155. Shah Sahib. Part Three

 

11/14/14. I talked to my brother today. He gave the following news:

When he was in train with Shah Sahib, he asked Shah Sahib whether he ever had any doubts about Islam.  Shah Sahib replied, “How can I even have an iota of doubt about Islam, when I found the light of Allah through Islam. One can reach God through different paths and creeds (same thing which Great Mystic of Khyber Pass, Yogi from India, Sri Ramakrishna, and the Baba from Saudi Arabia had said)”. He said that the study of the life of Prophet Muhammad^pbuh cannot be done without the study of Hadith ( sayings of the Prophet), because his life was not a secret. It was open. He lived with his companions, and had been observed by 20-25 thousands Muslims. Some of them had known him since he was a young man. Most of the Hadiths are reliable. Certain aspects of his life, like marriages, have been criticized. So be it.

 

Shah Sahib said a great thing, which delighted my heart. He said he respects other religions too. They are true also. It is just that the followers of the religions distort the message. However, the followers of each religion must follow their commandments faithfully, like doing good, and helping others. Thus Shah Sahib did not insist that Islam is the best, and the only true creed, a cause of so much bloodshed and intolerance.

The other day my brother was sitting in Data Durbar when a man approached him. He said are you Mr. …….? My brother replied in affirmative. He said last night he had a dream. In the dream a venerable person appeared and said “ Go to Data Durbar. There will be a person, ………, wearing white dress. Give him five hundred thousand rupees. So here are five hundred thousand rupees”. My brother asked him how did the person in the dream look like? That man replied that he could not tell, the features were not clear.

Soon my brother received clear orders from a different source. He learnt that this money is for enclosing the grave of Shah Sahib with a quadrangular wall. It should have two doors, one in the North and the other in the South side. So my brother went to the village of Shah Sahib. He gathered two village elders and the special Disciple. He told them the plan of the wall and gave the Disciple the money. It requires registration of the deed for the land in a Government office. Money was put in a steel safe deposit. 

This incident tells three things: a special spiritual site at Sayva is being created, already supplicants have started coming. Secondly, that Data Sahib, with the approval of God, takes care of his special disciples even after they die. Through the tomb of Shah Sahib and this mote’s blog, Shah Sahib’s name will be remembered, perhaps for a long time. Thirdly, it means Shah Sahib was no ordinary person. 

What can I say about the life of Shah Sahib? His life was an embodiment of Sufism, at its best. Never married, lived in poverty, never extended his hand to others. He met his expenses by accepting money from the grateful persons helped by him. Acceptance of such donations is allowed in mysticism, provided the money is given freely (mystics never ask for money, their gift is free) and is small (bigger donations are accepted if many students are attached to the shrine, or if free food is distributed). He even set his own money aside for grave-diggers. He bought his own coffin. He loved God. He got everything through Data Sahib. He helped the sick and the needy that came to him. He was a spiritual guide to my brother and this mote, although I never met him in person. I am honored that he mentioned this mote by name minutes before his death.

I do not know what special powers he had. He could cure some ailments. He had a receiver in his brain to receive messages. He knew of events, such as my brother’s meeting with the yogi from India. He could discern spirituality in others.

The Merciful God rewarded him for his lifelong piety and gave him the great gift of His Light. Such a reward is extremely hard to earn. As St Teresa of Avila (and Brother Lawrence) remarked (see blog78):

“If there is a single thing to which a man clings, it is a sign that he sets some value on it; and if he sets some value upon it, it will naturally distress him to give it up, and so everything will be imperfection and loss (also mentioned in blog 37)”. Probably Shah Sahib was close to that stage.

 

 

Footnote one. Spiritual light is very powerful. Nobody can endure it. Moses fell down unconscious. St Paul fell down from his horse and became blind for three days. A Qalandar who has been my brother’s mentor, and got injured in Data Durbar (blog 64), became oblivious to time and space (Jazzab) for over three weeks.

Footnote two. My brother survived the fire with only the clothes he was wearing. That was the greatest calamity of his life.

Footnote three. This mote has a different interpretation of the incident of fire. The fire occurred due to electric malfunction. It was a natural incident, not ordained by God. But  he was saved by the intercession of spiritual forces. I have called this Minor Interventions in blog 145.

