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[from http://www.kheper.auz.com/topics/mythology/Khezr.html ]

Subject: The Green Man of the Qur'an
                                        
                                  Eylon Israeli
                                        
   Just a little something I read last night:
   
   (Wilson, Peter Lamborn, "Sacred Drift - Essays on the Margins of Islam",
   San-Francisco, 1993,  p. 140 -- in the last essay, titled "Sacred Drift",
   and dealing mainly with the concept of 'Travel' is Sufism. This book, and
   the author's previous one titled "Scandal", are both excellent thought
   provoking readings from a 'renegade scholar' in search of 'poetic facts'.
   The paragraph quoted is, of course, out of context, and should be read
   likewise.  )
   
     "Some have identified Khezr with St. George -- but he might more
     accurately be seen as both St. George and the dragon in one figure.
     Nature, for esoteric Islam, does not need to be pinned down like some
     biology specimen or household pest -- there exists no deep moral
     struggle between Nature and Order  in the Islamic worldview. The
     "spirits" of Nature, such as Khezr and the djinn -- who are in sense the
     principles of natural power -- recognize in the Muhammadan Light that
     green portion of the spectrum upon which they themselves are also
     situated. If Christian moralism "fixes" Nature by "killing it," Islam
     proceeds by conversion -- or rather, by transmutation.
     
     "Nature maintains its measure of independence from merely human and
     moral sphere, while both realms are bathed in the integrative and
     salvific light of Muhammadan knowledge. Nowadays Khezr might well be
     induced to reappear as the patron of modern militant
     eco-enviromentalism, since he represents the fulcrum or nexus between
     wild(er)ness and the human/humane. Rather than attempt to moralize
     Nature (which never works because Nature is amoral), Khadirian
     Enviromentalism would rejoice simulaneously both in its utter wildness
     and its "meaningfulness" -- Nature as tajalli (the "shining through" of
     the divine into creation; the manifestation of each thing as divine
     light), Nature as an aesthetic of realization.
     
     "Khezr is the embodiment of the hadith 'Three things of this world
     delight the heart: water, green things, and a beautiful face.' He is
     also, as we shall see, the very patron and personification of Sufi
     travel."
   
   posted on the Donmeh West news list
   Mon 15 Feb 1999
   
================= 

[from http://www.kheper.auz.com/topics/Islamic_esotericism/Sabbatai/Zevi.htm#3 ]

  III. Khidr and Sabbatai Sevi
   =======================

   In Sabbateansim, Khidr is equivalent to Elijah, and this is the way they
   were conceptualized in AMIRA"H's thought. Just as Khidr is, in the Holy
   Qur'an, Moses' mysterious companion (as you can see from my post on this
   matter) -- so is Elijah/Khidr Sabbatai Sevi's companion and spiritual
   guide.

   Elijah/Khidr was AMIRA"H's mystical mentor, and it was he who has annoited
   him, in a mystical rite, to be messiah. Part of the rite was a gift, from
   Elija/Khidr, of the Book of Zohar. This reminds us of the way a Sufi
   initiate -- a murid -- receives his garmant -- khirqah -- in the Sufi
   initiation rite.

   What's more, Khidr is a customay initiation guide in the Sufi tradition.
   Sufi mystics would meet him in their journies, and he would inspire them,
   answer their questions, save them from dangers, and in special cases even
   bestow on them the khirqah. Such bestowing is thought valid initiation in
   the Sufi tradition, and those who pass it are considered connected to the
   greatest source of mystic inspiration.

   The great Sufi mystic Ibn al-`Arabi is one who claimed to have received his
   khirqah from Khidr. In a way, Sabbatai Sevi is comparable to Ibn al-`Arabi,
   since he too claimed to have received spiritual guidance and to have passed
   inititation by Elijah/Khidr.

