Rumi - The resplendent city of the soul

art Mahmoud Said

 Holy men dance and wheel on the
spiritual battlefield.
They dance in their own blood.
When they are freed from the dominion of self,
they clap a hand;
When they transcend their own imperfection,
they make a dance.
From within them musicians strike the
tambourine:
At their ecstasy the sea bursts into foam.
You see nothing, but for them
leaves on branches are clapping hands.
You see not the clapping of the leaves:
One must have spiritual ears,
not the ear of body.
Close the head's ears to jesting and falsehood,
That you may see the resplendent city
of the soul.

 

Thich Nhat Hanh - Emptiness

Emptiness, Nirvana and the Extinction of Ideas

‘We are afraid of death, we are afraid of separation, and we are afraid of nothingness. In the West, people are very afraid of nothingness. When they hear about emptiness, people are also very afraid, but emptiness just means the extinction of ideas. Emptiness is not the opposite of existence. It is not nothingness or annihilation. The idea of existence has to be removed and so does the idea of nonexistence. Emptiness is a tool to help us.

Reality has nothing to do with existence and nonexistence. When Shakespeare says: “To be or not to be - that is the question,” the Buddha answers: “To be or not to be is not the question.” To be and not to be are just two ideas opposing each other. But they are not reality, and they do not describe reality.

Not only does awakened insight remove the notion of permanence, but it also removes the notion of impermanence. The notion of emptiness is the same. Emptiness is an instrument, and if you are caught in the notion of emptiness you are lost. The Buddha said in the Ratnakuta Sutra: “If you are caught by the notion of being and non-being, then the notion of emptiness can help you get free. But if you are caught by the notion of emptiness, there’s no hope.” The teaching on emptiness is a tool helping you to get the real insight of emptiness, but if you consider the tool as the insight, you just get caught in an idea.

If you have a notion about nirvana, that notion should be removed. Nirvana is empty of all notions, including the notions of nirvana, you have not touched nirvana yet. This deep insight and discovery of the Buddha took him beyond fear, beyond anxiety and suffering and beyond birth and death.’

- Thich Nhat Hanh, No Death, No Fear.

 

Mooji - There is an empty room...

art Maandersen

 There is an empty room,
come fully inside.
There are no stories here.
There is no past or future here.
No relatives.
No names, no forms, time, no self.
Don't be in your head now.
Listen from another place; a holy place deep inside your being.
All the things you once talked about are outside now.
This is a room without walls. No door.
Nothing lives here.
It is not a dead space.
It's your true place and Being.
The mind will try to say something like:
‘You cannot stay here,’ or ‘There is nothing here for you,’
but this voice is also phenomenal, while you are not.
Therefore, touch nothing.
Pay attention only to your unmixed self now,
not the personal sense of self.
Personality is only a garment worn by the Self
for a duration called a lifetime.
The body also is just a garment worn for the time being.
Rare is a human being who comes to this place
which cannot be divided;
that cannot die,
where one is naturally happy,
where there are no beginnings or ends.
It is the most pure—immaculate.
From here ego and world arises as fleeting images,
but the Real does not arise.
It permeates all yet nothing permeates it.
Leave everything.
Be here.

~ Mooji

Rishikesh, India, 8th of March 2013

 

art Jale Saraçoğlu