It was a blustery February morning, and just a few days before my 40^th birthday, when my cell phone rang. I thought perhaps it was someone offering me early well wishes. But it was my mom, calling with news that would forever alter the course of my life.

“Hi, Mom,” I said as I sat down. “How are you?”
“Not good,” she whispered like a frightened child sharing a dark secret. “You know I’ve been feeling really down lately.”

“Yeah,” I said softly, matching her breathy tone.

She was talking so quietly that I cupped my hand over my left ear so I could hear her.
“I just swallowed a bunch of sleeping pills,” she blurted out.

My eyes widened as I sprung to my feet, nearly tripping over my toddler.

“A bunch? Like, how many?” I asked.

“I dunno,” she replied. “A lot.”

I raced to the kitchen, my hands trembling as I fumbled to dial 911 from the landline while trying to keep Mom talking to me on my cell.

A few moments later, I told her that the paramedics were on their way. She mumbled something incoherent. I could already feel her drifting away.

“Can you hear me?”

Numbing silence filled the line. Desperate to keep her awake, I continued talking, my voice growing louder each time I spoke.

“Are you still with me? Mom? Mom!”

Sensing the intensity to my tone, my 8-year-old son asked what was wrong. I wanted to comfort him, but I had to keep focused on Mom. Meanwhile, my toddler, who had only just realized his grandmother was on the phone, threw his goldfish crackers to the floor and pleaded to speak with her. He reached for the receiver with his tiny, cheddar-stained hands and shrieked, “I talk to Ga-ma!”

“Not now,” I said gently.

Both my boys burst into tears as my mind raced with worry. I paced the floor and repeatedly asked, “Are you still there, Mom? Keep talking to me.”

But I only heard a hint of monosyllabic mumbles, then a thud.

I stopped for a moment and stood beside the sliding glass door, shifting my weight from my right leg to my left as I stared out at the falling snow. I kept my eyes fixed on a specific tree branch in an effort to still my mind even as my restless stomach churned.

The wind whipped wildly, which made the snowflakes look as if they were engaged in a vicious game of tug-of-war. Blowing in umpteen different directions, the blustery scene depicted my current state of mind: frenzied, scattered, unsettled. My anxious eyes darted back and forth between the ticking clock, my wailing kids, and the straining pine trees in the backyard.

Finally, I heard the paramedics in the background and for the first time in forever, I took a breath.

I shot off a text message to my brother.

“Call me,” I wrote. “Mom just tried to kill herself.”

Even as I hit “send” with my quivering thumb, the moment seemed surreal. Did this really just happen? How? Why?

As I drove to Missouri, I tried to imagine what was running through my mom’s desperate mind as she ingested an entire bottle of sleeping pills. I envisioned her in her soft flannel pajamas, sitting on the cold tile bathroom floor, swallowing one handful of pills after another. My eyes squeezed shut and a lump formed in the back of my throat. I knew clinical depression was scary, but I’d never seen it up-close-and-personal.

When I stepped inside the hospital room, Mom’s eyes revealed a mixture of sorrow, regret, guilt, and fear. I sat next to her on her bed. She clasped my hand in hers, gripping it tightly.

“I’m sorry,” Mom said softly, staring at the floor.

It’s okay,” I replied.

The truth was that it wasn’t okay. Not even a little bit. But what else could I say?

I stayed with her for several days, trying to soothe her by offering hugs and encouraging her by offering advice.

“Go to group therapy. Go to individual therapy. Do anything and everything to help you feel better,” I suggested. “Snarf up every resource possible.”

But instead of concentrating on getting better, she seemed more concerned with how her behavior would be perceived.

“What will people say if they find out what I did?” Mom asked, her eyes brimming with tears.

After she was released from the hospital, I went back home to Indiana. The following month, I was cautiously optimistic when Mom invited me, my husband, and our sons to visit her for her birthday and stay through Easter weekend. I took it as a good sign that she wanted to reconnect with her grandsons, so we packed our bags and drove west.

Though it was great to spend time with Mom, she was anxious and unsettled, worried that the kids might make a mess in her house. This was a far cry from the woman who in the past would often jump into the lake to entertain her grandsons. She spoke slowly and methodically yet still stumbled on her words. She seemed uncomfortable in her own skin. She wouldn’t even sit down to eat meals. Instead she stood by the sink, nervously nibbling at her food like a rodent.

