We offer here the conclusion of the talk given in Los Angeles, begun here. In his opening remarks, Hazrat Inayat Khan said that he intended to speak about four themes: manifestation, gravitation, assimilation and perfection.
And now I come to the subject of gravitation. The gravitation known to science is the material gravitation, that all that belongs to the dense earth is attracted to the dense earth. But it is the same theory, that all that belongs to the spirit is attracted to the spirit. Therefore, man is pulled from both sides. Man is pulled more so than any other creature, for he is close to the spirit. On one side earth demands his body, on the other side the spirit asks for his soul. If man gives in to the attraction of the earth, then the body drags the soul towards the earth. If man gives himself to the attraction of the spirit, then the spirit drags the body to the spirit. In this way man is subject to the law of gravitation from both sides, from the earth and from the heavens.
And now coming to the subject of perfect assimilation. As the soul has passed through these different planes I have just explained before you, it has borrowed from every plane things that belong to that plane: qualities, tendencies, ideals, thoughts, feelings, impressions, flesh, skin, bone and blood. And that which the soul has borrowed, it must give back when it has done its work. It has borrowed all this for a certain time and for a certain purpose. When the purpose is fulfilled, when the time is finished, then every plane asks for that which the soul has borrowed from it. And one cannot help but give it back to that plane from which it was borrowed. It is that process which is called assimilation. Since man is born greedy and selfish, he has taken enthusiastically and willingly, and gives it back grudgingly, and he calls this giving back death.
Assimilation, therefore, is to give back to the earth the physical matter which one has used on this physical plane. It becomes assimilated by the earth. And the soul becomes free of that burden which it had once carried, and begins to experience a greater liberty and a greater ease. For going beyond is only releasing the soul of a limitation and of its great captivity.
The life in the world of genius is longer compared with the life on the physical plane. It is that life which may be called the life in the hereafter. But there comes a time when all that which was borrowed from the plane of genius has to be given back also, for it did not belong to the soul. It is according to the same theory: that which does not belong to our body, our body will not have it. It will throw it out, or if it cannot throw it out, the body will be thrown out of life. And so no one can carry beyond the substance of a lower plane. Each plane has its own substance, and that substance must be returned to that plane. That is the only way the soul can be freed from that plane in order to rise above it.
When the soul soars higher it must also give up its angelic qualities. They will be assimilated in the angelic plane before the soul can dissolve into the great ocean, the supreme spirit. And it is that dissolving which is called emerging into the real self.
There is one thing most important that can be learned from this process: that every soul that is coming from the source toward manifestation gives what it brings from the source to the souls who meet it, and takes from the souls returning from manifestation to the source. And it is this exchange which is the cause of the various conditions of life that man is born in on coming on earth. One is intelligent, another is simple, one is born in a rich family, another in a poor family, one is healthy, the other weak, one will have a great purpose, the other knows not what he must do. It is all determined. By what? The soul who is coming from the source has collected on its way from souls returning to the source. For instance, a businessman was going to Jerusalem to have a retired life. He met someone in Europe who was coming from the East and going to the United States. And the first man said, “For forty years I have been in business in the United States, and now you are going there to do some business. I have a business established there. I can tell you of my experience. I can give you my heritage. I can give you all the help if you continue that business. I will give you letters of introduction. I will help you to come in sympathetic surroundings.”
And there is another man who is coming from the Orient, and he met someone who never had any luck. He said, “Are you going there? I have been there for sixty years, without one friend, nothing but ill luck.” And he disappointed this man. He comes and he finds the same ill luck of the man he met. The other comes in the midst of friends, it is all prepared for him, he has only to continue the thing he was sent for.
And now we come to the final question. And that is, “What must be the purpose of the whole creation? Is there anything to be gained by it?” Yes. What is to be gained by it? It is a realization of the divine gained by the experience of life. And what does the word “divine” mean? It means the soul’s experience when the soul has been led to that height where it is no longer an individual soul, but it is conscious of all planes of existence, of the source and of its limitation, both. And when all the inspiration and power that is latent in man is within his reach, then that realization is called perfection. And it is that perfection which Jesus Christ has spoken of in the Bible where it is said, “Be ye perfect as your Father in heaven is perfect.”
Q.: Are these planes not a place but a mental condition?
A.: Yes, they are. But what we call a place is a mental condition also. Because it is as rigid as physical appearance, we think it as a place, but really speaking it is a mental condition. Therefore, those who have understood this have called it an illusion.
Q.: Is one direction better than the other?
A.: One thing leads to another thing. As in life one success brings many more times success and one failure brings to more failures, so the interest in one direction leads to the deeper interest in the same direction. As people say that there is nothing that succeeds as success, and that it is the money that can make a person rich. That law always is the same. If a person has knowledge then he is directed to greater knowledge. In the same way, if a thief goes to a large city, he will be the first to find thieves. Another person who is perhaps in a large cityfor ten years, he will not find one thief. But I should not be surprised if the first man the other person meets will be a thief. Like attracts like. Every impression gathers with that impression. If one goes toward happiness, success, riches, knowledge, wisdom, he goes deeper and deeper into it, because it interests him. The same way with all weakness. He is attracted to it. Everything is the same way. A little inclination towards wickedness, evil, leads one more and more towards it, whether he has love for it or not. He gets accustomed to it and he goes on in the same direction.
Q.: Does cremation free the soul more than disintegration?
A.: No, the condition of the body has nothing to do with the freeing of the soul. Only, cremation can choke the soul more than the burying in the earth. Besides that, since the body is made of clay, it belongs to the earth. If a person says, “The body belongs to water too,” water is in the depth of the earth; it belongs to earth just the same.
Gracias Maestro, gracias, gracias, nos llevas de la mano con tanto Amor, Paciencia y Consideracion. Que recibas muchas bendiciones!