FIRST POINT

Man is a mirror to the Divine Names in three aspects.

The First Aspect: Like the darkness of the night shows up light, so through his weakness and impotence, his poverty and need, his defects and faults, man makes known the power, strength, riches, and mercy of an All-Powerful One of Glory, and so on... he acts as a mirror to numerous Divine attributes in this way. Even, through searching for a point of support in his infinite impotence and boundless weakness in the face of his innumerable enemies, his conscience perpetually looks to the Necessarily Existent One. And since he is compelled in his utter poverty and endless need to seek for a point of assistance in the face of his innumerable aims, his conscience in that respect all the time leans on the Court of an All-Compassionate One of Riches and opens its hands in supplication to Him. That is to say, in regard to this point of support and point of assistance in the conscience, two small windows are opened onto the Court of Mercy of the Ail-Powerful and All-Compassionate One, which may all the time be looked through.

The Second Aspect of being mirror-like is this: through particulars like his partial knowledge, power, senses of sight and hearing, ownership and sovereignty, which are sorts of samples given to him, man acts as a mirror to the knowledge, power, sight, hearing, and sovereignty of dominicality of the Master of the Universe; he understands them and makes them known. For example, he says: "Just as I make this house and know how to make it, and I see it and own it and administer it, so the mighty palace of the universe has a Maker. Its Maker knows it, sees it, makes it, administers it." And so on.

The Third Aspect of being mirror-like: man acts as a mirror to the Divine Names, the imprint of which are upon him. There are more than seventy Names the impresses of which are apparent in man's comprehensive nature. These have been described to a degree at the start of the Third Stopping-Place of the Thirty-Second Word. For example, through his creation, man shows the Names of Maker and Creator; through his being on the 'Most Excellent of Patterns,' the Names of Most Merciful and All-Compassionate, and through the fine way he is nurtured and raised, the Names of All-Generous and Granter of Favours, and so on; he shows the differing impresses of different Names through all his members and faculties, all his organs and limbs, all his subtle senses and faculties, all his feelings and emotions. That is to say, just as among the Names there is a Greatest Name, so among the impresses of those Names there is a greatest impress, and that is man.

O you who considers himself to be a true man! Read yourself! You may otherwise become animal-like or be inanimate!