Of what does a life consist? Written in hopes of finding a better way to plan my activities:

At this point in my life, the entire goal of my existence is the unfettered experience of an indefinable thing I term “Quality”, whose context of appearance is as variable as life itself. It has no recognizable features other than its own essence, and it seems to appear variously for different people. The one thing in common is the experience itself, which each person has to seek out on an individual basis. At the same time, however, Quality can arise from a certain group dynamic, or between two people, or an infinitude of ways. So there is no particular “way” that defines my search, but only the essential experience itself. There are probably innumerable ways to find it, and all of them are equally valid in that one respect. There is even a special quality in leading others to experience it; its ways and forms are without number.

The search for quality must begin with maintenance: Activity to allow for more activity. This kind of labor is an investment in the future, though if the task itself reveals quality, it falls into a different category. When the maintenance of my life coincides with my goal, such as making money by doing something I love, it is pure joy.

Once life is set to continue (for my part), the next task is learning where quality can be found, and pursuing it. This takes on too many forms to even mention, although it can be hard to find at first. One never knows without searching where quality will be found, just as a lover cannot find his beloved who does not step out of his house. Sometimes I am surprised by the places where I find quality – even finding it where I don’t wish to! But since quality is the goal, and not the medium, it pays to keep one’s eyes open, and expectations to a minimum.

A worthwhile task is the elimination from life of whatever does not match one’s goal. With respect to maintenance, this means exchanging quality-less modes of operation with those that exhibit quality in their own right. I found a way to do this for showering myself, for example, by finding an olive oil soap that I feel so much in love with, that now I look forward to taking a shower every day. When every single act of every day is joyful, and we look forward to the experience of being alive, then I think the fruits of good planning are shining through.

Perhaps planning, then, is simply the application of intellect to the question of how to organize life toward our goal. The more exclusively this is done, the more fulfilling each act will be – since our actions more and more purely lead to fulfillment. Loss of energy in unproductive activity (in respect to the goal) can only cause fatigue, and a sense that life’s possibilities are being wasted.

How to implement this as a plan? Since I am using Life Balance to architect my search for quality, I will describe things in those terms. First of all, the programs want me to list the tasks that are immediate to my goal, and then to break those down into smaller tasks, until I reach the point where each task can be done in a fairly short period of time. This results in a branching tree of tasks with parent, short-term goals, all leading toward my overall goal. The top goal is called “My life as a whole”, which in my case means “The search for quality”. Since anything else is a waste, I will create a category called “Wasted time”. That way, if anything does not fit into my plan, I will have a place to put it that reminds me of its role within the plan. The object of “Wasted time” is to remove the need for having such a category at all.

The top level items, in terms of seeking quality, would be: “Look for quality”, or actively looking for experiences where I can find quality. It is here that I would plan on buying tickets for a symphony I’ve never heard, or visit new places, or make new friends. I don’t know yet what I will find there, but exposure is always the best way to improve one’s chances.

In cases where I have found quality, I next want to strengthen my relationship to whatever it was that led me there, in hopes of taking me there again. If I hear a beautiful symphony, for example, I will want to find a good recording, buy a better sound system, learn more about the composer, etc. This is a cycle of enrichment, and fosters the growth of whatever seeds I’ve found. I would call this category “Improve capacity”. It includes the development of tools, the purchase of means, the maintenance of beneficial connections, etc. The improvement might be something that enhances the experience, or facilitates the creation of new experiences based on a similar theme.

Once capacity is honed, there is only one step left: making use of that capacity: to enjoy the quality it reveals, or exercise its abilities in creating new forms of quality. So “Enjoy quality” is where I plan experiences I know will offer just that – though in a passive context; while “Create quality” is a higher mode, in which the quality experienced is from my own hand. Everything is a build-up to this end of reveling in quality. Ideally, even “Maintain life” should differ from “Enjoy quality” only in the matter of necessity.

Such enjoyment takes its highest form, for me, in the act of artistic creation, especially when that art has a productive end – such as writing computer programs which can, themselves, be used to further these goals. In that case, all aspects of my humanity merge together in act whose mode of expression is joyful, whose result is joyful, and which result conduces to the future extension and refinement of that joy. This sort of cycle, where each element separately fulfills the goal, and all of them together further that goal, is evidence of genuine progress in realizing my purpose of a complete and continuing experience of quality.

And of course, there must be a category called “Maintain life”, which is not negotiable, whether its contents contribute to the goal or not. Some of these would more properly fall under “Wasted time”, except that they cannot be avoided; while others are really “Improve capacity” in the strictest sense, but with an importance that cannot be ignored – since doing so would negatively effect every other entry in the plan, whereas the reverse is not true.

Where does serving others come in? By referring to the spiritual concept of reflexivity – that one is all, and all are one – then aiding others to find and dive into quality is identical with doing so for myself. It is not the pursuit of individual joy that fulfills my goal, but simple the pursuit of joy in itself. Wherever there is more spirit manifest in the world, my goal is accomplished. Perhaps the overall goal could be expressed as “Brighten the world”, but since I believe this happens whenever the human heart experiences quality, and since all hearts are truly one heart, I have expressed the above plan in terms immediately applicable to the life under my control: my own.

It is very interesting, now, looking at my original list of tasks and fitting them into these goal-directed categories. It is not always obvious what should go where; although it is clear that no other categories need to be introduced. The inability to categorize something in these terms shows that I am not yet myself clear in how it relates to my goal. I think I will move everything unclear into “Wasted time”, and let time decide whether it should be moved into a nobler category. For some of them, already I ask myself: Is this an experience quality? Does it assist the experience of quality? Will it lead me to an experience of quality? If the answer to all three is “no”, then why ever am I doing it?

People living in America seem to place too great an emphasis on the “mind” in the life of the individual. I have made this statement several times to many people, and especially the younger generation seems to object with varying arguments. Perhaps those who have the most future left to them want to imagine that future as highly controllable. This control is meant more in terms of inward condition than of external events. After all, how is an individual to find happiness? If happiness is truly an obscure state arrived at by non-intellectual means, then to an intellectual it appears vague and unattainable. But if it can be imagined as the logical result of a cognizable sequence of steps, there is at least some hope for the future even if the present does not share in that future state. The cognizable possibility of achieving the state of happiness appears to be paramount; unless it is rationally foreseeable, life transmogrifies into something too haphazard to be manageable.

This, I feel, is a naive attempt to reduce the true complexity of life. We as a species have merely begun to live. There are countless thousands of years of development ahead of us, and how can we imagine to have completed most of it with the remainder just a refinement of already-discovered processes? I believe that there are critical, basic elements to the understanding of our selves which we have not yet even discovered. These elements will be viewed in the future as requisite to a proper understanding of the human mind. But at the present time we possess only a handful of insights; what is most important for us now is that we view these understandings in the appropriate light, otherwise we allow our own immaturity as a species to hold us back from further development.

One philosopher stated that the fundamental flaw in any over-intellectual thinker is that he comes to conclusions too rapidly and finally. If our tendency were to hold off conclusions until the last possible moment, it would afford our thought processes a much needed flexibility. The core premise is that we are like children, and furthermore that thought is not the foremost faculty of human experience.

I stand on a border  
between light and shadow:  
the falling sun my gateway  
to a world beyond worlds.  
I can almost glimpse  
the guise of Tomorrow  
hidden behind the rise;  
when darkness finds me  
and sweeps me into time.

As I was driving down to San Jose this weekend, when I saw something on the hills west of Palo Alto that made me wish I owned a camera. Though, since my mind has always been the store of my experiences, I will try to capture the image in words instead of data:

That day Pacifica had been fully encased in fog, making it impossible to see the road ahead. It was cold, damp, and feeling more like London than San Francisco. These fogs are usually confined to a small area, with sunshine and warmth just over the next hill. So I drove out, pushing my car through a pea soup, until I reached Belmont and the skies cleared up again.

When I got to Palo Alto, I looked west (to my right) and saw a carpet of dark green on the hills. It was nearing evening, making the green seem denser, as if hinting at the darkness of evening to come. And at one point along those hills, the line of trees stopped: to be replaced by a pure white fog. For all the world it looked like frosting on a giant, loamy cake.

It poured over the crest of the hill and splashed into the valley below. That is, the wave flowed smoothly down, but when it reached the bottom of the valley it churned, up into the sky. If I could have watched it at high speed, it would have played out like a white wave crashing into the richness of the forest.

And the sheer density of it! It was only a layer on the trees: nothing above, nothing to the sides. It was obvious where the side of the wave was, because it covered only part of the hills. It was so thick and white: it might have been milk pouring into a valley-sized cereal bowl. The beauty was arresting. I had to keep looking over, to watch the wispy breakers dissolve into the sky. If I’d only had a camera…

In the poetry section of this site there is now a compilation of all the poems that were written last summer, extracted from my journal and listed in chronological order.

There are many levels of truth, one might say. In one station, that of limitation, the world is divided according to its qualities, and each thing possesses a station in accord with its merit. This is necessary for testing the soul and assisting in its growth.

In another station, everything the soul beholds is from God, and all things, high or low, are seen as gifts, as tokens of His bounty. Beyond this, even the soul is but a ray from the everlasting Sun: the rays being nothing without His shining. Can anyone pick out a single ray from the sun’s light? In yet another station, to discuss even the rays or Sun is to go astray. As Bahá’u’lláh writes:

In this Valley, the wayfarer leaveth behind him the stages of the “oneness of Being and Manifestation” and reacheth a oneness that is sanctified above these two stations. Ecstasy alone can encompass this theme, not utterance nor argument; and whosoever hath dwelt at this stage of the journey, or caught a breath from this garden land, knoweth whereof We speak.

