Tuesday, October 12, 2010

Love and power

Another mental postcard from a strange land. This "came to me" as my teachers would say, while I was out walking some days ago.

Some people may desire to be like God out of envy, and some out of love. The first desire God's power, but not His nature. The others desire God's nature, but do not consider themselves worthy of His power. But in reality, the two are not separate, God's love and God's power.

We are obviously not talking about any random Iron Age deity here, but the Absolute and Infinite, the Prime Mover, the Tao if you want. Or the O of the Bionic Raccoons.

Because the Supreme God is self-sufficient and not in need of anyone or anything, the "overflowing of God" that creates the universe is pure selfless love. At the same time, this is the primary power from which all power is derived. It is one and the same thing. Thus, you cannot actually have one without the other.

This is certainly not to say that if you love selflessly, you will have magical superpowers to do miracles. (Although historically there certainly are treasure troves of such stories.) For one thing, even the great saint or bodhisattva has only a partial glimpse of the Original Love. But also because the creative power of the One is exceedingly subtle. Apart perhaps from the first Fiat Lux! (and I am not so sure about even that), it has all flowed so natural that it almost seemed logical, almost unavoidable, that it would have to run all the way to us.

This reminds me of what Lao-Tzu says: "When the sage has led a great work to completion, the people say: We did it ourselves!"

And with that we should certainly be satisfied, if even the Ultimate is.

Not that I know what I'm talking about or anything. I just heard it on the road, but it makes sense to me.

6 comments:

julie said...

Makes sense to me, too Magnus. Thanks.

Der Fledermaus said...

Your experience indicated God's power is derived from Love.

But not just any kind of love. It is the love that happens when nothing is needed.

Can this be used as a doorway for a human being? For instance, to say, "I am enough, I have enough," until this becomes your truth?

Then, the flow of primary love which you spake of could become unimpeded. This would theoretically greatly increase the love-power that one could wield.

And that would be an optimum condition, in my book.

Too bad as things stand now, I need people and things. Or at least I believe I do; perhaps I do not. We shall explore that vein.

Thank you for the post; I know I requested it as you were going to write it anyway. I would very much enjoy a weekly post from you though I don't actually need it.

Cordially, DFM

Magnus Itland said...

Dear Fledermaus,
you and I remain conditional beings, not just during our incarnation, but even afterwards. This lasts until the final merging with the Absolute One, personally or universally.

During our tenure in the flesh, we depend on other people even for our daily bread, and pretty much every other part of life. And even after leaving the body, chances are that we will be walking in the light refracted through greater created beings than ourselves, though I don't have much revelation about this.

So there is no point in waiting for an opportunity to give love without needing love. (And I mean love in a very wide sense, of course.)

Rather, what is feasible is to give more love than we receive (from created beings). Even that probably takes more than we believe. But when we feel that there is a dearth of love coming our way, that is the moment when we have the rare chance to shine. When the heat is on the steel, that's when the steel begins to glow. That is our (potential) moment of glory. But who is capable of even this?

Der Fledermaus said...

Magnus:

I see your point about people. We are going to need them, and there's no two ways about it. Even for food. Not directly of course.

Your metaphor regarding the steel glowing under the ordeal of tempering, and the giving of love when a dearth is returned, do strike chords within.

Such a thing is beyond my ability. Even the loss of ordinary affection from my mate for three days makes it difficult for me to be gracious.

Your comment on greater created beings is interesting. I would like to know any more you can gather on that topic.

Cordially, DFM

Anonymous said...

By contrast this essay on The secrets of the Kingdom of God makes a lot of sense.

www.beezone.com/up/secretsofkingdomofgod.html

Plus a related essay

www.beezone.com/up/criticismcuresheart.html

Magnus Itland said...

It amuses me that this "Adi Da" would like to be known as a god, yet has to use spambots to parasite on the spiritual talk of simple working folk. At least he gets his humiliation before Judgment Day, may it serve him well.

"If you cannot explain the teachings in your own words, using simple words that a child knows, then you have not understood them yourself."

(That's a quote from the tax-cutting would-be savior from Venus, but I just wrote it in my own words. ^_^)