The Living Universe

by Duane Elgin

  The lamps are different,

  but the Light is the same.

  One matter, one energy, one Light, one Light-mind,

  endlessly emanating all things.9

  In Buddhism, awakening experiences are often described with phrases such as “enlightenment,” “self-illuminating awareness,” “seeing the light,” and “self-luminous recognition without thought.” Buddhists also speak of a “clear light” (Prabhasvara) infused with wisdom, love, and creative power that permeates the universe with its shimmering presence. The clear light that infuses and sustains everything is a luminous presence, outwardly transparent and inwardly permeated with qualities such as openness and joy. The luminous energy at the foundation of reality is sometimes described as the “mother clear light.” The luminous awareness we realize in meditation is sometimes called the “offspring clear light” or “child of the clear light.”10

  Other spiritual traditions also describe a light that infuses the world with both physical illumination and wisdom. In the Tao Te Ching, the sacred text of Taoism, we find the following passage describing the way of a wise person: “. . . the sage is devoted to the salvation of all human beings, without rejecting anyone. He is dedicated to saving things, without abandoning anything. This is the practice of the clear light.”

  The revered poet Walt Whitman wrote about the colorless light at the foundations of reality: “ineffable light—light rare, untel-lable, lighting the very light—beyond all signs, descriptions, and languages.” In seeing this light at the foundation of all things, Whitman said he knew the universe did not consist of dead matter but was entirely alive. Andrew Harvey, a contemporary religious scholar and mystic, writes: “Divine Light is what is animating this universe. Light is what is creating everything. . . . Everything that we are, everything that we see, everything that we know is the Light dancing and playing—the Light knowing itself in a thousand different disguises.”11

  When reading these many descriptions of the nurturing “light within light,” I am again reminded of lying on the living room floor of our farmhouse as a child and absorbing the changing textures of light’s loving presence. If we look gently at the ordinary things in life—a piece of tile on a floor, the surface of a desk—and don’t press upon them with our seeing but simply receive what is before us patiently and with soft eyes, we can sometimes see an infusing and permeating clear light—a dancing liquid of delicate, transparent luminosity. Like heat waves rising from the Earth in the summer, although faint and insubstantial, we can discern delicate, rippling, shimmering waves of light that are the source and womb of material existence. We live within a field that is thick with energy and aliveness. If we overlook the fabric of seemingly empty space—if we look through it as transparency and do not consciously see into it with soft and welcoming eyes—we can overlook the aliveness at the foundations of existence.

  All of the world’s wisdom traditions point to the presence of a clear light infusing the universe that, although subtle and difficult to discern, is glowing with aliveness. The clear light of the Mother Universe is an ocean of intelligent luminosity that is not “in-visible” but “trans-visible” because it is far more than simple nothingness. The light of the Mother Universe is clear because it is unlimited and unbounded—and therefore completely lacking in obstruction. Because this clear light is the source and foundation of everything in our universe, it cannot be limited within the confines of our contracted world and so presents itself as transparent. Despite its transparent nature, this luminous and living presence has been recognized, tasted, and celebrated by sages throughout history.

  A Body of Music

  The universe is a single, extraordinarily complex, pattern of resonance. The world looks solid and concrete but upon close inspection solidity breaks down, and material reality becomes a vast ocean of vibrations, frequencies, and harmonies that converge, moment by moment, to produce the stable reality around us. Everything that exists—from atoms to humans to galaxies—has its “song-line” or unique orchestration that contributes to the whole. We are made from music. To say we are a body of music isn’t just poetic; it is also true.

  Physicists are now exploring the foundations of physical reality with what is called string theory. Despite its shortcomings, it is giving us a new way to picture matter. In this theory, matter is no longer seen as tiny, solid points or particles; instead, the particle nature of matter gives way to unimaginably small, vibrating loops of non-material strings. These loops of energy vibrate like violin strings and different vibrations are thought to generate different patterns that manifest as unique energy-particles.

  Given that resonance and vibration are fundamental to the universe, it is understandable that we would each embody a unique hum of being that is recognizable to others as they experience the feeling-tone of our soul. Different temperaments and personalities naturally express a unique symphony of knowing-resonance.

  Returning to the cosmic scale, many spiritual traditions portray our universe as being sung into existence. In the Bible, we read “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God Himself” (John 1:1). It has been suggested that the Word is the vast primal sound of creation itself.

  From the Islamic tradition, the Sufi poet Kabir who lived in India (1398—1448) spoke of the music of creation in his ecstatic poem “Sound”:12

  The flute of interior time is played whether we hear it or not,

  What we mean by “love” is its sound coming in.

  When love hits the farthest edge of excess, it reaches a wisdom.

  And the fragrance of that knowledge!

  It penetrates our thick bodies,

  It goes through walls—

  Its network of notes has a structure as if a million suns were

  arranged inside.

  This tune has truth in it.

