In the last part, we watched thinking run all the way to its edge and stop — the mind simply can’t reach the One who made it. But when the thinking stops, something opens. This part is about what the mystic actually sees when it does: that everything, all of it, is One. It builds toward one of the most breathtaking lines in the whole book — the universe became man, and man became universe.
Shabestari goes on to say that the universe is limitless, but that everything is really a replication of “One,” the original source. Only when you go beyond the superficial consciousness can you see that all those numbers are actually one.
When you reach higher consciousness, you’ll see that HE (the universal spirit, God) is actually the Seer, the Seen, and the Seeing! Everything is God. The Hindu Upanishads have many statements that are considered Great Pointers; one of them is “Sarvam khalvidam brahma,” which basically means: truly, all this is God.
The Sufis want to experience nothingness, to lose the illusory consciousness of individual existence — because only in that state can you awaken and realize that everything is HIM, the Universal Spirit. Call it God, call it Him, Her, It, Buddha — call it Mickey Mouse! It doesn’t matter; language can’t explain it anyway!
Another great statement from the Hindu Upanishads says, “Tat Tvam Asi” — Thou art That!
So not only is everything HIM, but you are also HIM, or HER. You and I don’t really exist as separate individuals; we are all one spirit, experiencing itself as many!
Now let’s slow down and go through the rest of Shabestari’s answer, piece by piece. It’s the deepest stretch of the whole chapter, and the pictures he paints are worth sitting with.
The mirror of nothingness
Here’s the engine under everything he’s been saying. Nothingness, he says, is a mirror.
God is the only real thing — pure Being. He holds up nothingness like a clean mirror in front of Himself, and everything you see, the whole universe, is just His reflection in it. The One never turns into many. It only looks like many the second it’s reflected — the way one face becomes a thousand faces in a room full of mirrors.
Non-existence is the mirror, the world the reflection, and man the eye of it — while the hidden One is the light within the eye.
So why the mirror at all? There’s a famous saying: “I was a hidden treasure, and I wanted to be known, so I made the world.” That’s the whole reason anything is here. God was hidden, He wanted to be seen, so He put His reflection into the empty mirror — and that reflection is you, me, and everything else. And here’s the strange part: you’re the eye inside the reflection, and He’s the light inside your eye. An eye can’t turn around and look at itself. That’s exactly why you’ll never catch God as a thing you look at — He’s the one doing the looking.
A hundred suns in every atom
Then the poem goes wild for a while. A hundred suns in every speck of dust. Split one drop of water and a hundred oceans pour out. A whole world inside a single seed. A sky inside the tiny black point of a gnat’s eye.
It sounds like exaggeration. It isn’t. He’s saying the whole is fully present in every part. God isn’t hiding somewhere behind the universe — He’s completely there in the smallest piece of it. That’s how the Lord of both worlds can live in something as small as your heart.
One point — and all of time is now
And if everything holds everything, then time falls apart too. All of it — every age, past and future — is packed into this one moment. The making of Adam and the coming of Jesus are happening right now.
This is that line again: the universe became a human, and the human became a universe. It’s all woven so tightly that if you pulled out a single atom, the whole thing would collapse. Nothing is separate. Nothing is extra. And behind every tiny speck, he says, the face of the Beloved is hiding.
About the world, you have only heard words
Come, tell me — what have you seen? What did you grasp of appearances, or of meaning? What is resurrection, and what is this world?
Now he grabs you by the collar. You keep saying “the world, the world” — but what have you actually seen? Nothing, he says. Because you’re asleep, and everything you call “seeing” is a dream. One day you’ll wake up and realize the whole thing was a picture in your head. And when the real Sun finally rises, all the little lights — sun, moon, stars — just vanish. One ray of it touches a mountain and the mountain breaks apart like colored wool.
The call: leave the fading lights and travel
Act now, while action is still within your power; When you no longer can, what use is knowing? What shall I say of the Realm of the Heart To you, whose feet are sunk in the mire? The world is yours, yet you remain helpless; Has anyone ever seen one more deprived than you?
So he pushes you hard: do something now, while you still can. What’s the use of knowing, if you never move? This is the message of spirituality and mysticism: don’t just be a philosopher — work your way toward the ultimate, every single day.
Don’t just sit reading scriptures and dwelling on your plight. Do something — even something small. A single act, repeated faithfully, becomes a force that conquers all.
Go forth like Abraham, and seek the Truth; Turn night to day, and day again to night. The stars, the moon, the mighty sun alike Are but the senses, fancy, and the mind. Turn from them all, O traveler on the Way, And ever say: "I love not those that set." Or walk this path as Moses, son of Imran, Until you hear: "Indeed, I am God."
If you really want this, get up and go. Whatever shows up on the road, keep walking past it — don’t stop and camp there. Don’t wait around for company or an easy ride. Go a little crazy like Abraham: seek the ultimate truth and don’t settle. Or meditate like Moses until you reach the peak of your being and hear the inner voice — “Indeed, I am God.”
These are all paths to God within us, and yet we don’t walk them. When Shabestari says to meditate like Moses until you hear the inner voice, this points to the path of Yoga called the Yoga of Inner Sound, where one meditates until he or she hears the most subtle sound of creation within, and becomes united with it, and free.
The mountain of “I”
So long as the mountain of your own existence still remains, The cry of "Show Yourself to me!" is answered only by "You shall not see Me." In truth, the Divine Reality is amber, and your being but a straw; If your mountain still endures, what path remains for you? Should a single flash of Divine Manifestation strike the mountain of selfhood, That lowly mountain would become mere dust beneath the feet. By one ecstatic attraction, a beggar becomes a king; In but a moment, a mountain is reduced to a single straw.
