The Existence of God-Soul-Unity and Death by Hisham M Nazer

The Existence of God-Soul-Unity and Death

By, Hisham M Nazer

A New Edition

Thou best philosopher, who yet dost keep

Thy heritage, thou Eye among the blind,

That, deaf and silent, read'st the eternal deep.

Haunted for ever by the eternal mind,

Mighty Prophet ! Seen blest'

On whom those truth do rest,

Which we are toiling all our lives to find ~ Wordsworth; 'Ode: Intimations of Immortality'

          Simultaneous dissipation and integration of spatio-temporal dynamics (both progressive and regressive) are what reality is composed with. Diversifying multiplicity is bound to become simple at a certain point. This is the law of 'becoming' and 'being'; the law of the seemingly complex reality heading towards a simple point—probably the extreme expression of which is – no-thingness!

And exactly it is complication that leads us towards the simple understanding. As for my theory, excluding all orthodox ideas about God, the highest expression of my proposed system is God himself. He is the end where we become what we were at the beginning. There is a permanent renaissance of Genesis at the point of Salvation—and then its eternal continuance. Therefore then, life explicitly means only and only complication, without which there is no transcending to that simple state. But, there is unity (oneness) in diversity (manyness); affinity in contradiction. When diversity and contradiction is dynamic and not static, then they become unity and affinity, like the moving of the ceiling fan. Usually a ceiling fan is composed of 3 or 4 distinctly different blades. It means they are ‘many’. But when they are in dynamic movement, what they ‘become’? The many blades separated, or a single circle? Moreover when they are static, they are of no use (and too the blades are of no use if they are not united by a middle that moves them). When they are united in a movement, they are of best use in cooling us—which is their law and purpose. The precondition of oneness (oneness doesn't mean egotistic isolation of an individual from many, rather it means to be together with all, so that the individual and the all cannot be distinguished) is manyness. In the psychological level, first there should be a subtlety of understanding that will cause dispersion in it. The mind shall rush from here to there, and in this pursuit, sometimes will be lost. But when everything is known—material things and too their metaphysical significances—then the mind intuitively grasps the connection among all reality. Like when one starts to draw a circle, it is no circle at all but merely a ‘possibility’ of becoming anything, but when one connects the opposite lines together, it becomes a single circle, and then, though the manyness of the lines still is there, yet it is seen as one. This then is the psychological explanation of how dissipation can prove to be the cause of integration. Essential conflict is essential for a thing to be understood and to exist. The cause of cosmic and spiritual dissipation and integration is choice. When there is no choice, everything is possible. Choosing is like the law of nature. Once the smoke goes out of the chimney, it never comes back. So we've got one chance to pick or to pick not. But if we do not pick (after the manner of our own ego), there's always a possibility. Everything has singular direction as Physics has proved it. The water drop falling from the pipe never returns back; the tears do not squeeze back into the eyes; a dead never becomes alive again! It seems everything follows the law of 'dissipation' (fragmentation). From the vase it becomes pieces; from the cigarette it becomes the puffs; from the lamp it becomes light. It all began with the Big Bang (because scientifically Big Bang is the mother of this dissipation—the primal cause of fragmentation of particles into gigantic heavenly bodies). But what will happen when the universe will stop expanding—when it shall reach its highest integrated state after a long process of dissipation? As perfection leaves no room for betterment, what will happen when there will be no spatial transformation? Will time continue to exist? According to the law of physics, to be is to be generated and to be energized. If the Sun ceases to evolve, its heat shall also cease—for ‘evolution’ causes vibration in the matter which consequently produces heat, or cold. When time and space will cease to exist, or will come to a standstill, what dimension we will then be in? In the Genetic state? In the state of existential perfection?—in the state of the Zero?—in the state of material and spiritual harmony? Will we stop, after regaining our originality—where we all were unified because we had no body, therefore had no desire? Will we then meet God and be with him? Then, Zero or Nothing is the true identity of God—the only Ultimate Truth which is so different than the image of him that all the Orthodox religions try to portray (in some cases – impose). Then there is no determinism, for nothing can be determined by God for he never limits. Our choice is the reason behind our 'karma' that, probably, God 'feels' and knows (not even sees like an objective observer) for he is his creation inclusive—for he is truth, and whatever there is—is true! He is not like an autocrat king who imposes; or like a powerful mystic who sees everything; or like ten thousand and infinite Hercules who can perform anything; or like a magician standing at two places at the same time, but He in his own contemplation simply participates in the form of soul within everyone, for when He contemplates Himself- He participates, and he cannot stay away from participating this grand dance because He is the only true dancer—the only truth, or the only truth is He. To determine something, there should be objective duality (exclusiveness) between the object determining and the object determined. Like when one throws a pen to a definite direction, he determines its situation and place. But like God if he is one with the pen, can he throw himself? The answer is definitely no. If God determines everything, be sure that in this process He himself is determined, but indubitable it is that God is beyond any limitation—for to be is all that is needed by a being to exist, and nothing else. Determination is the definition of potentiality. God cannot limit God, as he's all and all is he.

