Not settling for the mere condition of a human-animal and developing the qualities that will make us truly human, such is the ultimate task facing us. The pressing challenge, though, is to prevent Bob, our “inner bonobo”, to end up taking control. So much of our behaviour already bears its mark! Practically speaking, we need to imagine the worst and take the initiative, in other words strive to take control of our self. Only on this basis can we work toward cultivating our humanity.

There is no Nobel Prize (to date) rewarding ethics research, but surely no one would dispute that in this field Ostad Elahi was perfectly learned. What is meant here by the word “learned”? Being learned is not merely knowing. A learned individual is first and foremost one who comprehends, not in theory only or through sustained reading, but as a result of self-acquired concrete knowledge. To comprehend a reality is to have concretely experienced it, to have gained first-hand knowledge of some truth. Indeed, when Ostad Elahi addresses any topic, you have a distinct sensation that he is speaking from personal experience.

In the latest French edition of The Path of Perfection published earlier this year, Professor Bahram Elahi presents a model of the human soul, or what he also calls the true self – a preview of which had already been given on this site. In this model, the soul, just like the body, is presented through a series of anatomy-like diagrams as an actual organism: a psychospiritual organism with which it is necessary to become familiar in order to perfect one’s humanity.

Nested in the cocoon of our ego like silkworms, we are unaware of what we really are. Bahram Elahi develops the metaphysical as well as ethical implications of this striking image. The reality of the self consists in a plurality of functions and levels of consciousness in dynamic interaction, as illustrated—in figures—by the polarity between “surface conscious self” and “deep conscious self” (“inner guide”). Some key-ideas to help us break the cocoon…

Ostad Elahi used to define his teachings as a new medicine of the soul: one that is adapted to the true nature of human beings and adheres to the law of causality governing both their spiritual and material lives. The spirituality he practiced was natural spirituality, and he considered the process of spiritual perfection to […]