In order to provide its readers a more interactive participatory experience, e-ostadelahi.com is introducing nested comments: you may now reply directly to a comment by clicking on the “Reply to this comment” link. It thus becomes easier to follow the discussion.

In a book about self-esteem, the French psychiatrist Christophe André cites a number of social psychology studies according to which, in any given field, most of us feel just a little bit superior to the average person. We feel a bit more skilled, a bit more intelligent, we think that we have better taste, etc. “Based on these studies taken as a whole, he writes, 67 to 96% of people overestimate themselves in comparison to their peers. And that phenomenon is fully subconscious…”

If this is true when it comes to professional skills or taste, it is also true, and perhaps even more so, when it comes to ethics. Indeed, while we may sometimes nurture an inferiority complex with regards to our looks, general knowledge or intelligence, we rarely have similar doubts with regards to our moral values.

The musician, composer and writer Clive Bell dedicates his November column in the British music magazine The Wire to Ostad Elahi’s music and the current exhibition at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, “The Sacred Lute: The Art of Ostad Elahi”.

Ken Moore, Curator in charge of the Department of Musical Instruments at The Metropolitan Museum of Art, gives a tour of the exhibition “The Sacred Lute: The Art of Ostad Elahi” on NYC-ARTS’s latest episode.

In the execution of my duties as a judge, Ostad Elahi said, I would do things that no one else dared to do, for I was answerable to God, not to the Ministry, and was not afraid of anyone. The following anecdote—a translated excerpt from the collection of Ostad Elahi’s sayings (Words of Truth), who departed from this world just forty years ago on 19 October 1974—provides a concrete example of the above. It shows how sincere faith is also a source of boldness and unshakable trust.

The academic journal Resuscitation recently published the results of a large-scale international study involving 2060 cardiac arrest patients. Sponsored by the University of Southampton (United Kingdom), the study was conducted by a medical research team under the direction of Dr. Sam Parnia, the author of Erasing Death: the Science that is Rewriting the Boundaries between Life and Death. Among the cases reported, the most disturbing are those—very numerous—of patients considered to be “brain-dead”, but who reported, once resuscitated, states of consciousness and even perceptions that seem to have taken place while they were suspended between life and death. The neurosurgeon Eben Alexander gave an account of his own spectacular experience in his 2012 best-selling book Proof of Heaven. It has become clear that such cases are not so uncommon, and they are now also better understood. According to the article published in Resuscitation, one case of verifiable conscious awareness was even attested to in the absence of any clinical evidence of brain activity.

John Schaefer showcases an excerpt of the special commemorative CD-book issued by the Metropolitan Museum and Harmonia Mundi for the exhibit, “The Sacred Lute: The Art of Ostad Elahi”, on the New Sounds programme of 30 September 2014 (Episode #3643), on WNYC.

An exhibit opens this week at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, wholly devoted to the musical heritage of Ostad Elahi.

The exhibition runs from Aug. 5 2014 to Jan. 11 2015. Exhibition Location: The Hagop Kevorkian Fund Special Exhibition Gallery, Metropolitan Museum of Art.

In all areas, real progress requires theory to be repeatedly put into practice. Ethics and spirituality are no exceptions. As often pointed out on e-ostadelahi.com, it is only through practicing ethical and spiritual principles and thus assimilating them that we can transform ourselves. But it isn’t always easy to move from theory to practice. Motivation is key, of course, but a good method and appropriate tools are also needed. This is what inspired the creation of a new website with a focus on spiritual practice: OstadElahi-inPractice.com. We have had the chance to test it for you and, let us say it upfront, it has been a very successful experience!

This post is a follow-up to a previous post entitled “Ethics in a delicate situation: what do you think?”, which presented a hypothetical case study together with a poll, to which you can still participate if you haven’t done so yet (you might want to do so before reading further). Let us begin with a few remarks about the poll results: On both the French and the English versions of the site, choice e (There are no fundamental differences between helping others and devoting sufficient time to one’s spouse: Jack could have spent that evening exclusively with his wife and still be practicing ethics) has been by far the most popular, followed by choice b for the French version (The well-being of one’s spouse should always take precedence. It should be preferred to the well-being of others and even to one’s own well-being) and choice a for the English version (Efforts of generosity always meet obstacles that must be overcome to allow progress: Jack should have expected Kelly’s opposition and prepared himself better for this test in order to prevent any conflict).