AZLY RAHMAN

I am so happy today. It is a real Merdekal Day for me. My first book in the beautiful Bahasa Malaysia and my fifth on Malaysian Cultural Studies will be out soon, entitled Kalimah Allah Milik Siapa?: Renungan dan Nukilan Tentang Malaysia di Era Pancaroba, due to be out in the Malaysian bookstores by Merdeka Day. I am elated.

A few months ago, when I was working on it, I wrote these, I am sharing with you wonderful and supportive readers since eight year ago when I first started writing for Malaysiakini. Here it goes:

My greatest moment of joy, in my years of writing, will be for my ideas to be translated into the Malay Language. I have often told myself that I will one day find that moment to celebrate I think this will be the moment.

To me, there is a sense of awe, mystery, magic and humility in this beautiful language I find enchanting as an effort to convey my ideas to Malay-speaking readers. I grew up in this language and my social and inner reality was constructed out of the tools and materials, artifacts and consciousness, offered by it.

This language will always be the beautiful bridge that connects me to the person I loved most in my life: my mother. She passed on a few years ago. My only regret is she did not get the chance to understand what I have been writing all these years.

Language constructs reality, alters it, shapes, it deconstructs it, or even destroys it to have it evolve into a karmic cycle. Throughout my life, my worldviews have vacillated and oscillated between these two worlds. I think in both languages and direct my consciousness to act in the worldviews of both.

There is a challenge, however. I write better in the English Language having been schooled in it since the day I set foot in an English-medium school in Johor Baru: Sekolah Temenggong Abdul Rahman 1.

The challenge is to express my thoughts to others in the Malay Language and to convey the meaning as accurately as I can by using metaphors, similes, examples, extrapolations, and clarifications in the Malay Language. The biggest challenge is to convey anthropological, philosophical, philological, and technological ideas to a speaker of the Malay Language.

In the case of my writings on the Allah Controversy, how, for example would the English language be able to fully convey the ideas of the nature and attributes of God when words such as ujud, qidam, baqa, muha-lafatuhu lil hawadis, walqiamuhu binafsih wahdaniat, kudrat, iradat, ilm, hayat, sama basar, qalam of ruh, jasad, zat, sifat, of the concepts addressing complexity of the ilmu kalam, and so on and so forth are to be translated or transliterated into the English Language?

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A meaningful Merdeka Day for me!

Feature Article of Sunday, 31 August 2014

Columnist: Kwarteng, Francis

It is a six-storied apartment complex. Folk consensus had it that it is The Country, so-called. Uncle Kweku Bonsam occupies the sixth floor, Aunt Kweku Bonsam the first floor. An anonymous straggle of characters takes up the intervening floors. And as is always the case, Uncle Kweku Bonsam duly pays Aunt Kweku Bonsam one of his many clandestine conjugal visits.

When? Today. Conjugal visit? Really? Somehow. Not really! What is it then? Surely we shall come back to this question again as it is left hanging in the emotional cobweb of The Peoples jaded imagination.

Uncle Kweku Bonsam and Aunt Kweku Bonsam have a gorgeous daughter between them. She answers to the name Akua Bonsam. But she is not merely a daughter as everyone else thinks but a son as well, a not-so-conscientious one at that. Akua Bonsam is an intersexual mystery, a male shadow clothed in the moral fiber of feminism, who suffers from a paralysis of the limbs, of the eyes, of the mind, the collective conscious. Of the eyes? Yes. Blindness. Akua Bonsam was born out of a fractious relationship of syphilitic poetry and chlamydial journalism and gonorrheic novelism. And although, she is indisputably actively motile and forever seems to be on the move developmentally and culturally and economically, she is glued to a fantastic fate of perpetual immobility. Her unapologetically pathetic situation, however, is indistinguishable from the Cartesian spatiality of existential actualities, which any true lover of political mathematics should of course want to associate with the point-set topology of circles.

That is the state of political affairs. It seems. Thus, moving endlessly in hazy circles is as problematically confusing as running back and forth on a misty treadmill of linear paths of political indecision, for prescience, a cultivated virtue by many a great man and woman, is not a functional locationality of ideational simplicity as exemplified by emotional circularity and sentimental linearity. Akua Bonsam, a mere six-year-old automaton, is deep asleep breathing heavily at the hour of her father Uncle Kweku Bonsams stealthy arrival in Aunt Kweku Bonsams neurotic one-bedroom apartment. Aunt Kweku Bonsams alert eyes quickly throws up a ray of fast-moving suspicion through slits of flooding light at a stranger fully attired in a mystery of forlorn darkness. She inches closest to the mystery of forlorn nightlines. Who is it? says she.

