Part 9 (2/2)

Wisdom = Power = Love.

You should try to solve the equation for yourself. You will not fail to understand it if you think hard.

[19] Here again taking the three missionary religions mentioned above, the Ident.i.ty is:--

Creator = Preserver = Adjuster.

G.o.d said unto Moses, _I am that I am_--_Exodus, iii, 14._

[20] Some Sufis define Nature as Individual _plus_ his Environment. By _individual_ they mean any one capable of thinking of himself as ”I” or ”Me” and every thing else as ”not I” or ”not me” which is his _environment_.

[21] It may be said that all the three ideas of G.o.d's relation with Nature (the three ”isms” I have mentioned in brackets) are but different _degrees_ of a man's desire for communion with his G.o.d. Says Rumi in his celebrated _Masnavi_: ”All religions are in substance one and the same”--Bk. iii, story 12 (St. Daquqi).

[22] See last para. of Note 4 and also Note 10. [Arabic: at ?uruq li-llah-i bi ?is-bil anfus] There are as many ways leading to G.o.d as there are minds.

[23] ”Religion places the human soul in the presence of its highest ideal (=G.o.d), it lifts it above the level of ordinary goodness, and produces at least a yearning after a higher and better life in the light of G.o.d.”--_Max Muller_.

[24] Sura = Chapter.

[25] Absolute = not conditioned by place time measure or circ.u.mstances. Infinite = without beginning or end.

[26] ”The proper name of the religion preached by Muhammad is Islam.”--Sale

[27] The word ”Islam” means literally (1) resignation (2) preservation and (3) peace. Lord Tennyson has most admirably expressed the Islamic ideal of self-surrender to the will of G.o.d and has incidentally decided the vexed question of free-will in a single line:--

”_Our wills are ours to make them Thine._”

[28] By Christians in European countries.

[29] ”The proper name of the religion preached by Muhammad is Islam”--_Sale_. See p. 37.

[30] I use the word in the restricted sense of ”Islam as taught by Muhammad.” If you take Islam to mean belief in one G.o.d and virtuous conduct in life, you may say that there has not been and will never be any true religion besides Islam. In this sense Islam is the only true religion. See p. 27, last para. of Note 2 p. 19, and of this Note pp. 33, 34.

[31] ”A man must not do reverence to his own sect or disparage that of another man without reason. Deprecation should be for specific reasons only, because the sects of other people all deserve reverence for one reason or other. By thus acting, a man exalts his own sect, and at the same time does service to the sects of other people.

By acting contrariwise, a man hurts his own sect and does disservice to the sects of other people.”--King Asoka's _Edict XII_.

”Every sect favourably regards him who is faithful to its precepts, and, in truth, he is to be commended.”--Akbar, (Ain Akbari III).

[32] See p. 55.

[33] Muslim = resigned and submissive, therefore, _peaceful_.

[34] See Foot note [30].

[35] Compare _the Bhagvat Gita_, iv. 7-8:--

”Whenever there is decay of righteousness, O Bharata, and there is exaltation of unrighteousness, then _I myself come forth_;

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