Arthur Szyk's Pesach

"Blessed are you, Lord our G-d Sovereign of the Universe who has kept us in life, sustained us and who has enabled us to reach this season." --A prayer from the Szyk Haggadah

In the 1930s Jewish artist, Arthur Szyk, living in his native Poland set to work to create a beautiful Haggadah, a religious book used during the Passover meal. Passover or Pesach, has been observed by the faithful since antiquity. It is an experience that is near universal in the faith life of Jews the world over. With beautiful calligraphy, stunning imagery, Szyk (pronounced Schick) created what some regard as a masterly and most meaningful work of its era.

A prominent Jewish artist during the 1930s rise of Fascism in Europe, his book was an offer of hope to the Jews in that dark time. Using the tradition of the Haggadah as his guide with illuminated text, Szyk created a testament and visual commentary on the struggle for human freedom. The major figures of Torah are depicted from Moses to Ruth, triumph over the injustice and oppression around them. A volume of the original The Szyk Haggadah translated into
English, in re-print, now allows English speakers to come to know the work and vision of its creator, Arthur Szyk.

Pesach, that spring time festival of hope, renewal and redemption begins well in advance of the day. There are a number of preparations to be made. It is a spiritual pilgrimage; it has to be made. Pesach doesn' t just happen. A home based festival, it is one of cleaning out and cleaning up both of one's home and of one's spirit. The night of the meal, the Seder is special; it is a meal, an experience of hope, an education, a time for prayer and for communal sharing.

More than food needs to be prepared before the Seder meal. Each individual must prepare spiritually for the observance. Contemplating how each of us may be liberated from those things spiritual and material which enslave us is a principle task. What those things are leads to a discovery of how they may be either managed or eliminated so that one may shine as the truest work of G-d's creation. Following this or any Haggadah is a path to the spiritual progress of human freedom. It entails both the profound, the sacred and the mundane, the cleaning of the home, the heart and the prayers of freedom.

Islam, In the Name of God, Most Merciful

"...Can any intelligent person accept that the vast scheme of being... should be based on aimlessness and purposelessness?" The Seal of the Prophet and His Message by Sayyid Mujtaba Musavi Lari

About the author, Lari is the son of the Persian Ayatollah Sayyid Ali Asghar Lari, grandson of Ayatollah Hajj Sayyid Abd-ul-Husayan Lari. Writing in another of the books, The Seal of the Prophets and His Message*, from a collected set, the younger Lari, Sayyid Ali takes up the subject of the prophets and shares with his reader an insight into them, and their meaning within the Islamic faith; for that matter, he gives an indication of the meaning of 'prophet' within all of the monotheistic world. Writing in a beautiful and provocative way, Lari challenges his reader to consider a deeper, fuller meaning of man's relationship to god and prophet.

"In the world where our existence unfolds, we have never heard of or seen an organization, or administration that is left to its own devices without a [proper] supervisor responsible for it." As human society is highly social and structured, Lari writes that there must be an intelligent, creative being who has given each creature, in his own kind, a proper and fitting degree of perfection. How then, he muses, can a person, such as a prophet, who may play such a central role in the life of natural man, man of the original face if you will, be overlooked as a credible and viable source in the evolution of a human being? Lari writes, "...Can any intelligent person accept that the vast scheme of being... should be based on aimlessness and purposelessness? So just as the orderliness of life springs from the Creator, the same may be said of the whole scheme of being, including the existence of the human being."

"The question," Lari suggests is directed at thoughts of "punishment and reward here." He writes, "A God who holds back nothing in order for every creature to attain its perfection cannot possibly be indifferent to the human being's attaining the degree of perfection suitable to him. He [God] guides the human being to material perfection... to his true perfection... ." The Quran [Koran] states, "We will give help to both groups, those who worship the world and those who seek the hereafter, so that none should remain deprived of the favor and generosity of their Lord." (17:18)

It may be deduced from various writing in the Quran that the mission of the Prophets is clear and mandated from heaven, so that they may purify and conclude differences among human beings. "It is He who sent a great Messenger among the unlettered Arabs, one from among them, who might recite to them the verses of God's revelation, purify them from the filth of ignorance and evil characteristics, teach them the Law contained in His book..." (62:2) Thus writes Lari, "the Prophets came in order to convey to human beings Divine knowledge, free from all forms of illusion and error. They came to proclaim to the human beings a series of truths which a person would never have attained unaided, such as matters lying beyond the natural realm, like death, the intermediate realm and the resurrection."

