Hello Tarquin.

I’ve been reading your stie and find it fascinating. While familiar in principle, the Sufi take and the other perspectives highlighted on your site shed new light on spiritual matters. I particularly liked this passage from the above post:

That religion deals with belief and faith, whilst the esoteric is in fact a quest for knowledge rather than an actual belief. This does not mean that a mystic has no faith, but rather that his faith is subordinate to (and constantly being redefined in the light of) whatever knowledge he possesses of these matters.

The convergence of these different paths, insomuch as they all lead to gnosis/enlightment, confirms my beliefs in the commonality of all things. We all have, once we get in touch with it, a common need for knowledge and meaning.
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Hi Coe

thanks for the comments! I was thinking along the same lines as you about this commonality earlier - of course the traditional mystics of most traditions claim that ‘all is one’ in some form or another but equally important is that many ‘religious’ formulations militate against this.

I think especially in ‘evangelical’ Christianity the idea that one can be ‘born again’ is essentially magical thinking and speaks against the journey to Gnosis as a path which has to be travelled- and one which there is no guarantee of success on.

Paul (who I am coming to appreciate more and more and who may have been seriously under-rated) takes the opposite view to this and is essentially a mystic when he says “work out your salvation with fear and trembling”.

In many ways the convergence of all different paths is evidence that there is a common thread but the fact that many people see divergence between traditions rather than the common ground is equally proof that we do not perceive unity. It is interesting why this should be really....