"God" can be likened to a mountain peak.To reach the wisdom, comfort and serenity of God, one must climb this peak.

There are many routes to the top. For some people, only one route works for them; they may have to try (and fail) at several before finding their route.

Others try, one, or many different routes, and fail, and finally give up, saying "there is no God"-and sink into despair.

Others try, and fail, yet continue to seek--and in this seeking, find God (Wisdom, comfort, serenity) whether they reach to top of the peak or not.

Are Sufis relativists? No- there is one deity, but many paths to reach him.

End

PS-Had no time last week to attempt last week's Sufi Wisdom. I did read it, and let it steep for a few days, but...

PPS-tried to print the poem out, but was not readable. I had to rely on my imperfect memory.

footnote:
From the otherwise undistinguished movie "Remo Williams" comes this unforgettable line:

Master Chun (Joel Grey??)-"Perfection is a road-not a destination"

Yea, probably, if they have true wisdom. One of the viewpoints that seems to be prevalent in the blogosphere is the acrimony to the concept of "moral relativism" and it really makes me want to rant. I understand it will take more than a few words from me to get people to understand - but the longest journey begins with one step.

Relativism is the nature of Reality. Einstein discovered this on the level of physical reality. If anyone reads the great teachers of the past (with an open mind) they will discover that they all are talking about moral (spiritual) relativism. Lets look at a few words from a very popular Jew - Judge not lest ye be judged. That is just one example. Almost every Master can be found to speak of the same type of concepts, Rumi is another great one. His lines at the end of the poem are very poignant -

When you eventually see through the veils to
how things really are, you will keep saying
again and again,
"This is certainly not like we thought it was!"

This is a theme repeated again and again in the writings of the great Masters.

A great physicist once said - the universe is not as strange as we can imagine, it is STRANGER than we CAN imagine.

I understand why people are ranting against moral relativism - it seems to them that it is exploding their own worldview and that can be a scary prospect. I have found the 'Conversations with God' series a very mind expanding set of books. I don't agree with every concept in them, but it certainly gives one pause to review their own worldview.

Thanks for a great blogsite!!

Great comments.

I wonder about the relativism label for the Sufis, as that's a very difficult fit with ethical monotheism of any sort. It's one thing to make a distinction between form and spirit in the experience of divine grace, and to acknowledge the limits of human comprehension and varied paths to the truth. Relativism's denial of the fundamental ground of truth itself, however, strikes me as a very different ball game. The 2 may look similar to casual observation, but are they?

I see another angle to this poem... and here's where Ron & I have more common ground. Let's use a concrete example, too - the concept of Creationism. the common theme? Our limited comprehension of the divine, and tendency to cloak that in human-like forms. As Rumi notes:

"When you look in a mirror, you see yourself,
not the state of the mirror."

Zen thought also takes the mirror as a symbol of ultimate reality, because it reflects what IS. Yet we look at creation, and cannot help seeing ourselves.

We look at an omnipotent, omniscient being... and when we imagine creation, we imagine it like some 8 year old with a magic LEGO set. Huh? Such a being would understand and practice "creation" far, far beyond human comprehension, manipulating underlying forces we aren't aware of to produce goals whose subtlety and very nature speaks to language and concepts we don't have. In sum, such a being would create like G-d - not like mankind.

For me, my problem with strict creationism goes beyond science (though it includes that), and into the territory of idolatry and blashphemy.

Still, it is worth applying understanding to this conduct. Applying human notions of what creation is and how it ends was appropriate to our level of understanding when the Bible was written, and some levels of explanation even today. It's a glimpse of the divine through the "mirror" that those who receive this understanding have to use. Shattering that reflection because it offends "higher sensibilities" was Moses' mistake in the poem - let's not make it ourselves.

Neither must we be bound up in that reflection's limitations, however. As Rumi points out:

"When you eventually see through the veils to
how things really are, you will keep saying
again and again,
"This is certainly not like we thought it was!""

Indeed. As Ron notes, the world is stranger than we CAN imagine.

There's a secondary point I see here as well, the corrective that helps keep us from making the above mistake and leaves the road open to higher possibilities:

"The flute player puts breath into a flute,
and who makes the music?
Not the flute. The Fluteplayer!"

The Sufis aren't big on religious formalism. substitute that for "flute" - both are complex, fixed structures designed to take breath (spirit) and turn it into music (ecstatic union with the divine reality). Without breath, the flute is just a paperweight. Yet the flute, too, has value here, as anyone who has ever heard a good flautist can attest.

The Sufis do not denigrate the flute, simply assign it its proper place - and implicitly acknowledge that music can be made in other ways too.

As Rumi notes:

"Whenever you speak praise or thanksgiving
to God,
it's always like this dear shepherd's simplicity."

Spirit first. Seeking, even "burning" first. Breath first. If it's sincere and persistent, the instrument will appear, music will follow... and we may enter into an understanding that at last transcends our human mirror, and the words we use to describe what we see in it.

The world is the flute. We're the music. Who is the Musician? Can there be music without a Musician?

Can there be a Musician ... without music?