It is I! says he in a muffled tone, a playful act typical of a character on the verge of giving birth to a sensual bubble of childish mischief.

Immediately Aunt Kweku Bonsam auditorially catches up with the familiar voice of erotic presence. She gives the starving door a romantic nudge, letting him in on tiptoe. Before long, emotional shadows of hushed tones from scenes of conversational foreplay dissolve into assorted physical entanglements of aphrodisiac oneness on Aunt Kweku Bonsams lousy lone couch, each passionately fondling the other for the sensual whereabouts of his or her lost soul. Akua Bonsams visual tentacles are wide awake, piercing through the emotional concrete of nightly romance.

In no time running-beads of ghostly moans and groans of pretense slowly arrive at the doorstep of her argus-eyed ears. Akua Bonsam is jolted out of her deathlike sleep into an elderly world of sinful wakefulness. She sits up hesitantly, staring straight ahead into the fast-approaching distance. Her perceived blindness cuts through another thick fog of sheepish sleepiness, ultimately settling her focused attention on her parents sinusoidal lockstep of erotic rhythmicity. Her visual fixture on her parents sinful political nature goes on uninterruptedly for about six minutes or so. It does not take too long, however, before the sweltering sun of her cold stare gnaws into the rigid distance of telepathic conscience separating her from her mother, ultimately melting the distance into outwardly radiating smokescreens behind which lie buried layers of ignoble pretentions deriving from her parents political prostitution. The aura of Aunt Kweku Bonsams guilty conscience wakes up to Akua Bonsams righteous anger. Mother, what do you think you are doing? asks the latter.

That spontaneous question from Gods voice! The smiling sun of existential reality sets in nonetheless, instantaneously ceasing its rotatory progression around the earth of wickedness, paralyzing the romance of nightly confidence.

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Is Democratic Imperialism The Answer (1)?

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Teilhard de Chardin - Great Awakenings
Teilhard de Chardin, the French paleontologist and Jesuit priest is one of the fathers of evolutionary spirituality. Amy Edelstein describes the impact his life has on spiritual aspirants now....

By: Amy Edelstein

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Teilhard de Chardin - Great Awakenings - Video

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7/25/2014 Lynn Sparrow Christy
Producer/Host Timothy Roxbury Welcomes Author Lynn Sparrow Christy to the show Beyond Soul Growth, Awakening to the Call of Cosmic Evolution By Lynn Sparrow ...

By: Supernatural Realm

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7/25/2014 Lynn Sparrow Christy - Video

You can change your life.. You do have the power to create anything, anyway you wish to experience it. Consciousness Power is Who & What You Are!

I'm all about helping you to understand and experience a New Movement! This movement is TRUTH. Spiritual TRUTH!

The law of attraction is more than what you've been led to think it is. It's deeper than most teach.. it's about empowerment of YOU. You are the creative force.. you just don't realize it.

What I offer you is more than coaching, more than energy work to heal your body... I offer you the tools to SEE yourself as you really are.. to know yourself as Source Energy. This is the secret..

The secret is knowing how to work with the principles of life itself.. the law of attraction Creative LifePrinciplesto create with conscious intention.

Most of the people in the world, most of the time, create unconsciously from the place of fear, doubt, dread, past painful experiences and expectation that life is hard.

This is exactly what they get over and over again.

Perhaps you are one of those people.

You've worked hard, long hours and still you don't have the success you dream of.

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Consciousness Power - TransformationCoaching

It happens every year as Doubting Thomas makes his Easter appearance. Its a kind of resurrection of a glimmer of the faith that I long to recall in my flesh. I harken back to the time when I could embrace those wounds as proof. Oh how that faith comforted me. Resurrecting the memory of Thomas, who for years functioned as a trustedhero in my scant faith, now sends me into the dream of belief as the answer in and of itself; a kind of innocence that once gone is never forgotten. My nostalgia for my faith in belief will pass. But for just a moment or two, I pause to embrace the wounds, waiting for my doubts to open me to the evolving reality of now. Jump!!!

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Evolutionary theologianMichael Dowd insists that any understanding of God that is not synonymous with the all, reality, ultimacy, or nature is a trivial and inconsequential notion of God. He warns that how we think about God matters because our attitudes about reality lead to real-world problems.

