🕋 تفسير سورة المائدة
(Al-Maidah) • المصدر: EN-KASHANI-TAFSIR
بِسْمِ اللَّهِ الرَّحْمَٰنِ الرَّحِيمِ يَا أَيُّهَا الَّذِينَ آمَنُوا أَوْفُوا بِالْعُقُودِ ۚ أُحِلَّتْ لَكُمْ بَهِيمَةُ الْأَنْعَامِ إِلَّا مَا يُتْلَىٰ عَلَيْكُمْ غَيْرَ مُحِلِّي الصَّيْدِ وَأَنْتُمْ حُرُمٌ ۗ إِنَّ اللَّهَ يَحْكُمُ مَا يُرِيدُ
📘 O you who have faith! It is narrated that Jaʿfar ibn MuḤammad said that these words have four traits through which the Lord of the Worlds honored and caressed the community. One is that they are a call, second an intimation, third an allusion, and fourth a bearing witness. O is a call, you is an intimation, who is an allusion, and have faith is a bearing witness. The call is an honor, the intimation of mercy, the allusion to love, and the bearing witness to recognition. “He called them before He made them appear, and He named them before He saw them.” They were in the concealment of nonexistence when He called them to honor. They had not yet come into the circle of existence when He named them with a beautiful name: He named you sub- mitters from before [22:78]. He saw the faults and He approved of the faults. He saw the offenses, and He bought the offenses. He saw the pure ones of the high world, and He chose the tainted ones of the low world, for “The sinner's sobs are more beloved to Me than the glorifier's murmur.” Given the beginningless solicitude of the Unneedy Threshold toward the Adamite, his situ- ation is like that of a child whose mother sews him new clothes. She says, “Beware, beware, O child! Do not let this fancy garment get dirty!” The child goes outside and busies himself playing with the other children and dirties the clothes. He comes back home with dirty clothes, so he hides in a corner, helpless and bewildered. He keeps on saying, “Mother, I'm sleepy.” The mother knows that the child is afraid of her rebuke. “Dearest,” she says, “come. I only sent you outside after I had soap and water in hand, for I knew what you would do.” The Adamite's state is like this. When that center point of good fortune and chosen one of the empire was sent out from the concealment of nonexistence to the confines of existence, the pure spirits and holy ones began to shout, and they aimed arrows of denial at the world that God was setting forth: “Wilt Thou set therein one who will work corruption there? [2:30]. You are creating a group who will blacken the garment of Today I have perfected your religion for you [5:3] with the smoke of disobedience and the dust of associationism.
قُلْ لَا يَسْتَوِي الْخَبِيثُ وَالطَّيِّبُ وَلَوْ أَعْجَبَكَ كَثْرَةُ الْخَبِيثِ ۚ فَاتَّقُوا اللَّهَ يَا أُولِي الْأَلْبَابِ لَعَلَّكُمْ تُفْلِحُونَ
📘 Say: “The vile and the goodly are not equal, even if the manyness of the vile stirs you to admiration.” In the tongue of the Shariah, the vile is the forbidden, and the goodly is the permitted. In the tongue of the Haqiqah, every occupation that is empty of the mention and remembrance of the Real is vile; and every occupation at the beginning of which comes the Real's name, in the middle of which is the witnessing of the Real, and at the end of which is praise and gratitude is goodly. ʿāÌisha the sincerely truthful commanded that a shirt be sewn. The person who was sew- ing seems to have been heedless of remembering the Real. His heedlessness became known to ʿāÌisha. She commanded him to undo the sewing. She said, “This is vile, and the vile is not ap- propriate for me.” It has been said that every wealth from which God's rightful due is taken and the alms tax given is goodly, and everything from which it is not taken is vile and on the edge of destruction. MuṣṬafā said, “No property is wasted in the land and the sea except by holding back its alms tax.” It has also been said that the vile is what you accumulate and store up in this world, holding it back from the hand of expenditure and good. The goodly is what you send forth for yourselves, spend in the good, and store up for the next world. This is the meaning of “What we sent forward was our gain, and what we left behind was our loss,” which was already mentioned.
يَا أَيُّهَا الَّذِينَ آمَنُوا لَا تَسْأَلُوا عَنْ أَشْيَاءَ إِنْ تُبْدَ لَكُمْ تَسُؤْكُمْ وَإِنْ تَسْأَلُوا عَنْهَا حِينَ يُنَزَّلُ الْقُرْآنُ تُبْدَ لَكُمْ عَفَا اللَّهُ عَنْهَا ۗ وَاللَّهُ غَفُورٌ حَلِيمٌ
📘 O you who have faith, do not ask about things which would harm you if they were made to appear to you. He is saying, “Do not circle around the stations of the great ones, do not seek access to their states, and do not ask about their way stations, for then you will see that your level falls short of that and you will despair, and despair is the seed of remorse and the foundation of idleness.” A merchant from the bazaar came to Junayd and said, “O Pir of the Tariqah! If servanthood is what you have, then what do we have? What can we hope for? This is a place for despair.” That pir said, “The army of the commander is not all special friends and boon companions. There are also dog-keepers and herdsmen. In the empire, all are useful and all live in their own places and their own measures.” Though you be beautiful, do not disdain the ugly, for in this realm flies are as useful as peacocks. [DS 307] You should consider exalted the state of the dervish who said in his whispered prayer, “O God, approve of me as a lover! If you do not approve of me as a lover, approve of me as a servant! If you do not approve of me as a servant, approve of me as a dog!” O friend, if you won't give me the forefront of respect, at least keep me outside the door like the dogs.
يَا أَيُّهَا الَّذِينَ آمَنُوا عَلَيْكُمْ أَنْفُسَكُمْ ۖ لَا يَضُرُّكُمْ مَنْ ضَلَّ إِذَا اهْتَدَيْتُمْ ۚ إِلَى اللَّهِ مَرْجِعُكُمْ جَمِيعًا فَيُنَبِّئُكُمْ بِمَا كُنْتُمْ تَعْمَلُونَ
📘 O you who have faith! Against you are your own souls. Those who are misguided cannot hurt you if you are guided. The tongue of commentary is what I explained. The tongue of allusion in keeping with the tasting of the folk of desire is this: “O faithful, beware! Subjugate your own soul before it subjugates you. Busy it with obedience before it busies you with disobedience.” When Abū ʿUthmān was asked about this verse, he replied, “Against you is your own soul. If you occupy yourself with making its corruption wholesome and concealing its shameful parts, you will be too busy to gaze on the creatures and to occupy yourself with them.” Ḥusayn Manṣūr Ḥallāj gave advice to his disciple, saying, “Against you is your own soul-if you do not keep it busy, it will keep you busy.” MuḤammad ibn ʿAlī said, “Against you is your own soul-if you spare the creatures its evil, you will have taken care of most of its rightful due.” The nature of the soul is always to be at rest with this world and to hurry toward disobedience. It counts disobedience as a small thing and is lazy in obedience. It is conceited and acts with eye- service toward the creatures. Within it are found associationism, eye-service, and hypocrisy. It is said, “The soul is duplicitous in all its states, hypocritical in most of its states, and an associater in some of its states.” Abū Yazīd BasṬāmī said, “If in that world the Lord says to me, 'Make a wish,' I will ask per- mission to enter hell to punish this soul, for in this world it has always made me writhe and suffer.” MuṣṬafā said, “Your worst enemy is your soul between your two sides.” He said this because when you get along with an enemy, you become secure from his evil, but when you get along with your own soul, you will perish. If you act well toward someone, he will thank you at the resurrec- tion, and if you act badly, he will complain. The state of the soul is the opposite: If you act well toward it in this house, it will be your antagonist in that house, and if you act badly toward it in this house, it will thank you in that house.