And there are stations where there can be neither speaker nor speech, neither comprehension nor awareness – nor even the absence of these. Such degrees of reality are referred to in mystic literature as the divine worlds: beginning with the mortal world, and ending in Háhút, the realm of God’s perfect aloneness.

As the soul grows in perception and self-surrender, it comes to a fuller realization of what is real (“the real real”) and what is false. Or it may transcend both real and false, and leave behind ideas altogether. However it happens, whenever one makes efforts to find Him, entire worlds unfold…

In every city he will behold a world, in every Valley reach a spring, in every meadow hear a song.

The soul can love only perfection. But first it must learn how to recognize perfection. When it begins seeing it in life, it falls in love with that essential Quality. And what it has fallen in love with, loves the soul in return: Faith dawns that these two may become reunited. That faith is empowered by choice, with education providing the moral guide to the choices that will lead toward, and the choices that will lead away. That good choices draw us near is guaranteed, as with the opposite – and so justice is born. As the process continues, the soul comes alive, and opens its eyes – to see with His. The purpose of life is to test souls to awaken, so that after death they may take their place, as tokens of divine beauty and grace.

What does it means to have a duty to recognize God’s Messenger?

If I told you there were things about astronomy you did not know, it’s pretty easy for an honest person to recognize that indeed, you do not know them. Perhaps it might require a little proof, but ignorance is easily uncovered by the willing seeker.

Let’s say you want to be an astronaut. I claim it’s your duty to familiarize yourself with those details of astronomy, otherwise there’s no chance of your heading into space – or at least, you’d have to be extremely lucky (blessed?) to reach where you wanted to go.

Bahá’u’lláh tells us that God’s creation is ordered according to spiritual laws, and that our own reality, being spiritual in nature, cannot grow or become fulfilled except through acting within the sphere of those laws.

Thus it is the duty of anyone who wishes to become a servant of God, to recognize the fact of his own nature, and that no truth he finds is genuine unless it be encountered within the confines of His Law (of which there are both general and specific aspects).

The analogy does go further, since it’s quite possible for someone to obey a physical law without understanding it. But the perfection of nature cannot be unveiled without close attention to the laws governing it. It’s one thing to discover fire; it’s another to reach out bodily toward the heavens.

So while God’s grace is liberally diffused over all human kind, and no one is threatened by extinction (according to my reading), it is another question entirely who will make the choice to plumb the hidden Depths.

To sum: A student who would attend a school must realize that his teachers are there to teach, and he is there to learn. Thus a recognition of station takes place, followed by an obedience of the laws existing between those two spheres of being. Ignoring that duty leads to expulsion from the school (albeit, not from life, or from trying again). So if we wish to be heedless beings, it is our choice. But there is Door waiting to be opened, a door whose key one must turn with the hand of endeavor, and not just a hopeful wish.

Every set of laws describes a system. The extent of each system – all the possible expressions within the scope of its laws – is its domain. Everything within the domain pre-exists, in that it potentially exists within the possible interactions of the laws. These are all the things that can be imagined, and become manifested, if the laws are fully understood.

Even with a small number of laws, due to the combinatorial expansion of possibilities, any domain can seem vast beyond conception, and practically infinite. Certainly we can never cause every possibility to be made manifest.

Without regard to the psychological impact, I define knowledge as awareness, not of pre-existence, but of the actual existence of any particular possibility within a domain. To know a linguistic term, knowledge always relates to a sequential form of the laws.

Everything not embraced by such knowledge is the unknown. There are unknowns whose potential is conceived to exist, and which are proximate to our knowledge, while the rest (the vast majority) is truly unknown, without any relationship to anything but the laws themselves. This sub-domain I will refer to with a capital U, to signify the uncharted depths of the possible, those things which are simply not accessible via any previous experience.

With humanity there enters the fact of needs in an actual world, which are not satisfied with the potentialities of pre-existence. This introduces the idea of relevance, that some sentential forms are more practical to our needs at different times than others.

So humanity becomes, within every system, an explorer searching for anything with a meaning that will add to his life in any way. To this end he is like a miner, delving into an unaccountable mountainside for whatever he may find.

Since the field is so large, man must develop strategies to assist in his search – to keep the future safe and free from error. If one tunnel should produce a motherlode, you will find shrines there a century later, with the entire mountain condemned as “holy ground”, to the frustration of the young.

Bless the young who do not take our histories to much to heart, and who sometimes realize their stewardship of humanity’s continuing awakening. We grow by fits and starts, caught millenially between fascination and fear. The dark is an awful place, but can be awesome as well, if we brave our path to the other side. But who can in good conscience send his child to brave the way? So we hold to our duty, and hold them back, until the point that defiance is the only healthy answer.

Need it be so? Is there a possibility that an inward detachment is possible, in service to a higher good than stability, that will cause us to welcome death, and march steadfastly upon the imagined spears of Come What May? For God, an idea uncaptured by all our current theories, must lie out there somewhere, in the unknown, the unseen, the unexplored. Even our own reality can never be captured by words, though humanity is often captivated by them.

This way, this Straight Path which does not meander like a twisted and tortured river through the history of mankind – I leave its discovery to the reader. What is more within my grasp is to ponder on the nature of this unknown, since i seem to discern its evidences in everything around me.

So, we not only face the unknown, we live beside it, within it. Our visible spectrum is the needle in an unaccountable haystack whose reaches we will never fathom. In the past, after many many years, we stumbled upon many veins of ore within this mountain of our pre-existent domain (it could be any one of innumerable mountains I reference here, examples will be given later). The mountain is so huge, but we know by cognition it must contain wealth. Some dug in random places and found ore, others developed ideas to explain the distribution of ore, but these ideas only appear to work, since successful ones have succeeded more than the failed ones failed (for the simple reason that we stopped trying them right away, whereas we will doggedly pursue a successful idea until by chance or favorable circumstances it is successful again).

These ideas are our strategies, attempts to provide maps based on the minute territory we’ve seen so far. These strategies are quite helpful, they serve us well, because they dramatically increase the chances of our success among such vastness and so many dangers.

But memory and history have a strange way of mythologizing the practical, promoting to a meme what was once perhaps only a suggestion. After that point humanity takes on the shackles of servitude, forgetting completely the old relationship between thinker and thought. As these memes settle, the one who would venture anew again into the mountain must combat tradition, taboo, moral stricture, and every kind of fence which minds make would seem to make perfect sense, but it is a terribly difficult task. Everyone seems to grasp the immensity of the problem, and that random wandering is too often fruitless to the point of despair. How many writers look for completely fresh ideas by striking random words down onto the page? Having a strategy seems the only sane way to bypass an unpredictable decades or centuries of utter failure, without even a derivative benefit to show for it. Who in modern society is willing to accept such an approach, when most generally frown on new explorations of any kind? Like a timid diner, we repeat the restaurants and dishes we know to be safe, or can trust by recommendation. But for one who would try something new beyond relating, new beyond vision – to them history is never a grandmother with happy tales to tell.

Otherwise, excepting the obvious, he would be forced to cast about randomly, hoping for a catch in a sea that is near infinitely larger than the fish it contains.

These rewards those that succeed, and encourage others that come after to try the same route, hoping that with just slight variation they will produce similar results. Of course, the vein runs dry, but this usually dose not strike people as favorably as the memory of success and its rewards. To the extent that we may even bury the former.

When we reach a state of ensuing impoverishment, someone must – by natural inclination or motivated desire – strike out into the territory of the unknown.

To explore the unknown is a place without precedent. It is unknown, foreign, unpredictable. Sanity shies from such a place. We deny even its existence, although it sits next to us at every moment. To anyone who claims such a desire, then you must also wish for death, for its character is the same.

Yet it is also, truly, the undiscovered country. All our future riches and possibilities are there. Soon we will exhaust the present, and must allow the future to come in its wake. Not the “near present”, of which we speak when we imagine that we forsee the future’s course, or at least the general shape of events, but the genuine future, whose content is a mystery until the moment it appears. Even then, it takes all of the moments the present offers us to behold this onrushing future, and be witnesses, without any moment to spare for speculation forward or back.

Unless we experience this intensity of novelty, we are not venturing forth, but reducing mere patterns of the known, further and further, until the experience of time becomes automatic. I mention this evidence of real future to suggest both the difference between “merely not yet seen” and “unknown” and the character that the real future has, which we hold at bay by mapping near futures for ourselves, and trying to pave the way before we reach it. This, to acquire the safety, predictability, security, which the unknown certainly does not possess. Nor the future.

The unknown is always the unexpected, even if it makes complete sense the moment afterwards. The unexpected defies every attempt we can make to “map out the unmapped” before it is reached. This manifestation of the constant unexpected is a proof that we are doing this very thing, of attempting to foreknow the unknown, “to cut its teeth”, so to speak.

The unknown seems not only real, but the real dreamworld of our unconscious fantasy, where all possibilities might come true. It is grand and rich, and horrifying and unspeakable, beyond words to tell (since the system of words is a sub-system of that in which they exist). For anyone with courage, I would think this is where the real part is at.

The unknown. Every hope possible, every fear possible. No more clear decisions, but added dimensions that defy even sight itself. Any mind would go mad here, grasping for air on those few islands of sanity it may (never) find. But the rest of that world is ocean, whose depths challenge our every resolve to dive in.

