Claims and Teachings - Ahmad The Promised Messiah and Mahdi — Page 298
manen. tly, but also render the object of the union a certain fail- ure. Any disturbance in the true union is productive of immen- se harm and mischief. Such iri also tha case of the spiritual union of man with God. The person who cuts asunder his con^ nection from his heavenly Master, has his heart cankered and vitiated. His suffering is very great and knows no end. Again* as there is pleasure in the sexual union of man and woman for the production of new life, so there is bliss in the spiritual union of man and God for an immortal life. The bliss that is felt in the spiritual union far transcends all earthly and material enjoy- ments, and has nothing comparable to it in the pleasures of the senses. If the men of this world who are given to the worldly pleasures taste but once of this heavenly bliss, they would forget all their former pleasures for its sake. But what is to be deplored is the ignorance of most men as regards the source of this heavenly enjoyment. Their genuflexions and prostra- tions are not accompanied with the bowing down of the soul on the Divine threshold and hence their prayers are meaningless movements of the body. They perform their religious exercises with an absent rnind, and their prayers have no other signifi- cance than sitting and rising alternately. It grieves me still more when I see people resorting to prayers that they may be seen of men and revered and honored among them ; and their insincere prayers make them successful in the attainment of this mean object. Ah, ignorant souls ! they never think that if their false prayers can make them honorable in the eyes of men, would not true and sincere prayers make them honorable in the sight of God ? In short, indifference to prayers and remissness in them are due only to an ignorance of the pleasure and enjoyment with which true and sincere prayers are attended. In large cities and