Restoring the Transcendent: The Four Volume Study

The endowments which distinguish the human race from all other forms of life are summed up in what is known as the human spirit; the mind is its essential quality. These endowments have enabled humanity to build civilizations and to prosper materially. But such accomplishments alone have never satisfied the human spirit, whose mysterious nature inclines it towards transcendence, a reaching towards an invisible realm, towards the ultimate reality, that unknowable essence of essences called God. The religions brought to mankind by a succession of spiritual luminaries have been the primary link between humanity and that ultimate reality, and have galvanized and refined mankind's capacity to achieve spiritual success together with social progress.

           (The Universal House of Justice, 1985 Oct, The Promise of World Peace, p. 1)

The four volumes of Restoring the Transcendent that I am planning and writing will explore some unfolding relations between Revelation, the all-embracing Word of God descending from out the transcendent world of Spirit, and the ascending, enfolding, containing forms of humanity It creates from interaction with the "rational faculty, which is the essence of the human reality: cosmos, history, civilization, and knowledge.  In a nutshell, for the potentials latent within these four forms to unfold they must open to the transcendent realm from which emerge powerful energies and principles of life and thought which enable humanity to break free of whatever cocoon it is a chrysalis within.

Connection with the transcendent realm is accomplished through the opening of the human heart and mind to higher Reality.  Bahá’u’lláh wrote: “It is clear and evident, therefore, that the first bestowal of God is the Word, and its discoverer and recipient is the power of understanding. This Word is the foremost instructor in the school of existence and the revealer of Him Who is the Almighty. All that is seen is visible only through the light of its wisdom. All that is manifest is but a token of its knowledge. All names are but its name, and the beginning and end of all matters must needs depend upon it.”  (The Tabernacle of Unity: 3)

Sacred doctrine and the transcendent thought, i.e. Revelation, makes use of human reason, not to prove faith and vision, which are the exercise of our two greatest spiritual faculties, but to make clear (i.e. manifest) within human understanding whatever is set forth in Revelation and grasped by faith and vision.  Human reason can never hope to prove faith directly, but it can elucidate and clarify the pulsations of divine energy and thought.  The Master tells us that “faith compriseth both knowledge and the performance of good works.” (The Universal House of Justice, 1996 Oct 22, Authentication and Authority.) 

Faith is central to human understanding, especially of spiritual reality, and is one of the powers composing the power of understanding that discovers the Word.  Faith is the mediator between Revelation and reason, the foundational principle of human knowledge.  George Townshend wrote: “'Abdu'l-Bahá once said that Reason was the throne of faith; in another place he likened Reason to a great mirror looking into the heavens but reflecting no image because it was in darkness. Faith, he said, was like sunlight which enabled the mirror to see and to reflect all the heavenly truths that lie before it. These symbols express exactly the Christian and the Bahá'í view of Reason and Faith, but not the view of traditional orthodoxy which is a purely human concept.” (Christ and Baha'u'llah: 53)

Thus, reason, or knowledge, is not adequate to faith.  According to ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, faith is the whole, knowledge or reason is one of its parts, along with deeds, which alone prove faith.  One does not, in these matters, reason toward faith and certitude, but from them.  To be fully manifest—i.e. be complete and self-sufficient within its own limits-- faith must comprise both thought and deed, yet stand apart from the realm of Revelation in order to manifest Revelation.  In its own realm, faith imperfectly mirrors the completeness, self-sufficiency and unlimitedness of the thought of God.  ‘Abdu’l-Bahá explained that “light cannot become manifest unless those things which perceive and appreciate it exist.” (Promulgation of Universal Peace: 462)  Revelation cannot become fully manifest unless human reason, the one power that perceives and appreciates it, exists.

The other great spiritual faculty is vision, which seems to have some close associations with light and meditation.  ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, in one of His talks in the United States, explained: “In the world of existence there is nothing so important as spirit, nothing so essential as the spirit of man. The spirit of man is the most noble of phenomena. The spirit of man is the meeting between man and God. The spirit of man is the animus of human life and the collective center of all human virtues. The spirit of man is the cause of the illumination of this world.” He goes on to talk about a power of that spirit: ‘When you wish to reflect upon or consider a matter, you consult something within you. You say, shall I do it, or shall I not do it? Is it better to make this journey or abandon it? Whom do you consult? Who is within you deciding this question? Surely there is a distinct power, an intelligent ego. Were it not distinct from your ego, you would not be consulting it. It is greater than the faculty of thought. It is your spirit which teaches you, which advises and decides upon matters.” (The Promulgation of Universal Peace: 239, 241—I more fully explain faith and vision on my book, Renewing the Sacred: A New Vision of Education.)

It is notable that he calls the human spirit “greater than the power of thought.”  So important is meditation that the Master tells us in another place: “It is an axiomatic fact that while you meditate you are speaking with your own spirit. In that state of mind you put certain questions to your spirit and the spirit answers: the light breaks forth and the reality is revealed.

You cannot apply the name "man" to any being void of this faculty of meditation; without it he would be a mere animal, lower than the beasts.

Through the faculty of meditation man attains to eternal life; through it he receives the breath of the Holy Spirit—the bestowal of the Spirit is given in reflection and meditation.

The spirit of man is itself informed and strengthened during meditation; through it affairs of which man knew nothing are unfolded before his view. Through it he receives Divine inspiration, through it he receives heavenly food.

Meditation is the key for opening the doors of mysteries. In that state man abstracts himself: in that state man withdraws himself from all outside objects; in that subjective mood he is immersed in the ocean of spiritual life and can unfold the secrets of things-in-themselves. To illustrate this, think of man as endowed with two kinds of sight; when the power of insight is being used the outward power of vision does not see.

This faculty of meditation frees man from the animal nature, discerns the reality of things, puts man in touch with God.

This faculty brings forth from the invisible plane the sciences and arts. Through the meditative faculty inventions are made possible, colossal undertakings are carried out; through it governments can run smoothly. Through this faculty man enters into the very Kingdom of God.” (Paris Talks: 54)