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the chalk board. This aliph is without form and is the all pervasive Divine. This knowledge is a matter of experience which cannot be written. A parallel idea is found in Christianity, where God is described as the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end. In mystical Judaism this same idea is know in the correspondence between the first letter of the Hebrew alphabet, the aleph, and Ultimate Reality.
When Guru Nanak (founder of Sikh Dharma) was a child he went to a Mullah (Muslim clergy) to study. The Clergy gave him letters from the Arabic alphabet—aliph, be, etc.—to memorize. Guru Nanak duly repeated each letter of Arabic. He asked the Clergy to tell him the meaning of aliph. The teacher replied that the meaning is one. Then he asked for the meaning of be, the second letter of the alphabet. The teacher replied, two. Guru Nanak said, “Please let me understand the one (One Divine Reality), before I take up the study of two."
What kind of understanding of aliph was Guru Nanak referring to that enabled him to become a great sage? Muhammad himself, although not a scholar, received the verses of the Holy Koran. How was he able to receive and repeat the Divine Revelation? It is said that for those whose heart is pure and full
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