  Where else have you heard a sound like this?

  The ancient Hindu Vedas (scriptures) tell us that in the beginning was Brahman, the Absolute reality. Brahman is often portrayed as the great sound that gives birth to entire universes. Here music is viewed as the divine thread that connects the individual soul with the Supreme Soul of the universe. Brahman manifests everything in the universe as vibrations, from the smallest to the largest. Physical forms are thus sound forms. Music can help us to spiritually awaken to the resonant soul of the universe. For many Hindus, the primal sound of creation—the “sound body” of Brahman—is embodied in the word OM, the sacred sound of the Mother Universe that evokes her core qualities.

  Chinese Taoist stories speak of the “Great Tone of Nature” and, in Indigenous cultures, the combination of chanting, drumming, and dancing is often used to connect with the spirit infusing the universe. Music provides a rich universal language for growing our soul. In the words of Plato, “Music gives soul to the universe, wings to the mind, flight to the imagination, and life to everything.” Beethoven said that “Music is the electrical soil in which the spirit lives, thinks, and invents.” In different ways, all of the world’s wisdom traditions recognize existence as a living field of music.

  We are all musicians of the soul, and the optimal condition for any person or society is a high level of creative tension. Think of a violin. If the strings are too tight, it will break the body of the instrument; if the strings are too loose, they will produce no resonance. Only when there is the appropriate level of creative tension can the violin make music. Likewise, to serve our soulful nature it is vital that we find our unique balance between straining so much that we harm the instrument of our being or becoming so slack in our lives that we are no longer engaged in a dance of participation and discovery. To play the music of our lives, we must become skillful musicians of our soul, continually discovering the right amount of creative tension.

  With careful attention to our everyday experience, we can cultivate the songlines or musical qualities we want within ourselves—for example, the tempo or pacing of our responses to life, the harmony or
disharmony of our communications, the degree to which we improvise in our interactions with others or, alternately, stick to classical scores and behaviors. We each bring a different songline to the larger orchestration that is the universe. Our orchestration matches our character and consciousness and is tuned through our bodily experience, emotions, and mental qualities. We participate in a cosmic symphony as a vast number of individual songlines come together in a new expression at every moment.

  A Body of Love

  The vibrations of sound, light, and knowing-resonance at the foundations of the universe convey a feeling tone. When skilled meditators from diverse traditions reach into the finest essence of reality, to the very foundations of existence, they report a common experience. The feeling-tone at the foundations of the universe is not a gray mechanical hum devoid of feeling; instead, it is a subtle resonance of aliveness and love.

  With love at the foundations of the universe, it is understandable that love is a core theme of the world’s wisdom traditions. The Encyclopedia of Religion states, “. . . many great figures have argued that love is the single most potent force in the universe, a cosmic impulse that creates, maintains, directs, informs, and brings to its proper end every living thing.”13

  Christianity is founded on the understanding that love is the essence of God and that our supreme task is to cultivate our capacity to bring a loving presence into this world. “Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love” (I John 4:8). “God is love, and anyone who lives in love, lives in God, and God lives in him” (I John 4:16).

  The Christian usage of the term agape (selfless and unconditional love) comes directly from the teachings of Jesus. When asked what was the greatest commandment, Jesus said “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.” (Matthew 22:37—41). As we extend our love into the world, it mirrors the love that God has for creation. In the words of the fourteenth-century English mystic, Julian of Norwich, “We have been loved from before the beginning.”14 We are created from love for love.

  Islam celebrates Ishq, or the divine love of God. This is also the focus of Sufis, who see the universe as a projection of God, whose essence is love. In turn, Sufism is often referred to as the “religion of love.” The great Sufi philosopher and mystic Ibn al-Arabi saw God as the “Beloved” everywhere. Through our eyes, the Beloved looks out and sees the world and is ultimately able to look back at himself with love. God loves himself through his creation. Al-Arabi wrote: “God is necessary to us in order that we may exist, while we are necessary to Him in order that He may be manifested to Himself.”15

  Abu-said Abil-Kheir (967–1049) was another Sufi whose passionate spiritual poetry expresses his intimate connection with the Beloved:

  Love is Here.

  It is the blood in my veins, my skin.

  I am emptied of my self.

  Filled with the Beloved.

  His fire seizes every part of my body.

  Who am I? Just my name; the rest is Him.

  Here is the wisdom of the Sufi poet Rumi with regard to love:

  Through Love all that is bitter will sweeten.

  Through Love all that is copper will be gold.

  Through Love all dregs will turn to purest wine.

  Through Love all pain will turn to medicine.

  Through Love the dead will all become alive.

  Through Love the king will turn into a slave!

  In Hinduism we also find the idea of bhakti, which is loving devotion to the supreme God. This is not romantic love, but an unselfish, sacred love that wants only union with the divine. Tiru-Mular, a Hindu poet of the Middle Ages, sang: “The ignorant say love and God are different. . . . When they know that love and God are the same, they rest in God’s love.” When the love of the devotee meets the love of God, there is an experience of undivided union.

