Category
Mysticism & spirituality
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If only the transformed can know, how could a mystic ever be shown to be wrong?
Since I campaign against superstition, let me say first that I'm not asking this to sneer. I read Sufi poetry with real pleasure, and I've learned from discussions here that the Sufi claim is subtler than "feelings beat reason". The claim, as…
Started by Arvind PoojaryAnswer first (no replies yet) -
Al-Ghazali says some knowledge has to be tasted. Is that an argument, or a way out of one?
Last month I read al-Ghazali's Deliverance from Error in an English translation I found online, and one part keeps bothering me. He goes through the theologians, the philosophers and the Batinites, finds each of them lacking, and then turns to the Sufis.…
Started by Fajar Nugroho5 replies -
Is fana in Sufism the same as nirvana in Buddhism?
My grandmother used to read Sufi poetry about fana, the annihilation of the self in God. Now I've started reading about Buddhism and nirvana, which also seems to involve the end of the self. Are these basically the same experience described in…
Started by Elif Yıldız4 replies -
What do Sufis mean by “tasting” (dhawq) as a way of knowing?
I love the Sufi poetry that has been sung in Yogyakarta for centuries. My teacher, an old woman who learned from her father, often says that certain things cannot be known from books, only "tasted". I always took this as a beautiful…
Started by Ratna Wulandari4 replies -
If ātman already is brahman, what is left for liberation to do?
Recently I started on Advaita Vedānta, and one idea has stopped me cold. As I understand it, the claim is that the self (ātman) already is ultimate reality (brahman). "Tat tvam asi", you are that, as Uddālaka tells his son in the…
Started by Rohan Desai5 replies -
Arjuna sees the universal form and begs it to stop. Is that the sublime, or something else?
I reread the Bhagavad Gita when I burned out last year, and the chapter I keep returning to is the eleventh. Arjuna asks Krishna to show his universal form. Krishna gives him a divine eye, and what Arjuna sees is unbearable: countless…
Started by Rohan Desai4 replies