The student asked the teacher:  The universe , all matter , is the furthest away from the divine. Can you explain?

The material universe and all that is contained there-in is the closest to the Divine as possible without being it.

How shall we understand this?

Human beings are beings of perspective. Because of mathematical knowledge we have discovered that perception is 'subjective' and perhaps fits the concept 'distant from the divine'. What supports this concept is the assertion that matter is 'atomic' and that the weight of 'atoms' is a number. Thus we arrive at this idea: atoms are mathematical, and mathematical is an abstraction (as point line or cube) of reality. So now we have this question: is mathematical perception actual, does it fully embrace all reality, or is it a 'part' and being part then it has a relation of 'far' or 'near' to the divine? If math is nearest to the divine, then matter is nearest too, to the divine. If mathematics is 'external' to the spirit, then it is not calculable, and there-for it is true of all that uses mathematical calculations i.e. atoms, mass, etc, are abstractions of another reality that is not expressed. Please notice this separation: matter is not atoms, nor mass, it has an unexpressed relation of quality above that which is calculated - and this makes it closer in relation to the divine as it represents that which was acted upon, but it is now 'frozen' or immobile. When the time element is added to our concepts, then we can discover this: what is frozen was once mobile, fluid, and perhaps alive. So now we have the amazing contradiction of New and Old - of dead, and potential - of matter and anti-matter as inseparable aspects. Without time, dead, with time - it is definitively imponderable i.e. you see it when it is not, and when it is, then you can't see it. And that is the closest to the Divine as possible without being it.