Bowl of Saki for January 11

WHERE THE FLAME OF LOVE RISES, THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD UNFOLDS OF ITSELF. -- Hazrat Inayat Khan

Commentary by -- Hazrat Samuel L. Lewis:

As it is evident that human intellect cannot grasp Deity and as it is said that God created the world to become known, there must be some other means of attaining to Divine Knowledge. As has been explained, this means is through love, through the casting away of self. Love has two aspects, the love of the greater for the lesser called 'compassion', and the love of the lesser for the greater called 'adoration'. These are pictured in the six-pointed star.

Compassion is the love which seems to fall like water, or as Shakespeare has beautifully described it, "The quality of Mercy is not strained, it droppeth as the gentle rain from Heaven." The use of the word 'strained' is excellent for it describes the passing of the Divine Light-Love down into the sphere of sentient beings. The idea of the god Avalokita or Avalokiteshvara came from that source.

But in man love is like a flame, and in adoration it rises and raises the whole personality. It is the rising flame of love which turns man around to face God, to begin the upward journey until he gets above the mind-mesh and karmic activity. Then the knowledge of God unfolds of itself, no effort is needed once man has discarded his lower self. ______________________________________________________________________