The Function of the Dhikr

~Henry Corbin

Of all spiritual practices: meditation on the sayings of the Prophet and on the traditions of Sufism, meditated recitation of the Qoran, ritual Prayer, and so forth, the dhikr is the practice most apt to free spiritual energy, that is, to allow the particle of divine light which is in the mystic to rejoin its like.

The advantage of the dhikr is that it is not restricted to any ritual hour; its only limitation is the personal capacity of the mystic. It is impossible to study the question of colored aphorisms without knowing the spiritual exercise which is their source. Everything takes place, needless to say, in the ghayba, the suprasensory world; what is in question here is solely the physiology of the man of light. 

Najm Kobra set himself the task of describing the cases and circumstances in which the fire of the dhikr itself becomes the object of mystical apperception. As opposed to the fire of the Devil, which is a dark fire, the vision of which is accompanied by distress and a feeling of overwhelming oppression, the fire of the dhikr is visualized as a pure and ardent blaze, animated by a rapid upward movement. 

Dzogchen / As it is [2]

~Tulku Urgyen Rinpoche

We also need to clearly understand what is meant by the tenns 'samsara' and 'nirvana.' Nirvana means the fully realized buddha nature that consists of Body, Speech and Mind aspects. The Body is the essence that simply is. Speech is its nature, the cognizant quality that is vividly present. And Mind is the capacity, which is radiant. 

These three aspects comprise the basic presence of all buddhas. They are none other than their essence, nature and capacity. All sugatas are of this same identity. In the same way, samsara is the body, speech and mind of all sentient beings, which are the deluded expressions of their essence, nature and capacity. In this way, dharmadhatu encompasses all of samsara and nirvana. 

Dharmadhatu is adorned with dharmakaya, which is endowed with dharmadhatu wisdom. This is a brief but very profound statement, because 'dharmadhatu' also refers to sugata-garbha or buddha nature. Buddha nature is all-encompassing: this means it is present or basic to all states, regardless of whether they belong to samsara or nirvana. 

Love of God, Consciousness of the Real

~Frithjof Schuon

Love seems to be the only element capable of uniting the soul to God, for it alone is desire of possession or union—a desire whose sublimation can engender the greatest sacrifices—whereas knowledge, as seen from this point of view, appears on the contrary as a static element having no operative or unitive virtue. 

To adopt this standpoint is either a question of terminology—and then “knowledge” is taken to mean only theory while “love” is held to exclude no mode of spiritual union—or it shows a misconception of metaphysical “consciousness”, which is an eminently concrete participation in transcendent realities: far from denying love or the fear that is its complement, this consciousness embraces them in surpassing them, and because it surpasses them.

Before being able to “love” it is necessary to “be conscious”; the sun pours out light before heat, as is proven by the visibility of immeasurably distant stars; and to be conscious in the sense that interests us here is to fix the heart in the Real, in permanent “remembering” of the Divine.