Generally Western culture is grounded in scientific fact, in which things are only real if you can see, study, or examine them, or if they are verifiable by others. From a spiritual point of view there are many things we don’t understand about our universe and reality. The things we don’t understand appear to us to be magic or miracles. Some of the things experienced on the mystical path appear to be magic because we don’t understand them or how they work. Magical things can and do happen and the whole truth of what is, is beyond our current scientific understanding.
Some aspects within religious or mystical traditions contain elements that are considered magic, including incantations and creating amulets. However, in most communities there is a resistance to practicing the magic portion of their mystic tradition and they attempt to divorce magic from their religion in the fear that magic might be used for dark purposes.
However, a well-balanced religious spiritual tradition should include elements of magic, because these elements of magic allow the adherent to relate to the deeper esoteric spiritual teachings of his faith. Naturally, however, the magic elements are not the entirety of the religious tradition, and they need to be viewed in the larger context of a robust relationship to mysticism.
People who remove magic from a religious spiritual tradition and make it instrumental to their relationship with the divine are not doing justice to the whole picture of a spiritual life.
Many modern people have difficulty articulating a belief in a divine presence, or in miracles. However, miracles surround us at all times, all we have to do to see them is to take time away from the general distractions of our physical life. Most people have stopped seeing miracles because they’ve become commonplace and have been trivialized by their commonality. Many things we take for granted can be seen as miracles when we stop to contemplate how complex they are or if we consider what it took to create them. Being in a state of radical amazement helps those mystically inclined see the small miracles that occur constantly around them, such as the setting of the sun or the blooming of a flower. The mystical approach acknowledges that we are surrounded by miracles, because the miraculous is an extension of the awareness of our divine being present in every moment.
Most people view themselves as independent self-enclosed entities, however mysticism shows there is deeper reality, s divine union in which all beings and energies vibrate with a natural wavelength and are interconnected and inseparable. This interconnectivity means that our consciousness is constantly interacting with other beings and energy vibrations around us. This vibration interaction occurs all the time and we exist in an interdependent relationship with all those around us.
Many people believe miracles are an exception to natural law, however in the mystic’s experience they are only the expression and understanding of the higher vibrations of natural law. Miracles are the manifestation of our understanding, or our attunement to a different rate of vibration which allows things to shift and change in what seems to us to be a miraculous way.
Featured in this series: Fr. Richard Rohr, Timothy Freke, Rabbi Aubrey Glazer of Congregation Beth Shalom, Mary Reed, Lama Palden Drolma, Paramacharya Sadasivanathaswami at the Hindu Monastery in Kauai, Dr. Carol Weyland Conner Murshida of Sufism Reoriented, Sufi Hadi Paul Reicherz, Shankina Reinhertz, Pamela Desvernie, Itara O’connell, and Guy Douglas.
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