One morning when the house was quiet, Mom approached me and said meekly, “Christy. I have to tell you something.”

“What is it?”

I didn’t want to rush her or force her, but I was desperate to hear what she had to say.

“I haven’t been completely honest with you,” she said, squeezing my hands as if to relay some sort of message to me through code.

“Honest about what?”

She opened her mouth, but no words came out. I pressed her a bit more.

“You can tell me, Mom. Whatever it is, I’ll help you. What are you not being honest about?”

“We’d better get ready,” she said tersely, releasing my hands. “The boys want to go to the zoo today.”

Just like that, the moment was gone.

At the zoo, the kids had fun seeing the animals and riding the train, but I couldn’t get past the vacant stare in Mom’s eyes. It was like she was looking past everybody—like she wasn’t all there. Anytime I tried to engage with her, I’d get the same response: “I’m tired.”

That evening after tucking the boys into bed, I asked Mom if she wanted to talk. She looked at me with a pained expression, like she was gripping a hot plate without a pot holder.

“Well, I…um, I,” she muttered.

I don’t know if she couldn’t speak or wouldn’t speak or what was going on. But her mind definitely seemed muddled. I knew something was gnawing at Mom, but I didn’t know how to pull it out of her.

When I laid down to bed that night, tears welled up in my eyes as I confided to my husband, “I think Mom may still be suicidal.”

I hated to admit it out loud, and yet, I could sense a definite heaviness to her spirit.

“Why do you say that?” Eric asked.

“I can’t put my finger on it, but she’s definitely not herself. She’s apologized profusely for trying to kill herself, but earlier today she told me that she’s not been completely honest with me, and when I asked her what about, she clammed up. Have you noticed how empty her eyes look?”

“What do we do? Your dad won’t listen. He’s adamant that she’s getting better.”

“But clearly she’s not. I wish I could get her to confide in me, but I feel like us being here is stressing her out more,” I said. “If the boys’ energy is causing her anxiety to spike, maybe we should take off and let her and Dad have a quiet holiday weekend.”

“Okay,” Eric agreed.

The next morning, I found Mom in the kitchen. She wasn’t eating, cooking, or doing dishes. She was simply standing in her housecoat staring into space. Until she caught a glimpse of my oldest son. Then her eyes moved to him and she watched him intently, like she was memorizing his every move. She did the same when my younger son entered the room. When I sat down, she acknowledged me with a weak, forced smile like she was using every last bit of energy to keep from crying.

I approached her and said softly, “Mom, we’ve decided to leave early.”

“When?”

“Here in a few minutes,” I said. “Eric’s packing the car.”

Confusion, sadness, and relief simultaneously spread across her face.

“Why today?” she asked.

“I can tell you’re struggling, Mom, and I know the boys have a lot of energy. I want you to be able to rest so I think it’s best if we get out of your hair.”

Her lips began to quiver, her brows furrowed, and she said with palpable remorse, “I’m sorry, Christy. I’m so sorry.”

It was a phrase she had repeated numerous times over the past three days so I didn’t think much of it. I replied in the same way I had all weekend—by telling her, “It’s okay.”

We hugged and I told her I loved her.

“Things will get better,” I whispered into her ear. “I promise.”

Those were the last words I ever spoke to my mother.

Six weeks later, my phone rang again. When I answered, I heard my dad’s voice, low and scratchy, say my name, followed by a long pause.

“She did it again,” he said quietly.

My gut clenched as all the color drained from my face.

“What?” I asked.

“She was doing better. She seemed stronger….” he said, his voice cracking.

My entire body began to tremble.

“It’s far worse this time,” he continued. “She swallowed hundreds of pills of all different kinds.”
My knees buckled.

“No-no-no-no,” I repeated.

How could this be happening again?

“I’ll jump in the car,” I told my dad as tears sprang to my burning eyes. “I can leave right now and be there by midnight.”

“Even if you left now, I don’t think you’d make it in time to say goodbye.”

Wait. What? Goodbye? Oh, Jesus!

