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Thought for the Day:

Through you
the world learns
to recognize itself
-- as heaven.

Mansur al-Hallaj is one of the more controversial figures of Sufism. Considered by many to be a great poet-saint, he was executed for blasphemy and sorcery.

The name al-Hallaj means "wool carder," probably a reference to his family's traditional occupation. Al-Hallaj was born in the province of Fars, Persia (Iran). He later moved to what is now Iraq, where he took up religious studies, particularly the Sufi way.

Orthodox religious authorities took offense at his poetry and teachings, particularly the line in one of his great poems "Ana 'l-Haqq," which translates as "I am the Real," but can also be translated as "I am the Truth" or "I am God" -- acknowledging the mystical realization of unity with the Eternal. He was condemned by a council of theologians, imprisoned for nine years, and eventually put to death. He is revered today as a martyr for truth by many Sufis and mystics.

--

In this poem al-Hallaj reminds us that, wherever we look, we are always staring at the face of God, "right before [our] eyes." Everyone, knowingly or unknowingly, is always searching for the Eternal, but too easily we become lost in our search. The idea of a search is already to be lost -- "a blind quest." We imagine that the Goal will be found elsewhere, somewhere that we are not, and so we rush about looking, looking. "Guessing and dreaming," looking for God in some distant heaven instead of beneath our feet and between the span of our arms, we blindly have our "faces turned toward the sky." But doing that, we never recognize that "the lord remains among [us]" in our "every condition / every instant." We are never without the Divine Presence, "not for the blink of an eye!"

Hallaj says it very simply, speaking to God as the Beloved who is everywhere and, at the same time, the heart of the heart:

My spirit and yours
blend together
whether we are near one another
or far away.

I am you,
you,
my being,
end of my desire.

Thanks to Ivan of Poetry Chaikhana

So, I found the book in a bookstore and read the essay there. I found it interesting and a little bit off from my POV. Remember I work in addictions so knowing he died of psirosis of the liver I'm reading it from that pov. I'll probably go back and read it again sometime. He's always been a paradox for me Trungpa has. Why would a supposedly enlightened person drink that excessively?