Loh o Qalam [33]

Lecture 33

Division of Senses

Beginning and ending of every species whether it is the mankind, jinn, angels, celestial bodies or galaxial systems, are founded upon the alternation of the Conscious. If the beginning or commencement of something is known as its birth stage then, the conclusion or ending is to be termed as death. But, when the death is deliberated upon, it is observed that even the death is also a step of life, a life, which is life at its every step. The senses and the consciouses in which the universe is passing through the phases of its life are different states, that is, the universe is the name of varying changes of the states of life.

Our conscious is so weak that when we attempt to comprehend something, the limits confine us and obstruct our understanding. If a thin paper is held before our eyes our conscious stops functioning, at least as far as the sight is concerned. But, if we could enter into the limitlessness after getting freedom from the confined limits, the conscious becomes immensely strong and powerful. We have stated that the phases of life are determined by the four consciouses, namely; the conscious of the individual, conscious of the species, the cosmic conscious and the ultra-cosmic conscious. Actually there is only one conscious and the same one conscious is being divided and subdivided into different grades and cadres according to the range of the movement taking place in it.

All the Attributes of God cannot be encompassed by a limited conscious because the Attributes of God are limitlessly infinite. We know of only those Attributes of God, which have been named as the Elohistic Knowledge and these attributes are that Moment in which the Will of God is prevailing. Briefly it could be said that the Will of God is the Continuous Time. The Will of God by itself is the Time and formation of features in the Will of God according to the Will of God is the Space.

According to the teachings of the prophets of God, we are required to understand that Being whose Command caused the universe to come into being. Unless the Absolute Being is not comprehended, Its Command or the Edict cannot be understood properly. Some people raise this objection that understanding of the Edict of Lord or the Holy Will of God is not possible.

God says, “No eye has the power to see God; God may display Himself upon any eye.”

It means that if a person is not familiar with his own roots his mind is not directed towards the Absolute Being. And, when a person gets to know himself, he knows the Edict of the Lord operative in him and, if a person does not know the Edict, he cannot know his Self.

When Moses, after seeing the light on the mount of Sinai, had inquired, “Who?” God had replied him saying, “I am thy Lord,”

This event leads us to the conclusion that Moses is the Edict of the Lord and the God is the Absolute Being. It means that the light, which Moses had seen on the Mount Sinai, was the Absolute Being. This helps us to know the limits of the Absolute Being and the Edict Being. On one side is the Absolute Being and His Attributes of Cherishing Lordship and on the other is the Edict Being; Moses and his needs and wants. Moses despite witnessing the Absolute Being felt the need to know as to whom it was. He could not know upon seeing the light that it was his Lord God and he felt the need to know so he asked who it was.

Qalander Baba Auliya says: -

Few people in their own narrative style named the Absolute Being as The Absolute Reality and the Edict Being as the universe. This is the style of the Scholars of Deity. These are the people who try to understand the universe after rising above heir Conscious and entering into their Unconscious by meditating and have quest to explore the realities. But, the approach of the prophets of God is altogether different than the scholars of the Deity. The prophet explore the Absolute Reality by means of the Presented Knowledge and the Scholars try to resolve it by exploring the manifestations, which being against the laws of nature does not take them in the right direction and they tend to go astray.

The prophets search the manifestation through the immanent and the scholars try to explore the immanent through the manifestations. At their own places both the approaches are correct. The reason is that since the Scholars are ignorant about the immanent or the inner realms therefore they have no other option but to try to reach to the root of the manifestation by analyzing the physical form of manifestations. They ignore those hidden facts with which they are familiar and due to this approach and attitude many secret facts about the structural formation of the universe remain unknown to them whereas the approach of the prophets of God is free from this flaw. In order to comprehend the reality of the universe they go for the Creator of the universe before going for the creation. According to the prophetic considerations, the Absolute Being is the Life; therefore, they declare that life is eternal even for the mortals.

