The Visible and the Invisible.
It is an interesting exercise to draw a line down the middle of a page, and on the left hand side just write at random the things that are visible, that immediately come to mind. The house, the garden shed, the car, the drive, the grass, the trees. Ok, it is easy enough to make a list of perfectly humdrum things. Things that are visible, knife and fork, cup, cat, and cap are easily set down. They are easy to set down, because one can see them, touch them, hear them perhaps, smell them and taste them. These are all the things that we can receive through our senses, all the things that we receive through our nafsu, through our functions.
I hasten to add here that some people think that the nafsu are themselves inimical, but the way in which I am using the word is that what is inimical are the lower forces for which the nafsu is the gateway - and even then not necessarily so. I know that some people in Subud have got into the habit of using the work nafsu to mean passions, but in my understanding the passions, desire, anger, greed, lasciviousness, sloth and so on when aroused, simply make use of the gateway of the nafsu. I know that some people will disagree with me on this, but this is my understanding of what Pak Subuh said in the early days, which is why I also prefer the word Functions. For Gurdjieff people the nafsu would correspond roughly to the three Lower Centres, that is the Thinking Centre, The Emotional Centre and the Instinctive Centre.
Now to continue, if we have drawn a line down the centre of the page we can now write down all that belongs to the Invisible. This line one can think of as a curtain, an invisible curtain which divides the visible world from the Invisible. It is easy to make a list: Soul, Jiwa, God, Allah, Angels, The Inner Light, the Atman, Brahman, Tao, Tuhan, Gott, the Great Life Force, Principle, the Holy Ghost, Will, the Trinity and so on and so forth.
Does anything strike you about this list? Let me help you. Rainier asked me to define Soul. Can you define Soul? Do you know for sure what is the Jiwa? Even if you were a Quaker, could you surely tell me in what consists The Inner Light, which is the basis of the Society of Friends? Even if you are a devout Christian Scientist, as was my ancient Aunt Belle, (may she rest in Peace!), could you say for certain what is Principle, as spoken of by Mary Baker Eddy? I hardly dare ask you how you would define God. In the hymns we say and we sing, “Immortal, Invisible, God only Wise…” If this is a definition it is a definition in terms of imponderables, of unknowables. From our side of the fence, we know absolutely nothing. Let me repeat that. From our side of the fence, from our side of the curtain we know absolutely nothing. The Tao that can be named is not the Nameless Tao. We can read sentences like that, and they make strike a chord within our breast, but that is all.
We are defining the Unknowable only in terms of the Unknowable.
Once one has grasped this, one can also grasp what I wrote in Ergo Cogito Sum, that we cannot help lying. I said I was not referring to ‘porkies’, which is just the normal deceptions that people in business or marital life are always making. No! What I am talking about is ‘lying’ in respect of the Invisible. Every day, every Sunday, every Sabbath, every Holy Day there are priests and imams and teachers and gurus, lying.
And I do not mean that they are not saying sublime Truths, they may be repeating the Scriptures or discoursing upon the same, but nevertheless they are lying. Unless… I will come to the ‘Unless’. But perhaps some of you know already where I am driving.
Now in my opening Chapter “No Heretic” I re-told the story of J.G.Bennett thrilling the audience at the Onward Hall. What was he talking about? “I believe that there is a Higher Will that is the friend of the Will in every one of us…” Do you not notice something right away? Every word that he used belonged to the Invisible World, every word was on the right side of the invisible curtain. Now I recorded that this talk of his moved a large section of the audience, and I also observed that Mr Bennett had recently been opened. I believe that at that moment in time he was speaking the Truth.
What was the difference? If you like, it was this: Which side of the curtain was he speaking from?
Now let me assure my readers that in so far as I am on the left side of the curtain, I am a liar. Even though I may utter sublime truths, I am a liar. But I have had the experience of speaking the Truth and really telling the Truth. It occurred in the early days of Subud.
After the latihan, Asikin, may God Bless him, rushed up to me and said, “What have you been doing? You were crying out ‘It is completely forbidden by God! It is completely forbidden by God! And Bapak was here and Bapak heard you.’” You may all imagine my feelings. I was speaking the Truth, but in a language that I did not understand. In a way I was making my Confession.
When I was speaking then I was on the right side of the curtain. It was impossible to lie. It was impossible to hide anything.
Now that I am on the left side of the curtain again it is impossible not to lie.
I said at the end of “No Heretic” that I would deal with the reason why those Religions that espouse the idea of Submission to the Will of God, to Surrender to God’s Will, still cannot agree with one another. But I have said enough for one day.
Those who are open will understand readily that when one is in the state of the latihan, when one is receiving then one can speak the Truth. And if one is not receiving, even though quoting from Holy Scriptures, only lies come forth.
For those that can speak the Truth, there is already only one Religion; there is already a Communion of Saints.
May God preserve us all.
Anthony Bright-Paul May 2006
