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118 - UPDATING OUR UNDERSTANDING OF SPIRITUALITY

While the prow of the momentous advance of civilization is
exploring new perspectives by abandoning previous formats, the
more populous bulk of human potential is still bogged into diehard
customs, habits of thought, and dogmas. There are prescriptions,
institutionalization, authoritarianism, vested spiritual interests
- in fact we're right back into the sclerozed obscurantism, and
bigotry of the middle ages. As we stand on the brink of opening up
exciting perspectives for the millenium, in the midst of the din
of war cries, testing technological weaponry to stem the primitive
territorial conquests fed by hackneyed, outmoded feuds, the ugly
face of resentments, intolerance for the unfamiliar unknown,
revenge, vendettas, the ordeal of victims of abuse throughout the
world, the victims of religious fanaticism; we seek rescue in the
way of life, the dedication, the human values of the saints,
recluses and prophets, "warners of coming dangers and awakeners of
the world from sleep". These values are embedded in the conscience
of the more evolved beings, appalled, alerted by the sounds of
alarm to take responsibility in redressing the infamy.

At this juncture, more then ever in the world's history, we are
poised between the push of the past and the pull of the future.
Advances in technology, cultural changes, new ways of thinking,
anomalous art forms are beckoning upon us to brainstorm a brave
new world - while the attendant greed, crass materialism, elitism,
callousness and manipulation, balks the sensitivity of nobler
souls. Those nobler souls' cultural values include the dedication
to charity for the victims of that emerging power which abuses our
physical resources; and include the splendor that sparks creative
minds exploring loftier dimensions of thinking, uplifting our
spirits by an intuition of the sacred nature of our human status.

"The whole universe has contributed to the way humanity thinks
today. If the Planet did not have an intelligence, it would not
have intelligent beings on it. The collective working of several
minds and the activity of the whole world in one direction are
governed by the intelligence of the Planet."
(HIK, presumably, -- UNITY OF RELIGIOUS IDEALS, presumably)

"The divine mind becomes completed after manifestation. The
Creator's mind is made of His own creation. The experience of
every soul becomes the experience of the Divine Mind..."
PIR-O-MURSHID INAYAT KHAN, FROM THE UNITY OF RELIGIOUS IDEALS.

There is a mind behind all minds; there is a heart which is the
source of all hearts; there is a spirit that collects and
accumulates all the knowledge that every living being has had. No
knowledge or discovery that has ever been made is lost. It all
accumulates and collects in that mind as an eternal reservoir -
the Divine Mind.

Thus we are recurrently pummeled between honoring our sacred
traditions as a safeguard against loosing one's roots, and
conversely updating by upgrading our thinking beyond
undemonstrated assumptions taken for granted for having neglected
to examine them. Pioneers in the thinking of humanity in the
religious realm, even in the secular, have consistently bypassed
conformity to the traditions of their ancestors even as they
honored those ancestors, and thereby opened wider horizons
embracing both the past and the future. Such was the curve of Pir-
o-Murshid Inayat Khan's spiritual journey as he moved from the
transmission of his Sufi predecessors to the all-embracing purview
of the "Universel", the Message of Unity. We encounter this
challenge in our Sufi institutions such as the Sufi Order or Sufi
Movement to forestall them becoming sects. Pir-o-Murshid warned us
about how the "followers of the followers":

"Therefore there is a difference between the followers and the
followers of the followers... But the real following is the
imitation of the prophet. And what is it? It is greater than
study, and even greater than meditation. Among a thousand
disciples, perhaps there will be nine hundred for study, one
hundred for meditation, but hardly one who will follow."
(HIK, presumably)

The followers, if failing to see the breadth of outreach of the
pioneer, would discount Pir-o-Murshid's readiness and wish to
explore new ways. Pir-o-Murshid would undoubtedly have explored
new ways if he had lived in our time.

Pir-o-Murshid's s vision incorporates the traditional transmission
of the ancient Sufis, while making it accessible to people in
their daily lives and updated the teachings of the great schools
of the world religions, rather than discounting them. He embodied
his latest views in the 'Universel', a temple made of human beings
sparked by the vision of the Message of Unity and Spiritual
Liberty of our time, announcing thereby the next step which he
placed in our hands: ''I have placed the Message in your hands".
The Universel carries Pir-o-Murshid's vision of an overarching
organization which implements his intention embodied in his
institution of International Headquarters of the Sufi Movement to
ensure the coordination of activities such as the Universal
Worship, Healing Order, etc., opening up the perspectives of this
message to a broader public. This encompasses a wider outreach
than the Sufi Order which is the Esoteric school to train the "the
ten thousand workers" to spread the Message of Unity in the world.