۞ يَوْمَ يَجْمَعُ اللَّهُ الرُّسُلَ فَيَقُولُ مَاذَا أُجِبْتُمْ ۖ قَالُوا لَا عِلْمَ لَنَا ۖ إِنَّكَ أَنْتَ عَلَّامُ الْغُيُوبِ
📘 on the day when God shall gather the messengers, at the source of absolute union, or the source of the union of the Essence, and He will say: 'What, answer have your communities given to you when you summoned them to Me. In other words, 'Do you [messengers] have any insight into their [spiritual] levels with regard to the perfections to which they oriented themselves when they followed youḍ'; they shall say, 'We have no knowledge, that is, all knowledge belongs to You, comprehensively and in differentiation, and none other than You has any knowledge, because our attributes have been annihilated in Your attributes. You, only You, are the Knower of things unseen', and so the unseens of our innermost aspects and their innermost aspects all constitute knowledge that is Yours.
يَا أَيُّهَا الَّذِينَ آمَنُوا اذْكُرُوا نِعْمَتَ اللَّهِ عَلَيْكُمْ إِذْ هَمَّ قَوْمٌ أَنْ يَبْسُطُوا إِلَيْكُمْ أَيْدِيَهُمْ فَكَفَّ أَيْدِيَهُمْ عَنْكُمْ ۖ وَاتَّقُوا اللَّهَ ۚ وَعَلَى اللَّهِ فَلْيَتَوَكَّلِ الْمُؤْمِنُونَ
📘 when a people, from among the faculties and attributes of your veiled souls, purposed to extend their hands against you, by holding sway [over you], vanquishing [you] and dominating you in order to actualise their goals and pleasures, He restrained them from you by means of the methods of purifying [yourselves] and exalting [Him] which He has shown you; and fear God, and take Him as a shield by which you can vanquish this [people] and restraing them, and in God let the believers put their trust, by seeing that all acts are from Him.
إِذْ قَالَ اللَّهُ يَا عِيسَى ابْنَ مَرْيَمَ اذْكُرْ نِعْمَتِي عَلَيْكَ وَعَلَىٰ وَالِدَتِكَ إِذْ أَيَّدْتُكَ بِرُوحِ الْقُدُسِ تُكَلِّمُ النَّاسَ فِي الْمَهْدِ وَكَهْلًا ۖ وَإِذْ عَلَّمْتُكَ الْكِتَابَ وَالْحِكْمَةَ وَالتَّوْرَاةَ وَالْإِنْجِيلَ ۖ وَإِذْ تَخْلُقُ مِنَ الطِّينِ كَهَيْئَةِ الطَّيْرِ بِإِذْنِي فَتَنْفُخُ فِيهَا فَتَكُونُ طَيْرًا بِإِذْنِي ۖ وَتُبْرِئُ الْأَكْمَهَ وَالْأَبْرَصَ بِإِذْنِي ۖ وَإِذْ تُخْرِجُ الْمَوْتَىٰ بِإِذْنِي ۖ وَإِذْ كَفَفْتُ بَنِي إِسْرَائِيلَ عَنْكَ إِذْ جِئْتَهُمْ بِالْبَيِّنَاتِ فَقَالَ الَّذِينَ كَفَرُوا مِنْهُمْ إِنْ هَٰذَا إِلَّا سِحْرٌ مُبِينٌ
📘 [When God said, 'O Jesus, son of Mary, remember] My favour to you, in the way of special guidance and the station of prophethood and sanctity through [divine] friendship (walāya), and to your mother, in terms of purification, cleansing and election, [when I strengthened you with the Holy Spirit] such that you spoke to people, in the cradle of the body, and in maturity, attaining the light of the grey hairs of perfection by the disengaging from the body and its garments, and when I taught you, the scripture of realities and gnoses that are fixed in the Preserved Tablet by means of reinforcing [you] with the Holy Spirit and the wisdom of [the method of] wayfaring to God by the actualisation of [virtuous] character traits, states, stations, outer disengagement and inner solitude; and [taught you] the Torah of the exoteric forms of knowledge, judgements concerned with acts and the states of the soul and its attributes, as well as the Gospel of the esoteric forms of knowledge in the way of the knowledge of the self-disclosures of the attributes and the rules governing them, and the judgements concerning the states of the heart, its attributes and its deeds; and how you create, out of the clay of the intellect of primordial matter, which is the pure preparedness, by the hand of nurture and practical wisdom, the likeness of, the bird of the heart that flies to the Holy Presence because of its disengagement from its world and [because of] its perfection, by My permission, that is, by My knowledge, My power and My facilitation upon the self-disclosure to you of My attributes of life, knowledge, and power, and [My] vindicating you and calling you to prophethood, and you breathe into it, from the spirit of perfection the life of true knowledge by perfecting [it] and [by] correlation, and it becomes a bird, a perfect disengaged soul flying off to the Holy Side by the wings of love; and you heal the blind, the one veiled from the light of the Truth, and the leper, the one blemished by the sickness of the love of this world and the overpowering of caprice; and you raise, those dead by ignorance from the graves of the body and the earth of the soul, by My permission; and how I restrained the Children of Israel, those veiled from the light of the self-disclosures of the attributes, the ignorant who are opposed to you because of their ignorance of your state and station, from you, when you brought them clear signs, definitive arguments and clear proofs, and those who, were veiled, among them, from the religion of truth, said, �This is nothing but manifest sorcery�, because of their bewilderment regarding it.
وَإِذْ أَوْحَيْتُ إِلَى الْحَوَارِيِّينَ أَنْ آمِنُوا بِي وَبِرَسُولِي قَالُوا آمَنَّا وَاشْهَدْ بِأَنَّنَا مُسْلِمُونَ
📘 And when I revealed to the disciples, that is, [when] I inspired into their hearts, those luminous ones who had cleansed their souls with the water of beneficial things and purgative deeds, until they accepted your call, due to the purity of their souls, and loved you with complete volition, due to their correspondence to you in terms of the light of [their] primordial nature and the purity of [their] preparedness: �Believe in Me, with a true fatih, by affirming the unity of the attributes and [by] effacement, and in My Messenger�, by being mindful of the dues of the self-disclosures of these [attributes] at the level of differentiation; they said, �We believe; bear witness, O God of ours, by Your all-inclusive knowledge that encompasses all things, that we are obedient to You, submitting the existences of our attributes to You.
إِذْ قَالَ الْحَوَارِيُّونَ يَا عِيسَى ابْنَ مَرْيَمَ هَلْ يَسْتَطِيعُ رَبُّكَ أَنْ يُنَزِّلَ عَلَيْنَا مَائِدَةً مِنَ السَّمَاءِ ۖ قَالَ اتَّقُوا اللَّهَ إِنْ كُنْتُمْ مُؤْمِنِينَ
📘 When the disciples said, when your companions made a request of you, saying: is your Lord able, that is, [is] your witness from the world of Lordship [able] - for the lord of each person is the name that nurtures him and perfects him. Every person worships only what he knows of the world of Lordship and he knows only what he has attained of [an understanding of] the levels of the divinity, drawing therefrom an effusion of knowledge and drawing down therefrom blessings and draws therefrom spiritual reinforcement, which is why, despite their affirmation and their submission, they said 'your Lord' and not 'our Lord', since 'their Lord' is not able, to send down on us a Table from the heavenḍ', a law from the heaven of the world of the spirit that subsumes various types of knowledge, wisdoms, gnoses and judgements, wherein is nourishment for the heart and nutrition for the soul, its life and its tastings. He said: 'Fear God, beware of Him lest the attributes of your souls manifest themselves, and take Him as your shield with regard to the character traits and acts that issue from you, so that you are delivered from the [evil] consequences of these, are victorious and prosper, for if your faith is realised, you have no need of any new law.
قَالُوا نُرِيدُ أَنْ نَأْكُلَ مِنْهَا وَتَطْمَئِنَّ قُلُوبُنَا وَنَعْلَمَ أَنْ قَدْ صَدَقْتَنَا وَنَكُونَ عَلَيْهَا مِنَ الشَّاهِدِينَ
📘 They said, 'We desire, to profit, from it, and to implement it and draw strength from it, and that our hearts be reassured, because knowledge is the nourishment of the heart and its source of nutrition, and that we may know, your truthfulness in what you inform of your Lord, your prophethood and your authority therein and thereby, and that we may be among the witnesses thereof', who are present, possessors of knowledge, to inform others who are absent about it, to teach them and to call them to God by it.