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All the most renowned and revered mystics from the worlds great wisdom traditions all tell us the same thing. They all boldly declare that the ultimate nature of reality is that there is only one and not two. Time space and the entire creative process emerge from primordial emptiness or nothingness. Andrew Cohen

Andrew Cohen is a self-described spiritual teacher, cultural visionary, and founder of EnlightenmentNext and author of Evolutionary Enlightenment: A New Path to Spiritual Awakening.In his attempt to integrate science and spirituality,Cohen moves beyond into traditional enlightenment mystics and calls for us to align ourselves with the evolutionary impulse so that we might embrace the ever evolving creativity of which we are a part.

Cohen suggests that, Traditionally, spiritual teachings pointed to a static attainment. The aspiration for enlightenment was the aspiration to come to rest in a steady statein nirvana, in heaven. But when spirituality is reinterpreted from an evolutionary perspective, it is the aspiration for infinite becoming. The evolutionary impulse is an infinite reaching towards the future that affects the way we think about everything. Now we are no longer looking for spiritual liberation and release beyond the world, or after we die. We realize that the spiritual release is found in unconditionally, radically, and totally embracing the creative process of infinite becoming, as ourselves. Its a very different orientation to spiritual liberation.

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This weekend, Holy Cross partnered with the Trinity Institute in Manhattan to host a live webinar featuring Sister Joan Chittister. Sister Joan challenged traditional images of God and opened us to new evolutionary images of God which empower us to engage reality. It was an amazing program and you can view the keynote by clicking the link below.

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evolutionary spirituality | pastordawn

I Origins 3.5 stars out of 5 Starring: Michael Pitt, Brit Marling, Steven Yeun, Astrid Bergs-Frisbey Directed by: Mike Cahill Running time: 113 minutes

The Alfred P. Sloan prize may not have the name recognition or glam factor as the ever-coveted Oscar, but the $20,000 award named after the longtime head of General Motors is unique in the world of entertainment because it honours movies that feature science and scientists in a major role.

Director-writer Mike Cahill has won this prize twice since it was first handed out at the Sundance Film Festival in 2003: first in 2011 with the low-budget but intellectually rich sci-fi thriller Another Earth, starring Brit Marling and William Mapother, and in January with I Origins.

That may not seem so impressive given the relatively low profile of the prize, but it tells us a lot about Cahills overall approach to the creative endeavour, not to mention the universe as a whole.

Cahill clearly feels the mystery of the life experience, and he wants to explore the spiritual implications of consciousness. But hes too analytical to surrender entirely to abstracts and human fable.

In Another Earth, he tells the story of a college student who accidentally kills another driver, spends time in jail, then gets out on the eve of a momentous discovery: Earth has a twin planet weve never seen before, where we may well have a doppelgnger going through the same life crises.

Cahill said that movie was about externalizing our inner dialogue. I Origins probes a similar crack in the existential wallpaper by peeling back layer after layer of religious and scientific theory about what happens after we die.

Michael Pitt plays Ian, a researcher exploring the genetic roots of the human eye. Ian believes if he can find the origin species for sight, he will gain a better understanding of the eye and see evolutionary biology from a whole new perspective.

Yet, just as he intensifies his focus, hes blinded by a raging attraction for a woman he meets at a party. Sofi (Astri Bergs-Frisbey) is a free spirit, a model and a sex vixen. Shes also wearing a mask, but Ian takes a photograph of her uniquely coloured irises as a memento.

For the next few days, hes entirely distracted by memories of their brief encounter. Then, fate seems to intervene. In a scene borrowed from The Great Gatsby, he sees a billboard that features her unique eyes and begins to track her down.

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Movie review: I Origins a tale of faith, sceience and love (with video)

By Danny Peary

I Origins fits my category Movies That Should Play in Sag Harbor. The second science-based SF film written and directed by Mike Cahill (the impressive Another Earth, starring Brit Marling) opens in New York City on Friday. It is described in the press notes as being both a molecular biology thriller and a love story. Smart, provocative, and well cast, it begins as a SF film but no experiment goes wrong and leads to horrific consequences, and it turns into an exploration of reincarnation. Michael Pitt is cast against type as Ian, an atheist scientist who is studying the origins of the eye. Ian is aided in his research by Kenny (Steven Yeun of The Walking Dead) and Karen (Brit Marling), his brilliant freshman assistant. Ian falls for Sofi (Astrid Bergs-Frisbey), a mysterious, spiritual woman he meets at a party. Years after Sofis death, Ian goes to India because its discovered that a young girl, Salomina (Kashish), has eyes that are, impossibly, a perfect match for Sofis. Last week I participated in roundtables with Mike Cahill, Brit Marling and Steven Yeun, and Michael Pitt and Astrid Bergs-Frisbey. I note my questions.