No wonder our past champions in this field were not uncommonly unhinged. A bit of madness would be needed to open that Door, which it would seem to self-limiting to shut again thereafter. And would they receive any support for having done so, any thanks, any rest after such a mind-wearying journey? No wonder, then, that most died crazy too.

This must actually be a manifest of madness, then, the height of begging for society’s disapproval. In fact, courting the unknown is positively destructive, unforgivable to “society”, though ultimately beneficial to those who live in it. But the current generation cannot see that, as their walls topple, except for the minutest few.

So let us recede for a bit, take a moment from our respectable lives, and look more comprehensively at how such strategies manifest themselves today, in the various systems we find time to relate with. (Show examples in: music, chess, poetry, science, religion, etc.)

This all has the nature of a game, in fact, because we “play” it for its value – its resulting benefit to ourselves and our world, these systems are not life itself, but a way of enriching life. Yet this game, like any game, has the potential to draw us in to the point of losing ourselves, when the completeness of our identification has left us blind to what exists outside that one system. Life is a system for our spirit, that we might find those things which will develop our souls.

Provides a striking contrast to our everyday life which allows us to observe our accustomed behaviors and discover in what ways we can improve ourselves.

Symbolizes becoming detached spiritually from the things of this world.

Fasting is a symbol. Fasting signifies abstinence from lust. Physical fasting is a symbol of that abstinence, and is a reminder; that is, just as a person abstains from physical appetites, he is to abstain from self-appetites and self-desires. But mere abstention from food has no effect on the spirit. It is only a symbol, a reminder. Otherwise it is of no importance.37

Happy is your condition for you have executed the divine command, and have arisen to fast in these blessed days. For this physical fasting is a symbol of the spiritual fasting, that is, abstaining from all carnal desires, becoming characterized with the attributes of the spiritual ones, attracted to the heavenly fragrances and enkindled with the fire of the love of God.38

Weakens the chains that bind us to the Earth.

… Whate’er thou doest, Prince! Eating or sacrificing, giving gifts, Praying or fasting, let it all be done For Me, as Mine. So shalt thou free thyself From Karmabandh, the chain which holdeth men To good and evil issue, so shalt come Safe unto Me – when thou art quit of flesh – By faith and abdication joined to Me!39

We have found, [the true philosophers] will say, a path of speculation which seems to bring us and the argument to the conclusion that while we are in the body, and while the soul is mingled with this mass of evil, our desire will not be satisfied, and our desire is of the truth. For the body is a source of endless trouble to us by reason of the mere requirement of food; and also is liable to diseases which overtake and impede us in the search after truth: and by filling us so full of loves, and lusts, and fears, and fancies, and idols, and every sort of folly, prevents our ever having, as people say, so much as a thought. For whence come wars, and fightings, and factions? Whence but from the body and the lusts of the body? For wars are occasioned by the love of money, and money has to be acquired for the sake and in the service of the body; and in consequence of all these things the time which ought to be given to philosophy is lost. Moreover, if there is time and an inclination toward philosophy, yet the body introduces a turmoil and confusion and fear into the course of speculation, and hinders us from seeing the truth: and all experience shows that if we would have pure knowledge of anything we must be quit of the body, and the soul in herself must behold all things in themselves: then I suppose that we shall attain that which we desire, and of which we say that we are lovers, and that is wisdom, not while we live, but after death, as the argument shows; for if while in company with the body the soul cannot have pure knowledge, one of two things seems to follow – either knowledge is not to be attained at all, or, if at all, after death. For then, and not till then, the soul will be in herself alone and without the body. In this present life, I reckon that we make the nearest approach to knowledge when we have the least possible concern or interest in the body, and are not saturated with the bodily nature, but remain pure until the hour when God himself is pleased to release us. And then the foolishness of the body will be cleared away and we shall be pure and hold converse with other pure souls, and know of ourselves the clear light everywhere; and this is surely the light of truth. For no impure thing is allowed to approach the pure. These are the sort of words, Simmias, which the true lovers of wisdom cannot help saying to one another, and thinking….

And what is purification but the separation of the soul from the body, as I was saying before; the habit of the soul gathering and collecting herself into herself, out of all the courses of the body; the dwelling in her own place alone, as in another life, so also in this, as far as she can: the release of the soul from the chains of the body….40

Can be a form of healing.

There is but one power which heals – that is God. The state or condition through which the healing takes place is the confidence of the heart. By some this state is reached through pills, powders, and physicians. By others through hygiene, fasting, and prayer. By others through direct perception.41

Is a kind of personal communion with God.

Moreover when ye fast, be not, as the hypocrites, of a sad countenance: for they disfigure their faces, that they may appear unto men to fast. Verily I say unto you, they have their reward. But thou, when thou fastest, anoint thine head, and wash thy face; that thou appear not unto men to fast, but unto thy Father which is in secret: and thy Father, which seeth in secret, shall reward thee openly.42

Teaches self-restraint.

O ye who believe! Fasting is prescribed to you as it was prescribed to those before you, that ye may (learn) self-restraint…43

Conduces to mindfulness, and the awakening of consciousness.

Besides all this, prayer and fasting is the cause of awakening and mindfulness and conducive to protection and preservation from tests…44

Demonstrates our eagerness to progress along the Straight Path.

Therefore also now, saith the LORD, turn ye even to me with all your heart, and with fasting, and with weeping, and with mourning…45

My last request is that you permit no one henceforth to enter my chamber. From now until the time when I shall be summoned to leave this house, let no one be allowed to disturb my devotions. This day I intend to fast – a fast which I shall not break until I am brought face to face with my Beloved.46

Táhirih’s last words to the wife of Kalantar, who was looking after her:

Mullá Alí hastened to his companions and acquainted them with the nature of his conversation with Mullá Husayn. Ablaze with the fire which the account of that conversation had kindled in their hearts, they immediately dispersed, and, seeking the seclusion of their cells, besought, through fasting and prayer, the early removal of the veil that intervened between them and the recognition of their Beloved. They prayed while keeping their vigils:O God, our God! Thee only do we worship, and to Thee do we cry for help. Guide us, we beseech Thee, on the straight Path, O Lord our God! Fulfill what Thou hast promised unto us by Thine Apostles, and put us not to shame on the Day of Resurrection. Verily, Thou wilt not break Thy promise.’47

Is a form of humbling our will before the Will of God.

But as for me, when they were sick, my clothing was sackcloth: I humbled my soul with fasting; and my prayer returned into mine own bosom.48

Might be considered as a period of spiritual “gestation” before re-entering the affairs of the world; such as it was common for the Manifestations and others (e.g., Shoghi Effendi) to withdraw from the world for a time before embarking on their missions.

Is a time of mourning the absence of our Beloved.

Then came to him the disciples of John, saying, Why do we and the Pharisees fast oft, but thy disciples fast not? And Jesus said unto them, Can the children of the bridechamber mourn, as long as the bridegroom is with them? but the days will come, when the bridegroom shall be taken from them, and then shall they fast.49

Is a way of relating to the experiences of our Beloved. (I apologize, but I don’t have this reference with me; it is from the book “Fasting: A Bahá’í Handbook”, where `Abdu’l-Bahá talks about the wisdom of fasting).

Establishes a kind of silence in our lives, which betters our inward hearing.

Is the Sun of religion…

And as the sun and moon constitute the brightest and most prominent luminaries in the heavens, similarly in the heaven of the religion of God two shining orbs have been ordained – fasting and prayer. `Islam is heaven; fasting is its sun, prayer, its moon.50

Impresses upon the believer, in a more moderate way, what asceticism would hope to achieve.

Introduces us to a way of life which is different from the ways of this world.

Wherefore have we fasted, say they, and thou seest not? Wherefore have we afflicted our soul, and thou takest no knowledge? Behold, in the day of your fast ye find pleasure, and exact all your labours. Behold, ye fast for strife and debate, and to smite with the fist of wickedness: ye shall not fast as ye do this day, to make your voice to be heard on high. Is it such a fast that I have chosen? A day for a man to afflict his soul? Is it to bow down his head as a bulrush, and to spread sackcloth and ashes under him? Wilt thou call this a fast, and an acceptable day to the Lord? Is not this the fast that I have chosen? To loose the bands of wickedness, to undo the heavy burdens, and to let the oppressed go free, and that ye break every yoke? Is it not to deal thy bread to the hungry, and that thou bring the poor that are cast out to thy house? When thou seest the naked, that thou cover him; and that thou hide not thyself from thine own flesh? Then shall thy light break forth as the morning, and thine health shall spring forth speedily: and thy righteousness shall go before thee; the glory of the Lord shall be thy reward.51

Sharpens the distinction between that part of us which is carnal, and that which is divine.

Likewise, reflect upon the perfection of man’s creation, and that all these planes and states are folded up and hidden away within him.

Dost thou reckon thyself only a puny form When within thee the universe is folded?

Then we must labor to destroy the animal condition, till the meaning of humanity shall come to light.52

By removing the most immediate forms of self-gratification, it gives us pause to consider exactly what this world has to offer. For example, perhaps we are like a drowsy bird asleep in his cage. Each time we come close to wakening, and hence to realizing the horror of our imprisonment, we are lulled to sleep by the complacency of material satisfaction. By removing the narcotic effect of material balsams, in a sense, we permit the mist to clear, and waken to the realization of our own selves.

