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SEEDS
OF TRUTH 1
In the name of God,
the Merciful, the Compassionate
All
praise be to God, and all blessing and peace be upon our master
Muhammad and on all his family and Companions.
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The
prescription for a diseased age, for crippled limbs, for
disabled organs, is: follow the Qur’an.
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For
a great, greatly afflicted continent, for a once glorious,
now humbled and wretched state, for an invaluable, now
undefended people, the prescription is: unity under the
guidance of Islam.
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If
you cannot turn between your fingers the earth and the
other planets and all the stars as easily as you turn
the beads in your rosary, you have no right to claim any
part in creation: for all things are intertwined with
all things.
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It
is as easy for the Power of God to raise all the dead
on Judgment Day as to rouse, from its winter sleep, a
single fly in springtime. Such Power is of the Essence
of the Divine – it does not change, neither decaying nor
diminishing, nor can it be impeded in any way. Being absolute,
the Power of God admits no degrees – everything, vast
or slight, is equal before it.
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He
who created the gnat’s eye also created the sun.
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He
who arranged the flea’s stomach also arranged the solar
system.
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Seeing
the miraculous harmony in the universe, all material causes
(supposing that they have any sort of independent agency)
bow down, nor can they help but say: Glory be to You!
We have no power. Surely, You are the All-Mighty, the
All-Wise!
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As
befits the Oneness and Majesty of God, causes have no
reality or effect in the inner dimensions of the creation
and functioning of the universe; as for its manifest,
outward forms, they serve as a veil before the operation
of Divine Power so that certain entities and events, seemingly
disagreeable or banal, might not be attributed directly
to It.
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Where
the Divine Power operates directly, in the inner dimension
of everything, is pure transparency.
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The
visible, corporeal world is a lace curtain before the
worlds of the Unseen.
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The
creation of even a dot in just the right place requires
infinite power, the same that created the universe in
its entirety. For every letter of this great book of the
universe, especially every ‘living’ letter, has a face
turned toward, and an eye staring at, one of its sentences.
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As
commonly happens at the end of Ramadan, people were scanning
the horizon to catch sight of the new crescent indicating
‘Id (the religious festival). No one saw anything. However,
one old man claimed to have seen the new crescent. What
he had seen was in reality the curve of a white one of
his own eyelashes. Now, how could an eye-lash have any
equivalence with the crescent? Then again, how could the
motion of minute particles be taken in the place of the
One Who manages the formation of whole species?
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Nature
may be likened to something printed, but not to the printer.
It is a design, not the designer; a recipient, not the
agent; a composition, not the composer; an order, not
the orderer; and it is a collection of laws established
by the Divine Will, laws [which our minds can grasp but]
which in themselves have no power or material reality.
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Attraction
and being attracted are felt in human conscience (which
is innate in man) because of the attractive power of truth.
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The
innate drive in things is not contradictory to their nature.
For example, the urge of a seed to grow says: ‘I will
grow into such and such plant and produce fruit!’ Then,
it does what it says. An egg has an urge to life which
says: ‘I will be a chick.’ Then, by God’s leave, it becomes
a chick. A quantity of water says, from an urge to freeze,
‘I will spread myself more thinly on the ground.’ Then,
so as to avoid contradicting the water, hard, solid iron
(pipes) make a way for it. Such drives and urges are manifestations
of the Divine commands of creation, issuing from the Divine
Will.
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The
Eternal Power provides ants with a leader and bees with
a queen; the same Power would not deprive human beings
of the leadership of a Prophet. The splitting of the moon
is a miracle of the Prophet Muhammad demonstrated in the
visible, corporeal world. His Ascension (to the Presence
of God through the heavens) is a miracle demonstrated
to the angels and other spirit beings in the world of
inner dimensions: it proves and makes manifest the sainthood
contained within his Prophethood. Also through that miracle,
that most illustrious of beings extended and diffused
his radiance, like a flash of lightning or a bright moon,
into the world of inner dimensions.
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The
two halves of the proclamation of belief – I testify that
there is no deity except God, and I testify that Muhammad
is His servant and Messenger – mutually attest each other’s
truth. The first is the argument a priori for the second,
and the second is the argument a posteriori for the first.
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Life
is a manifestation of individuality in the sphere of multiplicity;
therefore, it leads to unity which can enable a single
thing to come into the ownership of everything.
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The
spirit is a law with consciousness and a real, sensible
existence: Divine Power has clothed it in an energetic
envelope within a body of sensory organs. This spirit
which exists in man is a counterpart to the laws of nature,
which have merely theoretical existence. Both are unchanging
and permanent, and both have issued from the world of
the Divine Commands. If the Eternal Power had clothed
the laws with material existence, each would have been
a spirit; and if the human spirit were stripped of consciousness,
it would become an immaterial law.
