the ANGEL project

Some mystics believe that a soul grows in steps from a mineral, to a plant, then an animal, and then to a human. When the human resolves to die, a soul could become an angel. The Persian Sufi mystic poet Jalal al-Din Muhammad Rumi wrote in his poem Masnavi:

I died as inanimate matter and arose a plant,

I died as a plant and rose again an animal.

I died as an animal and arose a man.

Why then should I fear to become less by dying?

I shall die once again as a man

To rise an angel perfect from head to foot!

Again when I suffer dissolution as an angel,

I shall become what passes the conception of man!

Let me then become non-existent, for non-existence

Sings to me in organ tones, 'To him shall we return.'

(Translation from Wikisource, Masnavi I Ma'navi, Book III, Story XVII)’’