My breath caught in my throat as my heart splintered.

When I got news in the middle of the night that Mom had died from the overdose, my world faded to grey.

Why? Why? Why? Why?

A thousand other questions bombarded my brain, but this was the predominant one. I could not, for the life of me, make sense of the fact that my sweet, loving, kind, compassionate mom would choose to take her own life. It defied logic and left me feeling helpless, hopeless, and hollow. How was I supposed to go on? How was I to let go of the guilt that gnawed at me round the clock? How was I to ever smile again? None of it seemed possible.

“Everything’s possible with God,” well-meaning people told me. But their platitudes and looks of pity only pissed me off. They didn’t know what it felt like to be leveled by grief. Though friends encouraged me to find peace through prayer, I did the opposite and gave God the silent treatment. What did I have to say to Him, anyway? I was angry that He had not only taken away my mom but that He had allowed her to exit the earth in such a terrible, tragic way. Having been a Christian all my life, I’ll admit it felt strange to cut Christ from my life, but I didn’t know what else to do. Many days, I found myself curled in the fetal position, sobbing and gasping for air.

Over the next six months, everything was a chore—driving, cooking, reading, even sleeping. Then one night I fell into a deep slumber and was met by a vivid dream that seemed to carry with it a distinct message.
I was at home when suddenly bright blue skies began to darken as a slight breeze tickled the shutters. Instantaneously, the sky transformed into a greenish-black hue. A small hiss followed a rumble, then a booming crash. The ground shook with a sinister force. Giant tree limbs snapped. Heavy shutters broke. Tin mailboxes crumpled. Wooden dog houses cracked. As the wind continued to howl, dirt, debris, and trash swirled through the air like frenzied snowflakes. Fence sections and lawn ornaments crashed through windows and dented car doors.

The scene was chaotic and scary. I glanced out the window, helpless and weak. Then, just as quickly as it built, the storm died out, and the world grew eerily still. I stepped outside to assess the damage and my jaw dropped at the sight of the devastation. Our beautiful house—a house I had always perceived to be strong and indestructible—was now a shell of its former self.

As I walked the perimeter of the house, I saw that it was uprooted from its foundation. It became evident that we wouldn’t have access to power or water anytime soon. It was going to take a lot of time and effort to rebuild this foundation—to start fresh. As a result, we would not be living comfortably for quite some time.

There was a silver lining, however. Despite such extensive damage, we determined that we could stay in the house, which provided a degree of comfort.

I stood in stunned silence, beholding the wreckage that surrounded me. I couldn’t believe the massive devastation that had leveled my life in the blink of an eye. But…I had survived.

For the first time since Mom’s suicide, I woke up with a sense of peace. I knew I would still face challenges and cry countless tears. But I had survived the worst, and though my foundation was shaky, I was still standing. And I could feel God standing beside me.

In the weeks and months ahead, I began surrounding myself with others who needed love and support, and, together, we journeyed through our pain: we shared tears, smiles, and embraces, and we held one another up, day in and day out. I learned that being in a community is perhaps the most important piece of life’s puzzle when it comes to maintaining a healthy existence. I also found that even in the deepest, darkest pit of despair, one can find a sliver of light, a glimmer of hope, a hint of peace. And that is what propels us forward, enabling us to breathe in, breathe out, and carry on.

She might as well save her breath. After carrying water in pails and plastic bins from the first to the fourth floor of the building where we live, I know better than to waste a drop of it.

Moms love to warn though, so there she goes again: “We have so little left. Use it sparingly. Make it last until evening.”

In the evening my sister and I will start our summer ritual-water carrying-like the rest of our neighbors who don’t live on the first floor. The town’s water reserve level drops so low in the summer that the water pushes itself up the pipes to the first floor, but no further. On the first floor the water flows from the taps while in the higher floors it carries only growling sounds, like a monster in a bad mood.

So we use it sparingly, only when strictly necessary.

In winter the water runs through the taps of the whole building, not discriminating on the terms of the floors, three times a day for an hour and a half. Every household is busy filling every useable container in their possession during that time.