Empowers us, by demonstrating quite palpably that our will is capable of overcoming our physical concupiscence.

Offers a view of the world, and a state of mind, which, like prayer, is unique among the experiences of life. In what other avenue of life do we experience the same feelings as we do when we’re fasting? It introduces us to a way of living that is not common, and thus implies that the ordinary mode of survival is not the only kind of life there is.

Makes very real to us the influence our physical lust has over our wills, and how much of our daily plans are devoted to material considerations.

Like prayer, it is a very real, concrete sensation, and so can become a powerful focal point of meditation. Mere ideas have a chance to become forgotten, but physical experiences obtrude on our consciousness.

Causes us to be grateful that it lasts for only a fixed time! And thus we realize God’s mercy, and the Hidden Word:

O Son of Being! If poverty overtake thee, be not sad; for in time the Lord of wealth shall visit thee. Fear not abasement, for glory shall one day rest on thee.53

That is, the fact that we are permitted to break the fast is perhaps symbolic that times of deprivation will always be followed by reunion.

Increases our awareness of the sufferings of others; not only their material privations, but their lack of familiarity with the Beloved. After all, a condition of thirst and hunger describes the situation of someone who has not yet been introduced to the Table of Bounty. In this way, it may underscore the primary role of teaching in our service to the world.

Reminds us that the spiritual life requires attention and effort, and that if instead we relax ourselves entirely, we shall sink inescapably into oblivion.

Ye are even as the bird which soareth, with the full force of its mighty wings and with complete and joyous confidence, through the immensity of the heavens, until, impelled to satisfy its hunger, it turneth longingly to the water and clay of the earth below it, and, having been entrapped in the mesh of its desire, findeth itself impotent to resume its flight to the realms whence it came. Powerless to shake off the burden weighing on its sullied wings, that bird, hitherto an inmate of the heavens, is now forced to seek a dwelling-place upon the dust. Wherefore, O My servants, defile not your wings with the clay of waywardness and vain desires, and suffer them not to be stained with the dust of envy and hate, that ye may not be hindered from soaring in the heavens of My divine knowledge.54

Underscores the fact that true growth requires a certain degree of pain, while the rewards far outweigh the cost! We should pursue our spiritual course with alacrity, even if at times the flesh may be unwilling.

The steed of this Valley is pain; and if there be no pain this journey will never end. In this station the lover hath no thought save the Beloved, and seeketh no refuge save the Friend. At every moment he offereth a hundred lives in the path of the Loved One, at every step he throweth a thousand heads at the feet of the Beloved.

O My Brother! Until thou enter the Egypt of love, thou shalt never come to the Joseph of the Beauty of the Friend; and until, like Jacob, thou forsake thine outward eyes, thou shalt never open the eye of thine inward being; and until thou burn with the fire of love, thou shalt never commune with the Lover of Longing.55

Causes those with means to understand the suffering of the destitute:

All praise be unto God, Who hath revealed the law of obligatory prayer as a reminder to His servants, and enjoined on them the Fast that those possessed of means may become apprised of the owes and sufferings of the destitute.56

It leaves us with nothing to suffice us but God.

Rid thou thyself of all attachments to aught except God, enrich thyself in God by dispensing with all else besides Him, and recite this prayer:

Say: God sufficeth all things above all things, and nothing in the heavens or in the earth or in whatever lieth between them but God, thy Lord, sufficeth. Verily, He is in Himself the Knower, the Sustainer, the Omnipotent.

Regard not the all-sufficing power of God as an idle fancy. It is that genuine faith which thou cherishest for the Manifestation of God in every Dispensation. It is such faith which sufficeth above all the things that exist on the earth, whereas no created thing on earth besides faith would suffice thee. If thou art not a believer, the Tree of divine Truth would condemn thee to extinction. If thou art a believer, thy faith shall be sufficient for thee above all things that exist on earth, even though thou possess nothing.57

During the time of fasting, the spiritual takes on the ascendant in our lives; in this way it may symbolize the “Divine Springtime”: the period of the Manifestation’s presence amongst us. The force of that Presence perpetuates throughout the rest of His Cycle, but the time of its Dawning is especially blessed. The fast perhaps is a symbolic remembrance of that time, and hence our joy and our desire to spend time with Him would outweigh all material considerations.

O My friend, listen with heart and soul to the songs of the spirit, and treasure them as thine own eyes. For the heavenly wisdoms, like the clouds of spring, will not rain down on the earth of men’s hearts forever; and though the grace of the All-Bounteous One is never stilled and never ceasing, yet to each time and era a portion is allotted and a bounty set apart, this in a given measure. ‘And no one thing is there, but with Us are its storehouses; and We send it not down but in settled measure.’ The cloud of the Loved One’s mercy raineth only on the garden of the spirit, and bestoweth this bounty only in the season of spring. The other seasons have no share in this greatest grace, and barren lands no portion of this favor.58

O Son of Justice! Whither can a lover go but to the land of his beloved? and what seeker findeth rest away from his heart’s desire? To the true lover reunion is life, and separation is death. His breast is void of patience and his heart hath no peace. A myriad lives he would forsake to hasten to the abode of his beloved.59

Consider these nightingales. So great is their love for these roses, that sleepless from dusk till dawn, they warble their melodies and commune with burning passion with the object of their adoration. How then can those who claim to be afire with the rose-like beauty of the Beloved choose to sleep?60

We know for certain the Bahá’í Faith disallows homosexual copulation. What I cannot see is how this implies anything except that He found such an act incommensurate with the needs of our age. Whether it will always be so is not within our knowledge.

Muhammad forbade His followers to eat pork. Did this make pork eaters “sick” (no pun intended), or evil? It was a commandment made at the time, which was later repealed. The Manifestation has full authority over such matters. Morality is defined in reference to His Law, not by our personal feelings of what is “good” or “right”.

After some simple-hearted thought on this matter, I came to the following conclusions:

1. A practicing homosexual is no more deviant than anyone else who disobeys the Law. If any of us failed to read from the Writings this morning, hey! we just entered the same boat. I have no quotations to back up this statement. I make it from the negative, since the only statement of “doing this is worse than doing that” I have ever seen has to do with murder and backbiting.

2. Do I shun my friends who drink, or who have sex before marriage? Do I even think about such things, unless they choose to do them in front of me?

3. The matter is one of personal decision, unless it affects the name of the Faith, in which case administrative sanctions might be employed. Even then, it is ultimately an individual matter. It is not like murder, or theft, which harms another’s livelihood.

4. If there is any wrongness, it will be addressed between God and that individual at the time of reckoning. Unless we ourselves have nothing to fear from that day, we should seriously avoid debating the goodness of other people.

We are all human. Things we personally abhor, when we find that God has also disallowed them, we have a tendency to become vigilant against – whether we do so consciously or not. It as though the Law gives us justification for our judgmental attitudes.

But such attitudes are manifestly false according to Bahá’í teachings. The fact that this issue is so controversial among us shows only our own immaturity: not the “sinfulness” of those people who have a bent toward lovers of their own gender.

O Children of Men! Know ye not why We created you all from the same dust? That no one should exalt himself over the other. Ponder at all times in your hearts how ye were created. Since We have created you all from one same substance it is incumbent on you to be even as one soul, to walk with the same feet, eat with the same mouth and dwell in the same land, that from your inmost being, by your deeds and actions, the signs of oneness and the essence of detachment may be made manifest. Such is My counsel to you, O concourse of light! Heed ye this counsel that ye may obtain the fruit of holiness from the tree of wondrous glory.

If someone wishing to participate in homosexual sex also wishes to obey Bahá’u’lláh, they have a dilemma on their hands; and I don’t think any of us should underestimate the displeasure of that situation. If anything, what is needed is support, and a constant remembrance that such abstinence is not without purpose.

This is perhaps what makes this issue so difficult: we focus on it out of context. The Law is our guide and our light in the darkness. The wisdom of it we may never learn until the final moment. But why is it a part of our lives at all? I would think this is a much better question to ponder and debate.

I leave with the sentiment of these words written by Bahá’u’lláh, revealed in the Sufi tradition of insight into the mundane – in this case the letters of the word Gunjishk (G N J SH K), meaning “sparrow”. They seem to point to the very heart of morality: not that some are evil, and some are good; but that in order for our souls to fly free, we must unload ourselves of all encumbrance.

Kaf or Gaf (K or G) referreth to Kuffi (“free”), that is, “Free thyself from that which thy passion desireth; then advance unto thy Lord.”

Nun (N) referreth to Nazzih (“purify”), that is, “Purify thyself from all else save Him, that thou mayest surrender thy life in His love.”

Jim (J) is Janib (“draw back”), that is, “Draw back from the threshold of the True One if thou still possessest earthly attributes.”

Shin (SH) is Ushkur (“thank”) – “Thank thy Lord on His earth that He may bless thee in His heaven; albeit in the world of oneness, this heaven is the same as His earth.”

Kaf (K) referreth to Kuffi, that is: “Take off from thyself the wrappings of limitations, that thou mayest come to know what thou hast not known of the states of Sanctity.”

Wert thou to harken to the melodies of this mortal Bird, then wouldst thou seek out the undying chalice and pass by every perishable cup.

Peace be upon those who walk in the Right Path!

Why are there seven valleys and not five or eight?

Seven is a rather significant number in religious history. The Bible is filled with examples involving the number seven. However, it is not clear that “seven” in relation to the Seven Valleys is a fixed and rigid number. It may simply have been a convenient choice for Bahá’u’lláh in responding to the Sufi who questioned Him.