Are religions outdated?

149. Development and critique of religious thought. Part one.

 

I respect all religions, but believe in none. I think that the religions are outdated now. Moral conscience of the society has sufficiently developed. Today is the epoch of secular humanism, which this mote believes (in my case, with the addition of fervent love of God and to reach Him through mysticism).  

The religions arose to fulfill the needs of a particular society at a particular time in human history.

Why did man need religion? I have written about it in various blogs (33, 36, and 98). Let me repeat them over here.

Human beings saw a flat, stationary earth.  Sun and moon rose in the East and set in the West. Stars filled the sky. Sunlight permeated the day and the moonlight suffused the night. Cool breeze in a hot summer day was delightful. There was a pregnant pause at dawn and dusk, as if the whole universe was holding its breath. There was joy in watching the children play. There were myriad plants and animals. Rain came to nurture the harvest. Fragrant flowers attracted butterflies. Each season came with its own delights. Beautiful snowfall in the winter, and fragrant flowers in the spring. There were blue lagoons, winding rivers and deep oceans. Clouds scudded the blue sky. Fish swam in the water and birds soared in the air. Cows and horses roamed in the pastures and camels in the deserts. Bees supplied them with honey and quadrupeds with meat and milk. Man was filled with wonder.  Everything moved with precision. Just as a house could not develop by itself, somebody had to make it; similarly, the world had to be made by somebody. The thought of the grand universe making itself never came in the imagination of humans. There had to be a creator of the universe. 

Against such beauty and grandeur, there was ugliness. There was great suffering and injustice.  

Famines were common. Just few years of drought were sufficient to cause them in ancient times. Hundreds of thousands of people would die, including women and children. Tsunamis, floods, hurricanes and earthquakes would wipe out hundreds of villages and towns. There was the constant misery of epidemics of smallpox, plague, malaria, cholera and many other such diseases. Childhood sicknesses and birthing problems killed hundreds of thousands each year. Most of the globe suffered from chronic malnourishment in the poor.

Then there were the problems created by human beings themselves, such as poverty, wars and slavery. The dark ages had cruel kings like Tamerlane and Genghis Khan who would construct towers of heads. Last century had unprecedented number of deaths by the hands of Hitler, Stalin, Hutus and Pol Pot. 

The problem of misery and injustice has plagued philosophers and religious scholars for over two thousand years. The ancient Greek philosopher, Epicurus posed what is now called Epicurean Paradox 

“God is omnipotent, God is good, but Evil exists”

"Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then he is not omnipotent. Is he able, but not willing? Then he is malevolent. Is he both able and willing? Then whence cometh evil? Is he neither able nor willing? Then why call him God?"

It was more natural to think that sufferings could not be explained by religious arguments, so human beings thought about it and tried to reconcile the 3 powerful observations, which were before them. Those 3 observations were the following: 

(A) Huge universe is present, and could not have possibly arisen, on its own.  

(B)There is lot of suffering

 (C) People do good things and bad things. Cruel or bad persons are not necessarily punished, in fact they may have a great life, and the good are not necessarily rewarded. 

Since it was obvious and unalterable fact (to them) that there was a God, the need was to reconcile it with the second observation, the suffering. The logical answer would have been that God was not such a kind entity; in fact He appeared to be downright cruel. Even under the best circumstances He had to be indifferent and uncaring. So the wise men convinced themselves that there must be a life after death where justice will eventually be done. And to explain the bad deeds in the presence of omnipotent God, the Devil (Satan) had to be invented (bad deeds were the work of Satan and not of God). Hindu religion used a different theory: ‘Your sufferings are due to the misdeeds done by you in previous lives’. Oppressed people needed these dogmas, because that way of thinking gave them strength and eased their burden in three ways:  First, because they may think that their suffering  was due to God’s will, so it must be good, since God is good. And religion taught unquestioned surrender to God. Secondly, they may think that there may be a hidden benefit in the present calamity ( there is a silver lining in most clouds). And, through these trials, there may be an improvement in the better part of one’s nature. Who were they to question God’s wisdom? He knew better. Thirdly, if they were not rewarded here, then God’s justice made it absolutely certain that they will be rewarded in the next life.

 

To be continued.