Living The Quran
From Issue: 1023 [Read full issue]
Terrestrial Body
Taha (Taha) - Chapter 20: Verse 55 (partial)
"From it We created you and to it We shall return you."
Know that the Adamite is two things: spirit and body. The spirit is from light, and light is celestial. The body is from dust, and dust is terrestrial. The spirit wants to go up because it is celestial. The body wants to go down because it is terrestrial. In the perfection of His power, the King bound the two together. The spirit was bound to the body, and the body was bound to the spirit, so both are in bonds. The spirit and the body settled down together.
On the day of death, when the life of the servant comes to an end and the moment of death arrives, the bonds are loosened, as when a bird comes out of its cage. The spirit rises up from the body and goes skyward to its nest. The body takes the road of the earth to its centre. The spirit is put into a lantern of light, which is hung from the tree of blessedness. The body is wrapped in a shroud and entrusted to the earth. This is why the Lord of the worlds says, "From it We created you and to it We shall return you."
It is as if the King is saying, "Once I make dust the cause of being, and then again I make it the cause of nonbeing. Thus the world's folk will know that I am perfectly powerful, and I give being to all that is."
O Chevalier! If you ever pass through a graveyard, be careful to look at that encampment with an eye to taking heed.
It is not dust that you see, it is the bodies of the dear ones, the flesh and skin of the young, the elegant stature of those nurtured in joy, the hair and beards of the old folk.
We have decayed, but the rising stars have not.
The mountains remain after us, and the artifacts.
Compiled From:
"Kashf al-Asrar wa Uddat al-Abrar" - Rashid al-Din Maybudi. pp. 314, 315