Mike Cahill Roundtable

Q: What is the origin of your movie?

Mike Cahill: I didnt know I was going to make the movie until I met Michael Pitt. I was asked if I wanted to meet him, and since Id admired him for a very long time, I jumped at the opportunity, just to chat. We sat down in Brooklyn in a coffee shop, on Bedford Avenue in Brooklyn. During the conversation I told him the story of I Origins, and he was like, Thats really cool, Id love to hear more about that one day. And that set off a wildfire in my head to write it. Id had the idea for twelve years floating around in the ether, and Id written many, many things up until that point on it, but I didnt have a script. I wrote it two weeks later, that was in August, and we started shooting at the end of January 2013. It was one year in the making, and we released it at Sundance, literally to the day that we finished production, January 2014.

Q: I think it you should be commended for making affordable science fiction films.

MC: For me, the sense of wonder in movies, over the last fifty or sixty years, has partially been driven by visual effects, but it has also been driven by ideas. Cutting-edge visual effects that are in very expensive movies and give us a sense of wonder are lame after about two years. But an idea can last forever. And an idea is free.

Q: Virtual technology has actually become reality these days. The question is, How do you bring those elements in and separate the spiritual element?

MC: Well, I think writers of science fiction are often influenced by current technologies and the predictions of where they may go in the future. So they extrapolate whats going on now to tell their stories. Mary Shelleys Frankenstein was about electricity animating dead things and it was extrapolated to be this great horror/sci-fi, but thats what science fiction writers do, except for Jules Verne who was completely prophetic. Iris biometrics first began in 1987 at Cambridge University. Minority Report is set years after that, but its an extrapolation to where we may end up. On the other hand, I wanted to make my movie grounded in now, using current technologies.

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Dotting the Eyes in the Thought-Provoking I Origins

COTTONWOOD, Ariz. (PRWEB) July 14, 2014

Author Orville M. Baggett has written a treatise on with a focus on solving major issues through moral practices, After Humanity 50008: (+- a few million years) (published by iUniverse).

After Humanity 50008 is a blend of Baggetts observations with his logic and spirituality. Baggetts book of philosophy covers topics such as pollution, exploitation of Humanity and the misdeeds of politicians. He suggests that a strategy dealing with these issues based upon the concepts of strength, courage, compassion, honesty, intellect and responsibility would eliminate many of the worlds problems. It is his hope that within After Humanity 50008 is a message that can create a better world for all.

I thought I saw an opportunity to assist in making humanity aware of the huge potential power we have when we work together, Baggett says., I think we have what it takes power, intellect, resources so we have an opportunity.

An excerpt from After Humanity 50008:

In fact the truth of our past history should not be concealed but should be eagerly sought after, because the truth of our evolutionary history almost certainly provides a very concrete and very real basis for condence, and for monumentally positive rearmation of the success of the Human spirit in the face of all forms of adversity.

After Humanity 50008 By Orville M. Baggett Softcover | 5 x 8 in | 56 pages | ISBN 9781440119248 E-Book | 56 pages | ISBN 9781440119255 Available at Amazon and Barnes & Noble

About the Author Orville M. Baggett lives and writes in Cottonwood, Ariz. As a young man, he served in the Army. After Humanity 50008 is his first book.

iUniverse, an Author Solutions, LLC, self-publishing imprint, is the leading book marketing, editorial services, and supported self-publishing provider. iUniverse has a strategic alliance with Indigo Books & Music, Inc. in Canada, and titles accepted into the iUniverse Rising Star program are featured in a special collection on BarnesandNoble.com. iUniverse recognizes excellence in book publishing through the Star, Readers Choice, Rising Star and Editors Choice designationsself-publishings only such awards program. Headquartered in Bloomington, Indiana, iUniverse also operates offices in Indianapolis. For more information or to publish a book, please visit iuniverse.com or call 1-800-AUTHORS. For the latest, follow @iuniversebooks on Twitter.

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New book After Humanity 50008 looks to resolve world issues

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Grand Opening of our Cayce/Miller Caf, de Laski Education Center, and more!
Celebrate With Us! Friday, June 27 from 2 to 5 p.m. EDT Grand Opening of our Cayce/Miller Caf, de Laski Education Center, and more! Our program will begin at 3:30 p.m. Join us at our headquart...

By: Edgar Cayce #39;s A.R.E.

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