  The Buddhist meditation teacher Jack Kornfield describes the unbounded love at the foundation of the universe in this way: “I will tell you a secret, what is really important . . . true love is really the same as awareness. They are identical.” As we deepen our awareness, we find that love is our core essence—at the very heart and center of our experience. Buddhism teaches a path of compassion, where we see ourselves as inseparable from the overall ecology of life. A core practice in Buddhism is cultivating metta (lovingkindness) toward all sentient beings.

  All religions recognize that a life force, whose essence is love, sustains and permeates all existence and is accessible to everyone. The Mother Universe holds us in love as, with limited consciousness and great freedom, we make the long journey of awakening. When we learn the greater our love, the greater our awareness, we further our evolution.

  A Body of Knowing

  Physics has revealed that beneath the seeming separation of things there is a deeper unity—a nonlocal connectivity to our universe. We live in a holographic universe in which everything is exquisitely connected with everything else. Everything is mutually interpenetrating. The world’s spiritual traditions agree that by going into the center of our life-stream we tap into the flow that sustains the entire universe and this naturally has great wisdom within it. The wisdom of creation is directly accessible to us as the hum of knowing-resonance at the core of our being. When we relax into the center of ordinary existence, we penetrate into the profound intelligence out of which the universe continuously arises.

  Because the universe is a unified system, it contains within it all of the conscious experiences of all forms of life. Understandably, to touch into the consciousness of the cosmos even briefly—to experience “cosmic consciousness”—is a profound experience.

  Jesus declared “The Kingdom of God is within you.” If we look within, we will discover immense wisdom within our direct experience. The “Kingdom” is also all around us. Recall Jesus saying in The Gospel of Thomas, “The Kingdom of God is spread out upon the earth and people do not see it.” The treasures of this kingdom are both within (the felt wisdom and love of the heart) and without (a divine presence infuses all of creation).

  All of the world’s wisdom traditions declare this world is infused with sacred meaning and knowledge. The direct experience of life carries its own meaning and requires no intellectual explanation. Playwright and Jungian analyst Florida Scott-Maxwell offered this wisdom when in her nineties she wrote: “You need only claim the events of your life to make yourself yours. When you possess all you have been and done, you are fierce with reality.”

  When we allow our ordinary experience of knowing to relax into itself, we find a self-confirming presence. When we rest in the simplicity of “knowing that we know” without the need for thoughts to confirm our knowing, we directly enter our stream of being. The nature of the soul is knowingness itself; when we rest within our soulful knowing, there is no distance between the know-er and that which is known. In turn, the familiar knowing of the soul is experienced as an inexhaustible mystery.

  Recognizing Ourselves Before We Die

  When our physical body dies, will we recognize our subtle body of light and knowing-resonance? Will we recognize the unique orchestration and music of our being, the distinct way we light up the world with our luminous knowing? If we fail to recognize ourselves in this way, if we require the assistance of a physical body to anchor our self-recognition, then we are limiting ourselves to a world of three dimensions. The afterlife is unknown; however, the body of resonance, light and love that lives in eternity is knowable. Our responsibility is not to be concerned with the afterlife, but to be so fully present in this life that we recognize the familiar resonance of who we are, wherever we might be.

  Many spiritual traditions tell us how important it is to be awake to our soulful nature at the time of death. What happens after we die seems likely to forever remain a mystery. However, i
f we do not become familiar with our subtle self while we have the precious vehicle of a physical body, we can fail to recognize ourselves when our physical body dies. In The Gospel of Thomas, Jesus says, “Take heed of the Living One while you are alive, lest you die and seek to see Him and be unable to do so.”16 Because we are created from the non-visible reality of the Mother Universe, we may die and not see that this is who and what we are. Our physical body is an anchor for light illuminating light, knowing recognizing knowing, and love appreciating love. If, in freedom, we have not made friends with ourselves during this lifetime, our physical bodies can die and the animating life energy of our being may dissipate and lose its coherence. We may then require the constraint of a material world to enable us to encounter ourselves once again.

  Years ago, in catching glimpses of myself as a being of knowing-resonance, I confronted the stark question we are each called to answer: Will I recognize myself without a physical body when I die? When I asked myself this question, in truth, I wasn’t sure I would. I had not made friends with myself sufficiently for me to feel confident that I knew myself as a body of luminous knowing-resonance. I was not yet adequately familiar with the music of my own being to recognize the unique orchestration I brought into the world. Looking beyond my short lifetime, I realized this unfamiliar-ity with myself would likely require further returns to our physical reality, so I would again have the opportunity for clear encounters with my cosmic Self. With this understanding has come decades of meditation and contemplation as I have sought to become a more intimate, soulful friend with myself—my own best friend who “I” recognize intuitively.