leap of faith

“dare you to take a leap of faith?”
“deh, tu line dari inception”
“bukan aaah. kierkegaard ah”
“whatever. you’re a show off.”
“kau tau, baru baru ini aku baca buku pasal haji ni, pretty interesting. ia mengatakan bahawa perihal ibrahim yang menyembelihi anaknya tu -maksud aku, mengorbankan- simbol kepada, would you do anything for god? adakah kau sanggup memberi segalanya pada tuhan? rumah kamu, anak anak kamu, harta kamu, mainan kamu, duit kamu, pekerjaan kamu, in short, everything that you own and love. and this ibrahim, dia dah lama cuba meminta kepada tuhan supaya dikurniakan seorang anak, yang tak diberi oleh Sarah – haha- selama seratus tahun lamanya –
“wait, seratus?”
“kata buku tu lah. dan pabila Ismail ni dilahirkan oleh Hajar, a black slave – dia adalah, ketika itu, insan yang paling gembira di dunia agaknya.”
“dan tuhan minta dia dikorbankan”
“dan tuhan minta dia dikorbankan. imagine that. dia seperti torn diantara memilih untuk menjalani perintah atau menyelamatkan anaknya. faith or love. tuhan atau anaknya. it cannot be both. kau harus memilih diantara duanya. contradictions, contradictions, contradictions. endless duality. jadi peristiwa pengorbanan ini adalah semacam the Great Dilemma. the Greatest Dilemma. bilamasa kamu ditolak at the absolute edge of life, then what, who, would you choose?”
“Tuhan”
“atau Nafsu”
“Baik”
“atau Jahat”
“Akhirat”
“atau Dunia”
“Kesempurnaan”
“atau Kepuasan”
“Kepercayaan”
“atau Ketidakpercayaan”
“hmmmm”
“hmmmm indeed. Dikatakan yang bahawa peristiwa ini macam satu lagi ujian tuhan, that is of the same degree seperti Adam. jika dia ditegah, maka Ibrahim disuruh. Adam mengalah kepada bisikan Syaitan dan diturunkan darjatnya ke bumi. Ibrahim melaksanakan dan dia diangkat darjatnya di sisi tuhan.”
“jadi?”
“imagine if Ibrahim didn’t follow through god’s orders.”
“a second descent?”
“who knows?”
“jadi?”
“haji, it is a very wonderful thing. it is not senseless or merely the act of our ancestors. it is really, life itself. each station you visit, each act, each rule accorded, each interaction, and the movements during night and day, they are not really… meaningless.”
“therefore, life isn’t meaningless?”
“yes.”
“and it is wonderful as well?”

“yes, dear, that too”

“There comes a moment in a person’s life when immediacy is ripe, so to speak, and when the spirit requires a higher form, when it wants to lay hold of itself as spirit. As immediate spirit, a person is bound up with all the earthly life, and now spirit wants to gather itself together out of this dispersion, so to speak, and to transfigure itself in itself; the personality wants to become conscious in its eternal validity. If this does not happen, if the movement is halted, if it is repressed, then depression sets in.”