God and His Attributes [Electronic resources] نسخه متنی

The Lord of the World, as presented in the Quran, possesses all the
necessary conditions of an ideal object of worship. He is the creator of love and all
forms of beauty, the originator of all forms of power and energy. He is a vast ocean on
the slightest ripple of whose surface the swimmer of the intellect is tossed around like a
plaything. It is He Who preserves the heavens from falling and the earth from collapsing.
If, for an instant, He closes His eye of mercy or avert, it from this world, the whole of
the universe wilT perish and hurtle toward non being in the form of dust. The existence
and survival of every atom in the universe is, therefore, dependent on Him.

It is He Who bestows all bounties and all felicities, Who owns us
and may freely dispose of us. When He commands and an order goes forth, as soon as He
says, "Be!," a aeature comes into being.

Truth and reality derive their substance from His essence, and
freedom, justice, and other virtues and perfections derive from the rays of His
attributes. To take flight towards Him, seek to draw near to His glorious threshold, is to
attain all conceivable desire at the highest degree. Who ever gives his heart to God,
gains an affectionate companion and a loving friend; the one who relies upon Him has
placed his hope on a firm foundation, while the one who attaches his heart to other-than
God is a prey to illusion and builds a foundation on wind.

He Who is aware of the slightest motion that takes place any-where
in creation can also determine for us a path leading to happiness and lay down a way of
life and a system of human relations that conforms to the norms He has established in the
order of creation. He is, after all, aware of our true interests, and it is even His right
alone to lay down a path for us as the logical outcome and natural consequence of His
divinity. To act in accordance with the program He lays down is the only certain guarantee
for our ascent toward Him.

How is it possible that man should be so enamored of truth and
justice that he is ready to sacrifice his life for their sake, unless he is aware of their
source and origin?

If a being is worthy of worship, it cannot be anyone other than the
Creator Who is the axis of all being. No thing and no person has such a rank as to deserve
the praise and service of man. All values other than God lack absoluteness and primacy and
do not subsist in and of themselves; they are relative and serve only as a means for the
attainment of degrees higher than themselves.

The primary qualities that elicit man's worship are being the
bestower of all bounties and being aware of all the possibilities, needs, capacities and
energies contained in man's body and soul. These qualities belong exclusively to God; all
beings stand in need of and rely upon that being Who is existent by by virtue of His own
essence. The caravan of existence is constantly moving toward Him by means of His aid, and
His commands descend unceasingly of every speck in the universe.

Absolute submission and worship belong, then, exclusively to His
Most Sacred Essence. His glorious presence, uninterrupted by a single moment of absence,
is felt at the heart of each atom of being. All things other than God resemble us in that
impotence and deficiency prevail over them. They are, therefore, unworthy of our
submission and are not worthy of usurping sovereignty over any part of God's realm, which
is the whole broad plain of existence. Man, too, is too noble and valuable a being to be
subjected and humbled by anything other than God.

In the whole broad plain of being, it is God alone Who deserves
man's praise. Man must grant to his love of God, to his efforts to draw near to Him and
earn His pleasure, precedence over all other beings and objects of love. This will result
in the ennobling of man and, the augmenting of his value, for man is but a small drop and
if not united with the ocean, he will be swept away by the storm of corruption, dried up
by the burning sun of chaos. Man gains his true personality and becomes eternal when he
attaches himself to that effulgent source, when God gives meaning to his world and becomes
the interpreter of all the events of his life. It is in this sense that men's worlds may
be either broad and expansive or narrow and constricting.

The Commander of the Faithful, Ali, peace be upon him, says, in
discussing the weaknesses of man and his limited capacities: "How strange and
remarkable is the affair of man! If he becomes hopeful with regard to a certain desire,
greed will render him abject; desire will lead to greed, and greed will destroy him. If he
falls prey to hopelessness, grief and sorrow will kill him. If he attains happiness and
good fortune, he will fail to preserve them. If he falls prey to terror and fear, they
will reduce him to utter confusion. If abundant safety is granted him, he will become
negligent. If his blessings are restored to him, he will become arrogant and rebellious.
If he is stricken with misfortune, sorrow and grief will disgrace him. If he acquires
wealth, he will become overweening. If poverty lays hold of him, he will be plunged in
misery. If he is weakened by hunger, he will be unable to rise from the ground. If he eats
to excess, the pressure of his stomach will discomfort him. So all deficiency in the life
of man is harmful, and all excess leads to corruption and ruin."