قَالَ عِيسَى ابْنُ مَرْيَمَ اللَّهُمَّ رَبَّنَا أَنْزِلْ عَلَيْنَا مَائِدَةً مِنَ السَّمَاءِ تَكُونُ لَنَا عِيدًا لِأَوَّلِنَا وَآخِرِنَا وَآيَةً مِنْكَ ۖ وَارْزُقْنَا وَأَنْتَ خَيْرُ الرَّازِقِينَ
📘 that it shall be a celebration for us for the first and the last of us, by command, that is, [that it shall be] a law and a religion referred to in celebration by those in our times from among our correligionists and by those after us who will be from among the Christians, and a sign from You, a token and a knowledge from You by which You might be known and worshipped. And provide for us, that law and beneficial knowledge and guidance, You are the Best of Providers', providing [us] only with what benefits us and in which our best interest resides.
قَالَ اللَّهُ إِنِّي مُنَزِّلُهَا عَلَيْكُمْ ۖ فَمَنْ يَكْفُرْ بَعْدُ مِنْكُمْ فَإِنِّي أُعَذِّبُهُ عَذَابًا لَا أُعَذِّبُهُ أَحَدًا مِنَ الْعَالَمِينَ
📘 but whoever disbelieves, [whoever] is veiled from this religion after it is sent down and has become clear, I shall surely chastise him with a chastisement wherewith I chastise no other being from among all the worlds', by virtue of the path having become clear and the religion and proof having been clarified and their preparedness existing, so that when they deny it they are doing so only out of obstinacy. Chastisement in the case of knowledge is more intense than chastisement in the case of ignorance, since the sensing of the fact that one is veiled from that [truth] necessitates a severe painfulness [in the chastisement].
وَإِذْ قَالَ اللَّهُ يَا عِيسَى ابْنَ مَرْيَمَ أَأَنْتَ قُلْتَ لِلنَّاسِ اتَّخِذُونِي وَأُمِّيَ إِلَٰهَيْنِ مِنْ دُونِ اللَّهِ ۖ قَالَ سُبْحَانَكَ مَا يَكُونُ لِي أَنْ أَقُولَ مَا لَيْسَ لِي بِحَقٍّ ۚ إِنْ كُنْتُ قُلْتُهُ فَقَدْ عَلِمْتَهُ ۚ تَعْلَمُ مَا فِي نَفْسِي وَلَا أَعْلَمُ مَا فِي نَفْسِكَ ۚ إِنَّكَ أَنْتَ عَلَّامُ الْغُيُوبِ
📘 ['O Jesus, son of Mary] did you, call people to [worship of] yourself or your mother, or [it means: did you call people] to the station of your heart and your soul. For the one in whom there remains the existence of egoism and the remnants of the soul and caprice, or in whom there is variegation by the existence of the heart and its manifestation in its attribute will call creatures either to the station of his soul or to the station of his heart, and not to the truth. He [Jesus] says, 'Glory be to You!: an affirmation of the exaltedness of God above [that He should have] partnership and an absolution for him [Jesus] of the existence of any remnants [in him]. It is not mine to say what I have no right to, since I possess no existence in reality and as such it is not mine nor is it right that I should say something that I am not entitled to in reality, as statements, acts, attributes and existence all belong to You [alone]. If I indeed had said it, You would have known it, that is to say, had there issued from me any [such] statement then it would have been by Your knowledge, but there is no existence for that which You do not have knowledge of and there exists only what exists by Your knowledge. You know what is in my soul, encompassing as You do all things and so my knowledge is but a part of Your knowledge; but I do not know what is within Your Self, that is, Your Essence as I do not encompass all things [in my knowledge].
مَا قُلْتُ لَهُمْ إِلَّا مَا أَمَرْتَنِي بِهِ أَنِ اعْبُدُوا اللَّهَ رَبِّي وَرَبَّكُمْ ۚ وَكُنْتُ عَلَيْهِمْ شَهِيدًا مَا دُمْتُ فِيهِمْ ۖ فَلَمَّا تَوَفَّيْتَنِي كُنْتَ أَنْتَ الرَّقِيبَ عَلَيْهِمْ ۚ وَأَنْتَ عَلَىٰ كُلِّ شَيْءٍ شَهِيدٌ
📘 I only said to them, and I only commanded them that which You have charged me with saying and which you have obliged me to [say]: �Worship God, my Lord and your Lord�. In other words, I only called them to the union in the form of differentiation, the relationship of whose lordliness to all is equal. But they fell into error and saw that [lordliness] in only some of the differentiations because of the narrowness of their [spiritual] receptacles. And I was a witness over them, a watcher, present, looking after them and teaching them, whilst I was amongst them, that is, while there remained in me the existence of some remnant, but when You took me [to You], [but when] You annihilated me totally in You, You were Yourself the Watcher over them, given my having been annihilated in You, and You Yourself are Witness over all things, [You are] present; through You a thing comes into existence, for otherwise that thing would not be.
إِنْ تُعَذِّبْهُمْ فَإِنَّهُمْ عِبَادُكَ ۖ وَإِنْ تَغْفِرْ لَهُمْ فَإِنَّكَ أَنْتَ الْعَزِيزُ الْحَكِيمُ
📘 If You chastise them, by maintaining the veil [over them] forever, verily they are Your servants, deserving of the veil and of privation. You are most entitled to dealing with them as You wish, and if You forgive them, by removing the veil, You, only You, are the Mighty, the Powerful One able to do that and Whose might is not compromised by bringing them near or by the removal of their veil, the Wise', exacting what You exact in the way of chastisement through veiling and privation, or drawing [them] near [to You] through gentleness and forgiveness by Your absolute wisdom.
قَالَ اللَّهُ هَٰذَا يَوْمُ يَنْفَعُ الصَّادِقِينَ صِدْقُهُمْ ۚ لَهُمْ جَنَّاتٌ تَجْرِي مِنْ تَحْتِهَا الْأَنْهَارُ خَالِدِينَ فِيهَا أَبَدًا ۚ رَضِيَ اللَّهُ عَنْهُمْ وَرَضُوا عَنْهُ ۚ ذَٰلِكَ الْفَوْزُ الْعَظِيمُ
📘 [God says] 'This is the day, when your truthfulness shall profit you and the truthfulness of every truthful person [shall also profit him], constituting as this [truthfulness] does the ferment of perfections and the specific quality of the spiritual realm. Theirs will be the Gardens, of the attributes the token of which is the fruit of satisfaction, for satisfaction can only be after the annihilation of will and their will can only be annihilated after theirs are overcome by God's will which then annihilates theirs. That is why God's being satisfied with them is mentioned before their being satisfied with Him. In other words, since God, exalted be He, willed that they be pre-eternally in the manifestation-locus of His will and in the locus of His satisfaction, being satisfied with them in terms of locus and as deserving of that [locus], He strips them of their will by appointing His will in its place, giving It to them in place of theirs, so that He is satisfied with them and has satisfied them - that is the great triumph', that is, the prospering that has an awesome status. Had it been the annihilation of the essence [meant here], this would have been the greatest triumph and the most awesome prospering.