In the summer our survival grimly depends on the mercy of our first floor neighbors. Twelve families, three for each floor, carry their water up four flights of stairs, utilizing pails, bins, bottles, even cauldrons for this vital cause. Children are the most diligent carriers.

The clock on the wall reminds me that I need to get ready for the water’s evening course. The water won’t come for fifteen more minutes, but I must get in line at my first floor neighbor’s door to be ready.

I grab a pail and two bottles in a plastic bag. I run down the worn smooth stairs.

Soon, other neighbors join the march.

I am third in line.

The first is our next door neighbor, Auntie Jazja. She handles the ordeal quite normally. “I have seen worse,” tell her eyes.

Lina comes second. She lives in the fifth floor, above us. Three years older than me, but not much stronger, she holds an aluminum pail with a blackened bottom. Who knows how many times it has been used to heat water on the stove?

Behind me, fourth in line, is my best friend, Dita. She is restlessly switching hands with her glass bottles clinking noisily. She will break them sooner than she fills them with water. The line grows longer each minute.

Everybody talks with those nearby. Lina and Dita are chatterboxes. I am caught in the crossfire of their words.

I worry that our buzz will annoy our gracious first floor neighbor and she will shoo us away.

When the water starts gushing in we fall silent, listening in reverie. It is proper to wait ten to fifteen minutes for the household to fill their share of water, before the first in line is urged to knock.

I am glad Auntie Jazja is to do that today. A senior lady is always hard to turn down.

Soon enough she goes inside, greeting and blessing the benevolence of the neighbor who seems unpleased opening the door to a bunch of thirsty people. As we hear the water fill Aunties Jazja’s glass bottle, we let out a breath of relief.

Meanwhile the chatting resumes. We talk of anything but water.

Lina runs inside with her pail when Auntie Jazja calls her name, letting her know that she is almost done.

Auntie Jazja comes out carrying four one-liter glass bottles, two in each hand. A thin layer of condensation has formed on them. I think that is the picture of perfection. Those drops forming and dripping on the transparent glass refresh my soul.

Lina, shouts my name. It’s my turn. My heart beats in panic for fear that the moment I place my bottle under the tap, the water will stop flowing. Instead, I will hear that horrible whistle which I dread so much.

I enter, greet the lady of the house and head toward the bathroom. Lina is filling her pail, keeping a short hose in it. The water is forming turbulence, increasing in level, making me feel dizzy a bit with impatience.

When she withdraws her pail, I very quickly put my own under the hose, not wasting a drop of water or a second of time. We have to race with time as well, you see. There are people in line waiting.

I fill my container and call my best friend who appears in a second by my side.

I thank my neighbor, although I will return for more water in a few minutes. She knows that a pail and a few bottles of water are not enough for a family of six. I will make two more rounds if the time permits.

As I go up the stairs, I see a trail of water drops. Lina’s pail must be leaking. How silly! By the time she reaches home, half of the water will be gone. I look behind me to see if my pail is leaking, too. I am glad it is not.

At the second floor I feel my arm tighten. Warm numbness creeps up to my shoulders. The pail is heavy; my limbs stretch while my back complains. I put down my burden and I notice a fine red line forming in my palm by the handle of the pail.

I feel hot, and sweat is roller coasting down the bones of my spine. I will drink half a bottle of water to quench my thirst.

I take a deep breath, grab the pail and the bottle and step up the stairs. A frightful thought invades my mind. I had heard from Lina that carrying heavy weight was extremely harmful to young girls. It could badly damage the back, and also be disabling in childbearing. Although nine times out of ten I don’t believe what Lina tells me, this time I worry. Could it be true? My breathing becomes heavier and my muscles tenser. Tears swell around my eyes. I decide not to worry. Why have children anyway? To send them downstairs to carry water until they break their backs?

As I approach the third floor, I come across my little sister hurrying down the steps with one-liter plastic bottles under each arm. She smiles. I remember once when I was her age, I fell on the last steps of the fourth floor. I hurt my knee and my bottles rolled down, mercilessly spilling the water. I couldn’t stop crying, pretending that it was my knee that made me cry so much when it was the waste of water that broke my heart.

I leave the pail and the bottles in front of my door and as I catch my breath, I listen to Lina’s mother scold her daughter for carelessly spilling half of the pail on the stairs. It’s not her fault. The pail is leaking. But I would rather not interfere.

