Indic and Semitic Wisdom: Interfaith Dialogue

Revelation

"God Is the Author of Every Sacred Book—And His Final Scriptures Are Easier for a Tired, Weakened and Senile Humanity."

Let us clarify that all sacred texts contain inexhaustible depths, for they all emanate from the same Divine Author. Yet the last of the Revelations are distinguished by their greater accessibility: they are easier in form, not in substance. Dr. Martin Lings observes that the last Divine Revelations adapt to a diminished human capacity in the latter days,

“In the later religions, it is as if Providence had shepherded mankind into a narrower and narrower valley: the opening is still the same to heaven but the horizontal outlook is narrower and narrower because man is no longer capable of taking in more than a certain amount."

Source: The Essential Rene Guenon, Introduction

In the Golden Age, humanity was like a youth at the peak of his powers, with all his faculties intact. By the end of time—the Iron Age—he is like a frail old man: bedridden and disabled. Such was the traditional view of human history: not a tale of progress but decline.

Notes 

* The Vedic scriptures are one of the oldest sacred texts and they express the supreme truths of non-duality openly and explicitly without fear of being misunderstood. Many ancient sages across the world consider non-duality to be the ultimate Truth and the highest understanding of Divine Oneness but to express it openly was only possible in the Golden Age (Satya-Yuga). In later religions, such as Christianity and Islam, these non-dual teachings are present within the text but are more hidden and implicit. In Sufism, the highest Truth is called The Secret (As-Sirr) which cannot be divulged openly to others without preparation because it can lead to confusion and heresy in this dark age.

The Difference Between Salvation and Spiritual Awakening?

Question:

What is the difference between Salvation and Spiritual Awakening?

Answer

Salvation is spiritual bliss in the afterlife whereas spiritual awakening is a foretaste of that bliss in this very life.  The latter is more difficult to attain. 

Question:

Does Islam emphasise salvation over spiritual Awakening? Does Hinduism and Buddhism emphasise the opposite?  

Answer:

It is true that the average Muslim is more concerned with salvation and accumulating spiritual merit for his afterlife rather than spiritual awakening in this world which often seems unattainable to ordinary individuals. However, it would be wrong to say there is no concept of spiritual awakening in Islam, just as it would be wrong to say there is no concept of salvation in Hinduism and Buddhism. 

In the Indic traditions, salvation is determined by the principle of karma where puṇya (merit) and pāpa (demerit) affect one's karmic balance and destiny hereafter. Similarly, within Islamic mysticism (ʿirfān, Sufism), there is a rich tradition of seeking mystical knowledge (maʿrifah) and spiritual unveilings (kashf) in this life, paralleling the Buddhist and Hindu ideals of spiritual awakening or Enlightenment.

As a general truth:

"Spiritual awakening is salvation here-below.

Salvation is spiritual awakening Hereafter."

All sacred traditions acknowledge that humanity in the latter days becomes spiritually weaker. Islam, as the final revelation, emphasises salvation in the afterlife because spiritual awakening here-below is less attainable for the masses in the latter days. This is a form of divine expediency in which teachings are adapted to the diminished spiritual capacity of the age. This is what Buddhist term upāya (“skilful strategy”).

A similar shift is seen within Hinduism: in the latter days, the direct path of self-inquiry (jñāna yoga) is deemed less accessible, and bhakti yoga (devotion to the Lord) has risen to prominence, ensuring the path to God remains open to the majority.

Notes:

1. According to a Hadith, there are seventy thousand veils between the Creator and creation (the Absolute and the relative), symbolising different degrees of spiritual awakening/unveiling that are possible. While absolute unveiling may seem unattainable in this life, partial unveilings (kashf) are possible and are not strictly reserved for saints and sages (awliya).

Semitic and Indic Cosmology

Frithjof Schuon observes that the Semitic religions—Islam, Christianity, and Judaism—emphasise obedience, action, and sacred Law which means God is primarily addressing human will rather than intellect. In contrast, the Indic scriptures  - Hinduism and Buddhism -speak chiefly to  the intellect. This is not a matter of superiority, but different points of emphasis. 

One way of illustrating this contrast is the teaching of multiple worlds - what moderns might call a multiverse. The Semitic revelations remain largely silent on such a belief, since it does not concern our personal salvation and can even lead to distractions. The Indic scriptures, however, explicitly affirm the existence of countless worlds (lokas), each one unique from the other. Such teachings are included in their scriptures because it would not satisfy the contemplative intellect that an Infinite God only created one world.  

