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CONFLUENCE OF OPPOSITES
According to Shayast La-shayast (xvii. 7),
"the soul of him who commits sodomy will become a demon, and the soul of him who performs religious rites of apostasy will become a darting snake."
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In chapter four of the Shikand-Gumanik Vijar the destiny of the soul is traced out in this way:
"Moreover, if the births of the worldly existence are mostly manifest through the occurrence of death therein, even then it is seen that that death is not a complete dissolution of existence, but a necessity of going from place to place, from duty to duty. For, as the existence of all these creations is derived from the four elements, it is manifest to the sight that those wordly bodies of theirs are to be mingled again with the four elements. The spiritual parts, which are the rudimentary appliances of the life stimulating the body, are mingled with the soulon account of the unity of nature they are not dispersed -and the soul is accountable for its own deeds. Its treasurers, also, unto whom its good works and offences are intrusted, advance there for a contest. When the treasurer of the good works is of greater strength, she preserves it, by her victory, from the hands of the accuser, and settles it for the great throne and the mutual delightfulness of the luminaries; and it is assieted eternally in virtuous progress. And when the treasurer of its offences is of greater strength, it is dragged through her victory, away from the hands of the helper, and is delivered up to the place of thirst and hunger and agonising abode of disease. And, even there, those feeble good works, which were practised by it in the wordly existence, are not useless to it, for, owing to this same that hunger and thirst and punishment are inflict
reason,
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