In this worldHate never yet dispelled hate.
Only love dispels hate.
This is the law,
Ancient and inexhaustible. You too shall pass away.
Knowing this, how can you quarrel? Your worst enemy cannot harm you
As much as your own thoughts, unguarded. In all things be a master
Of what you do, say and think.
Be free. Love and joyfully
Follow the way,
The quiet way to the happy country. Quietly, surely
Approach the happy country,
The heart of stillness. Look within--
The rising and falling.
What happiness!
How sweet to be free! Find friends who love the truth. Drink deeply.
Live in serenity and joy. Live in love.
Do your work.
Make an end of your sorrows. Waken yourself, watch yourself.
And live joyfully. Like the moon,
Come out from behind the clouds!
Shine! --excerpts from The Dhammapada
I concerned myself to remember God, to seek Him, to know Him and to love Him. When I had come to the end I saw that He had remembered me before I had remembered Him, that he had sought me before I had sought Him, that His knowledge of me had preceded my knowledge of Him, and that His love for me had existed before my love for Him.
--Abu Yazid Bistami, or Bayazid, a 9th c. Persian Islamic mystic precursor of the Sufis.
The spiritual marriage may be compared to water falling from the sky into a river or fountain, where the waters are united, and it would no longer be possible to divide them, or to separate the water of the river from that which has fallen from the heavens.
--St. Teresa of Avila
The coming of the Bridegroom is so swift that He is perpetually coming and dwelling within with unfathomable riches, and ever coming anew in His Person, without interception, with such new brightness that it seems as though he had never come before. For His coming consists beyond time, in an eternal Now, which is ever received with new longings and new joy. Behold, the delight and the joy which the Bridegroom beings with Him in the coming are boundless and without measure, for they are Himself.
--Jan Van Ruysbroeck
Oh wonder of wonders! When I think of the union of the soul with God!...The divine love-spring surges over the soul, sweeping her out of herself into the unnamed being of her original source... In this exalted state she has lost her proper self and is flowing full-flood into the unity of the divine nature... Henceforth I shall not speak about the soul, for she has lost her name in the oneness of the divine essence. There she is no more called soul: she is called infinite being.
--Meister Eckhart
Oh night that guided me,Oh night more lovely than dawn,
Oh night that joined Beloved with lover,
Lover transformed in the Beloved!
All ceased and I abandoned myself,
Leaving my cares forgotten among the lilies. --St. John of the Cross
He or she who knows that enough is enough will always have enough.
--Lao Tzu
You will not find me in stupas, not in shrine rooms, nor in synagogues, nor cathedrals;
Not in masses, nor kirtans, not in legs winding around your own, nor in eating
nothing but vegetables.
When you really look for me, you will find my instantly--
in the tiniest house of time.
Student, tell me, what and where is God?
He is the breath, inside your own breath. --Kabir
The world in the past has been ruled by force, and man has dominated over woman by reason of his more forceful and aggressive qualities both of mind and body. But the scales are already shifting, force is losing its weight, and mental alertness, intuition, and the spiritual qualities of love and service, in which woman is strong, are gaining ascendancy. Hence the coming new age will be an age less masculine and more permeated with the feminine ideals, or, to speak more exactly, will be an age in which the masculine and feminine elements of civilization will be more properly balanced.
War and its ravages have blighted the world, but the education of woman will be a mighty step toward its abolition and ending, for she will use her whole influence against war....In truth, she will be the greatest factor in establishing universal peace and international arbitration.
--Abdu'l-Baha, 1844-1921
I am blind and do not see the things of this world; but when the light comes from Above, it enlightens my Heart and I can see, for the Eye of my heart sees everything: and through this vision I can help my people. The heart is a sanctuary at the Center of which there is a little space, wherein the Great Spirit dwells, and this is the Eye. This is the Eye of Wakantanka by which He sees all things, and through which we see Him.
--Black Elk
Love is my sect and religion.When my eyes saw the face of the Friend,
all sorrows became joys. Here, my King,
I give myself to You.
From beginning to end
all my treasure and richness is You. The source of this mind and soul,
the origins of space,
are with You.
You are the end and everything between,
I can only go toward You. My way is from You to You,
My tongue speaks of You within You... Don't let me wander from Your love,
don't let me leave Your door,
and if I lose myself
let me find myself within You. You are the soul and the universe,
the secret treasure of all. --Yunus Emre, d.1320
As the flame clothes the black, sooty clod in a garment of fire, and releases the heat imprisoned therein, even so does prayer clothe a man in a garment of holiness, evoke the light and fire implanted within him by his Maker, illuminate his whole being, and unify the lower and higher worlds.
--from _The Zohar_
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