What do the two traditions say about the origin of the cosmos?

 Semitic cosmology is creationist, teaching creatio ex nihilo — that God created the world out of nothing. This implies a fundamental distinction between Creator and creation. Indic cosmology is emanationist, teaching that the cosmos is an outflowing of the Divine, like rays streaming from the sun. This implies continuity and connection between Creator and creation (the Principle and manifestation). 

The image of a spider’s web is illuminating here where God is envisaged at the Centre. Creationism emphasises the concentric circles of the web, each circle separate from the others — a symbol of the seperation between God and all levels of reality. Emanationism, by contrast, emphasises the radiating threads streaming out from the Centre, revealing how the Divine Presence penetrates every circle of existence, without which it would collapse. The gaps grow wider in the web as we move away from the centre which implies absence of God meaning privation, limitation, ugliness, suffering and evil. Creationism stresses separation and Divine distance; emanationism stresses continuity and Divine nearness. St. Thomas Acquinas affirms that these two perspectives are not contradictory but complementary.

Broadly speaking, the Semitic religions do not dwell extensively on cosmology or the origin of life but focus more on morality and ultimate destiny. This can at times feel problematic for minds seeking a more detailed cosmological vision that can seriously challenge the narratives of modern science. In such circumstances, it may be advisable to study the cosmologies of other traditions to broader their perspective. This is not antithetical to Muslim belief, for the Prophet ﷺ said: “Wisdom is the lost property of the believer; he has a right to it wherever he finds it” (Source: Jāmiʿ al-Tirmidhī, 2687). This is something that traditional Muslims understood wholeheartedly, but which many modern Muslims struggle to accept. Shaykh Hamza Yusuf and others point out that many classical Muslim scholars quoted Plato, Aristotle, and even Hindu sages—something almost unthinkable for the modern Muslim, weighed down by a kind of inferiority complex after colonialism.

Notes 

1. Indic cosmology teaches that consciousness produces physical reality. Consciousness creates the world, not the other way round. Evolution reverses this teaching, claiming that physical matter comes first, followed by plants, animals, and man, with consciousness appearing last in the order.

The Indic scriptures teach that we exist in the mind of God, metaphorically speaking. All forms of consciousness exist within the broader Divine Consciousness that encompasses and sustains them in a shared dream world. What we call “physical external reality” is actually a projection of consciousness and a part of ourselves. Such a holistic worldview is universal amongst the ancients and affirms that all is interconnected, all is One, and that nothing exists completely outside of us. Those who imagine such a division exists fall into a Cartesian dualism — the false split between mind and matter that has haunted the modern West for centuries.

The universe is therefore comparable to a dream: vivid and immersive, yet relative when measured against higher orders of reality. The seven heavens, the seven hells, and this earthly plane each represent different levels of consciousness — stages of awakening. The Prophet Muhammad ﷺ said: “Man is asleep, and when he dies he awakens.” 

Let us clarify that these teachings should not be confused with solipsism, the claim that only one’s private mind exists and everything is simply an appearance within one's head. Traditional metaphysics speaks not of the individual ego but of the Divine Self as the ground of all reality.  

Difference between Metaphysics and Theology: Exoterism and Esoterism 

Theology expresses metaphysical truth in a simple way for the majority. In other words, Theology serves as a mask because metaphysical Truth in itself is too dazzling. Metaphysical truth is pure and unfiltered, while theology is its adaptation—an attempt to express the inexpressible through symbols and imagery accessible to the many. For some, this theological imagery can appear simplistic, sentimental, childish or overly anthropomorphic. Many who lose faith for this reason can often have it rekindled through metaphysical teachings- whether in Vedānta within Hinduism, Sufism within Islam, Kabbalah within Judaism, or Taoism within Confucianism. 

It is like a lover suffering from amnesia, searching for his lost beloved yet failing to recognise her when she appears veiled behind a mask. Through the mask, he sees a face that seems less radiant than he had imagined. Only later does he learn that what he took for her true countenance was in fact a veil—worn because her beauty was too blinding to behold directly. Then at last he realises who she truly is.

Notes 

1. This is the traditional distinction between exoterism and esoterism: the outward and the inward, the shell and the kernel.