۞ وَلَقَدْ أَخَذَ اللَّهُ مِيثَاقَ بَنِي إِسْرَائِيلَ وَبَعَثْنَا مِنْهُمُ اثْنَيْ عَشَرَ نَقِيبًا ۖ وَقَالَ اللَّهُ إِنِّي مَعَكُمْ ۖ لَئِنْ أَقَمْتُمُ الصَّلَاةَ وَآتَيْتُمُ الزَّكَاةَ وَآمَنْتُمْ بِرُسُلِي وَعَزَّرْتُمُوهُمْ وَأَقْرَضْتُمُ اللَّهَ قَرْضًا حَسَنًا لَأُكَفِّرَنَّ عَنْكُمْ سَيِّئَاتِكُمْ وَلَأُدْخِلَنَّكُمْ جَنَّاتٍ تَجْرِي مِنْ تَحْتِهَا الْأَنْهَارُ ۚ فَمَنْ كَفَرَ بَعْدَ ذَٰلِكَ مِنْكُمْ فَقَدْ ضَلَّ سَوَاءَ السَّبِيلِ
📘 [God had made] a covenant with the Children of Israel, the covenant mentioned [below]. The twelve leaders are the five external senses, the five internal ones, as well as the considerative intelligent faculty and the cognitive intelligent faculty. And God said: 'I am with you, in the subsequent bond [ensuing from the covenant], granting you assistance and help, that if you fulfil the dues in terms of self-purification and withdrawal in the way of refraining from corporeal felicities by means of devotions and abandoning the external felicities by means of renunciation and giving preference to the third, which is belief in the messengers of the intellect and in the inspirations, correct reflective thoughts, sincere thoughts coming in from the spirit, the heart, and [from] the reinforcement of the angelic realm, and by succouring these [messengers], that is, exalting them by unleashing them against the devils of estimation, reinforcing them and protecting these [messengers] from their [these devils'] whisperings and [their] casting [upon them] of illusory, imaginary and ego-centric thoughts, and lend to God a goodly loan, by acquitting yourselves totally from [claims to] the might, strength, knowledge and power that belong [only] to God in terms of the acts and attributes in their entirety, then from the Essence by means of [your] effacement, annihilation and surrender of these [acts and attributes] to God, I will absolve you of your evil deeds, that is, [of] the existences of these three, which constitute your veils and your impediments, and I will admit you to gardens, of My acts, My attributes and My essence, underneath which rivers flow, [these rivers being] the forms of knowledge relating to trust [in God], satisfaction, surrender, and the affirmation of the Oneness, which as a whole constitute the knowledge of the self-disclosures of the acts, the attributes and the Essence. Thus whoever remains veiled after this covenant and [after] the sending forth of leaders from among you, surely he has strayed, from the way that is made straight by the truth.
لِلَّهِ مُلْكُ السَّمَاوَاتِ وَالْأَرْضِ وَمَا فِيهِنَّ ۚ وَهُوَ عَلَىٰ كُلِّ شَيْءٍ قَدِيرٌ
📘 To Him belongs what is in the upper world and in the lower world, both in its exoteric and its esoteric aspect; and all that is in them: His names, His attributes and His acts, and He has power over all things, if He should desire it, He annihilates by the manifesting of His essence, or if He should desire He brings into existence by concealing Himself in His names and attributes.
فَبِمَا نَقْضِهِمْ مِيثَاقَهُمْ لَعَنَّاهُمْ وَجَعَلْنَا قُلُوبَهُمْ قَاسِيَةً ۖ يُحَرِّفُونَ الْكَلِمَ عَنْ مَوَاضِعِهِ ۙ وَنَسُوا حَظًّا مِمَّا ذُكِّرُوا بِهِ ۚ وَلَا تَزَالُ تَطَّلِعُ عَلَىٰ خَائِنَةٍ مِنْهُمْ إِلَّا قَلِيلًا مِنْهُمْ ۖ فَاعْفُ عَنْهُمْ وَاصْفَحْ ۚ إِنَّ اللَّهَ يُحِبُّ الْمُحْسِنِينَ
📘 [So because of their breaking their covenant, We cursed them and made their hearts] hard: these [hearts] hardened as a result of the soul's attributes holding sway over them and because of their inclination towards solid and hardened earthly affairs, and so they have become veiled from the lights of the angelic realm and the realm of the divine attributes, which constitute the words of God; they exchanged the faculties of their souls for these [affairs] and implemented their illusions and imaginations instead of their gnoses and realities in the way of intelligible concepts, or they mixed them together, which is [what is meant by] the distortion of words from their contexts; and they have forgotten a share, that is, a substantial portion of what they were given in a former covenant in terms of the latent perfections within their preparedness [that reside therein] in potentiality and they were therefore reminded of this [share] in the subsequent covenant; and you will never cease to discover some treachery on their part, that is, some infraction of the covenant or the withholding of some trust because of the sway acquired over them by the attributes of the soul and by Satan and because of the hardness of their hearts [except for a few of them. Yet pardon them, and forgive; surely God loves] the virtuous, who witness such folk as they endure God's trial but do not counter them with requital; rather they treat them with forgiveness and pardon.
وَمِنَ الَّذِينَ قَالُوا إِنَّا نَصَارَىٰ أَخَذْنَا مِيثَاقَهُمْ فَنَسُوا حَظًّا مِمَّا ذُكِّرُوا بِهِ فَأَغْرَيْنَا بَيْنَهُمُ الْعَدَاوَةَ وَالْبَغْضَاءَ إِلَىٰ يَوْمِ الْقِيَامَةِ ۚ وَسَوْفَ يُنَبِّئُهُمُ اللَّهُ بِمَا كَانُوا يَصْنَعُونَ
📘 So We have stirred up among them enmity and hatred, that is to say, We have forced this upon them because of the mutually opposed exigencies of their predatorial, bestial and satanic faculties and [because of] their inclining towards the lower aspect, that which necessarily entails contrareity and mutual resistance by virtue of their veiledness from the light of the affirmation of the Oneness and their distance from the world of Holiness wherein lie purposes in their entirety entailing neither mutual attraction nor mutual resistance, until the moment of their rising by the manifestation of the light of the spirit and the major resurrection by the manifestation of the light of the affirmation of the Oneness; and God will assuredly inform them, of the punishment for what they have wrought at the point of death and the manifestation of privation and loss at the manifestation of the despicable and hurtful configurations deeply rooted in them.
لَقَدْ كَفَرَ الَّذِينَ قَالُوا إِنَّ اللَّهَ هُوَ الْمَسِيحُ ابْنُ مَرْيَمَ ۚ قُلْ فَمَنْ يَمْلِكُ مِنَ اللَّهِ شَيْئًا إِنْ أَرَادَ أَنْ يُهْلِكَ الْمَسِيحَ ابْنَ مَرْيَمَ وَأُمَّهُ وَمَنْ فِي الْأَرْضِ جَمِيعًا ۗ وَلِلَّهِ مُلْكُ السَّمَاوَاتِ وَالْأَرْضِ وَمَا بَيْنَهُمَا ۚ يَخْلُقُ مَا يَشَاءُ ۚ وَاللَّهُ عَلَىٰ كُلِّ شَيْءٍ قَدِيرٌ
📘 They indeed are disbelievers those who say, 'God is the Messiah, by confining divinity to him and restricting the Deity by entifying Him; [if He desires] to destroy the Messiah, son of Mary, to where He says, all togetherḍ', by annihilating them in the affirmation of the Oneness and obliterating them in other than the union, as He has said Everything will perish except His countenance [Q. 28:88]ḍ And to God belongs the kingdom of the heavens, that is, the world of the spirits, and the earth, the world of bodies, and all that is between them, of forms and accidents, the manifest and the hidden in their entirety, as well as His names, His attributes and His acts.