I ring the bell. Mom appears with a worried look. A shade of pity lingers on her face as she takes the full containers inside, and with an air of apology hands me the empty ones. “My poor girl” her eyes lament. I have noticed that the more I go up and down to make Mom happier with the abundance of water she could use, the sadder she gets. That’s when I feel most miserable.

As she closes the door, I overhear her curse the incompetent government, blaming the infrastructure for our misery. I know the government blames the lack of rain. When the rain vindicates itself in fall showers the government will blame it again, this time for the flood. You see how hopeless it is?

I go down the stairs, this time with two plastic pails. I feel so light that I wish I would never reach the first floor, but I do. Lina is again in front of me. The chatting continues as intensely as the flow of water.

Lina produces a photo from her dress pocket. A young man poses in front of greenest garden I have ever seen. The blue of the sky and the whiteness of his teeth contrast attractively, but I can’t take my eyes off the vast lawn behind him.

“This is my cousin, Alban,” Lina says. “You remember? He immigrated to France four years ago. He is doing quite well. He works in the Luxembourg Gardens in Paris,” she says proudly, as if her cousin had become the mayor of the city.

I am busy sorting out something confusing though. Isn’t Luxembourg a country in Europe? Then what business do Luxembourg Gardens have in Paris, the capital of France? I doubt Lina has any idea where France or Luxembourg is, so I keep my peace.

“Do you know they water the grass in this humongous garden with sprinklers that turn on automatically?” she asks.

And before I express my admiration, she goes on about her cousin’s high salary, the car he drives, his clothes and the gifts he sent to them last year.

“I envy him, you know,” she concludes. Her eyes are daydreaming.

“I envy the grass,” I think to myself, but I don’t say it aloud. I would break into tears if I pronounced how worthless I felt, and then I would have the whole line asking what was wrong. What is it like to lie under the sun and be sprinkled with thousands of silvery droplets that replenish every cell of your being? What makes the grass of Luxembourg luckier than me? A surge of envy fills my heart.

Lina counts with delight all the things her cousin has, unaware that she is counting all the things we lack as well. She gets on my nerves. I am saved only when her name is called. She goes in, leaving me with pails full of despair.

I did five rounds of water carrying today. Some neighbors had gone out of town leaving the line, ever so graciously, to us. After dinner I fell asleep listening to the news anchor woman explaining that this year’s drought was the worst ever.

With her drought-warning words echoing in my head, I dived into the world of sleep, and I dreamed. I saw my town was flooded. Angry rivers of water carried furniture, cars, and trees floating in the streets. Among them I saw a body floating, undisturbed. Then I recognized that it was my body. My eyes were closed peacefully. I looked like I was sleeping. In dreams you can do anything, even sleep on a flood’s current. A radiant smile of intact elation lingered on my face. I remember thinking out loud, “I don’t know whether I am dead or not. Yet, no doubt I am happy. So happy that I don’t envy the grass of Luxembourg anymore.”

Mirkena Ozer is pursuing MA in women studies at the University of Georgia, Atlanta. 

First comment

Man has some relationship with, and stands in some need of, most of the species of creation. His needs spread throughout all parts of the cosmos, and his desires extend to eternity. As he desires a flower, so he desires a whole spring. As he wishes for a garden, so he wishes for eternal Paradise. As he longs to see a friend of his, so he longs to see the Graceful One of Glory. As he needs to knock at the door of his beloved friend in order to visit him, so he needs to take refuge in the court of an Omnipotent One Who will close the door of his world and will open that of the hereafter, Who will remove the world and establish in its place the world – to – come, in order that he should be delivered from unending separation from the ninety-nine per cent of his friends who have departed for the intermediate world.

The true object of worship of a being in this position can only be an Omnipotent One of Glory, a Compassionate One of Perfection, in Whose Hand are the reins of all things, in Whose possession is the provision for all things, in Whose sight everything, and in Whose presence everywhere, is, unbounded by space or time, free of all weakness or deficiency. For the one to meet the limitless needs of man can only be One with infinite power and all-embracing knowledge. Thus, He is the sole One worthy of worship.

