A Key To Wisdom

Excerpt:
Suppose a great and wondrous mirror is set up on the surface of the earth. This mirror shows the luminous reflection of the world-illumining sun wherever it turns its face, and there it causes the happiness of Naw-rūz and the cheer of spring. This is the example of the Imām of the time, because with respect to his corporeality he is the maẓhar (locus of manifestation) of the Divine favours and blessings and the mirror of the eternal light. It is because of this that the spiritual season of the Ismaili worlds always remain temperate and extremely pleasant and there is always spring in them. Thus the real (esoteric) Naw-rūz festival is found in the individual spirituality of mu’mins. That is, every sincere mu’min’s initial spiritual progress is his Naw-rūz festival, in the sense that when the mu’min truly obeys the light of Imāmat, the personal world of his heart, due to spiritual  vegetation and prosperity (i.e the Imām’s esoteric knowledge, ta’wīl), becomes like the garden of Paradise. 

This excerpt has been taken from page 46.