The Sublime Spirits, Where are they?

The loved ones1 of my heart--where are they? Say, by God, where are they?

As thou sawest their apparition2, wilt thou show to me their reality?

How long, how long was I seeking them! and how often did I beg to be united with them,

Until I had no fear of being parted from them, and yet I feared to be amongst them3,

Perchance my happy star4 will hinder their going afar from me,

That mine eye may be blest with them, and that I may not ask, 'Where are they?'

~Ibn al-`Arabi~
The Tarujman al-Ashwaq, XLV

 Mount Fuji’s Sea of Trees

Aokigahra Forest

Mount Fuji

Japan

NOTES on the Text:
1. the sublime spirits
2. their manifestation in the world of similitude
3. lest their radiance should consume me
4. the Divine favor predestined to me

This World is midwinter

There is no doubt that this world is midwinter. Why are inanimate objects called "solid"? Because they are all "frozen."*  These rocks, mountains, and other coverings that garb this world are all "frozen."  If the world is not midwinter, why is it frozen? The concept of the world is simple and cannot be seen, but through the effect one can know that there are such things as wind and cold.  This world is like the season of midwinter when everything is frozen and solidified.  What sort of midwinter?  A mental midwinter, not a tangible one.  When that "divine" breeze comes, the mountains of this world will begin to melt and turn to water. Just as the heat of midsummer causes all frozen things to melt, so on the Day of Resurrection, when that breeze comes, all things will melt.

~Rumi~ 


*This line of reasoning is based on an etymological similarity between jamad (solid, inanimate) and munjamid (frozen).

SOURCE: Signs of the Unseen, Discourses of Rumi, Discourse Twelve

Ladder Rungs

In a human being is such a love, a pain, an itch, a desire that, even if he were to possess a hundred thousand worlds, he would not rest or find peace. People work variously at all sorts of callings, crafts, and professions, and they learn astrology and medicine, and so forth, but they are not at peace because what they are seeking cannot be found. The Beloved is called dil-aram because the heart finds peace through anything else? All these other joys and objects of search are like a ladder. 

The rungs on the ladder are not place to stay 

but to pass through.

The sooner one wakes up and becomes aware, the shorter the long road becomes and the less one's life is wasted on these "ladder rungs."

Source: W.M. Thackston, Jr., Signs of the Unseen, The Discourses of Jalaluddin Rumi, Discourse Fifteen, Part 1.