Arguments for Resurrection – Part 24

Seedbed of Light (continuation page 60)

“This honor and distinction does not exempt us from being called to account. “Does humanity think that it will be left to roam at will, that it will be left uncontrolled?” (75:36). Each person will be called to account for even the smallest act in the Place of Supreme Gathering and the eternal world. Destroying the world, raising the dead, and assembling them for judgment in the Place of Gathering are as easy for Divine Power as creating spring and autumn. All past happenings, which are miracles of His Power, testify that He can do whatever He wills and promises to do in the future.”

What do we mean by human acts? In other words, which acts are to be preserved?

• Any act done consciously.
• What am I referring this act to?
• Meanings in the acts are to be preserved.

We can preserve the act physically but in order to fulfill the purpose of our existence, the One who created us wants us to see with what consciousness we are preforming this act. This consciousness side is being preserved.

Comment: Is consciousness same as intention?

Intention is different. I may have a good intention but again, am I referring this act to the Source? Am I conscious of acting in the name of the Creator? Or am I acting in my own name?

• What consciousness do I act upon?

1. Am I referring this act to the Creator and acting in His name?
2. Am I referring this act to myself?

Consciousness includes intention but intention does not include consciousness. Does my intention include the Creator in it? I may have a good intention but then not using my life in order to get to know the Creator and develop my awareness of “createdness”.

Whoever gives existence to anything in this world that is His Power manifested on the objects. Who can it be? Whoever gives existence to things? Question and investigate! Is there something within this universe giving existence to things?

How do I come to the conclusion of “God”?

We have to stop using value laden vocabulary like God and Creator! Rather use your own understanding which requires serious thinking. Example: The One that gives existence to things, who is that one? Use daily language without mixing up value laden concepts.

How can I confirm my belief and feel comfortable about it without falling into any prejudice idea?

• First, without alternatives, human beings cannot develop any concepts/understandings.
• Second, when you have an idea, the alternative always comes.
• Third, while questioning, you have to refresh your mind.

Example: He promises that He will resurrect and take us into account after recording. How do we know?

Value of our acts is recorded. Example: While I am drinking water, which kind of consciousness do I have? Human beings are expected to act with consciousness. I may or may not abide to this depending on my seriousness.

How do we understand that our acts are preserved and there is a “promise” behind it?

First, the “promise” is from the one who creates the act.
Second, we choose and He creates. Whatever comes into existence here, demonstrates that it does not come into existence for nothing. It infers meaning and must mean something i.e. they are going to be used. Where? When? How? That is not my concern but they must be used outside the conditions of this world. The recording is not for transient world only. The words “when”, “where” and “how” belong to this world. There must be another type of existence not on a temporary base.

• Do not think about the conditions of another realm of existence. FOCUS on “there must be another realm of existence.”
• Who knows God? No one but we are sure that such a being must exist. Knowledge and belief are different concepts. We do not know the Essence of this Being but we only conclude about the existence and reality of this Being.

What we know about another realm of existence is that it must not be like what we experience here. Otherwise, what is the point of creating another transient world if human beings are going to suffer again from ephemerality because human beings expect everything they like to be in a Permanent Eternal form. By using this feeling of wanting permanence, I conclude that there must be another realm of existence. The One who gave me these senses and conclusions must do it.

What exactly is recorded?

Meaning is recorded ONLY but the recording of the physical side is a sign that the One who gives existence to this physical body is the One recording it. Don’t you want to experience eternal happiness in physical form as well? Not only as imagination or dream. My desire is that whatever I desire and hope for should happen in a physical permanent form. I am endowed with this sense and I cannot deny it. My conclusion is that whoever gave me this sense must have a reason because I did not make myself desire Eternity. I found myself desiring Eternity. It is not my wishful thinking, it is a part of my existence. Wishful thinking can only happen within the conditions of this universe. If I was hoping and expecting an Eternal Existence, it goes beyond the conditions of this universe. Where did I get this idea? It does not exist within the conditions of this world? Can I really develop the idea of Eternity by myself? It’s not only me but every human being says that they are in need of Eternal Happiness. Whoever gave this sense to me must be promising me something. I can reason that whoever gave existence to this universe, made it purposeful so I can conclude that it must happen. That is, there is no reason for anyone to claim that there is no Eternal Life. People who think that existence is confined to this universe only, inevitably they think that Eternity is an imagination. QUESTION: Where did you get imagination?