   Khidr, or Hizir in Turkish, was greatly venerated by the Bektashi order,
   and many miracles are connected to his person. One of the miracle recounted
   is how Sari Saltik fought the seven-headed dragon at Kigra in the Dobruja;
   Hizir arrived in time to remind him of his sword, seizing which Sari Saltik
   cut off all the dragon's heads.

   Sabbatai Sevi used to take part in the Betashi rites conducted at the
   Bektashi Tekke in Adrianopolis. This Tekke was located at Hizirlik, a name
   dervied from Hizir, because it was connected with his person. Almost every
   town in Turky has a place called Khuddur Ellez, i.e., Khidr Elijah.

   A folk's festive day, the Hidrellez, very popular in Turky, is connected
   with both Hizir and Ellez (Elijah in Turkish), who are thought in the
   Turkish tradition to be brothers (or, according to another tradition,
   lovers; in this legend Elijah is the girl). This festive day is celebrated
   in the spring, May 5th and 6th, to mark the summer's beginning, and
   incorporates many magical rites, among which the most prominent one is a
   future-revelation rite. Since Khidr means "green", he is conceptualized as
   connceted with resumption of growth in the spring, and as a bringer of
   affluence, fertility and happiness. In the Sabbatean Calendar, Sivan 21st
   is selebrated as Elijah's revelation, the day Elija
   annoited AMIRA"H as messiah. This festive day was celebrated by Tukish
   Sabbateans for many generations.

   Sabbatai Sevi is the spring of the Jewish nation; he is the source of
   affluence and regrowth. Like Khidr, in his wake the greenary swells and
   flora is renewed. He is the messianic "Green man". How much green meant to
   Sabbatai Sevi can be learned from his antinomies in Jerusalem after his
   revelation as messiah. He appeared in public, riding his horse, and wearing
   a green mantle, saying that this was his wish according to his mysteries.
   The mystery of green, for AMIRA"H, is the mystery of Khidr, the Green Man,
   the mystery of Elijah is mentor. AMIRA"H's anoitment by
   Elijah, the Green Man, the saviour of scattered ones, marks the mythical
   transition of the whole Jewish nation from the barren cold of winter to
   spring's regrowth.

====================

   Al-Khidr: The Green One
   Hugh Talat Halman
   Ages 8-10, 34 pg HB
   Availability: Usually ships the next business day.
   B6476 pad $12.95 pad Order


====================

[from http://208.154.71.60/bcom/eb/article/0/0,5716,108140+14+105852,00.html ]

Other Qur'anic figures

   In addition to Muhammad himself, his cousin and son-in-law 'Ali, the Shi'ah
   hero, has been surrounded by legends concerning his bravery, his miraculous
   sword, Dhua'l-fiqar, and his wisdom. 'Ali's son, Husayn, is the subject of
   innumerable poems that concern the day of his final fight in Karbala'.

   Almost every figure mentioned in the Qur'an has become the centre of a
   circle of legends, be it Yusuf, the symbol of overwhelming beauty, or Jesus
   with the life-giving breath, the model of poverty and asceticism. Of
   special interest is Khidr, identified with the unnamed companion of Moses
   (Qur'an, surah 20). He is the patron saint of the wayfarers, connected with
   green, the colour of heavenly bliss, appearing whenever a pious person is
   in need, and immortal since he drank from the fountain of life, which is
   hidden in the darkness. In many respects, he is the Islamic counterpart of
   Elijah. Strong influences of the Alexander romances (a widely distributed
   literary genre dealing with the adventures of Alexander the Great) are
   visible in his figure.

