THE GARDEN OF TRUTH & THE GARDENER HIMSELF

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We were created to transcend the finitude and limitations

of the human state.  The mystery of our life on earth is not only that we are born, live, and die in a journey whose beginning and end we know not; it is also that within this horizontal journey we are given the possibility of wayfaring vertically beyond all the temporal and spatial accidents of our terrestrial existence.  And it is essentially for thye sake of making this second journey that we were put here on earth.  This journey, which takes us to the abode of the One and the Garden of Truth, is the primary raison d'etre of our existence in this world and the end of the journey, the ultimate goal of human life.

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From one point of view, the journey considered horizontally seems to be long, but from the metaphysical point of view, which is based on the vertical dimension, it is nothing other than that single instant when we surrender ourselves to God and begin the path of ascent toward Him.  We were created to know the Garden of Truth and ultimately the Gardener Himself, and to reach it through the full realization of this knowledge.  Sufism is one of the major paths that the Gardener has created, within the framework of Islam, to the Garden.

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Surely there are other paths and Sufism would be the first to attest to the universality of revelation. 

Let us then take advantage of the here and now to travel beyond all times and places, before the hand of destiny removes from us the possibility of that vertical journey, which begins here and now and finally returns to Here and Now.  We travel to the There only to discover that it is Here, and to the future that is beyond earthly time only to see that it is Now.

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To make the journey to the Garden means to go from here to There, and the fruit of the journey is the realization that There is Here.  That is why in the Quran, God addresses the Prophet, "If thy sevant asks thee about Me, truly I am Near."  That Divine Reality, the Gardener, is Near; we have only to realize His Nearness.  As for the Garden of Truth, like the Gardener, it resides at the center of our being.  Happy are those who are able to reach this Garden while they are still in the human state and have the possibility of doing so.

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From THE GARDEN OF TRUTH

The Vision and Promise of Sufism, Islam's Mystical Tradition

by Seyyed Hossein Nasr

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If you act as an instrument of God, whatever comes will not affect you; He will bear it. Then you will be able to finish what you started. You must be the instrument, then He will be the One who is the Doer. That is the point. Evil is everywhere, it is joined with you.
When you set out to do something good, when you are the instrument to do a good duty, the opposite of it, evil, will oppose you. If the “I” sets out to do something, it will be difficult, but if you become an instrument (of God), the weight is His. Then it will be easy. You must think of this. This point is the point of psychology. This is the way you must realize wisdom and truth in your life.
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 Bawa Muhaiyaddeen
Sufi Philosopher (d. 1986)

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