Existence in its transient form points that existence is given continuously because coming into existence is the sign that the Source must be Eternal. If the Source is Eternal, the act of existence must be Eternal. That is my inevitable conclusion as a human being.

According to me, the promise is for the future. We cannot develop a language which represents my actions outside this universe. If you do not know the object, you cannot develop a language for it. What you can say: let’s imagine something but this imagination is NOT real. How do you define imagination? This assumption of imagination is in contrast with what we see in this world. Example: This world is transient, in contrast to transient we say Eternal. Can you imagine Eternal? In order to explain Eternity, you cannot load any meaning of this word on the word of Eternity. Only you can say: Not transient. Can I objectify it? No but only through its opposite. That is why methodologically if someone does not pay attention to the “createdness” of this world, s/he cannot develop a word “Creator” without imagination. No one can imagine the content of the word “Creator”. The content is all negation i.e. Creator cannot be subject to time, not transient… When we say “God,” we only mean not created, not transient because we cannot imagine that which is not created (beyond human capacity) but I can conclude it by paying attention to the “createdness” of this world (that things are coming into existence).

We are endowed with the quality to conclude that there must be a Creator. How do you describe the Creator? He is not created, dependent or subject to anything. So He must have an independent existence. What can be self-existent? You can only imagine self-existence with its opposite concept that we experience here i.e. it is not like me or like the objects because they are all dependent and cannot sustain their own existence. The conclusion “there must be” is the most important aspect of human capacity that we can conclude about the existence of something which does not exist in the universe. That capacity must always be used. That is consciousness i.e. belief/faith lies there, the awareness of the qualities that we have. Denial means rejecting this human quality. We are given the quality to understand the Necessary existence of something which is not transient i.e. Eternal Happiness. But do we know the nature of it? No, so how can you believe in something whose nature you do not know? I am not saying when I say that I believe in the existence of Eternal Happiness that I know the nature of Eternal Happiness. I use my human qualities which give me the opportunity to conclude that such an Eternal Happiness must exist. The content of it, I have no idea.

Everything in the text is described in terms of this world because we cannot imagine the content of anything not within this world. This world is a sign that whatever created the objects and events is demonstrating Mercy. Example: dates were the fruits of the first audience of the Quran. For you and I, apples represent a form of Mercy. That is, if you realize that apples come out of Mercy, then in Paradise, you will experience Eternal apples. Wisdom requires that I must read the Quran according to my conditions. That is, according to my conditions, I conclude something. Do not make it general but personal. It is not an easy task but it must be achieved. If you do not understand the methodology of the Quran, then never read the hadith as you kill its spirit and reduce it to certain actions only. We have to make the Quran speak to myself according to my conditions. Make it personal! Universal message of the Quran means that it addresses to you personally but you cannot make your understanding universal. In other words, you cannot claim that your understanding of the Quran is the universal message. But if the Speech of the Maker of the universe is the Quran, you have to read and make it personal for yourself because, since it claims that it is the universal message to all human kind, it is for you as well. But your conclusion cannot be the claim that this understanding and interpretation of the Quran is the universal message of the Quran. Be aware of it! No one can claim that his understanding and interpretation of the Quran must be universal message. But the Quran includes everyone in every condition; otherwise it would not be the speech of my Creator. This consequence of reading the Quran for yourself recalls in the mind of some scholars that interpretations cannot be personal. That becomes an obstacle: if the concepts we read in the Quran is filled with our understanding obtained from this world. (We cannot claim that our understanding contains the meaning of the Quranic concept in its entirety.) If you claim that your understanding covers the whole meaning of the concepts of the Qur’an, then you are in error and you repeat yourself and do not learn anything new. Example: I have a certain understanding of “happiness” developed by the society. I have to be aware that this book contains its own vocabulary according to its own aim. What is it aiming to teach me? Read it within its own objective. Example: you have to read a biology book as a biology book not a nutrition book. Every concept introduced there must make sense in the field of biology. Vocabulary, words must make sense with the objectives of the Quran. The Quran says: “When you start reading the Quran, you have to take refuge with God”. What does it mean? It means take refuge from the whisperings of Satan i.e. cultural background. Do not pollute yourself from the outside culture. Read the speech of the Creator by opening your human qualities i.e. questioning things. What does it mean for me? Example: words such as Islam, Insaan, mountains… We know “mountain” as lump of rocks but the Quran says “mountains”. Within the context/objectives of the Quran, what does “mountain” represent? The better you train yourself in this method, the more the Quran becomes a universal message for you.