First, the original “seven valleys” can be found at the end of Mantiqu’t-Tayr (Conference of the Birds), a book by the Sufi poet Farídu’d-Dín `Attár. Because the Sufi who questioned Bahá’u’lláh was writing about this text, it was only natural for Him to response using a similar framework.

Second, in the beginning of Bahá’u’lláh’s Seven Valleys, he never says that there are exactly seven. The wording he uses always refers to the beliefs of others:

The stages that mark the wayfarer’s journey from the abode of dust to the heavenly homeland are said to be seven. Some have called these Seven Valleys, and others, Seven Cities. And they say that until the wayfarer taketh leave of self, and traverseth these stages, he shall never reach to the ocean of nearness and union, nor drink of the peerless wine.

Third, in an Arabic text named Javáhiru’l-Asrár (Gems of the Mysteries), Bahá’u’lláh also writes about seven valleys, but He skips two of them, and gives a description of two further valleys beyond the seven that occur in the Persian text. He even mentions this fact, and that He did this in the interests of time:

… we were denied the opportunity and the necessary leisure by the traveler who came on your behalf. He was in great haste and felt urgently that he must be on his way. For this reason, we have limited our discourse and contented ourselves with less than a complete description of the stages along the path. We have not detailed these as was fitting and necessary. Rather, we have altogether neglected to mention several cities and stages of the utmost importance. The impatience of your messenger was so great that we even omitted any reference to the two exalted stages of self-surrender and contentment.

These “two exalted stages”, if one compares the titles of the Valleys in that text with those in the Persian Seven Valleys, would seem to relate to the Valleys of Knowledge and Contentment. Here si the sequence that He gives in the Arabic text:

1. Search
2. Love and allurement
3. Divine Unity
4. Bewilderment
5. Nothingness
6. Unending, Eternal life
7. The City that Has No Name

By merging these two texts, then, we find nine stages depicted in total, and even these are not complete according to Him.

In conclusion, the use of “seven” valleys, as opposed to a greater number, appears dependent on the conditions in which the Seven Valleys was revealed, and therefore does not seem to have any essential importance.

Why does the Seven Valleys read the way it does?

The Manifestations of God always speak in terms relative to human understanding. As Bahá’u’lláh mentions in the Hidden Words:

O Son of Beauty! By My spirit and by My favor! By My mercy and by My beauty! All that I have revealed unto thee with the tongue of power, and have written for thee with the pen of might, hath been in accordance with thy capacity and understanding, not with My state and the melody of My voice.

If one reads the original Sufi text upon which the Seven Valleys was based (see above), he will find many of the same stories told, in some cases even exactly as Bahá’u’lláh retells them. There are even several stories which Bahá’u’lláh does not relate, and vice-versa.

It is almost as though Bahá’u’lláh is using Attár's framework as a base -- in deference to the limitations of the Sufi questioner -- and using ti as a way to fulfill and perfect whatAttár was trying to say. In this way, we see the Divine Mind expressing itself in a particular language, suited to a specialized system of understanding, yet revealing the same eternal truths that can be found in all Holy Scriptures.

The Sufis, as a group, have always sought a more direct, experiential relationship with God, and the Seven Valleys explains how this is both a legitimate and worthwhile goal given the proper orientation to God and His Manifestations.

Are the Seven Valleys a progression, to be passed through one at a

time?

It is my belief that the Seven Valleys is not only a sequential progression of the wayfarer’s understanding, but that passing through each valley has profound consequences:

• The behavior of the seeker is radically altered
• The world they see around them is fundamentally different from what others see
• The understanding they gain cannot be undone or lost

To see why this is so, it is necessary to discuss what is meant by understanding and knowledge.

In Ancient Greece, where philosophy was born, men debated a great deal about knowledge and wisdom, and what the signs were of each. It was understood that there are two fundamentally different orientations to the world: opinion and knowledge.

Opinion is something one holds in the mind, and thus is subject to change. It can be divorced from one’s actions, or changed in its form to suit the speaker. Modern language calls this “head knowledge”. Opinions can be forgotten, or substituted with a different understanding at different times. One can even hold several opinions about the same subject, and select between them as he deems appropriate.

Knowledge is the opposite of these things. Knowledge is not held in the mind, since it is a universal fact. It saturates you, since it is the foundation of everything around you. It cannot be divorced from one’s actions; in fact, when one truly knows something, he cannot act contrary to that knowledge, unless at some level he desires the consequences of doing so. Modern language calls this understanding, or insight or wisdom, implying an alteration of the individual himself. Knowledge cannot be forgotten, or substituted. Also, one cannot hold several different kinds of knowledge about the same subject. Knowledge, like truth, is one. If you achieve a greater understanding of a subject, this new knowledge will extend the old.

Here are a few examples: If you know that a scorpion can sting you, you will not step on one unless you want to be stung. Telling a child that scorpions can sting does not impart knowledge. Until he is stung by something, and has a true awareness of what it means to be stung, words alone will not suffice to convey knowledge. If, instead, he steps on the scorpion and is stung, from that point on he will “know” what scorpions can do. As long as one does not wish to be stung, he cannot step on scorpions.

Likewise, adults know that dimes are worth more than nickels, even though they are the same color, are lighter, and much smaller. No adult will ever trade a million dimes for a million nickels. This is because he relates not to the dime or the nickel, or their understanding of size and weight, but to their knowledge of the value of money.

It is in this sense that Plato believed a man who knew the Good could never act against it, since all men long for the Good. Therefore, only ignorance of the Good can explain evil actions. To come to know the good – to truly know it, in the Greek sense of knowledge – was thus the aim of philosophy, since to achieve that goal would result in a perfected man.

Back to the Seven Valleys: If the Valleys describe a progression of true knowledge as outlined above, then the descriptions of the wayfarer in the Valley of Knowledge, for example, depict a state of being which is more perfect than those who have not yet attained it. If after passing through that valley we reach a plane that elevates our being to a new world, to new horizons, then the nature of the Seven Valley is exactly like a spiritual Treasure Map. It is a guide book leading us to new realities, to new forms of life. It draws us closer to the Good, and transforms us as we move forward.

If, on the other hand, these stages are merely descriptive, and not fundamental, then the Seven Valleys is more like a picture book, showing realities that we might visit but never fully attain. Just as as we might be in the Valley of Contentment one day, but not the next, so nothing we ever gain is truly gained, since it can be lost the next day. What kind of understanding is so easily gained and lost? The Greeks would say that only opinions have this character, not knowledge. Opinions are a thing one holds in the mind by force of will, and rallies the emotions to their service; when one’s energy is good, success will be apparent, but when that energy is lacking, they are impossible to maintain. Knowledge, however, is not something that one sustains, but it is that which sustains the knower. In a sense, we are in so far as we know – in the spiritual sense – for otherwise we are acting, trying to make our opinions seem real against a world of continual contrast.

(This is not the place to get into what spiritual “knowledge” means, but please do not understand me to be referring to the type of knowledge that comes from study or learning. Bahá’u’lláh makes it clear that true understanding is available to all, and is dependent only on the spiritual qualities of purity and detachment. This is proven by the many illiterate Bábís and Bahá’ís in the world, who reached untold heights of spirituality, sometimes even without access to the written words of the Manifestation).

What is the Four Valleys, and how does it relate to the Seven Valleys?

There are basically three points of view regarding the Four Valleys:

1. They are the “four stages of the heart” mentioned at the end of the Seven Valleys.

2. The represent a renewed formulation of the stages of spiritual progress, and thus in a sense “supercede” the Seven Valleys.

3. They are an entirely different text, with a separate theme and intent.

It is my belief that the first two of these opinions are not supported by evidence, while there is grounds for suggesting that the third may be true.

First, regarding the “four stages of the heart”. These four stages are given as occurring after the seventh of the Seven Valleys, which means that the wayfarer has already achieved the station of True Poverty and Absolute Nothingness (faná). And yet, the first of the Four Valleys says, “On this plane, the self is not rejected but beloved; it is well-pleasing and not to be shunned.” Since annihilation of self is a dominant theme in the seventh Valley, this is hard to reconcile.

Furthermore, the Seven Valleys is demonstrably progressive:

And if, by the help of God, he findeth on this journey a trace of the traceless Friend, and inhaleth the fragrance of the long-lost Joseph from the heavenly messenger, he shall straightway step into the Valley of Love…

And if, confirmed by the Creator, the lover escapes from the claws of the eagle of love, he will enter the Valley of Knowledge…

After passing through the Valley of knowledge, which is the last plane of limitation, the wayfarer cometh to the Valley of Unity…

It is clear that certain conditions must be present for the wayfarer to move from one valley to the next.

In the Four Valleys, however, an entirely different scheme is presented. Rather than describing how a soul achieves a more perfect understanding of God, the Four Valleys offer four separate pathways by which souls may approach God. In fact, it is a message of tremendous joy and grace, since it opens the door of divine attainment even to those unable to abandon the self, or the domains of knowledge and love.

