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Interworld

By - Apr 16, 2012 - Category Conceptbox
Interworld

At the basis of natural spirituality, there is a belief: death is not an end; it is a passage into a more subtle dimension of reality, into another world that Bahram Elahi calls the “interworld”.

For the author of Foundations of Natural Spirituality, the concept of interworld is not yet another way of designating the afterlife, thereby fulfilling the human need to believe in the survival of the soul after death. The word is a translation of the Arabic “barzakh” (the “in-between” where souls await the Last Judgment), which points to a necessity intrinsic to the system of successive lives.

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Natural meditation

By - Jan 10, 2012 - Category Conceptbox
Natural Meditation

Anyone who has ever been in love has had that experience when thinking about the person they love: the sensation of the presence of the beloved can fill up your mental space to such an extent that it will accompany you at every moment and in every situation. When you are in love, this presence settles within you automatically and effortlessly. It can even be reflected around you in the smallest events. If you are not in love, you can still stir up a similar experience by directing your thought toward someone and attempt to develop positive feelings toward them and thereby experience the “presence” of this person. Such experiences are internal and multiform, and can be more or less intense depending in particular on how much attention we pay to them.

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351 Vote

Virtue

By - Dec 4, 2011 - Category Conceptbox
virtue

The goal of spirituality is the perfection of the soul. But what does perfecting the soul mean? From an ethical point of view, it is a matter of transforming the soul’s substance, thereby developing all human virtues within oneself. Such a transformation is not automatic. It requires that one first develops an accurate idea of what virtues are, as well as of the means for making them shine forth in oneself.

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172 Vote

Asceticism

By - Oct 5, 2011 - Category Conceptbox
Asceticism

It appears that asceticism has always played a role in societies where spiritual life was organised and ritualised, to different degrees and in various ways depending on civilisations and times.

Etymologically, the term “asceticism” comes from the Greek askesis, which simply means “exercise”. In Ancient Greece, it applied to the exercises and discipline required of athletes. This is precisely what all forms of asceticism have in common: to impose a discipline onto oneself and thus exert one’s willpower against certain natural bodily tendencies. In India, for example, the practice of asceticism includes bodily exercises designed to control the body, breathing exercises to control both the body and the mind, as well as various fasting and meditation techniques.

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226 Vote

Spirituality, natural spirituality

Spirituality Natural Spirituality

“Spirituality” commonly refers to anything that relates to the life of the spirit, which is sometimes called “inner life”. The extreme vagueness of such a characterization clearly leaves room for all kinds of associations and generalizations. Spirituality today refers to a vast array of beliefs and practices—from monastic life to yoga workshops, alchemy, Taoism, tarot-reading or astral travel, to name only a few. The supermarket of spiritualities is not bothered by contradictions—even atheism may lay claim to a certain idea of the spiritual.

For Ostad Elahi, spirituality is much more specific in meaning. On one level, it is in line with the religious or mystical understanding of the matter. Indeed, spirituality is first and foremost the life of the spirit considered in its true essence: distinct from corporeal things and, in particular—with regard to human beings—distinct from their animal part. Spirituality is inseparable from the process of self-transformation, that is from specific practices that make it possible to achieve a greater knowledge and a sharper perception of oneself and the world. The “life” of the spirit is oriented towards this end. According to Ostad Elahi, the idea of perfection defines this orientation.

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721 Vote

Perfection and the process of perfection

Perfection and the process of perfection

Every being is created for the purpose of reaching a state of complete fulfilment, i.e., perfection. In order to achieve this goal, all beings must undertake the process of perfection, which provides their lives with ethical and spiritual meaning.
Perfection concerns all beings, without exception. Ostad Elahi divides beings into several categories: minerals (in general, all things said to be inanimate), plants, animals, and human-animals. Every being that exists is a creature inasmuch as it results from a series of causes, the first of which is the Creator. The purpose of creation, according to Ostad Elahi, is the return to the origin. “Everything that exists emanates from Him, and everything returns to Him at the end of its process of physical and spiritual maturation called the process of perfection.” Once it has reached its perfection, a being can fully benefit from the potential for happiness for which it was created.

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283 Vote

The id

By - Jan 4, 2011 - Category Conceptbox
The id

The id or the terrestrial soul is the part of us that constitutes the source of our material instincts. When these instincts lead us to harm other people or the celestial part of our selves, the id takes on the face of the imperious self, an unethical and anti-divine instinct-driven faculty that stands in opposition to our perfection.

In Freud’s structural model, the id is the name given to the instinctual entity from which all of our instincts spring, alongside the super-ego—the seat of morality—and the ego—the centre of willpower and conscious reasoning.

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519 Vote

Metacausal energy

By - Oct 3, 2010 - Category Conceptbox
Metacausal energy

Generosity, for one who is so inclined by nature or by habit, is relatively undemanding, for it does not require any costly sacrifice. It is quite another matter when ethical concern requires us to renounce a pleasure or craving, or when it runs up against a selfish nature. To overcome such resistance, willpower alone does not always suffice. When self-denial costs us something, we require the aid of a particular type of energy, one that is also known as “grace”.

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229 Vote

The imperious self

By - Oct 29, 2009 - Category Conceptbox
The imperious self

In brief: in Ostad Elahi’s model of the self, the imperious self is the source of impulses within the psyche that imperiously drive us to act against ethical and divine principles and to violate the rights of others. Let us illustrate this with an example from everyday life. The following is Romain’s account of an […]

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126 Vote

The celestial soul

By - Aug 2, 2009 - Category Conceptbox
Celestial soul

In brief: in Ostad Elahi’s model of the self, the human soul results from the combination of two parts of different origin: the celestial soul and the terrestrial soul. Our celestial soul is the part of our soul that constitutes our core identity. It is the source of all the faculties—such as reason—that are specifically […]

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