Generally speaking, justice, nobillty, virtue and
other qualities that earn respect and praise must either be illusionary and imaginary, or
we must consider these values as real and necessary, based on the perceptions of
conscience and instinct. In the latter case, we ought humbly to submit to that universal
existence and absolute perfection which flows over with virtue, life and power, and from
which all values derive. *****

When we look into the matter carefully, we see that all the
countless beings that exist in the world, as well as the love and aspirations that are
rooted in the depths of our being, all converge at one point, all revert to one
source—God. The very essence and reality of the world is identical with its
connection, relation and attachment to God. Being re ascends by a different route to the
point where it began and from which it descended, and that point alone is worthy of man's
love and devotion. Once man discovers this point, he becomes so enamored of its absolute
beauty and perfection that he forgets all else.

We see that all phenomena have emerged from non-being into a state
of being, and that throughout the period of their existence, whether short or long, they
are dependent on a source external to themselves for aid and sustenance; they are marked
indelibly with subordination and lack of autonomy.

If the ideal object of worship we seek and toward which we are
attempting to advance were unaware of the pains we suffer and the nature of the world; if
it were unable to satisfy our desires and longings, being replete with impotence and
deficiency just like ourselves and belonging to the same category as us, it could not
possibly be our final aim and ultimate object or possess absolute value.

When we seek the fulfillment of a wish by means of our worship, it
is God alone Who can respond by meeting our needs. The Quran says: "Those whom you
call upon other than God are servants like yourselves (i.e., they have no power of
themselves)." (7:194)

The Commander of the Faithful, upon whom be peace, while
supplicating his Lord in the mosque of Kufa, said:

O my Master, O my Master! You are God the Great and I am your
wretched and insignificant slave. Who can show mercy to His insignificant slave but God
the Great? O Master of mine, O Master of mine! You are strong and powerful, I am weak and
impotent; other than one strong and power ful, who can show mercy to the weak?

O Master of mine, O Master of mine! You it is Who bestows generosity
on the beggar, and I stand as a beggar at your threshold. Who will show mercy to the
beggar other than the generous and the munificent one?

O Master of mine, O master of mine! You are eternal existence and I
am a creature destined to perish. Who will have mercy on one destined to perish other than
the eternal, everlasting essence?

O Master of mine, O Master of mine! You are the guide Who points out
the way, and I am lost and bewildered. Who will take pity on the lost and bewildered if
not the guide Who points out the way?

O Master of mine, O Master of mine! Have mercy upon me by Your
infinite mercy; accept and be satisfied with me in Your generosity, favor and kindness, O
God, possessor of generosity, favor and kindness, and in Your all-embracing mercy, O most
merciful of the merciful!

Thus, to show reverence to other-than God, to orient oneself to
other than His pure essence, is in no way justifiable; apart from God, nothing can have
the slightest effect on our true destiny. If an object of worship deserves man's devotion
and love and is capable of lifting him to the peaks of felicity, that object of worship
must be free of all deficiency and inadequacy. Its eternal rays must touch all creatures
with sustenance and life, and its beauty must cause every possessor of insight to kneel
down in front of it. Possessing infinite power, it quenches the burning thirst of our
spirits, and gaining knowledge of it, is nothing other than attaining the ultimate source
of our true nature.

If we choose an object of love and worship other than God, it may
have certain capacities and be able to fulfill our desires up to a point, but once we
reach that point, it will no longer be an object of love and worship for us. It will no
longer be able to arouse and attract us; it will, on the contrary, cause us to stagnate.
For not only will it not satisfy our instinctive desire to worship, it will prevent us
from reflecting on any higher value and imprison us in a narrow circle, in such a way that
we no longer have any motive to advance or ascend.

