66
Bismi'llah ar-Rahman ar-Rahim...for the sake of Prophet Muhammad saws and Sheikh Nazim may Allah protect his secret.
Some of you may have noticed that I have put a counter on the site..I just wanted to see if anyone ever visits (apparently they do)..It does make a difference wether one is being read or not.I know that sounds obvious to the point of silliness to some of you but,I have been one of those people who hesitate to state a point of view too dogmatically because I am so aware that all points of view have their validity.
Really that is what brought me to sufism..and from sufism to Islam.
Of course I now find myself in the position have being obliged to take a point of view and even defend it .. which I am not too fond of..
Below is the text of,first,a comment in reply to another comment on my ONENESS blog,and then,that included in an e.mail to Mike ..who made this comment ....
Mike said...
True oneness only comes from knowing the One True God. He is not Allah, but exists as a Triune God who sent His Only Begotten Son, Jesus Christ. It is only through Jesus Christ, the "God Man" that we recognize who God is and "find" our Path to God. Repent and believe in Jesus Christ! For it is He who said, "No man comes to the Father but by me!" This is Truth....
I then replied,
Uthman said...
Mike,I hadn't noticed your comment there until now.I don't know how much point there is in discussing this .. we both agree that,as you say "oneness comes from knowing the One True God.." perhaps you can(or can't) accept that Christians, Jews and Muslims all worship The One True God as taught by their respective prophets.Muslims love and respect Jesus Christ as one of Allah's prophets(the penultimate) we know him as "Ruh Allah" or Spirit of Allah.We believe in the virgin birth, we believe in and respect the Virgin Mary as the best woman ever created (as taught by the Koran)..We are eagerly awaiting the return of Jesus Christ who will join with Al Mahdi at the end of time to fight the Dajaal or anti-Christ and beat him and usher in the new spiritual age we are all so looking forward to.However we do not believe in the crucifixion as we can never accept that Allah would allow such a thing to happen to one of his beloved prophets.We believe that he was "Taken up" to heaven and has never died..and for this reason he is returning to finish his work here on earth.Many Muslims also believe that St Paul (who you will remember never even met Jesus) was largely responsible for the introduction of the Trinity .. a huge blasphemy which Jesus certainly never taught.The only gospel actually written while Jesus was alive,and therefore much closer to his actual message, is that of Barnabas, a sincere disciple and friend of Pauls who pleaded with the other disciples to allow Paul to be accepted among them and afterwards was pushed out by Paul back to Cyprus where he was stoned to death while Paul foisted his Triune theory on some Greeks he wanted to convert...!Enough?You can read Barnabas's gospel if you like..it has been rescued from where it was hidden in the bosom of the Catholic Church and now published .. It is available on Amazon.Sorry if I'm a little blunt ..space and time impose themselves.
That's what I wrote back in the heat of the moment.I can only say I stick by it but,(now that I've calmed down a bit) I just want to add that I'm open to discussion ..in fact I think that that is what blogs and the internet should be about.Also I am very interested in communication between Muslims and Christians as I come from a family where five generations of my father's side were Anglican priests and my father left the church and I found Islam through the sufi way.
The sufi way is the mystic way within Islam and I have always thought that mysticism is the place where all spiritual people and believers must meet because the true experience of God..or unity with Him..(the soul re-uniting with its source while still in this life we might say) .. is common to all religions and paths and can (or should) transcend differences of dogmatic beliefs.
How often has it been seen that men will kill each other in the name of God and (ridiculously enough) the same God with a different name.Submission to the One God is the message of all the prophets from Adam to Muhammad and it is crazy that Muslims Christians and Jews should fight when they have a common grandfather in Abraham (Khalil Ibrahim as he is known to the Muslims,or The Friend of God.)
So lets not get hooked up on nomenclature and see if at least one Muslim and one Christian can discuss reasonably without fighting ..and perhaps make Abraham and the other prophets happy with us!
Yours sincerely, Uthman/Gregory Collins.
Anyway,I've realised two things..one..my personal conflict over the dogma/unity thing and .. two..my desire to get a discussion and understanding going between groups from different faiths.
Either this will start to occur here through blogging..or..I may have to start a group or forum..
We'll see, ..Meanwhile ..I .. noticed that the counter said 66,which,some of you will know,is the number of Allah through the adjdab numerological system applied to the arabic letters of His name.
It made me aware that He is aware,even of this blog! (no matter how many people visit it,it is awareness of Him that matters most..and sincerity with Him ..)
