attains a new life...All the signs and the gifts of the past springtime reappear, with perhaps even greater splendour in its new season.
...The Sun of Reality, like the material sun, has numerous rising and dawning places...But the sun is one sun and one reality; the people of knowledge are lovers of the sun and are not fashinated by the places of its rising and dawning. The people of perception are the seekers of the Truth, and not of the places of its appearance, nor of its dawningpoints; therefore they will adore the Sun from whatever point of the zodiac it may appear, and they will seek the Reality in every sanctified Soul who manifests it. Such people always attain to the truth, and are not veiled from the Sun of the Divine World.
For exemple, once the Sun of Reality poured forth its rays from the sign of Abraham, and then it dawned from the sign of Moses and illumined the horizon; afterwards it rose from the sign of Christ: those who were the seekers of Reality, worshipped that Reality wherever they saw it, but those who were attached to Abraham were deprived of its influences, when it shone upon Sinai and illuminated the reality of Moses. Those who held fast to Moses when the Sun of Reality shone from Christ with the utmost radiance and lordly splendour, were also veiled; and so forth-
Therefore man must be the seeker after the Reality; and he will find that Reality in each of the Sanctified Souls. He must be fashinated and enruptered, and attracted to the divine bounty; he must be like the butterfly who is the lover of the light from whatever lamp it may shine, and like the nightingale who is the lover of the rose in whatever garden it may grow.
If the sun were to rise in the West, it would still be the sun; one must not withdraw from it on account of its rising place, nor consider the West to be always the place of sunset. In the same way, one must look for the heavenly bounties, and seek for the divine Aurora. In every place where it appears , one must become its distracted lover. "
Abdu'l-Baha
http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=bahaullah+and+the+bahai+faith&search=Search
www.Bahai.org www.Bahai.us
What more is there to say
Kind regards from
Laila
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