Ebnarabi > Ebnarabi's Quotes

“Fall in love with some activity, and do it! Nobody ever figures out what life is all about, and it doesn't matter. Explore the world. Nearly everything is really interesting if you go into it deeply enough. Work as hard and as much as you want to on the things you like to do the best. Don't think about what you want to be, but what you want to do. Keep up some kind of a minimum with other things so that society doesn't stop you from doing anything at all.”
― Richard P. Feynman

“From my insufficiency to my perfection, and from my deviation to my equilibrium
From my sublimity to my beauty, and from my splendor to my majesty
From my scattering to my gathering, and from my rejection to my communion
From my baseness to my preciousness, and from my stones to my pearls
From my rising to my setting, and from my days to my nights
From my luminosity to my darkness, and from my guidance to my straying
From my perigee to my apogee, and from the base of my lance to its tip
From my waxing to my waning, and from the void of my moon to its crescent
From my pursuit to my flight, and from my steed to my gazelle
From my breeze to my boughs, and from my boughs to my shade
From my shade to my delight, and from my delight to my torment
From my torment to my likeness, and from my likeness to my impossibility
From my impossibility to my validity, and from my validity to my deficiency.
I am no one in existence but myself,”
― Ibn Arabi, The Universal Tree and the Four Birds

“« مُناجاة المُريدين »

سُبْحانَكَ ما اَضْيَقَ الْطُّرُقَ عَلى مَنْ لَمْ تَكُنْ دَليلَهُ، وَما اَوْضَحَ الْحَقَّ عِنْدَ مَنْ هَدَيْتَهُ سَبيلَهُ، اِلـهي فَاسْلُكْ بِنا سُبُلَ الْوُصُولِ اِلَيْكَ، وَسَيِّرْنا في اَقْرَبِ الطُّرُقِ لِلْوُفُودِ عَلَيْكَ،.....”
― زين العابدين

“« مُناجاة العارفين »

اِلـهي قَصُرَتِ الاَْلْسُنُ عَنْ بُلُوغِ ثَنائِكَ كَما يَليقُ بِجَلالِكَ، وَعَجَزَتِ الْعُقُولُ عَنْ اِدْراكِ كُنْهِ جَمالِكَ، وَانْحَسَرَتِ الاَْبْصارُ دُونَ النَّظَرِ اِلى سُبُحاتِ وَجْهِكَ، وَلَمْ تَجْعَلْ لِلْخَلْقِ طَريقاً اِلى مَعْرِفَتِكَ اِلاّ بِالْعَجْزِ عَنْ مَعْرِفَتِكَ،....”
― زين العابدين

“لوعلمته لم يكن هو ،

ولو جهلك لم تكن أنت :

فبعلمه أوجدك ،

وبعجزك عبدته !

فهو هو لِهُوَ : لا لَكَ

وأنت أنت : لأنَت ولَهُ !

فأنت مرتبطٌ به ،

ماهو مرتبطٌ بك .

الدائرة مطلقةً

مرتبطةٌ بالنقطة .

النقطة مطلقةً

ليست مرتبطة بالدائرة

نقطةُ الدائرة مرتبطةٌ بالدائرة ..”
― ابن عربي, الفتوحات المكية

“The differences between religions are reflected very clearly in the different forms of sacred art: compared with Gothic art, above all in its “flamboyant” style, Islamic art is contemplative rather than volitive: it is “intellectual” and not “dramatic”, and it opposes the cold beauty of geometrical design to the mystical heroism of cathedrals. Islam is the perspective of “omnipresence” (“God is everywhere”), which coincides with that of “simultaneity” (“Truth has always been”); it aims at avoiding any “particularization” or “condensation”, any “unique fact” in time and space, although as a religion it necessarily includes an aspect of “unique fact”, without which it would be ineffective or even absurd. In other words Islam aims at what is “everywhere center”, and this is why, symbolically speaking, it replaces the cross with the cube or the woven fabric: it “decentralizes” and “universalizes” to the greatest possible extent, in the realm of art as in that of doctrine; it is opposed to any individualist mode and hence to any “personalist” mysticism.

To express ourselves in geometrical terms, we could say that a point which seeks to be unique, and which thus becomes an absolute center, appears to Islam—in art as in theology—as a usurpation of the divine absoluteness and therefore as an “association” (shirk); there is only one single center, God, whence the prohibition against “centralizing” images, especially statues; even the Prophet, the human center of the tradition, has no right to a “Christic uniqueness” and is “decentralized” by the series of other Prophets; the same is true of Islam—or the Koran—which is similarly integrated in a universal “fabric” and a cosmic “rhythm”, having been preceded by other religions—or other “Books”—which it merely restores. The Kaaba, center of the Muslim world, becomes space as soon as one is inside the building: the ritual direction of prayer is then projected toward the four cardinal points.