Now, o man, if you see yourself as a servant of His, and of none else, you will acquire a rank above all creation. If you refuse to be such, you will become a mean slave to powerless creation. Or, if you rely on your selfhood and strength abandon prayer and trust in God, and arrogantly claim to have power, then you will fall lower than a bee or an ant, and become weaker than a spider or a fly, with respect to positive acts and constructiveness. In negative acts and destructiveness, however, you will weigh heavier than a mountain and be more harmful than an epidemic disease. This is your being; it has two aspects: one of them is positive and active and has to do with constructiveness, invention, existence and goodness; the other is negative and passive and has to do with destructiveness, non-existence and evil.

Regarding the first aspect of your being, you cannot in yourself match a bee or a sparrow, nor have the strength of a fly or a spider. Regarding the second aspect, you surpass mountains, even earth and the heavens, for you bear a burden from which they hold back because of lack of strength; and your acts therefore show their effect in a wider realm than theirs.1 When you do an act of goodness, or construct something, this does not go beyond the reach of your hand and your strength. Your evil and destructive acts, by contrast, are aggressive and expandable. For example, unbelief is an evil, a nonexistence of affirmation, and is destructive. Though it seems a simple, single sin, it implies an insult to all creation, an aggression against all the Divine Names and an affront to all mankind. For all beings in creation have lofty ranks and important tasks in virtue of their nature as letters of the Lord, mirrors of His orders. Unbelief denies them the rank bestowed by these functions, reduces them to the state of instruments of coincidence, to the degree of insignificance, valuelessness and nothingness, and makes them perishable objects doomed to decay and separation. An unbeliever denies and thus offends the Divine Names, Whose beauties, impressions and manifestations are observed on the mirrors of beings throughout the cosmos.

Man is a work of poetry, praising God’s wisdom and beautifully displaying the manifestations of all the Divine Names, a manifest miracle of Power like a seed that contains the members of an eternal tree, holding the rank of the Divine vicegerent on earth, superior to angels and in ascendancy over mountains, over the earth and the heavens by virtue of the trust he holds. Unbelief throws him into a degree that is lower than that of the lowest animal, more helpless, and impotent, and more wretched, and degrades him to the state of a speedily perishable tablet on which are scribbled meaningless, confused things.

To conclude: the concupiscent soul can commit numerous crimes in wrongdoing and destructiveness; but it has little power in goodness and constructiveness. It can destroy a city in a single day, but cannot build one in a hundred. However, if it abandons selfhood and requests from God goodness and fertility, if it turns from arrogance, wrongdoing and destructiveness, and accepts the form of a perfect slave of God, it then becomes the referent of the Qur’anic verse: ‘God will change their evil into good’ (25.70).

The infinite capability for wrongdoing inherent in man then changes into an infinite disposition to goodness, and he thus ascends to the highest of the high, and gains the value of the best pattern of creation.

Now, o heedless man! Behold the grace and munificence of God Almighty: while it would be perfect justice on His part to do the reverse, He records a single sin only once, and records a single act of goodness as ten, or seventy, or seven hundred, or seven thousand. Also draw from this comment, some understanding that to enter Hell is the punishment of crime and mere justice, but to enter Paradise is the result of His perfect grace.

Second comment

Again, man has two faces: one is related to his selfhood and turned to the worldly life; the other concerns his nature as a slave of God and gazes upon the eternal life. With respect to the former, he is so wretched a creature that he has nothing of free will beyond a brief and fast-ending period, and nothing of existence beyond a small, decaying body. In this state, he appears as no more than one of many feeble members of just one of the innumerable species that are spread over all levels of the whole of creation. With respect to his other, better nature, however, and by virtue of the impotence and poverty that lead him to worship, man has a comprehensiveness and a great importance. Indeed, the Wise Creator has purposefully included in him infinite impotence and poverty so that he should be a large and comprehensive mirror for the endless manifestations of the infinite power of the Compassionate One and the infinite richness of the Munificent One. In other words, man resembles a seed that is given ideal and important faculties by Power, and a delicate, precious programme by Destiny, in order that it will work under the ground to leave that narrow world of soil and enter the wide world of the air, request from its Creator through the tongue of its disposition to become a tree and to reach the perfect state that will befit it. If that seed, because of its bad temperament, employs the faculties that are given to it in attracting some harmful substance contained in soil, it will soon decay in that narrow place and become nothing. If, in compliance with the cosmic decree expounded in the verse- “It is God Who causes the seed-grain and the date-stone to split and sprout” (6.95), it uses its ideal faculties in their proper places, it will then emerge from that narrow world, become a big, fertile tree, and thus its small, particular nature will take the form of a great, comprehensive truth. The nature of man is likewise equipped with important faculties by Power and with precious programmes by Destiny.