If the travelers seek after the goal of the Intended One (Maqsúd), this station appertaineth to the self…

If the wayfarer’s goal be the dwelling of the Praiseworthy One (Mahmúd), this is the station of primal reason

If the loving seekers wish to live within the precincts of the Attracting One (Majdhúb), no soul may dwell on this Kingly Throne save the beauty of love…

If the mystic knowers be of those who have reached to the beauty of the Beloved One (Mahbúb), this station is the apex of consciousness and the secret of divine guidance…

These, to me, clearly describe four different kinds of wayfarer, rather than the progressions of understanding of a single wayfarer. And while it does seem from comparing the two Texts that one cannot ascend through all of the Seven Valleys unless the wayfarer si one of those who seek the Beloved One (the Fourth Valley), yet the Four Valleys makes it clear that achieving the presence of God is not dependent on such a high station.

As to the second opinion, that the Four Valleys supercedes the Seven Valleys – which is the position taken by at least one Bahá’í author – this is hard to support when one considers that the Arabic rendition of these Valleys was revealed in 1860 (according to the “Leiden List”), while the Four Valleys was revealed in 1858 (according to Taherzadeh). If the Four Valleys was really meant to supercede, why would Bahá’u’lláh revert to the same format as the Seven Valleys two years later? This furthers my conjecture that the two Texts present different, though related, themes.

The word “self” is used in different contexts in the Bahá’í Writings. Its most common use when not capitalized, and excepting for certain instances, is definitely negative:

• the satanic self
• the darkened self
• the prison-cage of self
• the shadows of the valley of self
• this fire of self
• the Satan of self
• the tomb of self
• the idol of self
• the bondage of self
• the veil of self
• the treacherous hand of self
• the dust of self
• the wall of self
• the clay of self

Where the self is mentioned positively, it is almost always qualified:

• his inmost true self
• thy proper self
• the higher self

And in the first of the Four Valleys, Bahá’u’lláh describes a view of self which is not negative at all:

On this plane, the self is not rejected but beloved; it is well-pleasing and not to be shunned.

How are we to understand all these different uses of self, some of which seem contradictory? If Bahá’u’lláh truly applies different meanings in different places to the same word, how can we ever know which meaning is intended?

It is my assertion that self has two basic meanings that are related, yet differ fundamentally in degree. Further, that the Seven Valleys is a manual teaching us how to progress from the lower degree of self to the higher, while the Kitáb-i-Íqán is a historical exposition of this difference with respect to the Manifestations of God.73

The meaning of the two selves, and their relationship one to the other, is summarized in the following statement from Bahá’u’lláh:

Know verily that whenever this Youth turneth His eyes towards His own self, he findeth it the most insignificant of all creation. When He contemplates, however, the bright effulgences He hath been empowered to manifest, lo, that self is transfigured before Him into a sovereign Potency permeating the essence of all things visible and invisible. Glory be to Him Who, through the power of truth, hath sent down the Manifestation of His own Self and entrusted Him with His message unto all mankind.74

Here we find that Bahá’u’lláh, when considering His “own self” (in the possessive), “findeth it the most insignificant of all creation”. However, when He contemplates the higher realities of His nature, “that self is transfigured before Him” and is seen as “the Manifestation of His [God’s] own Self”.

What is this lower self, and what form of contemplation leads to such a transfiguration, that what seemed the most insignificant thing in all of creation now appears to Bahá’u’lláh as the Manifestation of God’s own Self?

I believe the Kitáb-i-Íqán represents an explication of this theme. In it, Bahá’u’lláh repeatedly asks of the people who deny the Manifestations, “What could have been the reason for such denial and avoidance on their part?” This question is repeated several times throughout the text, interleaved with descriptions of the historical sufferings of the various Manifestations of God. One particular discussion culminates with the well-known analogy of the Sun:

Consider the sun. Were it to say now, “I am the sun of yesterday,” it would speak the truth. And should it, bearing the sequence of time in mind, claim to be other than that sun, it still would speak the truth. In like manner, if it be said that all the days are but one and the same, it is correct and true. And if it be said, with respect to their particular names and designations, that they differ, that again is true. For though they are the same, yet one doth recognize in each a separate designation, a specific attribute, a particular character. Conceive accordingly the distinction, variation, and unity characteristic of the various Manifestations of holiness, that thou mayest comprehend the allusions made by the creator of all names and attributes to the mysteries of distinction and unity, and discover the answer to thy question as to why that everlasting Beauty should have, at sundry times, called Himself by different names and titles.75

Here He compares the particular, daily appearances of the sun with the sun’s constant, enduring reality. That is, the sun which rises on a particular day has a certain name, and a certain designation within the Zodiac; but this plurality does not mean that there are multiple suns. The reality of the sun is one, although it can be seen to manifest itself from different places on the horizon, and is referred to by different names.

In like manner, the Manifestations of the Sun of Reality, although they appear in the garment of a human frame, and manifest signs of distinction, are in truth independent of this distinction, and all sit upon the same throne of Unity. This distinction should be very familiar to most Bahá’ís, and can be read about in more detail by perusing the Íqán. But what does this have to do with selfhood, and the Seven Valleys?

The analogy of the sun shows in very plain terms the difference between the immanent and the transcendent, to borrow terminology from modern philosophy. The immanent is what appears to us in the moment, in its present form; the transcendent is what the immanent “refers to”, or implies by its being. All of the Manifestations of God, as they appeared to humanity, were without a doubt distinct and different people; that is, their immanent form was of a particular man from a particular village, speaking whatever language was common. Yet the essence of those Beings was something utterly beyond their appearance. Whatever they seemed to be, they were something far greater. This greatness could only be hinted at, or demonstrated through signs, but not seen directly since it does not appear as immanent.

Through understanding and recognition of signs, some are able to transcend the experiences of eyes and ears, and become aware that These are not ordinary beings as They seem, but Rays of a Sun whose brilliance we cannot imagine. This higher station of Theirs is not obvious, and yet it is Their true Reality; it is far more real than the physical Beings Who walked among us. What is this thing which is not obvious to our senses, yet is more real than what senses are capable of? Such is the nature of the transcendent.

To go back to the analogy of the Sun: every day has a particular name on the calendar; this is how we known each day in its immanence. There is no “nameless day”, no “ideal day”. Every day is a day of a particular name, be it Monday, Tuesday, etc. By looking at the reality of Monday and Tuesday, we notice that each of these refers to a another, more constant reality. That is, every day of the week shares certain qualities with every other day. By applying our understanding, we can transcend our awareness of each day as particular and distinct, and become aware of another reality we call “day”. We transcend the particular toward the abstract. However, this abstraction is not just a name; “day” is a very real concept, and each particular day contributes to the reality of that concept. We can look at today and say, “This is not Tuesday, it is Monday”, and at the same time say, “This is Monday, which is a day just like Tuesday”. In the first instance we consider the two days in their separation, while in the second we see their transcendent union with all the other days.

Given these terms, we can now define “self” more precisely: self, as negatively referred to in the Writings, is our immanent self, our particular self. It is the self which has a name, and is distinct from every other self. In this station, we are separate from others; we can look at someone and say, “That is not me”. We can also prioritize the desires of our self above those of the selves of others, since the desires of others will not aid our own self.

Just as with the Manifestations of God, there is also a “higher self” that we all participate in, a station by which all human reality is essentially united: the transcendent self. In this station, we are all leaves of the same tree, rays of the same Sun, flowers of the same garden. The desires of another are coequal with my own desires, since they are the desires of one reality. It does not matter, for example, if “I” perform a certain service, or “another” does it; in both cases in is “a servant” who has performed it, and since this is the transcendent reality of human beings, in fact there is no difference in who did it. Ego does not have authority on this plane, nor can it claim anything for itself.

When one’s vision accomplishes this transcendence, he is now aware of Divine Unity, a station depicted again and again in the Seven Valleys. It is in this station that we see the Manifestations of God as one, their Reality as one, their Being as one:

It is clear and evident to thee that all the Prophets are the Temples of the Cause of God, Who have appeared clothed in divers attire. If thou wilt observe with discriminating eyes, thou wilt behold them all abiding in the same tabernacle, soaring in the same heaven, seated upon the same throne, uttering the same speech, and proclaiming the same Faith. Such is the unity of those Essences of being, those Luminaries of infinite and immeasurable splendour.76

He states this idea even more directly in the following passage:

From these statements therefore it hath been made evident and manifest that should a Soul in the “End that knoweth no end” be made manifest, and arise to proclaim and uphold a Cause which in “the Beginning that hath no beginning” another Soul had proclaimed and upheld, it can be truly declared of Him Who is the Last and of Him Who was the First that they are one and the same, inasmuch as both are the Exponents of one and the same Cause. For this reason, hath the Point of the Bayán – may the life of all else but Him be His sacrifice! – likened the Manifestations of God unto the sun which, though it rise from the “Beginning that hath no beginning” until the “End that knoweth no end,” is none the less the same sun. Now, wert thou to say that this sun is the former sun, thou speakest the truth; and if thou sayest that this sun is the “return” of that sun, thou also speakest the truth. Likewise, from this statement it is made evident that the term “last” is applicable to the “first,” and the term “first” applicable to the “last;” inasmuch as both the “first” and the “last” have risen to proclaim one and the same Faith.77

In the Seven Valleys, Bahá’u’lláh uses the metaphor of color and light to describe the fundamental difference between the immanent and the transcendent. In His example, the immanence of particular colors refers to the light which shines upon material objects. Were man to comprehend the meaning of unity, he would look at the colored objects and see not just the colors, but the sun from which they derive their color and for which they exist as evidence. In order to see this truth we must “transcend” the difference of individual colors, and, through faith and understanding, see the reality of the sun these colors represent and reveal:

… colors become visible in every object according to the nature of that object. For instance, in a yellow globe, the rays shine yellow; in a white the rays are white; and in a red, the red rays are manifest. Then these variations are from the object, not from the shining light. And if a place be shut away from the light, as by walls or a roof, it will be entirely bereft of the splendor of the light, nor will the sun shine thereon…78

Thus when the wayfarer gazeth only upon the place of appearance – that is, when he seeth only the many-colored globes – he beholdeth yellow and red and white; hence it is that conflict hath prevailed among the creatures, and a darksome dust from limited souls hath hid the world. And some do gaze upon the effulgence of the light; and some have drunk of the wine of oneness and these see nothing but the sun itself.79

In the Seven Valleys, this example is given to describe the nature of those who journey in the Valley of Unity. Yet it is awfully similar to the analogies given previously in the Kitáb-i-Íqán. In fact, Bahá’u’lláh ties the two together when He says:

Yea, these mentionings that have been made of the grades of knowledge relate to the knowledge of the Manifestations of that Sun of Reality, which casteth Its light upon the Mirrors.