If Christianity is like a central fire, Islam on the contrary resembles a blanket of snow, at once unifying and leveling and having its center everywhere.”
― Frithjof Schuon, Gnosis: Divine Wisdom, A New Translation with Selected Letters

“167

It’s one of those days when the monotony of everything oppresses me like being thrown into jail. The monotony of everything is merely the monotony of myself, however. Each face, even if seen just yesterday, is different today, because today isn’t yesterday. Each day is the day it is, and there was never another one like it in the world. Only our soul makes the identification – a genuinely felt but erroneous identification – by which everything becomes similar and simplified. The world is a set of distinct things with varied edges, but if we’re near-sighted, it’s a continual and indecipherable fog.
I feel like fleeing. Like fleeing from what I know, fleeing from what’s mine, fleeing from what I love. I want to depart, not for impossible Indias or for the great islands south of everything, but for any place at all – village or wilderness – that isn’t this place. I want to stop seeing these unchanging faces, this routine, these days. I want to rest, far removed, from my inveterate feigning. I want to feel sleep come to me as life, not as rest. A cabin on the seashore or even a cave in a rocky mountainside could give me this, but my will, unfortunately, cannot.
Slavery is the law of life, and it is the only law, for it must be observed: there is no revolt possible, no way to escape it. Some are born slaves, others become slaves, and still others are forced to accept slavery. Our faint-hearted love of freedom – which, if we had it, we would all reject, unable to get used to it – is proof of how ingrained our slavery is. I myself, having just said that I’d like a cabin or a cave where I could be free from the monotony of everything, which is the monotony of me – would I dare set out for this cabin or cave, knowing from experience that the monotony, since it stems from me, will always be with me? I myself, suffocating from where I am and because I am – where would I breathe easier, if the sickness is in my lungs rather than in the things that surround me? I myself, who long for pure sunlight and open country, for the ocean in plain view and the unbroken horizon – could I get used to my new bed, the food, not having to descend eight flights of stairs to the street, not entering the tobacco shop on the corner, not saying good-morning to the barber standing outside his shop?
Everything that surrounds us becomes part of us, infiltrating our physical sensations and our feeling of life, and like spittle of the great Spider it subtly binds us to whatever is close, tucking us into a soft bed of slow death which is rocked by the wind. Everything is us, and we are everything, but what good is this, if everything is nothing?
A ray of sunlight, a cloud whose shadow tells us it is passing, a breeze that rises, the silence that follows when it ceases, one or another face, a few voices, the incidental laughter of the girls who are talking, and then night with the meaningless, fractured hieroglyphs of the stars.”
― Fernando Pessoa, The Book of Disquiet

“بدلا من ان يسعى الباحثون العرب المسلمون لإعادة تحقيق ما حققه العلماء الغربيون عن تراثهم، تكرس جل اهتمامهم للرد على الاستشراق والمستشرقين بطريقة اتهامية رائجة في أوساط المثقفين العرب المحدثين”
― نديم نجدي, أثر الاستشراق في الفكر العربي المعاصر عند إدوارد سعيد-حسن حنفي- عبد الله العروي

“اقتصر دور الصليبين على مايؤمن للغرب مقومات السيطرة كدخلاء او غرباء على محمياتهم - محمياتنا المقدسة، في حين كان المحتل العربي قد تغلغل داخل أنسجة المجتمع الإسباني مزودا بمعارف وعلوم مكنته من تحقيق مالم تتمكن من تحقيقه تبشيرات الحملة الصليبية”
― نديم نجدي, أثر الاستشراق في الفكر العربي المعاصر عند إدوارد سعيد-حسن حنفي- عبد الله العروي

“An intellectual? Yes. And never deny it. An intellectual is someone whose mind watches itself. I like this, because I am happy to be both halves, the watcher and the watched. "Can they be brought together?" This is a practical question. We must get down to it. "I despise intelligence" really means: "I cannot bear my doubts.”
― Albert Camus

“Should I kill myself, or have a cup of coffee?”
― Albert Camus

“I declare after all there is no enjoyment like reading! How much sooner one tires of any thing than of a book! -- When I have a house of my own, I shall be miserable if I have not an excellent library.”
― Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice

“إن الفن لايموت بسبب هزيمة عسكرية أو إنهيار إقتصادي أو كارثة سياسية، الفن لاينُتجه الموتى”
― Henry Miller, The Air-Conditioned Nightmare

“الفن والعلم أساس الإمبراطورية، لو أنك أزحتهما، أو قلّلت من شأنهما، لانتهى أمر الإمبراطورية. الإمبراطورية تتبع الفن وليس العكس، كما يفترض الإنكليز.”
― William Blake

“تذللت في الأوطان حين سبيتني **** وبت بأوجاع الهوى أتعـــــذبُ

لو كان لي قلبان لعشت بواحــــد **** وتركت قلبا في هواك يتعذبُ

لاكـــن لي قلبا تملـــــكه الهــوى **** فلا العيش يهنولي ولا الموت أقربُ

كعصفورة في كف طـفل يضمها **** تذوق أنواع الموت والطفل يلعبُ

لا الطـفل ذو قـلب يحن لما بها **** ولا الطير ذو ريش يطير فيذهبُ

أحقا تسميت بالجنون من ألم الهوى **** وصارت بيا الأمثال في الحي تضربُُُ”
― عنترة بن شداد

“متى أردنا أن نغير من سلوك الانسان شيئا يجب أ نغير من مفهوم اللذة و المنفعة عنده , و ندخل السلوك المقترح ضمن الاطار العام لغريزة حب الذات ص 77”
― محمد باقر الصدر, فلسفتنا

“إني منذ عرفت وجودي و مسؤوليتي في هذه الأمة, بذلت الوجود من أجل الشيعي و السني على السواء , و من أجل العربي و الكردي على السواء, حيث دافعت عن الرسالة التي توحدهم جميعا, و عن العقيدة التي تهمهم جميعا.”
― محمد باقر الصدر

“I ate civilization. It poisoned me; I was defiled. And then," he added in a lower tone, "I ate my own wickedness.”
― Aldous Huxley, Brave New World

“One believes things because one has been conditioned to believe them.”
― Aldous Huxley, Brave New World