If he wastes his spiritual means on this narrow world, under the ground of the worldly life and for the sake of his desires, he will leave from this world with a burden on his unfortunate soul that will be his responsibility before God. If, on the other hand, man waters the seed of his disposition with Islam, feeds it in the soil of worship, exposes it to the Qur’anic decrees, directs his spiritual means to their true purposes, he will of a certainty become a seed containing the essentials of a permanent truth and of an everlasting tree that extends its branches in the physical and intermediate worlds and yields endless blessings in the hereafter and in Paradise. He will, in fact, become a blessed, luminous fruit of the tree of creation. The actual progress of man is possible only by turning his heart, spirit, intelligence, imagination and other inner faculties to the eternal life, so that each of them will be occupied by its own kind of worship. For what the misguided imagine to be progress, which is to put one”s faculties at the disposal of the concupiscent soul in order to penetrate into all the details of the worldly life and to taste all its lowly pleasures, is not progress, but decline. I once observed this truth in a vision that was as follows: I was in a large city full of big palaces. Outside some of the palaces were spectacles to attract and entertain everyone.

As I came close to one of them, I saw that the master of the palace was at the door, playing with the dog. Women were absorbed in sweet conversation with young strangers, and grown-up girls were supervising children”s play. It was when I was the doorkeeper acting as the head of all the other people that I realized the inside of the palace was empty, and the important posts in the palace, obviously, had become so corrupted that their officials had left their duties and appeared in such a state outside the palace. I then came across another large palace. This time, a faithful dog was lying at the door, and beside it was standing a doorkeeper with a serious, stern and calm appearance. The palace seemed so quiet that I wondered why it was so, while the other palace was not. I entered the palace, and saw that the inside was, contrary to the outside, a scene of activity: one floor on another, different people with different, intricate tasks on each floor. Those on the first floor were conducting the management of the palace. On the second floor, girls and small children were studying; on the third were ladies occupied with fine arts and beautiful embroidery. On the top floor, the master of the palace was corresponding with the king in order to maintain the well-being of his people, and was also performing his own noble duties for his advancement and progress. As they did not see me, no one stopped me, so I was able to walk about. After I had left the palace, I realized that everywhere in the city there were palaces of these two kinds. I asked about this, and I was told that those palaces with empty insides and crowded outsides belonged to the notorious ones among the unbelievers and the people of misguidance, and the others to upright, eminent Muslims. Afterwards, I encountered another palace that attracted my attention, as my name Said was written on it. When I looked at it closely, I felt as if I were seeing my own shape on it. I was so bewildered that I began to cry, and at this point I woke up. I will now interpret this vision, may God make its outcome fortunate! That city is the social life of humanity and the terrain of human civilization. Each palace is the faculties and organs, such as eyes, ears, heart, spirit and intelligence, the self, desires, the sense of anger and carnal appetites. Each faculty of man has a different task in worship; it has also different pleasures and different sorrows. From among them, the soul and desires, the sense of anger and carnal appetites are like doorkeepers and dogs in the palace of the being of man. Thus, to put the other lofty senses at the disposal of the self and desires, and to cause them to forget their innate duties, is by all means a decline, not progress. You may now interpret for yourself the other details of the vision. R. Nur Collection (23rd Word)

References

1) The burden is described as the trust in the following verse: —Verily We offered the trust to the heavens and the earth and the mountains; but they refused to undertake it, being afraid thereof. But man undertook it; he was indeed unjust and foolish— (Qur’an, 33:72), and one of its aspects concerns self as explained in detail in the Thirtieth Word. [Tr.]