Light as a metaphor (for love and understanding)

This is the season in which (and the night on which) one remembers the light.

Whether it is in the west

[where one lights a lamp within a hollowed-out pumpkin to celebrate Halloween],

or in the east

[where one lights earthen lamps, or other lights, to brighten up the house, and its surroundings, to celebrate Deepawali, on the darkest of all the moonless nights that pass during one trip of the planet around the sun],

one uses this season, and this night, to remember the light, and to remind ourselves that it is light that we seek, at all times.

Light is a symbol; a metaphor.

Light is a metaphor for that which allows us to see, and to know, and to understand: who we are, who everyone else is, and what we are all doing here.

We are here to understand what each thing is; to understand the relationships between different things, and different living beings; to understand the relationships between the seemingly different, but integrated, worlds of the body, the mind and the spirit that define us; to understand that everything is born of a single light; a single ringing radiance; a single reality; the reality of consciousness.

In the darkness, we stumble upon things.

When there is light, we don’t stumble, because we can see the lay of the land, and the positioning of everything with respect to everything else, and the manner in which all things are laid out on this obstacle course (or game) that we call life.

The presence of light in one’s life, mind, and consciousness, enables one us to pick out a path for oneself; a path that cuts through all the clutter, and leads us to the destination(s) that we seek, for where our hopes lie, there we go ultimately.

In the world of the physical body, we light lamps to brighten up a portion of our surroundings on a dark night.

The light feels good because it allows us to see well enough to gain knowledge of our surroundings, and our situation in these surroundings, just as is possible during the day, when the sun gives us light (enough to know what lies around us).

In the world of the mind, light gives us insight, or understanding.

Insight feels good because it allows us to integrate and inter-relate the worlds of our concepts with the worlds of ideas, and the worlds of space and time that give form to these concepts, and also give form to the infinite variety of materials around us, all of which appear to derive from the reality of a mind that creates, and beholds its creation.

In the world of consciousness (or of the spirit) light is a metaphor for love.

Love feels good because love makes it possible for things to come into existence, and also to continue to exist, and be held together, thereafter; whether that matter, mind, or body.

In the east, this darkest of all moonless nights is a celebration, and remembrance, of the fact that the absence of light makes us hungry for the light, that the absence of intuition and insight makes us hungry for insight, that the absence of understanding makes us hungry for understanding, and that the absence of love makes us hungry for love.

Both without, and within ourselves, light serves as a symbol, and a metaphor, for insight, intuition, understanding and love. This is why we use the word ‘seer’ to describe those with access to insight, understanding and love; all the good people this world has ever known; all the people who are able to integrate body, mind and consciousness into a seamless whole.

In the scriptures of the Sikhs, it is said ‘Jo Brahmande Soi Pinde, Jo Khojae So Pawai’.

This line translates roughly into the words ‘Whatever exists in the universe also exists within the form of this human body, and whoever searches within it shall find it’.

In every culture of the world, in one form of another, exist the dicta which state: ‘As above, so below’ or ‘As without, so within’. These dicta signify that the consciousness and the mind, which are embedded within (and embodied by) the physical body, are manifest everything in the external universe, and also enabling us to search, see and understand this manifestation.

With what are we supposed to conduct this search?

In the Christian scriptures, there is an emphasis on the use of the eye of understanding; an eye that is single; an eye that is without judgement; an eye that loves everything, and everyone, unconditionally, even as the manifestation of one’s own self; an eye that comprehends everything for what it is, and does not break up anything up into ‘good’, and ‘bad’.

In the Bible, Christ is reported to have said the following about such an eye. He is reported to have said, ‘The light of the body is the eye: if therefore thine eye be single, thy whole body shall be full of light’.

This signifies that we shall only gain the light that we need, to see, understand and love everything, and everybody, unconditionally and without judgement, when our whole being becomes filled with light. Christ also says that this can only happen when we transition from duality (i.e., seeing through the two eyes, a left-biased view and a right-biased view) to unity (i.e., seeing through the single eye at the centre of the head; also referred to as the third eye).

The purpose of being human is to seek the light, to seek insight, and understanding, and to seek love, all of which come from the light and also give rise to the light, in a spirit of oneness.

In the beginning, that love appears to come to us from without.

In the end, we understand that we are love, and that everything, and everybody, is love.

We are that love. We are also the lover. And we are the beloved. There is only one reality, and no other. And that reality, in this world, is best described as love.

This may be the true meaning, and significance, of the celebration of the festival of Deepawali.

Thus, it is desirable that the cleaning of the house, and the lighting of lamps, must be accompanied by the scrubbing of the mind and the lighting of the lamp of understanding; the understanding that everything is born from a single reality; and that everything happens by itself, with past cause leading to present effect.

In the words of the nineteenth century Indian mystic, Tulsi Sahab of Hathras (near Agra, Uttar Pradesh), in a reference to the heart (which is a part of the mind's system in the body, along with the spine), we are introduced to the following lines:

Dil ka hujra saaf kar, jaana ke aaney ke liyey; dhyan gairon ka utha, usko bithaaney ke liye.

Clean the chamber of the heart, so that the beloved can come into the heart, and stay there; let go of the contemplation of all who are not yours, to seat the beloved in the heart and the mind.

If our worlds and our lives appear to be in disharmony, and spent in conflict, it is because we have failed to scrub our heart and minds clean, and have paid attention only to the scrubbing of our houses, and our bodies, but not what lies within.

Similarly, if we have failed to light up our minds, with insights, and with understanding, it is because we have failed to light up our insides, and only paid attention to lighting up of our houses, and our pumpkin lanterns.

Whatever is within is what gets manifested without.

May we remember this at all times.

May we use these festivals to scrub and light up ourselves, and search long and hard within ourselves to see what we choose to manifest.

Let us offload the darkness of separation, bigotry, and hatred, and take onboard the light of unity, compassion and love.

Happy Deepawali and Halloween, 2021.