يَا أَيُّهَا الَّذِينَ آمَنُوا لَا تُحِلُّوا شَعَائِرَ اللَّهِ وَلَا الشَّهْرَ الْحَرَامَ وَلَا الْهَدْيَ وَلَا الْقَلَائِدَ وَلَا آمِّينَ الْبَيْتَ الْحَرَامَ يَبْتَغُونَ فَضْلًا مِنْ رَبِّهِمْ وَرِضْوَانًا ۚ وَإِذَا حَلَلْتُمْ فَاصْطَادُوا ۚ وَلَا يَجْرِمَنَّكُمْ شَنَآنُ قَوْمٍ أَنْ صَدُّوكُمْ عَنِ الْمَسْجِدِ الْحَرَامِ أَنْ تَعْتَدُوا ۘ وَتَعَاوَنُوا عَلَى الْبِرِّ وَالتَّقْوَىٰ ۖ وَلَا تَعَاوَنُوا عَلَى الْإِثْمِ وَالْعُدْوَانِ ۚ وَاتَّقُوا اللَّهَ ۖ إِنَّ اللَّهَ شَدِيدُ الْعِقَابِ
📘 [O you who believe] do not profane God's sacraments, in the way of the stations and the states by which the state of the wayfarer in his wayfaring is known, such as patience, gratitude, trust, satisfaction and their like. In other words, do not commit the sins of the states and do not infringe the bounds of the station, for these are the sacred waymarks of God's pure religion. Just as these acknowledged places are marked out by the ritual that is performed thereat, such as the circumambulation, the pacing and the sacrifice and others, and [just as] the acknowledged acts of the pilgrimage are waymarks by which the pilgrim perceives his way, so these stations, levels and states are [also] waymarks by which the wayfarer perceives his state. And just as manifestly according to the [divine] law it is not permitted that one change the places of these [waymarks] or infringe its rules, so it is with these [spiritual waymarks] according to the law of the lovers, as is related of one of them who used to talk [at length] about [the station of] patience. When a scorpion pounced onto his leg and began to sting him, he remained as he was and did not cast it off. He was asked about this and said, 'I am ashamed to speak so much of a station then do what it is contrary to it'; nor the sacred month, meaning the moment of entering into pilgrim sanctity for the true pilgrimage, which is the moment of the wayfaring and the arrival, [profaning it] by infrining its bounds and occupying oneself with what is incompatible with it and bars him from his orientation and slows him down in his journeying; nor the offering, nor the prepared soul that is made ready for the sacrificial offering upon arrival at the courtyard of the divine presence, in the way mentioned, [profaning it] by using it for a purpose that distracts it from its path or weakens it, or by making it bear more than it has the capacity for in terms of spiritual discipline such that the person is severed [from the goal of wayfaring] before he has even reached [the desired] locus; nor the garlands, nor what the soul has garlanded itself with of the distinguishing mark of the wayfaring folk and of the [good] customary practices and outward deeds, by abandoning them or changing their condition; nor those repairing to the Sacred House, nor those purposeful seekers who are conscientious and industrious in their wayfaring, by causing them to change or preventing them from [pursuing their] spiritual discipline, or by belittling their resolve by interfering [with them] or reducing [their] ceremonious pacing, giving them the illusion that they have no need for any of that, or by distracting them with what bars them [from their spiritual purpose] or causes them to be idle, while they seek bounty from their Lord, by means of the self-disclosures of the acts, and beatitude, by means of the self-disclosures of the attributes.
يَا قَوْمِ ادْخُلُوا الْأَرْضَ الْمُقَدَّسَةَ الَّتِي كَتَبَ اللَّهُ لَكُمْ وَلَا تَرْتَدُّوا عَلَىٰ أَدْبَارِكُمْ فَتَنْقَلِبُوا خَاسِرِينَ
📘 [O my people] enter the Holy Land, that is, [into] the presence of the heart, which is the self-disclosure of the attributes, for in relation to the heaven of the spirit it [the heart] is the earth, which God has ordained for you, [which] He has specified for you in a preceding decree, having deposited in your preparedness [the means to achieve] the arrival to it and the stationing [of yourselves] therein, and do not turn back in flight, by inclining to the city of the body and pursuing it by seeking to actualise its [the body's] desires and pleasures, seeking to satisfy it and to adorn its configurations, for it [the body] constitutes a station that is anterior to your station and baser and inferior to your level, or you will end up as losers, in exchanging the lights of the heart for the darknesses of the body, and the goodly aspects of the former for the vile aspects of the latter.
قَالُوا يَا مُوسَىٰ إِنَّ فِيهَا قَوْمًا جَبَّارِينَ وَإِنَّا لَنْ نَدْخُلَهَا حَتَّىٰ يَخْرُجُوا مِنْهَا فَإِنْ يَخْرُجُوا مِنْهَا فَإِنَّا دَاخِلُونَ
📘 [They said, 'O Moses] there are a tyrant people in it, in the way of the sultan of estimation and the princes of caprice, wrath, lust and all the other pharaonic attributes of the soul which they have seized by force and by subjugation and they have mastery over them, dominating them and compelling all to [follow] their whims; we have no strength against them and are unable to resist them. They said that because they had become habituated to physical pleasures and carnal appetites and because of their being overcome by caprice. Thus they were unable to pursue spiritual disciplining, or to curb desire, or to curtail the attributes of the soul through spiritual struggle; we will never enter it until they depart from it, that is, [until] God should turn them out of it withouth any spiritual discipline or struggle on our part, or [until] they depart out of [their own] nature, despite the impossibility of this, or [until] their sway be weakened as is the case with [the advent of] old age, despite the fact that they would not be able to enter it then.
قَالَ رَجُلَانِ مِنَ الَّذِينَ يَخَافُونَ أَنْعَمَ اللَّهُ عَلَيْهِمَا ادْخُلُوا عَلَيْهِمُ الْبَابَ فَإِذَا دَخَلْتُمُوهُ فَإِنَّكُمْ غَالِبُونَ ۚ وَعَلَى اللَّهِ فَتَوَكَّلُوا إِنْ كُنْتُمْ مُؤْمِنِينَ
📘 There said two men of those who feared: the two were from among the twelver leaders - and they were the considerative intellect and the cognitive intellect, who feared the evil sequel of contiguity with the body and the evil consequence of being punished with its dark configurations - to whom God had been gracious, by guiding them to the straight path and the upright religion: 'Enter against them by the gate!, the gate of the village of the heart, which is trust through the self-disclosures of the acts, just as the gate of the village of the spirit is satisfaction. For if, you enter by the station of trust which is the gate of the village, you will be victorious, by having departed from your acts and your states and by being agents through God. For if might and strength are [procured] through God, the Satan of estimation and imagination as well as caprice and wrath shall flee from you and you shall be made victorious. That the gate is trust is indicated by His words: Put your trust in God, if you are, truly, believers, for faith when it is absent to the one adhering to it is the least of the degrees of presence at the self-disclosures of the acts.
قَالُوا يَا مُوسَىٰ إِنَّا لَنْ نَدْخُلَهَا أَبَدًا مَا دَامُوا فِيهَا ۖ فَاذْهَبْ أَنْتَ وَرَبُّكَ فَقَاتِلَا إِنَّا هَاهُنَا قَاعِدُونَ
📘 They said, 'O Moses, that is, they persisted in their refusal and their refraining from entry. So go forth, you and your Lord, and fight, that is to say, if you are [truly] a prophet then drive them away by the power of your soul and curb the caprice and those faculties in us without any spiritual discipline or struggle on our part, and ask your Lord to drive them away from us, as shrewd scoundrels [are given to] say when you admonish them, rebuke them and threaten them, 'Why don't you rid us of this wretchedness by your own resolve!', either in mockery and out of obduracy, or earnestly and out of conviction; we will be sitting here, we will adhere to our place at the station of the soul, cleaving to the whims of our souls and the pleasures of our bodies, as they said, 'Ḥiṭtan samqāthā!'
قَالَ فَإِنَّهَا مُحَرَّمَةٌ عَلَيْهِمْ ۛ أَرْبَعِينَ سَنَةً ۛ يَتِيهُونَ فِي الْأَرْضِ ۚ فَلَا تَأْسَ عَلَى الْقَوْمِ الْفَاسِقِينَ
📘 He said: 'Then it shall be forbidden them for forty years; they shall wander lost in the land: this constitutes the duration of their subsisting at the station of the soul. In other words, they remained in the wilderness of nature wandering perplexed for forty years [searching] for the village of the heart. For entry into the station of the heart when it is under the mastery of the tyrannical attributes of the soul is forbidden and prohibited. That is why He says [elsewhere] until when he is attained maturity and has attained forty years [Q. 46:15], for that is the moment of true maturity. It is related of this story of the wandering in the wilderness that they would journey earnestly all day the distance of six parasangs, but when it came to evening they found that they were still at the same station from which they had departed [earlier]. In other words, their endeavour was focused on the actualisation of carnal satisfactions and corporeal desires, which were confined to the six aspects and did not depart from these [six] aspects by disengaging. Thus they were [still] at the first station because they failed to orient themselves towards the azimuth of the heart by seeking disengagement and rising above corporeal configurations and ego-centric attributes. At night a column of fire would descend from the heaven by whose light they could journey and benefit; that is to say, there would descend upon them the light of the intellect of livelihood from the heaven of the spirit and they would be guided thereby to their welfare. It is described as being 'of fire' because it is an intellect that is blemished by illusion and not a pure intellect, for otherwise they would have been guided thereby to the path of the heart. As for the clouds, the manna and the quails, these have already been mentioned along with their interpretation. It is said that every child born in the wilderness had a shirt that was the length of his body and would grow as the child grew; by this they meant the garb of the body, but God knows best. If you wish to effect the correspondence between this story and your state, then you should interpret Moses as the heart and Aaron as the spirit, since he was his elder brother, which is why he said he is more eloquent than me in speech [Q.
