Holy Hush - Yahia Lababidi

Silence is the inescapable force in our lives - a constant presence.
Contemplatives, poets, and thinkers alike, have long hinted at
a wisdom beyond words, straining the limits of language
and sense, to describe the ineffable.

Silence is not the absence of failure of words, but instead
somehow exists before and beyond representation, a primordial
essence that lurks beneath our constructed world.  In the immortal
formulation of Tao Te Ching: 'Returning to the root is silence/
Silence is returning to being.'

It is in silence, that things patiently unfurl, open up and trust us
with their secrets or reveal their hidden natures...

Silence can be difficult to define.  For it is not merely the
absence of sound, but may be perceived as an actual physical
presence - a holy hush,  the elemental silence found in the
natural world, where Time appears to collapse and one is 
afforded glimpses into Eternity. Silence is the solemn 
companion of nature and can presence like the very
pulse of Being.

Krishnamurti describes this mystical state: 'And it is only
where there is space and silence that something new can be
that is untouched by time/thought.  That may be the most holy,
the most sacred - may be...  You cannot give it a name.  It is
perhaps the unnamable.'

One is said to 'enter' and 'emerge' from this state, as though it
were an actual physical territory.  We cannot forcibly break-in
and enter, or rush through this portal to arrive at a meditative-
reflective state; but instead must patiently wait to be granted
access...

The Christian philosopher, Max Picard said:
"Silence is listening.  And as attentive practitioners of this
metaphysical art may sense, it can sometimes be unclear who
is doing the actual listening...  us, or Silence itself...

Otherwise, dissimilar spiritual traditions - Hindu, Buddhist,
Taoist, Jewish, Christian, Muslim, and Native American - all
agree on the importance of observing silence as a tool for 
inner transformation...

Yahia Lababidi
Egyptian-Lebanese poet and "thinker"

Excerpts from an article entitled:
"Notes On Silence" 

With thanks to No Mind's Land for the link :)