We the senses are deliberated upon; we cannot draw any conclusion other than this that the senses were made to come into being by the order of the Supreme Being. Display of the existents in forms and features is the division of the senses i.e., the Divided Senses are the Edict Being, which exhibit themselves in the form of the universe. When God commanded, the universe came into being, that is, the Edict of the Lord taking the form of the cosmic features exhibited itself. This demonstration is the division and expansion of the senses because for the division of the senses a form and shape is needed.

The shape and form are also of two types, one is the material form and the other is the Nooric form. The material form does not lead us up to the soul as the matter is density and the soul is the subtlest thing. The matter exists because of the soul; if the soul is not there matter cannot exist. Material world is annihilating every moment but the soul does not perish. This is the reason that the soul cannot be traced by the material forms but the roots of the material forms can be explored by means of the soul.

Self is that soul upon which the matter is staying. The matter stays as long as the soul supports it and when the soul detaches itself from the material body, it perishes. This must clarify the mistake of those who prefer the matter to the soul.

When the manifestations are given undue priority, it means that we are declaring the manifestation as the actual source of life whereas, in actual effect, the physical features are perishing every moment. By giving preference to the manifestations, we actually negate the past. Whereas, it is our observation that this whole universe is nothing other than the Past. A baby who is born this minute, his birth is the past event only after one minute. There is no room for any present or the future in this universe because a child born this moment is the past next moment. It is the statement of the Holy Prophet (PBUH), “The Pen has dried up after writing all that is to happen.” For this statement no other form of time except the past is possible. We can, anyhow, say that the present and future are the components of the Past.

Universe is the reflection of the manifestations of the past. In order to have a proper understanding of the Movements of the Past we have to deliberate upon the divided and undivided senses. The shape and form are the divided senses and the astral body (tamasal) is the undivided senses.

The divided senses cannot be used to trace the undivided but the undivided senses can give us knowledge about the divided senses. All that has happened in the past is being demonstrated in the present and will be displayed in the future.

Let us once again examine the verse of the holy Quran where it has been stated, “Verily, it is His Edict, when He intends a thing, He commands it to be, and it is.” That means the cosmic program came into existence in the same order as it existed in the Mind of God, when God Commanded it to be. Intention of God or the Will of God is the limitless Noor and the universe exists in the Will of God and God governs everything, every individual or species. When this statement is analyzed, we find that there are three components of the God’s Edict.

1. Will

2. All that is willed i.e., the Object

3. Manifestation of the object that is willed.

Presence of something in God’s Intention indicates that whatsoever God wanted to create, He knew it before hand. And, since the objects of the universe existed in the Knowledge of God before these were commanded to be activated for their display and only the very same things came into being that were there in the holy Will of God, therefore, all that exists is the past.

Now what is the Past and what are measurements of the Past? We can understand these measures in many ways. One of them is that, according to the scientists the speed of light is about 300,000 km/sec. If it is acknowledged, it means that the speed of one moment of this universe is equal to the sped of light i.e., 300,000 km/sec.

Perception of the Serial Time, in fact, is the division of the senses. All that is happening in the universe, we measure it with the units of the Serial Time. The universe is encased in the moments. One or the other moment, every moment is bound to remain existing in one single moment. The universe cannot be static even for a fraction of a second. Every moment of the universe is kinetic and moving, or to say, one moment of the universe is one change and the other moment is the other change and the third moment is the third change and so on. And, since every moment of the universe is changing therefore, every moment is separate from the other moment and the events and the incidents of every moment are different from the other moments. When the activities and the incidents of every moment are different then it means that there is distance between every two moments. The separating distance between the every two moments is the separate unit of time.

Serial Time is the known incidents and the Non-serial Time is the unknown incidents. The units of the Serial Time are the collection of those incidents, which are known to the Conscious. And, the units of Non-serial Time are the collection of those incidents, which are not known to the Conscious.

God created Adam from the clay. The clay is an empty space or a void. God breathed His soul into this void and granted him the Knowledge pertaining to the objects of the universe. It means, Adam is composed of two agencies; the Soul and the Knowledge of things (objects). Knowledge of things was had after having the Knowledge of the Names.