Steps to reading the Quran:

1. Define what you are doing as far as the purpose of your existence is concerned and be aware that you should not impose your own vocabulary on the Quran.
2. You have to seek refuge with God because what you are reading is God’s speech. Read the Qur’an as a Word of God, not as a man-made speech; only then can you either approve the meanings you gathered from it and confirm it, or, if it does not make sense as God’s Speech, then, reject it.
3. You are purifying yourself from influence of outside culture. You have to be cleansed (wudhu in Arabic), cleaning yourself from the effect of outside world. Being consciously aware of your bodily existence and your relationship with other bodily existence. How do you represent this? By making ablution here, I am controlling my body, not my body is controlling me. It’s a ritual which represents your awareness/understanding and cleaning away your dominion of carnal desires developed by the external secular civilization.

All things you learned in school must be put aside. Rituals are a physical attitude represented by doing something physical. Declaring control of your body by consciousness i.e. you are aware of what you are doing.

Before understanding the whole entire message of the Quran and understanding the purposes of the Quran, you cannot understand a sentence in it independently because the sentence will make sense with the whole context of the Quran. If you learn Arabic language, you may get into eloquence of the Quran rather than its message. You cannot believe in the Quran just because of its eloquence.

Question: What does Supreme Gathering refer to?

Supreme Gathering (known as “hashr” in Arabic) means that all your account will be presented. Whatever idea or concept we experience in this world is represented in physical form. You cannot have an idea/thought and not put it into practice physically. Thinking or being conscious of something needs to be based on the physical existence of something that is how we are in this world.

The Eternal Life cannot be like a dream that we have in this world because dream is something which is not physically presented to us. Everything in the physical world needs to be performed or received with certain awareness/interpretation. That interpretation is called “consciousness” because we are given the ability to interpret the meaning of everything which exists. Without physical experience, you cannot experience anything with your entire humanity. When we dream in this world, we understand that it was only a dream, not like our normal life on earth, and we just ignore it.

Creator means not created. If you do not experience anything physically, you cannot develop any idea, what the physical experience refers to in its opposite sense (not of the nature of this universe). That is why we describe the Creator only by using its opposite concept: “Not created.” That is what we mean by “the Creator,” i.e. not the created one.

All our thoughts and experiences are combined with our physical experiences. That is what “hashr” means i.e. this combination will be experienced permanently, all the things gathered, that is what you are. What does your college degree represent? Accumulation of 4 years of experience or what you have learned i.e. physical and human abilities.

Permanent= not transient. Your point of reference is still this world. We have to realize the qualities in our existence. Whole summary of your life will be there (in the Supreme Gathering) in front of you where you would not care about loved ones being next to you because your love for them will be included within your being when you are given a permanent existence.