۞ وَاتْلُ عَلَيْهِمْ نَبَأَ ابْنَيْ آدَمَ بِالْحَقِّ إِذْ قَرَّبَا قُرْبَانًا فَتُقُبِّلَ مِنْ أَحَدِهِمَا وَلَمْ يُتَقَبَّلْ مِنَ الْآخَرِ قَالَ لَأَقْتُلَنَّكَ ۖ قَالَ إِنَّمَا يَتَقَبَّلُ اللَّهُ مِنَ الْمُتَّقِينَ
📘 And recite to them the story of the two sons of Adam, [Adam] of the heart, of the two who are Abel of the heart and Cain of estimation. Each of them had a twin. As for the twin of the intellect, this is the cognitive intelligence (āqila ʿilmiyya) that manages the affairs relating to livelihood and the final return by means of beneficial opinions that require righteous deeds and excellent characters traits which are able to infer all types of handiwork and rules of governance. As for the twin of the estimative faculty, this is the imaginal faculty that has free disposal of objects of sensory perception and particular meanings for the purpose of actualising satanic opinions. Thus the Adam of the heart commanded that the estimative faculty be married to the twin of the intellect, namely, the cognitive intelligence so that it might acquire mastery over it by means of rational proof-based analogies and that it might train it by means of obedience-inducing forms of spiritual disciplining and spiritual manipulation, making it subject to the intellect so that it might become obedient to the father-heart, be kind to him and be dutiful towards him and designate him in righteous deeds and refrain from being disobedient to him through corrupt satanic enticements and embellishments and by tempting the soul to these through wicked configurations and evil deeds. As for the marrying of the intellect the twin of estimation, that is in order to make it righteous and to prevent it from lusting after corrupt imaginations and from the goading of the mendacious conversations of the soul so that its father [the heart] might find rest from it and exercise it in intelligible and sensory objects as well as universal and particular meanings so that it then becomes a reflective entity that works to actualise forms of knowledge and its father thereby profits. The Cain of estimation was envious of the Abel of the intellect since his [Abel's] twin was more beautiful to him [Abel] and more beloved [to him] on account of its correspondence to him. Their father the heart commanded that each of them offer a sacrifice, a ritual slaughter, with which to draw nearer to God by means of the effusion of the result [of the sacrifice] and the annihilation of the analogous form and the acceptance of the universal intelligible form [of the sacrifice] that corresponds to the very thing that is his ritual sacrifice by which he seeks nearness to God.
لَئِنْ بَسَطْتَ إِلَيَّ يَدَكَ لِتَقْتُلَنِي مَا أَنَا بِبَاسِطٍ يَدِيَ إِلَيْكَ لِأَقْتُلَكَ ۖ إِنِّي أَخَافُ اللَّهَ رَبَّ الْعَالَمِينَ
📘 'I will not extend my hand against you to slay you, because I shall not invalidate your deeds, which in their contexts are intense, in the way of objects of sensory perception; nor shall I sever from you your life which is the sustenance of the soul and of desire; nor shall I prevent you from any act that is specific to you, for the intellect knows that the particular benefits, the rules governing sensory objects and the particular meanings attached to these and the hierarchic arrangement of the means to livelihood are not actualised or facilitated except by means of estimation. Were it not for hope and the actualisation of wishes and aspirations produced by the estimation, no one would have any means of acquiring a livelihood. I fear God, the Lord of the Worlds, because I know Him - He says Indeed only those of God's servants who have knowledge [truly] fear Him [Q. 35:28] - and I know that He created you for a purpose and brought you into existence for a wisdom and so I do not [suppose to] interfere with His purpose in that.
إِنِّي أُرِيدُ أَنْ تَبُوءَ بِإِثْمِي وَإِثْمِكَ فَتَكُونَ مِنْ أَصْحَابِ النَّارِ ۚ وَذَٰلِكَ جَزَاءُ الظَّالِمِينَ
📘 I desire that you should end up with my sin, the sin of slaying me and the sin of your slaying in the way of false opinions and corrupt conceptualisations because of which your sacrifical offering was not accepted, and so become an inhabitant of the Fire, of veiledness and privation. That is the requital of the evildoers, of those who place things in other than their contexts such as your application of the rules governing sensory things in the context of intelligible things.
حُرِّمَتْ عَلَيْكُمُ الْمَيْتَةُ وَالدَّمُ وَلَحْمُ الْخِنْزِيرِ وَمَا أُهِلَّ لِغَيْرِ اللَّهِ بِهِ وَالْمُنْخَنِقَةُ وَالْمَوْقُوذَةُ وَالْمُتَرَدِّيَةُ وَالنَّطِيحَةُ وَمَا أَكَلَ السَّبُعُ إِلَّا مَا ذَكَّيْتُمْ وَمَا ذُبِحَ عَلَى النُّصُبِ وَأَنْ تَسْتَقْسِمُوا بِالْأَزْلَامِ ۚ ذَٰلِكُمْ فِسْقٌ ۗ الْيَوْمَ يَئِسَ الَّذِينَ كَفَرُوا مِنْ دِينِكُمْ فَلَا تَخْشَوْهُمْ وَاخْشَوْنِ ۚ الْيَوْمَ أَكْمَلْتُ لَكُمْ دِينَكُمْ وَأَتْمَمْتُ عَلَيْكُمْ نِعْمَتِي وَرَضِيتُ لَكُمُ الْإِسْلَامَ دِينًا ۚ فَمَنِ اضْطُرَّ فِي مَخْمَصَةٍ غَيْرَ مُتَجَانِفٍ لِإِثْمٍ ۙ فَإِنَّ اللَّهَ غَفُورٌ رَحِيمٌ
📘 Forbidden to you are carrion and blood, the flesh of swine, that which has been offered up to other than God, the strangled, the beaten down, the fallen, the gored, what has been eaten by predators-except what you slaughter-what is sacrificed on stone alters, and that which you al- lot by divining arrows-that is ungodliness. Today those who disbelieve have despaired of your religion, so fear them not, and fear Me. Today I have perfected for you your religion and I have completed My blessings upon you, and I have approved for you the submission as a religion. Although carrion is vile and forbidden, a measure of it is still allowed at the time of constraint. Among the sorts of carrion is the flesh of a brother Muslim that is eaten by backbiting. In this there is never a concession in any state, whether by constraint or free choice. Hence this carrion is worse than that carrion, and its prohibition is greater. God says, “Do not backbite one another. Would one of you love to eat the dead flesh of his brother? You would abhor it” [49:12]. It has been said that an animal whose flesh is eaten has two states: One is that, when it is killed by the stipulation of the Shariah, it is pure. Taking it is allowed and eating it is permitted. When it dies by itself, it is defiled, and eating it is forbidden. By way of allusion He is saying that when this Adamic soul is killed by the sword of struggle in the path of discipline according to the Shariah-that is, when it has been subjugated by the religion and come to be commanded by the Shariah, made a servant and abased by the burden of obedience-the soul with this description is pure. Nearness to it is allowed, being its companion is lawful, seeing it is the heart's repose, and companionship with it is the spirit's happiness. But whenever a soul dies in the darkness of its own heedlessness such that it no longer perceives the work of the religion and exerts no effort in the limits set down by the Shariah, this soul is like the carrion whose body is defiled and nearness to which is forbidden. The strangled, the beaten down, the fallen to death, the gored. Beneath each of these words is an allusion in keeping with the tasting of the chevaliers of the Tariqah and according to the creed of the wayfarers of the Haqiqah's road. The strangled is an allusion to someone who places himself in the bonds of wishes, puts the chains of avarice on his own hands and feet, and