Coming back to the idea of Manyness and Singleness: the ephemeral span is needed, to understand what is eternity, for a simple thing cannot be understood simply, neither a complex thing complexly, for in both cases, there would be an incompatible chemistry between two principally similar objects resulting into zero synthesis;—as the similar pole of two magnets distract each other rather than attracting each other. This law is also true for human, for a male only feels attracted towards a female, and vice-versa (this is what Wordsworth has called – similitude in dissimilitude, and dissimilitude in similitude). Opposites attract, for one becomes at the becoming of the other, like good is the absence of evil, evil of good. There wouldn't be any evil if there were no God, no God without evil. There wouldn't be any time, if there were no eternity; no imperfection without perfection; everything without nothing! Yes, there is God, and it is proved by my postulations, though his existence does not depend upon any proof, because "he alone is the only being who not only cease to be, but also doesn't begin to be" (st. Anselm). Even this complication of reality is He—his particles tugging us towards his big chest by the rope of time. We will become nothing after death, and thus we shall culminate in the ultimate truth which has no expression as it expresses all beyond our human understanding. And that truth I name today as—God, distilled of any moral implication, or any existential obligation.

The Meaning of Unity, Soul and Essential Oneness in the light of my stipulated reality system

          It is not that your head is upon my shoulder, nor is your heart in my chest. Neither my mind is in your head, nor your self upon my legs. No, we are not one in this style. By this continuous denial, see we've reached into an extreme positive side. You've merged in me, as have I in you—not physically, but essentially. Formally there is no you and me anymore. In our divine pursuit we've left behind the ego of individuality, the difference of body. Listen to me carefully for what now I would speak may sound crazy but true. It is told from ancient time, in sacred books, in altruism, in every spiritual teaching that we all are one. How? How can we be one if we can see so vividly that we are not? Here we make mistake, for we use the eyes to see—which itself is a part of the ego. We all have the 3rd eye, that is 'conscience', latently but to foolishly beautify it we wear the sunglass of personal reason. In our personal convictions, we private ourselves. We private ourselves from Unity, and what is the highest expression of Unity other than God? EGO always is in the process of EdgingGodOut. Now how can we merge with the unity? Actually what is unity? Where is the essence of Unity? If I say that our body doesn't hold our soul, would you believe? Yes, our soul doesn't live in our body, because to say this is to enter into ontological contradiction. There is no individual soul, but one Absolute soul. It is everywhere in the air and in the nothing (probably Hinduism came closer to this conception with the term ब्रह्म —Brahma). The total truth is composed of this Universal Soul, of this Absolute Soul that encompasses everything, every-no-thing. No! We’re lied. The soul doesn't descend upon our body—because there is no individual ‘soul’—because soul is statically and eternally in its place—because it is not something like a limited air that can descend or ascend! It is always here in and out everything, because whatever is all – is Soul. Our body is just the lifeless end of love mixed with ecstasy or lust. It has no power to hold something. Why, has this never come to anyone’s mind that if the soul is eternal, perfect, then why can't it, at its wish, get free from the body whenever it wishes? Because there is no true individuality, no personality, no separation, no specification, no definition, and all these no, to begin again, end into yes. All is one. How? Think, think my dear you're in a big hall. Like air, the hall is full of soul—not individual soul, but a single one covering the whole space – a single whole feeding many bodies. Now, when you move one step ahead, you transcend your past [time starts to exist in this manner, from the transition of the body (matter) from one space to another. Even when it lies still, it is always something that is not the soul (immutable), and is essentially objective to it]; your past self dies out, but it lives again in the next step;—it is the energy of the material aspect of our being that keeps us alive in this world, and when age (time) comes to claim its price, the body loses all its energy and dies. This is the reason, as we all know; soul never dies and is eternal. When the lump of flesh comes out of (or even lives in) the mother’s womb, it immediately enters into the Universal Soul. It is not likely that soul comes and begs its way into the body, but the body merely jumps into the vastness of Soul. There is no breakage into the Universal Soul;—incessantly we (the material egos) are diving into it. When the body moves, it leaves the previous space of soul, and enters into the one ahead. But as soul doesn't die;—as it never ceases to BE, so when you'll step back, you'll again enter into the space of soul where you were previously. A single soul is everywhere, it is only the individual body that gets into it differently for its developed ego, and which gives us different identity and features. [One question may arise that then how would I explain intellect and genius? I believe ‘genius’ too is an accomplishment and a result of the body, of the matter, because every accomplishment, every fame, every development is useless against the final hour of death. Nothing remains with the death of our body. The Soul is a thoughtless entity, yet it knows all (actually I have meant nothing by ‘all’, because as Soul itself is everything, is all, how can it objectively know itself? When I myself am all, what more can I know?). It is so perfect that in it there is no consciousness of perfection. Another question may arise that as our intellect develops, and as we change (it is an illusion to think that we change), then why don’t trees? I would answer ‘time’ alone cannot change anything. Space too is responsible, in collaboration with time, for change. Trees stand in one place, and participate in the Universal Soul, and the characteristic of this participation is that there will be a necessary urge to produce—that is why though trees seem to have different biology from human, yet they produce in their own way. But we must not mistake this evolution and production of trees with Life. I conclude, trees have no life, rather they merely participate in the Universal Soul very much like us, with only one limitation that is energetic movements. Natural things produce in natural ways, but as they lack in intellect, the mango tree shall keep on producing only mangoes till the material aspect of the tree dies. In this way essentially, we are not at all different from Trees. We too are one with them when we think existence in the essence of Soul. A third kind of doubt may arise that do everything then participate in soul? Not everything, but only the matters that have energy and can evolve, and have the potentiality to produce]. Of course, ego is the expression of body that is why people fear to die. But when I possess nothing (material or sentimental) where is the fear of death? It is our attachment of sentiment to material aspects of our being that mars our recognition of our truest self. We attach too much love to our body (individuality) which is the cause of all sufferings. Is not death then merely the fear of losing what ‘I’ have? Egolessness is the renaissance of our original self. When I do not possess anything, there is no fear of death; there is no fear in embracing eternity leaving behind the futile transitoriness. The complete reality is a single soul, and we are just entering incessantly from merely one place to another, because the whole SPACE is a ONE SINGLE SOUL, and we cannot live without it! We’re the travelers into the world of a single soul; of a single all encompassing entity. When I've left ego behind, I've left all that I've from this world, and have entered into the realm of no-thing which is all. This is the ultimate salvation. This is becoming one with the Unity, with all, with the Universal Soul, with – God!

