abian Philosophy

The human capacity that we perhaps least understand is that we are creators. We perceive ourselves to be more or less "operated on" by circumstances, people, or fate. For the more pious soul, this passivity is raised to a virtue when he says, "God permitted this calamity to befall me." Nothing could be further from the truth. The purity spoken of in this concept is the knowledge that we participate in divinity. To the degree that we understand and operate by this principle, to that degree are we pure. To say that we create our own lives is not to say that we can protect ourselves from experiencing thunder storms, natural disasters, or accidental harm. But what is always in our control is the attitude with which we accept what life gives us. Joy, happiness, and fulfillment are in the attitude, not in the event. We are the creators of our attitude, and need never be held bondage to external compulsions against our will.

Sabian philosophy teaches that we can control our destinies through our ability to visualize or anticipate coming events. To the degree that we are pure, that is, to the degree that our lives are one with our unfolding divine potential, to that degree will we see the paths of our life-scripts imaginatively and thus actualize them successfully.

This approach to creative living is based on Ibn Gabirol’s Fountain of Life Book V, Chapter 13. Here the Teacher articulates this idea when he says that reason is a universal capacity, and reason contains in it all lower capacities. As we unite the activities of our lower sense perceptions and emotions with the higher light of reason, we can align our personalities to the true purpose, or form, of reason.

A practical application of the concept of purity would be to spend a short amount of time, preferably daily, in some kind of formal or informal meditation. Call it quiet time if that is a more appealing term. The point of it is to realize that there is a higher source of understanding available to us than can be found in the daily news report.