The letter-poem of the greatest Sufi sheikh, Ibn 'Arabi, swept into Rachel Gordin's life and consciousness in one fell swoop: "Dear Beloved, I called you again and again/You did not hear./ I showed you myself again and again/You did not see./I made myself into a scent/You did not smell./... Why do you not see me?/Why do you not hear me?/... Love yourself in me, me alone./Cling to me/There is no one closer to you than me./Others love you for themselves/ I love you for yourself and you/You flee from me/... Dear Beloved, I am closer to you than you are to yourself/Closer than your soul/Closer than your breath."
Two weeks after reading this, Gordin, an Israeli writer and healer, found herself in Scotland, at the Beshara School, where the teachings of the sheikh are taught, feeling like someone who had returned home.
Ibn 'Arabi was born in 1165 in Andalusia at the end of what is commonly called the Islamic Golden Age. As the son of an affluent family, he had an opportunity to study metaphysics and cosmology, as well as prayer rituals such as "ziker" (remembrance of God by repeating His names), meditation, fasting and nocturnal vigils. His fat'h, or spiritual awakening, came at the age of 18, when he was "abducted" from himself into a state of illumination.
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Although Ibn 'Arabi, who is said to have received his book "Fusus al-Hikam" ("Facets of Wisdom") in a dream, directly from Muhammad, is hardly representative of Islam and was even branded a heretic, it is hard not to echo the sentiments of one of Gordin's friends, quoted in the introduction: "Muhammad? When I hear Muhammad I think of Arafat." Or "Allahu Akhba is what a terrorist says before detonating a bomb." Really now, why would a Jewish woman from Tel Aviv go all the way to Scotland to meet the God inside her - in Arabic, and via Muhammad?
One answer is that you can't argue with a love story. True, it may be easier to accept less controversial loves, like love for Zen Buddhism or the teachings of G.I. Gurdjieff or Kirshnamurti, for example. But if, contrary to the historic approach, we are willing to accept the idea that there is a body of ancient esoteric knowledge that is the source of all mysticism, and assumes different guises in different periods and cultures so that it is accessible in all languages to all who are seeking their way, then what Rachel Gordin has found in Ibn 'Arabi is a universal truth.
A similar story appears in Ilan Amit's fascinating book "Gurdjieff and the Inner Work," which also explores, from a 40-year perspective, a revelatory experience that changed the author's life. Gordin and Amit are not starry-eyed New Age groupies. Their books were written after years of serious study and practice, during which they achieved a profound understanding of the "way." They write with rare clarity about matters of extraordinary complexity.
Another answer is that spiritual grazing in foreign fields and discovering the light in mystic teachings that are not "ours" is somehow cleaner. It is easier to enter through a gate that bypasses Judaism, free of depressing historical connotations and negative emotions triggered by zealous representatives of the religious establishment who claim a monopoly over God.
Similar to kabbala Any Hebrew-reader who encounters the Bible in English for the first time experiences this - something like a right-handed person drawing with a left hand that has no memory or dexterity, but approaches the task in a fresh and unencumbered way. Even the path to Jewish mysticism sometimes takes a winding road through India, passing through the well-known process of distancing oneself in order to come closer. In his poem "The Pool," Haim Nahman Bialik writes: "(Who can tell) that vainly he will travel, wander, seek/in the woods, through desert sands and ocean beds/ the lost princess, whose latent loveliness/is hidden in her own heart's sleeping depths" (translated by Ruth Nevo.)
Reading "Angels Don't Dream," it is impossible not to see the similarities between the teachings of Ibn 'Arabi and the kabbala and medieval literature that grew up in the same cultural climate. It is noteworthy that, while organized religions tend to accentuate their differences, and are brought to the point of bloody battles because of them, there is a great deal of kinship between the mystical teachings of those same religions, apparently pointing to that place that lies beyond differences.
They all emphasize unity, for example. The One (wahid), the mystery that can only be reached through paradox, is the central theme of Ibn 'Arabi's teaching. Multiplicity, both cosmological and psychological, is merely a retreat from all the possibilities hidden in unity. The work of the Sufi poet Rumi is also suffused with the desire to unite with his beloved, God, because separation is the source of all suffering, and unity, the source of all longing. Even romantic love is the longing to be one. All longing can lead to God. Even the Golden Calf was created from the longings of the Israelites. In smashing the Golden Calf, Moses released the longing from its dependence on an incomplete object and directed it toward that which is complete. The manner in which God is revealed to us depends on our knowledge. Because we, who were created to reflect Him, are not different from Him, He knows us from within. The lovesick Sufi Hussein Ibn Mansur, who declared "I am God" in Baghdad in 913 B.C.E, was brutally executed after he refused the entreaties of his disciples to retract his words.
In contrast to the unity of God, man's destiny is fragmentation, or the illusion of unity. The sense that the "self" has an ongoing, autonomous existence is a total illusion. A persona separate from God is merely a construct of passing thoughts that come together under the heading "ego," which we try hard to protect. The more profound meaning of "jihad" understands it as a battle against the false gods within us, who raise their heads and shout "Me." The ego does not want to destroy itself, nor can it. What it needs to do is accept unity as an intellectual idea and submit to a gradual loss of strength. Only modesty will lead it to the godhead (a process that Gurdjieff calls "self-remembering".)
The illusion of the continuity of the ego is also central to the teachings of Gurdjieff, although Ibn 'Arabi does not provide "tools" to work with (developing the ego only increases its importance in its own eyes). The way to reach God is through surrendering oneself completely and willingly becoming His servant; an approach familiar to us from the sacred Hebrew poetry of the medieval era. "The slaves of time are the slaves of a slave; only the slave of the Lord is free," wrote Yehuda Halevi.
The presumption that one can obey or not obey is very far from the mind of a genuine slave. Only a slave knows his master intimately and is gladdened by his very presence. Only the slave's humility allows the master to appear in his full glory. That is the work of the muqarribin<.i> - the "night people" - those who are close to God. Evil in Ibn 'Arabi's teachings does not exist on its own. Evil is the absence of any quality, in the same way that darkness is the absence of light. This is the place where God is partially revealed. The story of Job is perceived as a story of imbalance corrected by a shift in the opposite direction.
The ziker, or remembrance of God by repetition of his names; Merciful One, Sublimely Exalted, Giver of Life, Bringer of Death, the Bountiful, and so on; also exists in kabbalistic meditation, where various aspects of God are summoned up by naming the sfirot. That the Arabic word "qalam" means both "word" and "wound," alludes to the tremendous power of words.
In this comprehensive book, in which the teachings of Ibn 'Arabi, interspersed with fascinating "disciples' tales," are presented for the first time in Hebrew, Gordin performs a particularly difficult feat. She paints a picture of the religious experience that can be grasped by people who are not part of it, and manages to overcome the predictable resistance of readers to material of this kind conveyed in Islamic
terminology.
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