On Hijerat Day, September 13, 1926, Pir-o-Murshid announced the
next step: the Universel. Honoring the different world religions
together on the same altar is a bold and necessary step in the
interest of peace. A further step is getting into the
consciousness of the prophets, masters and saints as he did on
Tuesday evenings. This for example illustrates the aims of the
"Universel of Human Beings" rather than the temple of stone, and
while subsumed in the Universal Worship it represents a further
development. More than paralleling the teachings of the world
religions, it invites participants to effectively participate in
"getting to know the composer so to understand his music better".
Maybe this is what Murshid meant by the "formless Universal
Worship".

"Why do you  suffice  yourself with  the  known, when  you  can 
know  the  Knower? How much more important is the Knower than the
known."
NIFFARI

Such is the great art of distilling the achievements of the past
and fertilizing the future with their essence. New formats to link
people in resonance with a shared vision are emerging out of the
antiquated ashrams and khankas and parishes without enclosing them
in institutions 'in the name of spirituality' which an increasing
number of people reject. Initiation, pledges, consecration are
beginning to prevail over 'membership' - being a Sufi or a
Christian or a Muslim.

Moreover, this process is enabled by a delicate, balanced shift
from a hierarchical format to a selective group processing which
presents the advantage of availing oneself of a far greater pool
of human resources in terms of visions, ideas, and good-will. This
needs to be carefully articulated so that the insight and wisdom
of those assuming positions of greater responsibility are not
handicapped by more pre-possessive and domineering partners. This
is a precaution for the future, but does not apply in our present
group processing based upon trust and mutual respect.

There is clearly a difference of emphasis between the two poles of
Pir-o-Murshid's vision (two poles of the same thing): the Sufi
Order and the Universel. The Sufi Order, while honoring its
transmission needs to be more hierarchical. It is a school for
training for those who feel called to spread Pir-o-Murshid's
vision of the Message of unity of all people and all religions
(without being reduced to uniformity). On the other hand, the
Universel needs to extrapolate between the many-facetted bounty of
a vision implemented in the rich variety of human experience and
the nitty-gritty of carrying it out in actual real-life
situations, while holding the vision delivered in the hands of the
many-tiered gamut of human realizations

The vertiginous advance of civilization we may be witnessing is
counterbalanced by the current decadence, vulgarity, and
deterioration of noble values. But let us hold ourselves from
being stymied to the point of defeating our heart in our endeavor
to build a beautiful world of beautiful people. Birthing is
accompanied by pain, and sometimes disruption. The faster the
spearhead of our civilization advances, the more disruption it is
bound to stir. It bespeaks of a painful and rather unwieldy
adjustment to change.

"As one evolves, one develops a passion for the unattainable."
PIR-O-MURSHID INAYAT KHAN

Humanity is just espying a whole new dimension of thinking,
exploring other dimensions of the cosmos than the commonplace
existential cross-section of our many-splendored universe.
Although awakening to this or these dimensions of the universe has
always sparked the passion of great beings for the unattainable,
'beyond the beyond' pioneering thinkers are beginning to ascertain
with increasing conviction that it is the limitation in our
thinking that blocks us from making the next step in the
inexorable advance of evolution. This is our only way to move
forward updating and upgrading our human paradigm, in consonance
with the material progress of technology by extending our thinking
to these other dimensions of thinking.

"One needs to surpass familiar concepts because one cannot account
for the world or for our rapport with the old by relying upon
them."
D'ESPAGNAT,  LA PHYSIQUE QUANTIQUE,  CF.  L'HOMME FACE A LA
SCIENCE.

Since the challenges of out current civilizations are different
and greater that those of our spiritual predecessors, we will need
to even update their thinking while honoring their deep insights
and instructions. The onus is upon us to carry further the
inestimable research in the little or unexplored no-man's land of
the human mind they conducted in the solitude, by exploring and
fraying a serene yet venturesome path riding the tide of the
tumult of our covetousness for comfort, to crown our concerns with
a nostalgia for meaningfulness and holiness.

In the beginning of a world, all the matter which will eventually
form a completed whole is already in existence, but it is in a
state of chaos. It is not that any new thing or world, or being,
is to be created, but that there shall be a re-arrangement of all
the parts until the whole is complete. The number and arrangement
of every atom has yet to be made. Every electron and atom must
take its own appointed place in the mighty scheme. This is the
great evolutionary process. The God buried in humanity must be
uncovered and placed on His throne in the heart of man.

A world-in-the-making can be likened to a great jigsaw puzzle,
whose separate parts have life and are capable of independent
movement. Each part has its own particular place, and its relation
to every other part; and no thing or being can live to itself
alone.

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