Some of you may have noticed that I have put a counter on the site..I just wanted to see if anyone ever visits (apparently they do)..It does make a difference wether one is being read or not.I know that sounds obvious to the point of silliness to some of you but,I have been one of those people who hesitate to state a point of view too dogmatically because I am so aware that all points of view have their validity.
Really that is what brought me to sufism..and from sufism to Islam.
Of course I now find myself in the position have being obliged to take a point of view and even defend it .. which I am not too fond of..
Below is the text of,first,a comment in reply to another comment on my ONENESS blog,and then,that included in an e.mail to Mike ..who made this comment ....
Mike said...
True oneness only comes from knowing the One True God. He is not Allah, but exists as a Triune God who sent His Only Begotten Son, Jesus Christ. It is only through Jesus Christ, the "God Man" that we recognize who God is and "find" our Path to God. Repent and believe in Jesus Christ! For it is He who said, "No man comes to the Father but by me!" This is Truth....
I then replied,
Uthman said...
Mike,I hadn't noticed your comment there until now.I don't know how much point there is in discussing this .. we both agree that,as you say "oneness comes from knowing the One True God.." perhaps you can(or can't) accept that Christians, Jews and Muslims all worship The One True God as taught by their respective prophets.Muslims love and respect Jesus Christ as one of Allah's prophets(the penultimate) we know him as "Ruh Allah" or Spirit of Allah.We believe in the virgin birth, we believe in and respect the Virgin Mary as the best woman ever created (as taught by the Koran)..We are eagerly awaiting the return of Jesus Christ who will join with Al Mahdi at the end of time to fight the Dajaal or anti-Christ and beat him and usher in the new spiritual age we are all so looking forward to.However we do not believe in the crucifixion as we can never accept that Allah would allow such a thing to happen to one of his beloved prophets.We believe that he was "Taken up" to heaven and has never died..and for this reason he is returning to finish his work here on earth.Many Muslims also believe that St Paul (who you will remember never even met Jesus) was largely responsible for the introduction of the Trinity .. a huge blasphemy which Jesus certainly never taught.The only gospel actually written while Jesus was alive,and therefore much closer to his actual message, is that of Barnabas, a sincere disciple and friend of Pauls who pleaded with the other disciples to allow Paul to be accepted among them and afterwards was pushed out by Paul back to Cyprus where he was stoned to death while Paul foisted his Triune theory on some Greeks he wanted to convert...!Enough?You can read Barnabas's gospel if you like..it has been rescued from where it was hidden in the bosom of the Catholic Church and now published .. It is available on Amazon.Sorry if I'm a little blunt ..space and time impose themselves.
That's what I wrote back in the heat of the moment.I can only say I stick by it but,(now that I've calmed down a bit) I just want to add that I'm open to discussion ..in fact I think that that is what blogs and the internet should be about.Also I am very interested in communication between Muslims and Christians as I come from a family where five generations of my father's side were Anglican priests and my father left the church and I found Islam through the sufi way.
The sufi way is the mystic way within Islam and I have always thought that mysticism is the place where all spiritual people and believers must meet because the true experience of God..or unity with Him..(the soul re-uniting with its source while still in this life we might say) .. is common to all religions and paths and can (or should) transcend differences of dogmatic beliefs.
How often has it been seen that men will kill each other in the name of God and (ridiculously enough) the same God with a different name.Submission to the One God is the message of all the prophets from Adam to Muhammad and it is crazy that Muslims Christians and Jews should fight when they have a common grandfather in Abraham (Khalil Ibrahim as he is known to the Muslims,or The Friend of God.)
So lets not get hooked up on nomenclature and see if at least one Muslim and one Christian can discuss reasonably without fighting ..and perhaps make Abraham and the other prophets happy with us!
Yours sincerely, Uthman/Gregory Collins.
Anyway,I've realised two things..one..my personal conflict over the dogma/unity thing and .. two..my desire to get a discussion and understanding going between groups from different faiths.
Either this will start to occur here through blogging..or..I may have to start a group or forum..
We'll see, ..Meanwhile ..I .. noticed that the counter said 66,which,some of you will know,is the number of Allah through the adjdab numerological system applied to the arabic letters of His name.
It made me aware that He is aware,even of this blog! (no matter how many people visit it,it is awareness of Him that matters most..and sincerity with Him ..)
posted by longgone1 at 4/29/2005 09:32:00 PM
3 Comments:
That was a VERY interesting one! Seriously interesting.
Thanks for sharing that. It was fun reading it. :-)
Thank you, that was just an awesome post!!!
Post a Comment
<< Home