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Updated: May 18, 2025
Following the analogy of the notions of reality, substance, causality, and necessity, I cogitate a being, which possesses all these attributes in the highest degree; and, as this idea is the offspring of my reason alone, I cogitate this being as self-subsistent reason, and as the cause of the universe operating by means of ideas of the greatest possible harmony and unity.
Upon the highest mountains my young feet Ached, that no pinions from their lightness grew, My starlike eyes the stars would fondly greet, Yet win no greeting from the circling blue; Fair, self-subsistent each in its own sphere, They had no care that there was none for me; Alike to them that I was far or near, Alike to them, time and eternity.
These hands will gird up their loins to champion the Faith of God, and will, in My name the Self-Subsistent, the Mighty, subdue the peoples and kindreds of the earth. They will enter the cities and will inspire with fear the hearts of all their inhabitants. Such are the evidences of the might of God; how fearful, how vehement is His might, and how justly doth He wield it!
It is thus proved that the existence of phenomena is effected through the eternal Will, the Will of the Living, Eternal and Self-subsistent, and this is a rational proof concerning composition whereof there is no doubt or uncertainty. Furthermore, it is quite evident that our kind of life, our form of existence, is limited and that the reality of all accidental phenomena is, likewise, limited.
Everywhere around us we observe a chain of causes and effects, of means and ends, of death and birth; and, as nothing has entered of itself into the condition in which we find it, we are constantly referred to some other thing, which itself suggests the same inquiry regarding its cause, and thus the universe must sink into the abyss of nothingness, unless we admit that, besides this infinite chain of contingencies, there exists something that is primal and self-subsistent something which, as the cause of this phenomenal world, secures its continuance and preservation.
So far therefore as soul contains intellect by participation, so far it is produced by intellect, but so far as it is self-motive it is produced by itself. In short, with respect to every thing self-subsistent, the summit of its nature is produced by a superior cause, but the evolution of that summit is its own spontaneous energy; and, through this it becomes self-subsistent, and self-perfect.
But that the I which thinks, must be considered as in thought always a subject, and as a thing which cannot be a predicate to thought, is an apodeictic and identical proposition. But this proposition does not signify that I, as an object, am, for myself, a self-subsistent being or substance.
It is a divine energy, a substance, simple, and self-subsistent." And further he—peace be upon him—said: "Therefore it is the Most Sublime Essence of God, the Tree of Blessedness, the Lote-Tree beyond which there is no passing, the Garden of Repose." The Imám Ṣádiq hath said: "When our Qá’im will arise, the earth will shine with the light of her Lord."
As this mode of production therefore, from its being the most perfect of all others, originates from the highest natures, it will consequently first belong to those self-subsistent powers, who immediately proceed from the ineffable, and will from them be derived to all the following orders of beings.
This is the only way by which the final convictions of Life are able to possess greater depth and duration. Knowledge is possible only in so far as man participates in a self-subsistent life. Without such a self-subsistent life many intellectual achievements are possible, but they do not deserve the name of Knowledge.
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