Ibn al-’Arabi begins his long chapter on love (mahabba) in the Futûhât al-Makkiyya – as he begins most of the book’s 560 chapters – by citing relevant Qur’anic verses and prophetic sayings (II 322.16).[1] He points out first that love is a divine attribute, and he lists several of the Qur’anic verses in which God is the subject of the verb ‘to love’. Fourteen of these verses mention those whom God loves and another twenty-three mention those whom God does not love. In every case, the objects of God’s love or lack of love are human beings. Indeed, the Qur’an associates love only with human beings among all creatures. Hence love is a key term if we are to understand what differentiates human beings from other created things. Most other divine attributes – such as life, knowledge, desire, power, speech, generosity, justice, mercy, and wrath – have no necessary connection with the human race.
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In this paper, I attempt to investigate the irrefutable similarities found between the underlying foundations of many of the world religions, specifically their ontology. In fact, it seems implausible to neglect to also reveal the resemblance these religions have with a significant number of psychologists’ theories. Due to the vastness of this subject, I have paid particular attention to two specific world religions, Hinduism and Islam and again due to the complexity and diversity of each of these religions, I have chosen to examine only one school of thought from each religion, Advaita Vedanta in Hinduism and Sufism in Islam. There are such significant similarities in their ontology that I feel further investigation is fundamental.
The idea that all religions are essentially the same and the debates that surround that idea are briefly discussed, followed by the significant role India and Hinduism have played in the development and spreading of this ideology as well as its role in the nourishment of so many revolutionary philosophies.
In order to get an understanding into the specificity of the subject matter, an outline of both Advaita Vedanta and Sufism are given along with Jung’s concept of the ‘collective unconscious’ that seem to dovetail with Advaita’s and Sufism’s ontology.
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Sufism
The urge toward mysticism – the urge to experience a dimension beyond the material world, to know and return to a spiritual Essence or Truth – is inherent within every person, irrespective of his or her religion. Individuals are imbued with this tendency to differing degrees. Some are endowed with it in quantity; others, only in a small amount. Some people have a chance to develop and translate it into their daily lives, while others do not. Nonetheless, this tendency is present in every human being.
If Sufism is defined as mysticism or the way of the mystic, then its message addresses all people, not just the followers of one religion. Every faith has its own Sufism. In every nation and community there have been Sufis, although they have taken different names and adopted varying practices.
The human being comprises not only a body of flesh, but another aspect, commonly referred to as “I” or “the self (described in Sufi terms as nafs). Mystical experience activates the “I.” Like an electrical current, it runs through an individual, bringing forth untapped potentials. With the activation of self comes a certain degree of consciousness and insight. A person starts to sense that his or her “I” reflects another “I” – the “I” of a Supreme Being. He or she becomes conscious of God acting in and through creation. Read more...(1173 words, 1 image, estimated 4:42 mins reading time)
The teachings of George Gurdjieff are at the core of all that is most profound in religions, philosophies, and esoteric knowledge. He presents us with practical, uncompromising self-discovery, self-realization and self-transcendence. Gurdjieff said the following about his ideas: “This teaching is for those who are not satisfied with what they have found in life and who feel that there must be something else beside success and failure in life and beyond what they have been taught in school and by their upbringing.”
The ideas that he brought to the West and the system of work on oneself which came to be known simply as “The Work,” have the power to transform human consciousness and its understanding of reality. Anyone who begins to practice for a time the efforts of self-observation, divided attention, and self-remembering under the guidance of someone who has understood and lives the teachings will discover their radical impact on the human psyche.
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The self-sealing doctrine, a defensive maneuver used to protect cherished beliefs from disconfirmation, is discussed. Most evident in doctrinaire religious groups, the self-sealing doctrine may also appear among scholars and practitioners, and it can be discerned on both sides of the heated debate over recovered memory. The author advocates critical thinking and a willingness to test rather than protect cherished beliefs.
Theories are useful maps, but they can create problems if misused, as for example, when they are transformed into an ideology pure and universal, a pretext justifying any means, or a transference object too precious to question. It was this awareness that led Jacobs (1994) to revisit a painful chapter in the history of transactional analysis to consider the way in which reparenting theory may have contributed to excesses in reparenting practice.
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This article examines the concept of the Divine Feminine from the Sufî tradition (and its roots) with questions regarding the Sufî definition of the Divine Feminine, the various techniques used to experience it, the nature of the experiences, and the ultimate intentions of the sufi mystics known for engaging in such practices. It calls attention to an unexpected and little explored fact of immense significance in Islam: at the center of Islam abides the Divine Feminine.
The world famous Sufî poet Mevlana Jalaluddin R?m? (1207 – 1273) writes: “Woman is the radiance of God; she is not your beloved. She is the Creator —you could say that she is not created.”
Sufîsm cherishes the esoteric secret of woman, even though Sufîsm is also the esoteric aspect of a seemingly patriarchal religion. Muslims (someone who surrender to God) pray five times a day facing the city of Makkah. Inside every mosque is a niche, or recess, called the mihrab – a vertical rectangle curved at the top that points toward the direction of Makkah. The Sufîs know the mihrab to be a visual symbol of an abstract concept: the transcendent vagina of the female aspect of divinity. In Sufîsm, woman is the ultimate secret, for woman is the soul. Toshihiko Izutsu writes, “The wife of Adam was feminine, but the first soul from which Adam was born was also feminine.” Read more...(6841 words, 1 image, estimated 27:22 mins reading time)
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The teachings of George Gurdjieff are at the core of all that is most profound in religions, philosophies, and esoteric knowledge. He presents us with practical, uncompromising self-discovery, self-realization and self-transcendence. Gurdjieff said the following about his ideas: “This teaching is for those who are not satisfied with what they have found in life and who feel that there must be something else beside success and failure in life and beyond what they have been taught in school and by their upbringing.” 
Abstract
This article examines the concept of the Divine Feminine from the Sufî tradition (and its roots) with questions regarding the Sufî definition of the Divine Feminine, the various techniques used to experience it, the nature of the experiences, and the ultimate intentions of the sufi mystics known for engaging in such practices. It calls attention to an unexpected and little explored fact of immense significance in Islam: at the center of Islam abides the Divine Feminine. 
