HISTORY OF WITHOUTS

thinking, while the human heart is the centre of feelings and emotions. That is why man has always believed in heart-based spirituality. Hence, a spiritual philosophy has been formed on the basis of this supposition. The belief has developed that the human heart is a source of spirituality and, by awakening this latent source in the heart, spirituality can be attained. Scientific research has proven this supposition to be baseless. The only centre of both thoughts and feelings is the human mind. So far as the heart is concerned, it is merely a means of the circulation of the blood and nothing more. This is the reason why, despite spiritual exercises for the last several thousand years man has gained nothing but ecstasy—far from intellectual development—on the basis of what he conceives to be spirituality. This kind of spirituality, in fact, is limited in its form, and is not spiritual development in the real sense of the word. As we know, ecstasy is only a pleasant but indefinable feeling, while the greatest quality of man is the capacity to think. All developments in human history have been achieved by employing this thinking faculty. This being so, if spirituality has an existence, it should also be attained at the level of the mind. The source of all human progress lies in the intellectual faculty of the human mind. Similarly, the ways and means of spiritual development should also lie in intellectual activity. Spirituality is in fact, a high level of the realization of truth. It has nothing to do with any vague type of ecstasy. That is why real spirituality can only be one which is achieved at the level of the mind, and not at the level of the heart. Due to the ignorance of this reality, man has failed to achieve real spirituality throughout human history. What he took for spirituality was something else. And because of the ignorance of true spirituality, he could not begin his journey towards it. Perhaps there is no tragedy greater than this in the entire gamut of human history. o The beginning of the intellectual process is the ‘deconditioning of conditioned minds’.