EOF

==================

[from http://www.adishakti.org/his_light_within/surah_34_(Al_Nur).htm ]

   Ibn al-Arabi did not believe that the God he knew had an objective
   existence. Even though he was a skilled metaphysician, he did not believe
   that Gods existence could be proved by logic. He liked to call himself a
   disciple of Khidr, a name given to the mysterious figure who appears in the
   Koran as the spiritual director of Moses, who brought the external Law to
   the Israelites. God has given Khidr a special knowledge of himself, so
   Moses begs him for instruction, but Khidr tells him that he will not be
   able to put up with this, since it lies outside his own religious
   experience. It is no good trying to understand religious "information" that
   we have not experienced ourselves. The name Khidr seems to have meant "the
   Green One," indicating that his wisdom was ever fresh and eternally
   renewable. Even a prophet of Moses stature cannot necessarily comprehend
   esoteric forms of religion, for, in the Koran, he finds that indeed he
   cannot put up with Khidrs method of instruction. The meaning of this
   strange episode seems to suggest that the external trappings of a religion
   do not always correspond to its spiritual or mystical element. People, such
   as the ulema, might be unable to understand the Islam of a Sufi like Ibn
   al-Arabi. Muslim tradition makes Khidr the master of all who seek a mystic
   truth, which is inherently superior to and quite different from the God
   which is the same as everybody elses but to a God who is in the deepest
   sense of the word subjective.


                                             Karen Armstrong, A History of God

================

[from http://www.islamic-paths.org/Home/English/Glossary/JKL.htm ]

     * al-Khadir or al-Khidr - Mystrical Islamic figure whose name derives
       from an Arabic root meaning 'green'. A huge amount of information is
       available on this figure in the Tafsir, Hadith and historical
       literature of Islam. What might be described as the key primal text
       concerning al-Khadir occurs in Surat al-Kahf. Here he appears, unnamed,
       as the mystic sage or pir par excellence, familiar with God's ways and
       competent to test others. like Musa, about those ways. The moral of
       this text here in the Qur'an is clearly that God's ways are not man's
       ways, and the actions of the former imbued with prescient and universal
       knowledge, only seem bizarre. Al-Khadir appears to have a foot in both
       the human and celestial spheres and he ranks as a saint in popular and
       sufi circles alike. (See Wali.)

================

[from http://www.al-qiyamah.org/pdf_files/sufism_mysticism_(digiserve.com).pdf+khidr+Green+Man+Sufism&hl=en ]

 Muslim: Ibn  Arabi: Teacher

	The teacher (Quotations from Abu Bakr Muhammad ibn al- Arabi)
	Ibn Arabi was above all the disciple of Khidr {an invisible 
	master}... such a relationship with a hidden spiritual master 
	lends the disciple an essentially "transhistorical" dimension 
	and presupposes an ability to experience events which are 
	enacted in a reality other than the physical reality of daily 
	life, events which spontaneously transmute themselves into 
	symbols. (p. 32)

	Khidr {is} experienced simultaneously as a person and as an 
	archetype... To have him as a master and initiand is to be 
	obliged to be what he himself is. Khidr is the master of all 
	those who are masterless, because he shows all those whose 
	master he is how to be what he himself is: he who has attained 
	the Spring of Life... he who has attained haqiqa, the mystic, 
	esoteric truth which dominates the Law, and frees us from the 
	literal religion. Khidr is the master of all these, because he 
	shows each one how to attain the spiritual state which he 
	himself has attained and which he typifies...

	Indeed, Khidr's "guidance" does not consist in leading all his 
	disciples uniformly to the same goal, to one theophany 
	identical for all, in the manner of a theologian propagating 
	his dogma. He leads each disciple to his own theophany, the 
	theophany of which he personally is the witness, because that 
	theophany (pp. 32-33)

	... each person is oriented toward a quest for his personal 
	invisible guide, or ... he entrusts himself to the collective, 
	magisterial authority as the intermediary between himself 
	and Revelation. (p. 33)

	All these are matters that cannot be taught uniformly to all, 
	because each man is the measure of what he can understand and 
	of what, in accordance with the "economy" of esoterism, it is 
	fitting to set before him.  (p. 88)

	©1999 by Deb Platt

	[http://www.digiserve.com/mystic/Muslim/Ibn_Arabi/teacher.html 
				(1 of 2) [3/14/2001 6:38:24 AM]

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