throws the rope of wanting around his neck until he is killed by avarice and appetite. It is forbidden for the wayfarers and desirers to walk on the path of someone like this or to follow someone like this. The beaten down is an allusion to someone who stays a prisoner of caprice and a captive of Satan, beaten down by the fanciful notions of his soul and the disquieting thoughts from Satan, so that his heart dies in that beating and imprisonment. He becomes the carrion of the Tariqah, and companionship with him is forbidden. The fallen to death is an allusion to someone who has fallen into the valley of dispersion and been destroyed, losing the road of the Haqiqah. The gored is an allusion to someone who quarrels with his likes and similars for the sake of this world of carrion and is gored such that his adversary wins; he becomes carrion under the blows of a carrion-eater. What has been eaten by predators is that toward which the seekers of this world turn their heads; it is carrion and its seeker is like a dog. Only dogs eat carrion. It is nothing but rotting carrion which dogs try to drag away. Then He says, “except what you slaughter.” In the outward Shariah, He is saying that whenever a Shari'ite slaughtering takes place in the forbidden things that He mentioned such that it is allowed by the Shariah, then it is allowed and eating it is permitted. So also in the road of the Tariqah, whatever may be the traveling supplies of the road of the next world and the goods of this world necessary for life, taking them and having them is permissible in the religion and seeking them is allowed. The supplies for the religion's road pertain to the road of the religion. God says, “And take along supplies, but the best of supplies is godwariness” [2:197]. What is sacrificed on stone alters. Everything that is done for the caprice of wanting and not in conformity with the Shariah is sacrificed on stone alters. Making the caprice of your soul your ob- ject of worship and going forth according to what it desires is not the work of the religious, nor is it the state of the faithful. God says, “Hast thou seen him who has taken his caprice as his god?” [25:43]. And that which you allot by divining arrows-that is ungodliness. Every transaction and companionship that does not go forth with the permission of the Shariah and in conformity with the religion, the goal being to obtain this world and what is desired by the soul, is nothing but gam- bling. Its form is deception and deceit, its result ungodliness and corruption, and its final outcome punishment and chastisement. Today I have perfected for you your religion and I have completed My blessings upon you. Jaʿfar ibn MuḤammad said that “today” is an allusion to the day when MuṣṬafā was sent to creation and the crown of messengerhood was placed on the head of his prophecy. The carpet of his Shariah was pulled around the world and the rug of mercy was spread out. The smoke of associationism was wrapped up in its own misfortune and the traces and remnants of unbelief were effaced and dissolved. From the four corners of world the sound of the drum of Muhammad the Arab's good fortune rose up: “The truth has come, and falsehood has vanished away” [17:81]. God bless the son of āmina, who brought him forth open-handed and generous. Say to those who hope for Ahmad's intercession, “Bless him and wish him great peace.” * O you whose visage is everyone's gazing place before you all have fallen in the road. O Venus of the months and moon of all, your beauty has taken away everyone's luster and rank! The night of mortal nature still did not exist when the sun of his prophethood was set firmly in place in the heaven of its loftiness, for “I was a prophet when Adam was between water and clay.” “O great one! Show your beauty, so all of existence may become a sun. O master! Open the oyster shell of mercy, so these destitute ones may fill their pockets with pearls. “Why don't you take that face to the idol-worshipers- why not display it and take the unbelief from their hearts? “O master, We will mention your innate beauty only within By thy life! [15:72].
فَطَوَّعَتْ لَهُ نَفْسُهُ قَتْلَ أَخِيهِ فَقَتَلَهُ فَأَصْبَحَ مِنَ الْخَاسِرِينَ
📘 Then his soul prompted, facilitated and enticed, him to slay his brother, so he slew him, by preventing him from his specific acts and veiling him from the light of guidance, and became one of the losers, because of his suffering harm by his assumption of mastery over the intellect and exchanging the guidance and rightness of the intellect for his own misguidance and wrongness. For when estimation suffers the severing of the support of the intellect, it prompts the soul by all manner of temptations and [seductive] embellishments to indulge in things by which both the soul and the body suffer harm, such as those reprehensible acts of immoderation in the way of bestial and predatorial pleasures such as extreme covetousness in the pursuit of wealth and repute and excess, and therefore estimation is weakened or even invalidated.
فَبَعَثَ اللَّهُ غُرَابًا يَبْحَثُ فِي الْأَرْضِ لِيُرِيَهُ كَيْفَ يُوَارِي سَوْءَةَ أَخِيهِ ۚ قَالَ يَا وَيْلَتَا أَعَجَزْتُ أَنْ أَكُونَ مِثْلَ هَٰذَا الْغُرَابِ فَأُوَارِيَ سَوْءَةَ أَخِي ۖ فَأَصْبَحَ مِنَ النَّادِمِينَ
📘 Then God sent forth, the raven of covetousness, scratching into, the earth of the soul, to show him how he might hide the nakedness of his brother, meaning, estimation, because by its severing of the intellect from the light of guidance and its veiling of it from the journeying in the upper world to actualise perfection and to pursue the felicity of the end, becomes perplexed regarding itself, whereupon covetousness was sent forth and guided it in the wilderness of misguidance and showed it how to hide and bury its nakedness, that is, its slain corpse which estimation bore upon its shoulders until it had putrified. Thus the intellect of livelihood ended up under the soil of the earth, which is the form of the intellect that has been severed from the life of the spirit, blemished by estimation and caprice, veiled from its world in the darknesses of the earth of the soul, within which it lies buried as it is being consumed by the worms of the natural faculties which use it in order to actualise their pleasures and goals. He said, 'Woe to me! Am I not able to be as this raven, which has buried its youngling, that is, its herald or its perfection, in the earth of the soul by annihilating what can be actualised for it and suppressing it therein, and so hide my brother's nakednessḍ', by concealing it in the darkness of the soul and thus profit from it. And he became one of the remorseful, upon this loss and the resulting privation;
مِنْ أَجْلِ ذَٰلِكَ كَتَبْنَا عَلَىٰ بَنِي إِسْرَائِيلَ أَنَّهُ مَنْ قَتَلَ نَفْسًا بِغَيْرِ نَفْسٍ أَوْ فَسَادٍ فِي الْأَرْضِ فَكَأَنَّمَا قَتَلَ النَّاسَ جَمِيعًا وَمَنْ أَحْيَاهَا فَكَأَنَّمَا أَحْيَا النَّاسَ جَمِيعًا ۚ وَلَقَدْ جَاءَتْهُمْ رُسُلُنَا بِالْبَيِّنَاتِ ثُمَّ إِنَّ كَثِيرًا مِنْهُمْ بَعْدَ ذَٰلِكَ فِي الْأَرْضِ لَمُسْرِفُونَ
📘 it shall be as if he had slain mankind altogether, because every individual [human] entails what is entailed by every individual of that species, for a species subsists in the one as it subsists in all outwardly and number has no bearing in this respect, for a species is not augmented in reality by the number of its individuals nor is it diminished by its being restricted to the one.