The “grades of knowledge” are the levels of understanding from which we view the realities of the world. Were men to forgo the attraction of the immanent for the virtue of the transcendent, and not allow the beguiling nature of differences to distract him, he would in every age have recognized the Manifestation of God by His signs, rather than expecting someone of his own fancy. Because men are so attracted to titles of distinction, “a darksome dust from limited souls hath hid the world”, and thus the underlying unity of all things, and especially the unity of the Manifestations of God, has remained a very difficult concept to grasp.

Thus it is that certain invalid souls have confined the lands of knowledge within the wall of self and passion, and clouded them with ignorance and blindness, and have been veiled from the light of the mystic sun and the mysteries of the Eternal Beloved; they have strayed afar from the jewelled wisdom of the lucid Faith of the Lord of Messengers, have been shut out of the sanctuary of the All-Beauteous One, and banished from the Ka’bih of splendor. Such is the worth of the people of this age!80

For some there are who dwell upon the plane of oneness and speak of that world, and some inhabit the realms of limitation, and some the grades of self, while others are completely veiled. Thus do the ignorant people of the day, who have no portion of the radiance of Divine Beauty, make certain claims, and in every age and cycle inflict on the people of the sea of oneness what they themselves deserve.81

These proofs, then, relate not only to our acceptance and rejection of the Manifestations of God, but also to how we view our own reality. Just as the station of God’s Messengers is that of Lordship, Dominion and Authority, our station is one of servitude, humility and obedience. As the Manifestations are all One with respect to their True Reality, so we are all one with respect to ours. The Writings are replete with references to this theme.

Looking at ourselves in this light, it is plain that conflict can exist only between our lower selves, since with respect to our higher self we all serve the same purpose, and aim at the same goal. Distinction and contradiction can occur between colors, but not within light. Lanterns may vary with respect to size, shape, design, etc., but not in respect to their function and purpose.

Human reality is no different, and the Seven Valleys depicts a progression of human understanding from perceiving the world in its immanence, to discovering the transcendent realities implied in that immanence. By this progression we come first to recognize our goal, then to see how our lower self obscures that goal, then to surrender of that self, then flee from our self and discover unity, and finally to abandon the self and exist on the plane of oneness:

And when thou hast attained this highest station and come to this mightiest plane, then shalt thou gaze on the Beloved, and forget all else.

The Beloved shineth on gate and wall Without a veil, O men of vision.

Now hast thou abandoned the drop of life and come to the sea of the Life-Bestower.82

Notice again the distinction between “drop”, a unique isolation of water, and “ocean”, which is an undifferentiated agglomeration of water. We abandon the drop by letting go of our confined self, “the wall of self”, “the prison of self”, “the bondage of self”, and merge with the ocean of His Will, Who is the creator of our true reality.

Reading further, it also appears that “self” and “soul” are distinct realities, and that the soul can choose to align itself with either the limited self, or its unlimited Creator. In “Summons of the Lord of Hosts,” Bahá’u’lláh writes:

Know also that the soul is endowed with two wings: should it soar in the atmosphere of love and contentment, then it will be related to the All-Merciful, and should it fly in the atmosphere of self and desire, then it will pertain to the Evil one; may God shield and protect us and protect you therefrom, O ye who perceive! Should the soul become ignited with the fire of the love of God, it is called benevolent and pleasing unto God, but should it be consumed with the fire of passion, it is known as the concupiscent soul. Thus have We expounded this subject for thee that thou mayest obtain a clear understanding.83

This shows that the soul is not the self, and that the soul can choose to relate itself either with its Creator and His attributes, or with the lower self and its desires. As with a lamp, the soul can identify its reality with the iron of the individual lantern, or with the universal attributes of light that shine from it. Whichever it favors will gain the greater strength, and eventually come to overpower the other.

When the soul makes this higher choice, and favors absorption in the Divine over independent selfhood, what becomes of the self? Is it destroyed, eliminated? Or is its relationship within the scheme of things merely set to rights? Perhaps, instead of obliteration, oblivion would be a better word. That is, the self does not become “nothing” in itself, but with respect to our regard for it, it becomes “as nothing” in the sense of that our soul now identifies with God and the universality of His attributes, rather than the lower orders of Creation and their separate qualities. Perhaps an analogy will help to clarify this:

Soil is a very rich substance, able to impart life. The tree that grows from it gives us the food we eat. In this sense, the tree cannot exist without the richness of the soil.

Let us consider that the nature of our lower self is like this soil. It has a certain richness, and is filled with potential. However, it alone cannot feed others. The lower self is needed to beget the tree, but it is God’s grace that provides the seed and makes the tree.

Now the soul is related to both our selves, the soil and the tree; if it focuses on the bounty of the tree, it sees the soil merely as a servant, worthy of respect and care, but not deserving of any special attention during the harvest. Once the harvest is made, the needs of the soil are once again cared for, so that it may continue to be fertile.

If the soul focuses upon the richness of the soil, however, it considers itself the “author” of the tree, or the one responsible for everyone’s gain. It claims for itself the rights of bounty, and strives to view its fertility as coequal with God’s powers of creation. And yet, sadly, this attitude only causes it to dry up and cease to be productive.

In this sense, the independence of the soil to create is a complete illusion, and can lead it to flights of vanity which are entirely unjustified. Compared to the beauty of the trees and flowers, soil should be like a humble servant. It has a wonderful role to play in the growth of creation, but it is only the custodian of the higher powers that have been placed within it as a trust; in itself it is powerless.

When we let go of seeking to attribute powers to the soil, we allow God to do his work with it, adding sunlight and rain, and casting His seeds over it. In fact, soil works best when it does nothing at all (in respect to its relationship with the seed). It is poverty itself without the seed, mere dust; it is powerlessness itself compared to the seed’s ability to grow. However, at the same time it is the matrix of the seed, and, conjoined with the seed’s capacity to grow, serves it in ways entirely necessary for the tree to flower.

What results from the soil’s service to the seed is a far more beautiful reality than the filthy, yet honorable, soil. The tree stands proud beneath the sun, gathers the rays of that sun, and strives to grow toward the sun. It yields fruits and flowers that can feed the many, and continue the process of fruition.

But does even the tree merit individual recognition? We do not love the tree for itself, but rather for the attributes it reveals: the ability to sustain life, its beauty. These attributes are universal among all fruit-bearing trees, and we love them all equally for exactly that reason. A rose in the East smells just as sweet as one in the West.

So humanity, in all its uniqueness and individuality, carpets the earth in a mantle of fecundity, awaiting the seeds of God’s grace to shower down upon its soil. If we relinquish our own will, and do not strive against the Divine Pattern, bountiful trees can come forth. In this second life we are all coequal; although there is distinction in color, shape, variety, at the same time there is unity of virtue, objective, purpose. We are able to feed the many only when our lower selves exist as servants to the higher self, which itself is not “ours” but a manifestation of the attributes of God. Viewing the world through this lens, we see the soil in its role, rather than identifying our soul with it. Rather, the soul participates in a grand, never-ending struggle toward the Divine, in which any form of identification acts as hindrance.

The process of this coming forth of the higher from the lower – or rather, the discovery of the higher by the renunciation of the lower – reveals God’s attribute of “Creator”. Were it not for this creation, how could we understand His ability to create beauty from nothingness? Our lower selves receive the potency of His Will, and are given a chance to cooperate in the manifestation of a higher reality. The illusion is that we do any of this, or deserve any individual praise for it, or that our reality is in any way truly distinct or superior to another’s. When we see this, we transcend our belief in exclusivity, and enter the realm of the inclusive: we leave behind lack and experience abundance: we let go of the confining space of the drop – whose essence is still water – and merge with His mighty Sea.

If this analogy bears any resemblance to truth, it is clear that the self is not evil, or to be shunned, but merely that it has a particular place in the scheme of reality – and this place is not as the throne of the soul. The self is an abject, abased reality in comparison to God; yet, in relation to the operation of God’s will, it assumes the respectable nature of serving as a foundation for our aspirations God-ward.

A letter written on behalf of the Guardian clarifies this notion of self further:

Regarding the questions you asked: Self has really two meanings, or is used in two senses, in the Bahá’í writings: one is self, the identity of the individual created by God. This is the self mentioned in such passages as “he hath known God who hath known himself etc.”. The other self is the ego, the dark, animalistic heritage each one of us has, the lower nature that can develop into a monster of selfishness, brutality, lust and so on. It is this self we must struggle against, or this side of our natures, in order to strengthen and free the spirit within us and help it to attain perfection.