If the object we choose to worship and love be inferior to us, it
can never cause us to ascend and refine our beings. Our inclination to it will, on the
contrary, drag us down to decline, and we will, then, be like the needle of a compass
which is diverted from the pole under the influence of a completely alien magnetic field.
The result will be total loss of direction; eternal misery will become man's inevitable
destiny.

Worship, Man's Loftiest of Expression of Gratitude

An object of worship can give direction to man's motion and light up
his darkness with its brightness when it is able to give him ideals, is endowed with a
positive and elevated existence, is the cause of effects, and is the very essence of
stability and permanence.Then, the object of worship produces inner effects in man and
guides him in his thought and his actions. It facilitates for the essence of man, that
part of him nurtured by the divine wisdom, its search for perfection.

Any effort or motion on the part of man to choose a false direction
for himself, to take the wrong path in life, will result in his alienation from himself,
his loss of all content, and the distortion of his personality. Man cannot possibly come
to know himself correctly if he has separated himself from his Creator. To forget God
means to forget oneself, to be oblivious to the universal purposes of human life and the
world that surrounds one, and to be unable to reflect on any form of higher values.

Just as attachment to other-than-God alienates man from himself and
transforms him into a kind of moving biological machine, so, too, does reliance on God and
supplication at His threshold draw mono-dimensional man, lacking all spiritual life, up
from the oceanic depths of neglect, revive him and restore him to himself.

Through worshipping God, the spiritual capacities and celestial
forces in man are nourished. Man comes to understand the lowliness of his worthless
material, hopes and desires and to see the deficiencies and weaknesses without his own
being. In short, he comes to see himself as he is.

To be aware of God and take flight toward the invisible source of
all being illumines and vivifies the heart. It is utterly pleasurable, a pleasure that
cannot be compared to the pleasures of the three dimensional material world. It is through
orienting oneself to that abstract, non material reality that thoughts become lofty and
values transformed.

The Commander of the Faithful, Ali, peace be upon him, discusses the
wonderful effect of awareness of God on men's hearts as follows: "The Almighty
Creator has made awareness of Him the means for purifying the heart. It is through the
awareness of God that deaf hearts begin to hear, blind hearts begin to see, and rebellious
hearts become soft and tractable."

He says, too: "O Lord! You are,the best companion for those who
love You and the best source of remedy for all who place reliance upon You. You observe
them in their inner states and outer doings and are aware of the depths of their hearts.
You know the extent of their insight and knowledge, and their secrets are manifest to You.
Their hearts tremble in separation fromYou, and if solitude causes them fear and unease,
the awareness of You comforts them, and if hardship and difficulty assail them, You alone
are their refuge."

Imam Sajjad, upon whom be peace, that paragon of purity and justice
who had an unbreakable bond with his Lord, demonstrates to us in his supplicatory prayers
the highest expression of love.

This was a sacred love that had inflamed all of his being, and
although his spirit was sorely pressed by the mortal sorrow of separation, the powerful
wing of love enabled him to soar up into the limitless heavens. With indescribable
sincerity and humility, he thus prayed at the threshold of God, the Eternal: "O Lord!
I have migrated to Your forgiveness and set out to Your mercy. I ardently desire Your
pardon and rely on Your generosity, for there is naught in my conduct to make me worthy of
forgiveness, and Your kindness is my only hope. "

"O God, send me forth on the best path and grant that I die as
a believer in Your religion and be resurrected as a believer in Your religion.
"

"O Lord Whom I worship! O You whose aid the sinners supplicate
through Your mercy! O you in the remembrance of Whose generosity the wretched seek refuge!
O You in fear of whom the wrongdoers bitterly weep!"