But here’s the catch, and it’s really the whole thing. As long as the mountain of your “I” is still standing there — your ego, your feeling of being a separate someone — the answer to “show me, God” is always “you can’t see me.”
You’re like a tiny piece of metal; the Truth is a magnet that would pull you right in. But if you insist on staying a mountain, there’s no way through. The good news: let one flash of that Light hit the mountain, and it crumbles to dust. In a second, a beggar becomes a king. So follow a real Master, rise past both worlds, and you’ll finally see everything the way it actually is.
The universe is the book of God
Then he gives one of the most beautiful pictures in the whole book. For someone who’s awake, the entire universe is a scripture — God’s other holy book, written not in ink but in things. Every level of creation is a line of it. And the very last line, the one that finishes the book, is the human soul.
To the soul illumined by Divine Revelation, The entire universe is God's book in motion.
The Throne and the heart
Be not imprisoned by the elements and laws of nature, Come forth and contemplate the works of divine manufacture. Reflect upon the creation of the heavens above, That you may be praised among the signs of Love. Look once and see how the Mighty Throne is spread, Encompassing both worlds within its thread. Why is it called the Throne of the All-Merciful Name? What link has it with the human heart's own frame? Why are they both in ceaseless motion bound, Never for a single moment resting, still or sound?
He tells you not to stay stuck inside the physical world — step back and look at the workmanship. Then he asks a quiet, surprising question: why are God’s great Throne and the human heart both always moving, never still? Because the heart, he hints, is the center of that Throne. Give it a day and a night, and your own self becomes the throne of God.
The turning heavens, and the one hand behind them
From Him, why do these turning bodies move? Look well and see, and seek to understand and prove. From east to west like a wheel they spin and flow, Unresting, without hunger, without sleep, they go. Each day and night the greatest turning sphere, Completes its circuit round the world held near. And from it too, the other heavens all, Within their turning spheres do rise and fall.
Here he walks you through the old map of the sky — the spinning spheres, the zodiac, the fixed stars, the seven planets from Saturn down to the moon, all turning without rest like a giant water-wheel. It’s gorgeous, but that isn’t really his point.
His point is that this whole enormous machine turns because one hand keeps it turning. He even corrects the astrologer, gently: sure, the stars matter — but if you have no faith, you’ll mistake the tool for the toolmaker. Behind the whole spinning sky there’s a single potter, and every single moment He’s shaping a new pot out of water and clay. One maker, one workshop. And the stars themselves aren’t gods; they rise and fall too, and even “the heart of the sky is on fire” — burning with longing for the One who made it.
Even earth, water, air, and fire — four things that fight each other by nature — are made to get along, and out of them come rocks, plants, and animals. Each one is held by God in its own way: the rock pressed down, the plant pulled upward as if it were in love, the animal driven to keep its kind alive. All of them, whether they know it or not, are bowing to the same One and looking for Him.
A note for those who love astrology: no culture has ever produced a more accurate and sophisticated system of astrology than India — and yet all the enlightened masters of that land kept saying the same thing. It’s true that the stars can show what is good and what is difficult on your life’s path, but don’t forget who created the stars and is running them. Don’t think your destiny is in the hands of moving objects in the sky. It isn’t — it’s in God’s hands. And the closer you get to God, the less significant your astrological chart becomes. Put another way: for a serious spiritual seeker, the chart no longer defines the destiny. God and Guru can change it. Shabestari goes on to say:
O ignorant one—there is wisdom in the being of a gnat, And is there none in Mars or Saturn at that? But when you look into the root of this design, You see the heavens move by order divine. The astrologer, lacking the light of faith within, Speaks only of effects from shapes and signs of spin. He sees not that this green turning sphere above, Is bound by God's command and will and love.
Man: the last word — and where thinking finally ends
In the end it was the soul of man that appeared — and both worlds became a gift of his being. You were the reflection the angels worshipped — and so they were told to bow to you. You are the kernel of the world, and so you stand at its center; know yourself — for you are the soul of the world. You hear, you see, you live, you speak — all of it yours, yet not from you, but from There. Bravo — the First that is the very Last! Bravo — the Hidden that is the very Manifest! When thinking reaches its end, only wonder remains — and here the whole discussion of thought is sealed.
This is where the whole chapter comes home — and it comes home to you.
The human being showed up last in creation. That isn’t an afterthought; it’s the point. You come last because you’re what everything was building toward. In a way, both worlds were made for your sake.
Even your dark side has a job. Think of a mirror: plain glass shows you nothing. It’s the dark backing behind it that finally lets you see a face. Your flaws, your shadow — they’re part of what lets the light actually show up.
That’s why the old story says the angels were told to bow to Adam. A human being is a reflection of the very One they were worshipping. You’re the center of it all, and every soul is folded up inside you. So his whole message comes down to one line: know yourself — because you are the soul of the world.
And how does a God with no limits reach into this world? Through you. His power, His knowing, His will — they all show up through a human being. You see, you hear, you live, you speak. But none of it is really yours. It’s all on loan from Him.
Even your own body is more than we can figure out. The doctors, he says, still get lost inside it — every one of them admits he never reached the bottom. If we can’t even finish mapping the body, what makes us so sure we’ve mapped God?
So he ends right where he started. The First turns out to be the Last. The Hidden turns out to be the most obvious thing of all. You spend your days unsure about your own self — and maybe, he says, that’s fine. Maybe it’s better not to try to pin yourself down with your mind at all.
Because when thinking goes all the way to the end, it doesn’t hand you an answer. It hands you wonder. And right there, in that quiet not-knowing, Shabestari closes the whole question of thought.
📖 Read the Full Series: Garden of The Secret
Introduction · Part 2 · Part 3 · Part 4 · Part 5 – Thought · Part 6 – The Right Thought · Part 7 – The Universe Became Man · Part 8 – Who am I?