Many have protested when they have heard, and they have heard with limited understanding that God lies within us. He does indeed! How? What is the Universal Soul other than a supreme attribute of God? Can we think of a triangle without thinking three lines and three angles? Is triangle so different from the attributes that feed its triangularity? Now question may arise that without the attributes, can a triangle BE? Yes it can. When we draw a triangle upon a white sheet, we merely move our pen over the triangle which our mind has already drawn upon it—that is, the idea of triangle is already and always there formally. We merely express what is permanent, and gives an ephemeral impression of ideas timeless. Unity is God, and we are the ones who fulfill this unity. There is not a single person who is unity exclusive. Unity cannot lie out there, separately without ‘me’, and in that the ‘I’ has become a sub-attribute of the Supreme Attribute of God.

The Prediction

          After the logical proof of God, I think I have come across a logical way to say when the world may come to a stop. Starting from the birth of Humanity, we are developing—both physically and mentally. Our human pursuit too is in the continuous process of dissipation, for we are carrying out numerous tasks today that were inconceivable even 100 years back. But by this our venturing—our taking into consideration almost infinite problems—truths about reality are getting integrated in our mind, through the medium of experience, which is making us more capable of handling any situation or anything unknown. The more we are getting experienced, and the more our mind is fed with numberless possibilities, the more our understanding of the Unity is getting simplified. It is like reading a novel. Without reading all the pages as one cannot understand the theme of it, so cannot we understand the laws of reality without the multiplicity of our knowledge. We are at a point of history; we are at a specific stage of the age of World. If the ratio of intensity of our actions from all the previous epochs till now can be analyzed and compared with the ratio of velocity of a falling drop of water (from what height I do not know. May be from the height of π, I am not sure, but there must be something about it; also with Α and Ω, the beginning and the end, that appears in many classical depictions of Jesus the Christ as in the Romanesque Catalan fresco. These two apocalyptic symbols get sufficient importance in the mathematical sketches of the American Baptist pastor, Bible teacher and author Clarence Larkin[1], especially in his design of Ages and Dispensations to which my proposed theory coincidentally comes so closer), we can foretell by studying history mathematically— our future. When a drop of water falls from a certain height, it gains vibration for the velocity of its falling, and the closer the drop is to the floor, the more it is vibrated for gaining a specific progressive force. Now human history is not so different from the law of a falling drop of water. I cannot say further about it, for I lack both resource for scientific experiment and a mathematical mind. Moreover, history is to be analyzed like never before. Hope someday I will come up with my finished theory of telling what is not told.