"O source of tranquility for the heart of those banished in
fear from their homes! O consoler of those who sorrow with broken hearts! O succorer of
the lonely, helper of the rejected and needy! I am that servant who responded obediently
when You commanded men to call on you. "

"O Lord! Here I am prostrate in the dust at Your threshold. O
God, if You show mercy to whomever calls upon You in supplication, then let me be earnest
in my supplications, or if You forgive whomever weeps in Your presence, then let me hasten
to weep. "

"O God, do not make hopeless the one who finds no giver but
You; do not thrust me away with the hand of rejection now that I stand here at Your
threshold."

Anyone who wishes to understand the profound meaning of supplication
must realize that rational explanation and logical deduction are incapable of yielding a
deep understanding of questions touching on spiritual illumination.

The Noble Quran describes the conduct and way of life of the
unbelievers and materialists as follows: "The deeds of those who are unbelievers
are like a mirage in a flat and waterless desert. A thirsty man will imagine them to be
water and hasten toward them, but when he reaches them, he will find no water. "(24:39)

God and His Messengers summon mankind to the truth; other than
God, all claims are baseless and vain, for they are unable to meet any of man's needs. One
who relies upon them will be like the one who dipped his hand in a well to drink from it
but found his hand could not reach thewater. The unbelievers summon men only to
misguidance. (13:14)

The dwelling of those who choose other than God as friends and
protectors is like the dwelling of the spider; were the spider to know, the weakest of
dwellings is his.(29:41)

The deeds of those who disbelieve in God are like ashes that are
swept away by a strong wind; they have no benefit from all their strivings. This is the
path of misguidance, utterly distinct from the path of salvation. (14:18)

The loftiest expression of thankfulness that man can make at the
threshold of his true object of worship is supplication, the profession of love for His
absolute perfection and devotion to it. This he does in harmony with all of creation,
because all beings praise and glorify God.

The Quran says: "The seven heavens and the earth and all
they contain praise God. There is no a creature not engaged in the praise and
magnification of its Lord, but you do not understand their praise. God Almighty is
forbearing and most forgiving." (17:44)

This worship and praise naturally do not bring God the slightest
benefit, for He possesses all perfections to an infinite degree and neither the world nor
man can add anything to Him or take anything away from Him. Is it at all conceivable that
He would create man in order to benefit from his worship and praise? On the contrary, it
is man who, by gaining knowledge of the supreme being and worshipping Him in His
sublimity, reaches his ultimate aim and true perfection.

Professor Ravaillet, celebrated philosopher and physicist, has the
following to say about consciousness in the universe: "The new cosmology says that
atoms and molecules know what they are doing; in the norrnal sense of the word, they have
awareness of the tasks they perform and of the course of their lives. This conscious ness
of theirs is superior to the knowledge of the physicist, because all the physicist knows
of an atom is that if it were not tangible and recognizable, no one would know anything
about it. "

"Bodies, motion, speed, the concepts of here and there,
radiation, equilibrium, space, atmosphere, distance, together with many other things, all
came into existence thanks to the atom. If the atom were not to exist, what would be the
origin of all the remarkable phenomena of creation? There exists the same affinity between
consciousness and body as there does between motion and motion lessness, or the positive
and negative aspects of motion. "

"Now, space, taken as a whole, is not blind. We demonstrated,
if you remember, when examining the field of vision, that the eye is not the basic and
determining factor. Since it is fixed at a given point on the globe, according to the
limited circumstances of the human species and other terrestrial beings, it has a certain
narrow physical field within which it operates. But as for the space between the earth and
the sun, between the sun and the galaxies, and between the galaxies and remote gigantic
planets, where huge forces with tremendous range are engaged in exchanging energy, there
an organ such as the eye of terrestrial creatures has no opportunity to show itself or
demonstrate its effectiveness. "

"But precisely for this reason we cannot believe that lack of
consciousness and awareness prevail in that field for the exchange of vast energies and
forces ruled by the laws of attraction, equilibrium, motion, light and centrifugal force.
Blindness does not exist in these wondrous phenomena, and even particles of light cannot
be regarded as something akin to an illiterate mailman whose only job is to deliver
messages he cannot read."