1976-July-16

Bilalian News

The Tree And The Vine: Part 2

Imam W.D. Muhammad

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104. Now have come to you,
From your Lord, proofs
(To open your eyes):
If any will see,
It will be for (the good
Of) his own soul;
If any will be blind,
It wilt be to his own
(Harm): I am not (here)
To watch over your doings "

105. Thus do We explain
The Sign* by various (symbols):
That they may say,
" Thou hast taught (us) diligently,"
And that we may make
The matter clear
To those who know"

Holy Quran Yusuf Ali Translation: Sura VI: Verses 104-105
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In The Name of Allah, The Beneficent, The Merciful; Peace and Blessings upon His Servant and His Messenger, Muhammad, forever. Amen.

My Dear Brothers and Sisters:
The tree has its roots deep in the ground so that it can get water to maintain its life without having to wait for the rain to fall from heaven. Society is like the tree. Human beings come up in the world and we are more concerned about things like meat, bread, and milk than we are concerned about correcting the problems in the heart or the problems in the head. We forget about the heaven of the heart and the heaven of the head and we just think about the body, the flesh, itself.

The Need For Moral Values

The Bible is not just speaking to material things deep in the earth when it uses the symbol of the tree. Water is a symbol of the human form that we need to survive as a human being because it is not something hard like a rock. If you put a grain on a rock, it will not give birth to life. But if you put a grain on land where there is water, it will burst forth with life. Human beings need moral substance, moral values or a moral body in order to live. No matter how much you grow materially, if you do not have some moral body you will be, in effect, "dead." You will not be able to enjoy the happiness that your wealth would give you if you were not morally dead. Many people become materially rich, but they cannot enjoy the blessings of richness because they are morally dead. They are like a land rich with water but without the water necessary to produce tender flowers. There is death present in that kind of people because there is no desire for morals (human nature).

The "Sand People"

The bank of the ocean gets plenty of water without having to wait for rain, but nothing grows there — there is only sand. No life grows on the seashore because the nature of the earth there has been so thoroughly and completely changed that it has no desire for water. The sand (the earth) has become small particles of granulated rock. Some people are like sand. Even though they may exist in the midst of an ocean of moral teachings, they are still so materialistic that they cannot sprout even one tender plant. Since they cannot give birth to even one blossom that will be a sign of beauty, they remain just like sand or rock. Even so, they are not impossible to change.

The Holy Quran says that sometimes water flows out of rock. This kind of people represent the very hardest of the people and they are usually found right in the spiritual circle (in the "water" of God). Instead of working for a living, these people feed on the life that is thrown out of the sea and they give nothing back in return.

Earthly Feeding And Heavenly Feeding

The body of the tree has the strength of the tree because the trunk holds up the high branches that stretch out with great weight. Water goes through the body and feeds the leaves. In the very top of the tree there is also a kind of feeding taking place. The tree feeds from beneath and it feeds from above. The leaves, which feed on sunlight and carbon dioxide, produce oxygen like human beings feed on oxygen and produce carbon dioxide. The leaves of the tree feed from above and the roots of the tree feed from below. Because the tree is a life that feeds from the material body and also from the heavenly body, the ancients saw it as a very good picture of the human society. There are some people who feed just from the ground and there are other people who feed from things that are above the ground, from higher moral values, from the light of truth, from the light of God, and from righteousness. In religion, this life is called "sun." Although the present Bible refers to Jesus as the "son of man," the original scriptures referred to prophets as the "sun of mind." The light (sun) of the mind is truth.

The Fig Tree

In the language of Bible scripture, the Jews are referred to as the "fig tree." The fig tree produces a fruit that has many small, hard seeds in it. Because the promise of God to Abraham was that his seed would be many in the earth, the wise writers of scripture used the fig tree to describe this covenant.

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"That in blessing I will bless thee, and in multiplying I will multiply thy seed as the stars of the heaven, and as the sand which is upon the seashore; and thy seed shall possess the gate of his enemies;..." (Genesis 22:17)
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They did this when they saw that the people who the Bible identifies as "Jews" had stopped respecting the blessings that God had promised to them. They began to see these great blessings as only material blessings. The fig tree produces a mild, sweet fruit. It is a tree that is very susceptible to diseases and to worms. When it gets old, it looks very unattractive. This ugly tree was used to describe the materialistic people because they only become more materialistic with age instead of seasoning in spirit and maturing in moral value. Instead of growing sweeter and increasing in purity, they degenerate into a body of worms that eat up the beautiful things in God's creation. The older materialistic people become, the more they want to eat up the society. This kind of people will never achieve the promise of Abraham; that is, the promise for their seeds to be many as the stars of heaven. The stars of heaven are lights that exist when darkness is on the earth. Instead of them getting the blessings of many lights that will give direction for the world when it is in darkness, they began to hope for the blessings of many dollars.

The Devil's Germs

The fig tree bears a sweet tasting fruit, and this materialistic world bears a sweet tasting religion. But if you had the knowledge to chew up and to digest their religion with deliberation, you would detect the hard seeds of materialism in that mild, sweet fruit.

The so -called religious teaching of the Western world is the kind of teaching that has made Western society a materialistic society. Don't you think it is a great contradiction that the so -called Christian American society became the most materialistic society on the face of the earth? Jesus the prophet (peace be upon him) did not preach materialism, war and greed - he preached humanism, charity, tenderness, and love. Jesus was a human being who sacrificed the life of material wealth for the higher life. The Western society could not have become a greedy, materialistic society if it had been following the true teachings of Jesus. It has not been eating the fruit of Jesus, it has been eating the fruit of the fig tree. The fig tree's fruit tastes mild and sweet like the fruit of Jesus, but inside the fig are the subtle germs of the devil's greed and materialism.

Your Brother, W.D. Muhammad

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Wisdom of Muhammad

If you try to raise children in that kind of hellish state, you will destroy them. They will have nothing to live for because there is no peace or cooperation between their parents. The mother calls the child at one moment from the kitchen and the father calls him at the same moment from the front yard. This kind of disunity will tear the child to pieces. It forces the child to make a choice between the mother and the father when there should only be one choice, and that is the family's choice. They should see mother and father as one. The Bible teaches that the man and the woman should become one flesh. The children should not see the family members competing with each other. Some mothers try to get a hold on the child so that they will have the child against their husbands and some husbands try to get the greater grip on the child so that they will have the child against their wives. If you are wrong, admit that you are wrong and let the child choose the better parent. You should never lie to your children. In many homes, the parents are engaged in a war to drown the ears of the child so the child will not hear the other parent. This is terrible.