One of the very most fundamental tasks of the Prophets is then to bring the excesses of that which causes the human being trouble and torment in his [natural] rebellious spirit, under control and reduce them to order, so as to pacify its rebellious tendencies... in the 'school of the prophets,' pleasures are not negated." Their essential value remains intact. For Prophets are the source of virtue and the emerging of human ethics, nurturing and curing the spirit of man in such a way that through realization, each man attains a greater and deeper knowledge of truth and ethical values. In imitation of the Prophets a may may then engage in the struggle against the dark forces, those which hinder his development as a creature in truth and holiness. Divine guidance is essential to all human development in matters of spirit and morality.

*This volume is published in several languages from the original edition, Khatam-i anbiya va payamash, first published in Farsi. The English translation used here is by Hamid Algar copyright 2000, The Islamic Education Center, Potomac, MD.

Jung and the Monotheisms: Judaism, Christianity, and Islam

"All that is above is like all that is below; all that is below is like all that is above, in order that the miracle of Unity be accomplished." --The Tabula Smaragdina, attributed to 12th century writer, Hermes

Jung and the Monotheisms: Judiasm, Christianity and Islam is a book in five parts written by Joel Ryce-Menuhin. Ryce-Menihin explores a number of historical and current ideas within philosophy and religion, including Hermeticism, which includes alchemy, astrology and theurgy. Many if not most of the teachings of Hermetics can be traced back to the ancient Egyptians, Greeks, and Romans. Today it is in these forms which it survives. Hermetics is often described in terms of neo-platonism of the 200 C.E. period. Hermetics teaches that God, the creator, created man androgynous, in his own image. Many of its teachings were suppressed by early European monarchies, however Hermeticism resurged during the Renaissance period and carries forward in a number of traditions today, including Free Masonry, an outgrowth of Enlightened thinking of the same period.

One of psychologist Carl Jung's "most original contributions was his analogical [analogy, use of metaphor] work on development as psychological development in the same sense as the alchemists who were searching for ultimate self hood through the language of refining metals into gold," writes Ryce-Menihin. Of great interest to Jung was also the ancient notion of the Elixir of Life and the Philosopher's Stone, all deriving from ancient Arabic roots and resurrected in the Renaissance period. In these, Jung saw an alchemy, if you will, that occurred as patients came to him for analysis. Working through their interior thoughts, many he saw were attempting to realize spiritual development within these deep, subterranean elements of Christianized, Western culture.

The English nobleman and scientist of the Enlightenment, Sir Isaac Newton, eagerly sought in scientific experimentation the structure of a "micro" universe. Not merely satisfied with his discovery of gravity, Newton intuited and sought what some today might describe as Quantum Physics. He posited that there was yet another sphere, in which on the tiniest basis there existed elements of a secretive, mysterious world. In his day, the Renaissance of the 1600's, European thought was literally overrun with interest in mechanistic science, leaving alchemy and its proponents behind. Jung however has resuscitated interest; in the 20th century and now in the 21st century, we find Alchemy alive and well, often living under a label of "New Age." It is not new, nor unique to the age; its origins stretching far back into history of Kings, Queens and the Pharaohs of ancient Egypt.

To Jung, whose outspoken interest and allegiance to Orthodox Christianity is well documented, there was indeed an intersection between religion, psychology and western culture stretching back into the origins of human civilization. Jung believed that neither culture nor religion could be ignored in favor of psychology. Intuitively Jung recognized that dreams and other extra-normal experiences had roots in a deeply ingrained culture, and that most often religion was its vessel. It could not be ignored. For Jung, the Spiritual was the Religious; he did not dramatically differentiate them.

Famously when patients sought out Professor Jung for analysis, he inquired about their religion and their family religious traditions. He then advised his patients to continue in the tradition of their childhood, or to return to the tradition of their forebears. This, he believed,was a critical point for self understanding, a vessel in which a person's hopes, dreams, fears and wishes were most clearly contained. Today it remains a foundation of Jungian analysis. Indeed, as a child, Jung saw all things in the cosmos as circling around God! To resist this force, he believed, was a grave sin. His belief was strong, instinctive and intuitive.

As a young psychologist, Carl Jung fell in with the famed psychoanalyst, Sigmund Freud. Charged with the Socialist and Communist politics of the day, Freud was embraced; his conception of man was decidedly not religious, not Christian; he believed that man could be reduced [reductionism] to the motive and drives of the animal. This suited the policy makers of the day, who sought an "opiate for the masses," so as to quell and subvert their longings for personal and political freedom in the waning days of European Feudalism. However after a time, the two men fell out with one another.

Jung remained staunch in his views of religion, rejecting man as an animal, a mechanism of labor for use, believing God had a higher call than Freud allowed. The two men parted, effecting what would become one of the most remarkable thinkers of the 20th century, Carl Jung, who established what is today known as Jungian analysis. And Jung remained a member of the Protestant Christian denomination, the Swiss Reformed Church throughout his life time.