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Existents
are seen by the agency of light, and their existence is
known through life. Light and life are each discoverers.
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Christianity
will either become extinct or be purified [of its pagan
elements] and abandon its struggle against Islam. It split
several times and produced Protestantism which, in turn,
split [into diverse sects and groupings] and [some of
these] drew near to monotheism. Christianity will split
further. Then, it will either die out or, finding before
it the truths of Islam which include the essentials of
the original religion of Jesus, will submit itself to
Islam.
This very important truth is indicated in this saying
of the noble Prophet, upon him be peace and blessings:
The Prophet Jesus will come back to the world and, joining
my community, practice according to my Shari‘a.
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The
majority of ordinary people are not drawn so much by [the
strength of] proofs as by the sacredness of the origin
or source of authority.
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Ninety
out of a hundred parts of the Shari‘a – the indispensable,
indisputable points or principles of Islam – may each
be likened to a diamond pillar. What remains to be determined
by the judgments of the authorities on Islamic law – the
remaining ten percent of the Shari‘a – may be likened
to pieces of gold. Ninety diamond pillars are not to be
left under the protection of ten gold pieces. Rather,
the books, and arguments and judgments, of jurisprudents
should serve as binoculars to see the Qur’an better, or
as mirrors to reflect its meanings; they should not serve
to veil or replace it.
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Every
individual qualified to practice ijtihad – the derivation,
from established principles of the Qur’an and Sunna, of
legal judgments for new circumstances – can proclaim a
new law for himself, but he cannot generalize for others,
nor for the whole Muslim community.
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Extending
an idea to others must await its acceptance, first, by
the majority of scholars; otherwise, it will be regarded
as an ‘innovation’ contrary to the principles of Islamic
jurisprudence, and therefore rejected.
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Since
man is created of a noble disposition, he pursues truth.
Sometimes falsehood finds him and he embraces it warmly.
While searching for the truth, he is, in spite of his
intentions, captivated by misguidance and, thinking it
to be the truth [he was seeking], mistakes it for the
truth.
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There
are numerous mirrors to reflect Divine Power, each more
subtle than the other. They range from water to air, from
air to the ether, and thence to the world of ideal forms,
and higher still to the world of spirits and even to time
and ideas. A word multiplies a million times in the mirror
of air. The Pen of the Divine Power does this multiplying
in a quite amazing way. Things are reflected in those
mirrors with their apparent identities or both identities
and characters (nature). The reflections of solid entities
are each a moving lifeless form, but the reflections of
luminous, spiritual entities are each a living form connected
to the original. Even if the reflection (of a luminous
entity) is not exactly identical to the original, it is
not something other than the original.
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Since
the sun turns in convulsive movements around its own axis,
its fruits – the planets – do not fall. If it stopped
moving, its fruits would scatter.
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An
idea is dark and spreads darkness unless it is illumined
with light of the heart. As the cornea or white portion
of the eye, which can be likened to day, is not sufficient
to enable vision until it is combined with the iris and
pupil [the dark portion of the eye], which can be likened
to night, so the ‘cornea’ of an idea does not suffice
for one to see the truth of it unless it is combined with
the ‘iris and pupil’ of the heart.
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Knowledge
of something without conviction is little better than
ignorance. Taking sides with or ‘adopting’ something is
quite different from conviction in regard to it and attachment.
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A
fanciful, elaborate account of something bad can cause
immature minds to stray.
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A
scholar should give guidance in the way a sheep feeds
its young, not in the way a bird does. A sheep feeds its
lambs on its milk, a fully-digested and processed substance,
whereas a bird feeds its chicks on what it has half-chewed
and then regurgitated.
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The
existence of a thing is dependent upon the existence of
all its parts. Since the non-existence of a thing is,
by contrast, possible through the non-existence of only
some of its parts, a man of weak character tends to be
destructive and act negatively as a way of proving his
power.
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Principles
of wisdom and laws of truth cannot have the desired effect
on the ordinary people unless the former are combined
with the laws of the state and the latter with the bonds
of power.
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Injustice
has placed on its head the conical fez of justice; treason
has put on the cloak of patriotic zeal; Jihad, that is,
Islamic struggle in the way of God and for the good of
humanity is called aggression and violation of human rights,
and enslavement is presented as emancipation. In short:
opposites have exchanged forms.
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Politics
engaged in for personal interests is bestial.
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A
show of mildness to a hungry wild animal excites not its
pity but its appetite. Moreover, it then demands a further
payment, after it has fed upon you, for feeding upon you.
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