Seedbed of Light (page 61, continuation)
“The Lord of this changeable, transient world has prepared another, perpetual world. Those with enlightened intellects, illumined hearts, and illuminating spirits, who have discovered the inner reality of creation and things and thus acquired nearness to the All-Glorified God, have informed us that God Almighty has prepared an abode of reward of the obedient and an abode of punishment for the rebellious. He has promised and warned of these abodes, and does not break His promise or cancel His warning. In addition to the Prophets, saints, and purified, exacting scholars who have related this information to us, experts in these matters agree that this information, which is corroborated by the universe’s sign, is true. Can there be any other information truer than this?”
How do we know that the scholars and the Prophets are enlightened individuals?
As per the author, whatever they propose is in correlation to the universe and it is also in conformity within one’s being.
Can I also be enlightened?
Yes. All that is required on your end is to use your freewill and make use of your human qualities (intellect, heart and spirit) to experience the universe and come to your own personal conclusions.
What is the inner reality of creation?
The meaning that one extracts from creation. That is, when you look at the meaning of things, you understand that the meaning is referring to something else other than the objects themselves. Example: the table is the product of a conscious will, somebody deliberately made it. Wood cannot make the table by itself. That is reality. In principle, if I do not study how things are coming into existence, I cannot know the Source of their Existence. If I do not know the Source of their Existence, then how can I talk about why the Source of Existence of the table made the table. No one can know and in principle, no one can know what is on the mind of the Creator. Similarly, when the scripture offers us something that a drop of water is created with wisdom for example. If I do not examine how a drop of water comes into existence, how do I know that it is made by a Wise One?
If we just look at a table as a piece of wood with certain length and width, then we are not really getting into its being a table. Similarly, creation is placed before us so we may question its existence. How come the things exist in a meaningful way around me? Just like the table is used for several purposes, one’s inevitable question is who is preferring the things to exist?
Investigation starts from questioning and one’s question should always start with “how”. How come my ability to see exists for example? How come the tree is made to grow? These “how” questions then lead to answers which provokes more questions and so on. Only if you question how things are coming into existence, then you conclude something. “Why” questions come at the very end. That is, it then answers the purpose of your existence after the series of “how” questions. Every answer to “Why” questions cannot be more than one’s speculations for the answer to “Why” is only known to the one who made them.
Let’s say you are looking at a building. You cannot ask why it is created. You mainly ask how was it built or who built it? Similarly, when you observe the universe, you say how come it is given existence? You do not say I do not know why God created this universe. But you conclude that the One who made it must have such and such qualities. Otherwise it becomes irrational to think that science answers how questions and religion answers why questions.
What is the purpose of the Quran?
It teaches me how to train myself with living with Absoluteness. That is lailaha illallah (nothing has the power to give existence to anything and there must be a Source giving existence to things.) That is living with the awareness to never give any chance as attributing Divine quality to anything else than its Source. The purpose of existence in my being needs a never-ending process of education while we are here in this world.
The text prompts us and encourages us to investigate the universe. It challenges one to find anything in the universe that would deem its claim to be wrong. This is an ongoing process until we die where we have to constantly prove the validity of its claim with each verse.
Even if the Scriptures never encourages us to investigate the universe, isn’t it in our nature to go and investigate the universe? That will to investigate is within each of us, it is given to us. We have to ask: Am I going to reflect and investigate because the Scriptures say so? As a result, you will find out that the Scriptures are just teaching us who we are and what we are given. And as a consequence of that, the Scriptures can be used as a means for our gradual development. That is the messages we extract from creation teach us to pursue gradual development.