This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.
Ibn `Arabi, full name was Abū 'Abdillāh Muḥammad ibn 'Alī ibn Muḥammad ibn `Arabī
My heart has opened unto every form: it is a pasture for gazelles, a cloister for Christian monks, a temple for idols, the Ka`ba of the pilgrim, the tablets of the Torah and the book of the Qur’an. I practice the religion of Love.
Between the humble and contrite heart and the majesty of heaven there are no barriers; the only password is prayer.
To establish the principles of the Declaration of Independence, we are going to need to go outside the law, to stop obeying the laws that demand killing or that allocate wealth the way it has been done, or that put people in jail for petty technical offense and keep other people out of jail for enormous crimes.
It is in sickness that we most feel the need of that sympathy which shows how much we are dependent upon one another for our comfort, and even necessities. Thus disease, opening our eyes to the realities of life, is an indirect blessing.
Morality... must have the more power over the human heart the more purely it is exhibited. Whence it follows that, if the law of morality and the image of holiness and virtue are to exercise any influence at all on our souls, they can do so only so far as they are laid to heart in their purity as motives, unmixed with any view to prosperity, for it is in suffering that they display themselves most nobly.
Display | Heart | Influence | Law | Morality | Motives | Power | Prosperity | Purity | Suffering | Virtue | Virtue |
In order to arrive at the reality of outer objects I have just as little need to resort to inference as I have in regard to the reality of the object of my inner sense, that is, in regard to the reality of my thoughts. For in both cases alike the objects are nothing but represenations, the immediate perception (consciousness) of which is at the same time a sufficient proof of their reality.
Consciousness | Little | Need | Nothing | Object | Order | Perception | Reality | Regard | Sense | Time |
The moral worth of an action does not lie in the effect expected from it, nor in any principle of action which requires to borrow its motive from this expected effect. For all these effects - agreeableness of one’s condition and even the promotion of the happiness of others - could have been also brought about by other causes, so that for this there would have been no need of the will of a rational being; whereas it is in this alone that the supreme and unconditional good can be found. The pre-eminent good which we call moral can therefore consist in nothing else than the conception of law in itself, which certainly is only possible in a rational being, in so far as this conception, and not the expected effect, determines the will. This is a good which is already present in the person who acts accordingly, and we have not to wait for it to appear first in the result.
Action | Good | Law | Need | Nothing | Present | Will | Worth | Happiness |
What the things-in-themselves may be I do not know, nor do I need to know, since a thing can never come before me except in appearance.
Appearance | Need |
Does the world need more medicine and energy and buildings and food? No. There is enough food and medicine, there are enough resources for all. There is starvation and poverty and widespread disease because of human ignorance, prejudice, and fear. Out of greed and hatred we hoard materials; we create wars over imaginary geographic boundaries and act as if one group of people is truly different from another group somewhere else on the planet.
Disease | Energy | Enough | Fear | Greed | Ignorance | Need | People | Poverty | Prejudice | World |
Mature spirituality has little to do with altered states of consciousness. Powerful meditation and visionary experiences often initiate people into spiritual life, waking them up to untapped potentials. But mental disciplines, such as meditation cannot single-handedly sustain us on our journeys. We also need to open our hearts, then embody our love in everyday acts of attentive living. This integration of wisdom, love, and embodied action, which requires years of inner and outer work, constitutes our spiritual curriculum in today's modern world.
Action | Consciousness | Integration | Life | Life | Little | Love | Meditation | Need | People | Spirituality | Wisdom | Work | World |
It is vain to trust in wrong; it is like erecting a building upon a frail foundation, and which will directly be sure to topple over.
Never hope to conceal any shameful thing which you have done; for even if you do conceal it from others, your own heart will know.
It is in sickness that we most feel the need of that sympathy which shows how much we are dependent one upon another for our comfort, an even necessities. Thus, disease, opening our dyes to the realities of life, is an indirect blessing.
When young, we trust ourselves too much and we trust others too little when old. Rashness is the error of youth, timid caution of age. Manhood is the isthmus between the two extremes; the ripe and fertile season of action, when alone we can hope to find the head to contrive, united with the hand to execute.
Action | Age | Caution | Error | Hope | Little | Rashness | Trust | Youth |
Jane Goodall, fully Dame Jane Morris Goodall, born Valerie Jane Morris-Goodall
We can't leave people in abject poverty, so we need to raise the standard of living for eighty percent of the world's people, while bringing it down considerably for the twenty percent who are destroying our natural resources.