Corresponding to the Knowledge of Objects is the World of Nature. The World of Nature or the Witnessed Realm is the Serial Time. And, Soul or the Unseen Realm is the Non-serial Time.

This thing can be put down in the form of the following equation.

Elohistic Spirit--- Knowledge of Objects---World of Nature (Serial Time= The Witnessed Realm

Soul + Knowledge of objects in the soul (Cosmic Administration) = Adam.

Adam is a void. Void contains the Soul. Knowledge is in the Soul. The Knowledge of objects is the World of Nature. The World of Nature is the Serial Time. The Serial Time is based upon the Non-serial Time, which is the Unseen Realm.

The Real Time, Non-serial Time and the Serial Time are the three states of Time.

Serial Time is that in which we spend our life in this material world. In this state of Time the senses are dividing every moment. All the activities and incidents of this Phenomenal World are measured by the units of the Serial Time. There does not exist even a single moment, which is invariant and stable. Every moment of our life in this material world is a variant and brings change. We all know it well that after taking one step when the second step is taken, the first one undergoes a complete change. And, when the third step is taken, the second one is changes, i.e., no moment of life is a moment unless it is variable. Events and incidents of every moment are different and this difference segregates them from one event to another, from one incident to another a distance is there. When we take one step after another, each step brings a net change with respect to our original position and there is distance between every two steps that makes them two steps.

For having the knowledge of the Unseen Realm understanding the soul is necessary because the Unseen World opens up for the soul only and soul means the Unconscious. If we are desirous of knowing the Unseen Realm, it is necessary that we should get out of the World of conscious and enter into the world of Unconscious because it is not possible for the senses of the conscious state that these could comprehend the Unseen. The Non-serial Time is the Unseen. The Real Time is the Elohistic State, which is known as the Invisible of the Unseen (Ghaib-ul-ghaib). Non-serial Time is the world of angels. When a person enters into the world of unconscious after rising above the conscious level, the unseen reveals upon him and he witnesses the world of angels just as a person in the state of consciousness observes this material world similarly a spiritual associate after entering the Unconscious sees the angels and the creatures of the angelic realm.

Facing the Conscious there are two agencies, one is the Unseen and the other is the Invisible Unseen. Our Conscious remains oblivious of the moments of the Unseen Realm but these remain in the knowledge of our soul. The Invisible Unseen, which is Infinitude, is the Realm Time. Facing this Infinitude is the Finitude and the format of the every Finitude is the Knowledge, the knowledge that explores the Infinitude.

Knowledge is such a thing that remains in pursuit of understanding and discerning the lights of the Infinitude. Any light that Knowledge encounters during its pursuit is assimilated and absorbed in itself by the Knowledge and that light becomes a permanent feature of the Knowledge.

Let us consider this thing once again that when the species is in the form of an individual, It is the Serial Time and the root of the individuals is the Non-serial Time, or to say, the existence of the species is the Non-Serial Time. Every Species knows itself as to what it is. Man knows that he belongs to the mankind; an angel knows that it belongs to the species of angels; a plant knows that it is such and such plant. This knowledge pertaining to the existence of the species transfers to them from the Real Time. Repetition of this knowledge by the species results in separation of its individuals. A lion exists in this world because the lion, in order to maintain its existence, is repeating its species’ knowledge. This repetition ensures the existence of its individuals. And, on the one hand, this repetition is the Finitude and, on the other, is the Infinitude.

1. Real Time = Timelessness, Ultra-unconscious, Invisible unseen, Infinitude, The Absolute Noor, Absence of forms and features, Realization of Existence only.

2. Non-Serial Time = The Unconscious, Spiritual World, The Unseen, The Illustrative Realm, Compound Noor, Awareness as a species and its individuals.

3. Serial Time = The Conscious, Compound Nasma, The Material World, The Visible world, Creatures of the Elements, The Nature, Divided Senses, The Countless worlds in the grip of temporal time.