ordinances. All minds were turned towards deducing those ordinances. All hearts were eager to know, “What does our Sustainer want from us?” All that happened at that time did so in such a way as to make this known and understood. Discussions at that time concerned them. Thus, since everything and all situations and discussions and conversations and stories occurred in such a way as to give some sort of instruction in these meanings, and since this perfected the Companions’ capacities and illuminated their minds, and since their ability to interpret the law and deduce its ordinances was ready to be lit up like a match, no one at the present time can reach in ten years or perhaps in a hundred, the level of deduction and interpretation they reached in a day or a month, even if they have the Companions’ intelligence and capacity. Because now, worldly happiness is the focus of attention in place of eternal happiness. Humankind’s attention and view are directed towards different goals. The struggle for livelihood together with lack of reliance on God have bewildered man’s spirit, and naturalist and materialist philosophies have blinded his intellect. As a consequence, just as the social environment does not strengthen a person’s mind and capacity in respect of interpreting the divine law, so it confuses and scatters it. We proved in the discussion on interpretation of the law in the Twenty-Seventh Word in the comparison between Sufyan ibn Uyayna and someone of his intelligence today that today’s person could not acquire in a hundred years what Sufyan acquired in ten.

#### Second Aspect

Second Aspect: The Companions’ station in closeness to God cannot be attained to with the feet of sainthood. For Almighty God is infinitely close to us; closer to us than everything, but we are infinitely distant from Him. divine proximity may be gained in two ways:

The First is through the unfolding of divine immediacy, to which the divine proximity in prophethood looks, and which the Companions manifested through the legacy of prophethood and conversation of the Prophet (UWBP).

The Second Way is to traverse the degrees in our distance from God and be honoured with divine proximity to an extent. Most of the spiritual voyaging of sainthood is in accordance with this, and illumination through the self and through the outside world proceeds in this way.

Thus, the first way is solely given, it is not acquired; it is attraction, the drawing of the Most Merciful, and it is being loved by Him. The path is short, but very severe, very elevated, very pure, and without shadow. The other is acquired, long, and in shadow. Even if its strange wonders are many, it cannot reach the first in regard to quality and divine proximity. For example, there are two ways of reaching yesterday. The first is not to