Self-sacrifice means to subordinate this lower nature and its desires to the more godly and noble side of ourselves. Ultimately, in its highest sense, self-sacrifice means to give our will and our all to God to do with as He pleases. Then He purifies and glorifies our true self until it becomes a shining and wonderful reality.84

Hence it is that we “free” ourselves from the lower self, and “subordinate” it to our more godly and noble side. The self, like the soil, is not to be reviled or destroyed; rather, it assumes its proper place in relation to the Grand Design of the Tree, nor does it seek to excel it. We are created to be loving servants of all, and it is in the fulfillment of this role that we find our perfection, when all aspects of our being work in harmony toward one Goal.

The above is one view of how the self is variously referred to in the Writings, and its connection with the Kitáb-i-Íqán and the stages depicted in the Seven Valleys. It shows also how our understanding of the unity and distinction among the Manifestations of God might be suggestive of a far more universal theme – one perhaps hinting at the very underpinnings of reality.

Logic is a sure way of finding the relationship between a set of statements.

For example, if I know that my cat is fuzzy, and fuzzy cats always shed, then I also “know” that my cat will shed. This may seem obvious, but only because the example is simple.

Put another way, the sentence “my cat will shed” is implicit, given the first two sentences “my cat is fuzzy” and “fuzzy cats always shed”.

In a way, it’s hidden there; it’s between the lines; it’s really there, you just can’t see it yet.

Logic is a light, that can shine into the darkness between statements. It can root out hidden conclusions with perfect accuracy, because that’s what it does. Assuming your initial sentences make sense, logic will find any hidden sentences that also make sense.

How can this be? It works because logic relies on the special meaning of words like “always”, “sometimes” and “never”. These words – when spoken accurately – contain very potent pieces of information.

For example, if I say that I sometimes eat ice cream, you automatically know two things for certain:

1. I have eaten ice cream before.
2. I am not always engaged in eating ice cream. What you don’t know, is that:
3. I will eat ice cream again.
4. I also eat other things besides ice cream.

For many people, the statement “I sometimes eat ice cream” implies 1, 2, 3 and 4. But logic is very precise, and this precision is what allows it work. In logic, you only know that my statement means 1 and 2 – not 3 and 4 – because of the rigid definition of the word “sometimes”.

There are many special words and phrases (such as: always, never, at least once, sometimes, etc.), and different ways of building connections between them. Some are connections between if/then statements, and others look are derivations like the example of my cat being fuzzy.

Anyway, learning logic is basically a process of:

Learning what certain key words really mean.

For example, if I say, “All the women I’ve ever killed loved me very much”: I’m not actually admitting anything. Because the number of women I’ve killed is zero, so whatever I say about them is not false, because there is no counter-example. We say the set is “empty”.

Learning what correlations imply what.

If I say “all A is B” and “all B is C”, logic defines the result to be “all A is C”. This is syllogistic logic, of the “Barbara” form (you’re bound to run into that soon).

Learning how to evaluate an argument’s validity.

What if I’d ended my example above by saying, “All A is D”. How do you know it’s NOT true? The test of a correctly executed piece of logic is something to be learned. “Invalid” results, which are made to look “cogent”, but are really “specious”, are what we call “fallacies”.

Learning how to evaluate an argument’s worth.

A valid argument simply means the terms fit into place as they should. But do the terms themselves make sense? No one can dispute that my cat is fuzzy, but what if I were using logic with statements far more vague? How can I tell how much more vagueness has crept into my results?

Learning other types of associations.

In the statement, “If I go to the store, I will buy candy”, there is a piece of evidence, which you can link to other statements, such as, “If I buy candy, I will eat it”. You now have the ingredients necessary to derive a valid logical conclusion: “If I go to the store, it will result in my eating candy.”

And so on. Logic also gets into proofs (formal presentations of your logical derivations), using logic to manipulate symbolic terms, etc.

You will also find that logic is very close to mathematics, and in fact, there is a stage at which some mathematical symbols are even used. Math doesn’t deal with ideas such as “if/then”, but computer programming sure does. Logic is a fundamental tool for discerning unstated information from raw data. At this, it excels, and is one of the foundations of human knowledge.

There are many things it cannot do, however, as you’ve likely seen on this newsgroup. While it can derive conclusions from valid input, it cannot be used to prove the validity of that input. This would be like “asserting” that what you say is true because you say it. Logic can be applied in circular situations, where it likewise fails. It cannot derive meaning from meaningless statements. As a tool, it’s a wonderful thing, but it’s scope is limited. It has tremendous breadth of application in human life, but can go no deeper than its wielder’s eye.

This is my own poor summary of logic, from someone who finished only the first course. Most of what I understand today is derived from other understandings (pun fully intended). I hope it offers you something.

The problem of free will concerns the domain of humanity’s possible evolution. If, on the one hand, we are constrained to whatever decree science imposes, our direction and goal must be fixed. This has rankled just about everyone, however, since it precludes any essential benefit to thinking at all.

On the other hand, if humans are completely free to choose, it requires that we accept the world we inhabit as entirely a product of human choice. Whatever design might pertain to the world is confined to those systems lacking choice, and generally the argument runs that whatever has come into being since man’s fall from Edenistic bliss is now enmired in that fall.

If the world as we known it is the process of human decision, where is Divine Will? If we say one must be content with the Will of God, to what does this apply? However many people may agree with that sentiment, very few are found willing to accept particular events, if they do not accord with that inexplicable sense of God’s Will that people seem universally to possess. Whatever appears to be virtuous, or expected as a good outcome, this is God’s Will; but the truly despicable, evil cruelties of the world, these are man’s alone.

There is, however, a non-linear view of events in which it is plain that both conditions obtain: That every action borne of choice reflects free will, while every action accords with the will of God. I call it “multilinear” to reflect the situation it describes.

Determinism results from considering – independently of any moral or theological ideas – the simple fact that every effect is preceded by a cause. This is projected into the formula that every cause might be followed by a single effect. Chained together, it becomes necessary that all futures effects are caused by causes anterior to those effects. Thus is all past and future mapped out, and free will ostensibly fades away.

However, while undeniable that every effect is preceded by a single cause, is it true that every cause can have only one effect? Already in the theory of quantum coherence we have found repeatable evidence that a single cause may have multiple simultaneous effects, until interference from an external system causes a collapse of those possibilities into one outcome.

This evidence describes a situation in which a single cause may have a set number of possible effects, multiplied throughout the domain of subatomic interactions to provide for a finite, yet innumerable number of possible futures. It is not possible, furthermore, to induce an effect which is not possible from a given cause at a given moment, upholding the scientific requirement that every effect be proceeded by a cause for which that effect is a possible outcome.

How the agency of human will is related to the brain we do not know, but if we say that this relationship involves selection among mutually possible outcomes – which are selected between by some heretofore unknown agency – then we have a model which allows for free will within a system of determined outcomes, albeit the quantity of possible outcomes is sufficiently large to defy conception.

For those with a taste for teleology, let us say further that whatever pattern has been laid down to cause the orderliness of the world, and the rising up of conscious beings capable of such a “selective will” as to choose among possible futures, that this pattern is equally present in all of those possibilities, since their number is determinable in their finity from the initial moment of the pattern’s inception. There is no method available for the computation, but by assuming that each cause leads to a finite number of possible effects, we presume that the universe of all possible effects followed by their effects, etc., remains a quantity that while impossibly large is yet numerable.

This numerability of the set of possible futures implies a pre-ordained set of possibles, the exact shape of which considers the entire set, and not merely the single track which human choice has selected from among this incalculably dense forest. Yet the forest is not a desert, or an ocean; we are cutting our way through a pre-known geography, and the set of possible exits at any time is beyond the force of will to evade.

To use a plainer analogy, consider the presentation of meals in a cafeteria. Although we each make a choice according to our individual preference, and although the set of possible combinations is rather large, in the end we are not choosing outside of the set of possibilities initially chosen for us by the cafeteria staff. For our part, we are choosing, according to our will, whatever suits us; for their part, we are choosing, according to their will, from among the set of choices presented to us. There is no outcome that can exceed the possibilities allowed for, and in this sense our choice is foreknown – if by foreknowledge one includes a knowledge of each possible outcome simultaneously. Only the linearity of human minds might find such a conception difficult.

Thus we have reached a situation in which foreknowledge does not determine choice, and yet choice cannot escape that foreknowledge, since all available choices exist within the scope of the ordained pattern. The atoms of a river may jostle and bounce, but the river’s bed has fore-ordained the course. Whether one of those drops strives for the surface, or sinks to the depths, they will all reach the same sea – some collecting on the bottom, some moving out with the current toward greater depths.

Now if we call all events God’s will, we mean that teleologically speaking, no event can exist which does not reflect the fore-ordained pattern of human life. We also allow human will, which is active within this pattern, but cannot choose beyond it. And we admit the principle of determinism, in a multilinear fashion, by allowing each cause to have multiple events, which are chosen among by the function of coherence, the result of selective interference by effects external to the cause.

In this assessment, it would be better to say that human’s have selective will; it is not entirely free. It cannot contravene the Will expressed in the pattern, which to us is absolute, inviolate. We are determined insofar as the Primal Will determines our possibilities, and we are free insofar as these possibilities exist, unimaginably broad. We are not ships, sailing upon an unlimited sea; rather, we are wayfarers on a marked land, seeking a path to lead us to such shores.