So this is the birth of the Scientific God—the God who doesn’t demand devotion and crusades, but only honest reaction and living with every reality around and inside the human mind.

Death and the Paradox of its Independent Existence

          Alas it is time that makes the clock older, and ultimately, useless. Its service is the cause of its death, as our life is the cause of ours. Death then, is the offspring of life—a march towards inevitability. Death is not the absence of life, for without life, death is an impossible. It is impossible to conceive of death without ‘being’', and to be a ‘being’ is to possess life. Death has no individual existence; it is dependent on and yet independent of life, meaning: it is ‘an end’ of ‘a beginning’, the destination of a journey, but is very much an end-in-itself. It cannot be, or be arrived at, without a starting, yet it is unique and different from the path that leads us toward it. But, no matter how unique it is, its being is the unbecoming of life, and without life it can never and nowhere be. So, the statement ‘death is the absence of life’ is completely a wrong thesis. Death is actually, and most simply, the end of life (from which perspective that will be discussed latter). Its existence is not singular, in that it cannot be substantially ‘individual’—non-resultant/emergent, and it is non-existence when there is no existence before it. It would be a fallacy to recognize it in void. To say ‘death is the absence of life’ is similar to calling a blank space ‘death’.

And though how much rhetorically convincing, which I myself have hitherto believed and propounded to date, Jiddu Krishnamurti’s realization of death is not appropriate; though not completely wrong, it seriously lacks amplitude. In his marvelous book The First and the Last Freedom, in chapter X, entitled as ‘Fear’, he says:

“When I say I am afraid of death, am I really afraid of the unknown, which is death, or am I afraid of losing what I have known? My fear is not of death but of losing my association with things belonging to me. My fear is always in relation to the known, not to the unknown.”

To say this is to deny the independent existence of death completely, contrarily which is only ‘it’ when it ‘is’, accommodating nothing else. The state of death is a nullity of possibility, and it is an annihilation of life, but itself is– ‘the end of a life already annihilated’, and therefore no longer remains a force that annihilates. Death loses its power to destroy further when it ‘actually’ destroys something or someone. Death dies after ending a life. Its premature function is incepting inherent ‘dread’ and ‘despair’—accompanied by a consciousness of ‘end’, but in its actuality, it has no function at all. Thus it becomes something unique; it becomes the destroyer of every possibility by destroying itself, and becomes an ‘impotent impossible’. This gives it an independent existence, for all its subtle and milli/nano-second performance and then its transformation into a ‘blank of impossibility’, bred from all other potent-possibilities and its own impotent one (the fear of death is an impotent possibility). Here only for this reason it is different from ‘void’: that never had, has or will have any purpose. The separation is indeed too painfully subtle, but upon second thought is not inconceivable. The consciousness of consequence merely makes it appear dependent, and nothing else.

The fear of death is rather the fear of our ‘unbecoming’ after ages of efforts to ‘become’ someone (this is what Camus called– ‘the revolt against nothingness’). The fear is associated with impossibility, which though is dependent on the existence of possibility, in that it exists only when possibility is there and then denied, but is independent of it, for its unique function of disabling all human functions and becoming permanently functionless itself. Unlike ‘void’ it gives the awareness of ‘something was there’ but now ‘it is not’. No matter what permanence it gets upon its execution and upon its self-annihilation, it never fails to give the impression that it has indeed destroyed life. Death is not independent when meditated from the perspective of a decaying life. The word and all the consciousness entailed by ‘death’ can be absolutely replaced by the clause ‘the ultimate end of life’ but only before the milli/nano-second of its actual performance, when on the other side of the fence, of that milli/nano-second, it (un)becomes nothing but Death, and death only, which is independent.

Tolstoy remarked that the fear of death is like a fear of a ghost. Nobody knows what it is, yet everyone fears. Pathetically it’s not a plausible cause. Instead, the fear is of: losing the chance to know the unknown. Human life is a pursuit of knowing the unknown and thereby of deriving the delight from it. It is what it means to be—always in the ‘tension’ of achievement. Primarily it is ‘delight’ that we strive and yearn for, divine or carnal, spiritual or physical alike. So, death is not even a fear of ‘unknown’, instead it is a fear rather of a possibility that will annihilate all the possibility of knowing the unknown. We fear then our impotence, the loss of ‘mystery’ and hence, of ‘purpose’. It is not a fear of losing what we know, as Krishnamurti thinks it is, but of losing the chance of unraveling the unknown that death destroy ultimately.