يَا أَيُّهَا الَّذِينَ آمَنُوا اتَّقُوا اللَّهَ وَابْتَغُوا إِلَيْهِ الْوَسِيلَةَ وَجَاهِدُوا فِي سَبِيلِهِ لَعَلَّكُمْ تُفْلِحُونَ
📘 O you who have faith! Be wary of God, and seek the means of approach to Him. And struggle in His path. Perhaps you will prosper. Here you have a call of generosity, here you have an address with gentleness, and here you have an arrangement to be applauded, sweet to the hearts. It is a cause of familiarity and an aid to clarity. It makes one secure from distance and permits response. He is saying, “O you who are the faith- ful. You have heard the message, bowed your heads, and approved of the intermediary. Be wary of God. Fear God, avoid His anger, and think about Him, for everything is from Him. Say: All is from God [4:78]. Who in the world is like Him in loving kindness and servant-caressing? The hope of the disobedient is in Him, the remedy for trials is with Him. No one has pride save in His name, no one has ease save through His mark. There is no deliverance and joining without His guidance and kind favor.” This is why He says, “Seek the means of approach to Him.” This is the means of nearness, and nearness is the cause of joining and deliverance. The means of approach is the intermediaries that mark the friendship between the servant and the Patron. The cause of the conjunction between the two is obvious. From what come union and conjunction? Revering the commands, respecting the prohibitions, tenderness towards people, serving the Real, striving in the various supererogatory acts, and building up the spirit and heart. Striving in the various supererogatory acts can be done with three things: first, remembering the gaze of God; second, keeping one's days away from damage; and third, recognizing one's pov- erty at the halting place of exposure. When you remember God's gaze, you are one of the godwary. When you keep your days away from damage, you are one of the worshipers. When you recognize your poverty at the halting place of exposure, you are one of the humble. One can build up the heart with three things: listening to knowledge, mixing little with people, and curtailing wishes. As long as you are listening to knowledge, you are in the circle of the an- gels. As long as you are apart from the people, you are counted among the sinless.
إِنَّ الَّذِينَ كَفَرُوا لَوْ أَنَّ لَهُمْ مَا فِي الْأَرْضِ جَمِيعًا وَمِثْلَهُ مَعَهُ لِيَفْتَدُوا بِهِ مِنْ عَذَابِ يَوْمِ الْقِيَامَةِ مَا تُقُبِّلَ مِنْهُمْ ۖ وَلَهُمْ عَذَابٌ أَلِيمٌ
📘 [Truly, as for the disbelievers, if they possessed] all that is in the earth, that is, what is contained in the lower aspect, as these are the causes for the increase of the veil and [of] distance, and the only success can be found in the upper aspect in the way of gnoses and luminous realities.
يَسْأَلُونَكَ مَاذَا أُحِلَّ لَهُمْ ۖ قُلْ أُحِلَّ لَكُمُ الطَّيِّبَاتُ ۙ وَمَا عَلَّمْتُمْ مِنَ الْجَوَارِحِ مُكَلِّبِينَ تُعَلِّمُونَهُنَّ مِمَّا عَلَّمَكُمُ اللَّهُ ۖ فَكُلُوا مِمَّا أَمْسَكْنَ عَلَيْكُمْ وَاذْكُرُوا اسْمَ اللَّهِ عَلَيْهِ ۖ وَاتَّقُوا اللَّهَ ۚ إِنَّ اللَّهَ سَرِيعُ الْحِسَابِ
📘 Say: 'The good things are made lawful for you, from among the realities and the truth-derived gnoses and cognitive virtues that are actualised for you through your intellects, your hearts and your spirits; and what you have taught, of the predatory creatures of your internal and external senses and all your faculties and corporeal limbs to acquire virtues and refined dispositions, inciting [them], teaching them of what God has taught you, in the way of knowledge relating to character traits and divine prescriptions that elucidate the means by which shares are secured in an equitable manner; so eat what they have caught for you, what these [senses] have procured for you as a result of your teaching of them in the proper way, with an intention and a will that derives from the heart and a sound purpose that leads to the perfection of the individual or the species, without that these [senses] stir, bear their teeth and heave in agitation over it [the quarry] out of an inclination and a covetousness for the pursuit of their pleasures and lusts. And mention God's name over it, and be present with your hearts to [declare] that this quarry is being sought and desired for the [fulfilment of the] perfect human form and not for any other purpose. And take God as a guard for your when you do that so that it might be virtuous. Indeed, God is swift at the reckoning, for He reckons with you instantly concerning this and not over periods of time, as [can be seen] in the [sorts of] configurations that result in your souls as [soon as] you commit these [acts].
وَأَنْزَلْنَا إِلَيْكَ الْكِتَابَ بِالْحَقِّ مُصَدِّقًا لِمَا بَيْنَ يَدَيْهِ مِنَ الْكِتَابِ وَمُهَيْمِنًا عَلَيْهِ ۖ فَاحْكُمْ بَيْنَهُمْ بِمَا أَنْزَلَ اللَّهُ ۖ وَلَا تَتَّبِعْ أَهْوَاءَهُمْ عَمَّا جَاءَكَ مِنَ الْحَقِّ ۚ لِكُلٍّ جَعَلْنَا مِنْكُمْ شِرْعَةً وَمِنْهَاجًا ۚ وَلَوْ شَاءَ اللَّهُ لَجَعَلَكُمْ أُمَّةً وَاحِدَةً وَلَٰكِنْ لِيَبْلُوَكُمْ فِي مَا آتَاكُمْ ۖ فَاسْتَبِقُوا الْخَيْرَاتِ ۚ إِلَى اللَّهِ مَرْجِعُكُمْ جَمِيعًا فَيُنَبِّئُكُمْ بِمَا كُنْتُمْ فِيهِ تَخْتَلِفُونَ
📘 For every one of you We have appointed an avenue and a method.... So vie in good deeds. The avenue is the Shariah, and the method is the Haqiqah. The avenue is the customs of the Sha- riah and the method is the road toward the Real. The avenue is what MuṣṬafā brought, and the method is a lamp that the Real holds next to the heart. The avenue is following the Shariah, and the method is finding access to the light of that lamp. The avenue is the message that you heard from the Messenger, and the method is the light that you find in the secret core. The Shariah belongs to everyone, and the Haqiqah belongs to some rather than others. So vie in good deeds. The vying of the renouncers is through rejecting this world, the vying of the worshipers is through cutting off caprice, the vying of the recognizers is through negating wishes, and the vying of the tawḤīd-voicers is through abandoning people and forgetting both this world and the afterworld.
وَأَنِ احْكُمْ بَيْنَهُمْ بِمَا أَنْزَلَ اللَّهُ وَلَا تَتَّبِعْ أَهْوَاءَهُمْ وَاحْذَرْهُمْ أَنْ يَفْتِنُوكَ عَنْ بَعْضِ مَا أَنْزَلَ اللَّهُ إِلَيْكَ ۖ فَإِنْ تَوَلَّوْا فَاعْلَمْ أَنَّمَا يُرِيدُ اللَّهُ أَنْ يُصِيبَهُمْ بِبَعْضِ ذُنُوبِهِمْ ۗ وَإِنَّ كَثِيرًا مِنَ النَّاسِ لَفَاسِقُونَ
📘 [God desires to smite them] for some of their sins, the sins of the Jews are the veilings of the acts, while the sins of the Christians are the veilings of the attributes. Thus the wickedness of the Jews is the infringement of the rules governing the self-disclosures of the divine acts by the soul's inspection of its own acts, while the wickedness of the Christians is the infringement of the rules governing the self-disclosures of the attributes of the Truth by the soul's inspection of its own attributes and its being veiled thereby. The wickedness of the Muḥammadans is their turning of their attention to their essences and infringing the rules governing the unity of the Essence.
أَفَحُكْمَ الْجَاهِلِيَّةِ يَبْغُونَ ۚ وَمَنْ أَحْسَنُ مِنَ اللَّهِ حُكْمًا لِقَوْمٍ يُوقِنُونَ
📘 Do they desire the judgement of paganismḍ, meaning that what they desire by their ignorance is but a judgement issuing from the station of the soul and not issuing from divine knowledge.
۞ يَا أَيُّهَا الَّذِينَ آمَنُوا لَا تَتَّخِذُوا الْيَهُودَ وَالنَّصَارَىٰ أَوْلِيَاءَ ۘ بَعْضُهُمْ أَوْلِيَاءُ بَعْضٍ ۚ وَمَنْ يَتَوَلَّهُمْ مِنْكُمْ فَإِنَّهُ مِنْهُمْ ۗ إِنَّ اللَّهَ لَا يَهْدِي الْقَوْمَ الظَّالِمِينَ
📘 O you who have faith, take not the Jews and Christians as friends. They are friends of each other. Whoso of you takes them as a friend is one of them. Surely God does not guide the wrongdoers. The majestic compeller, the great Lord, the knower to perfection, the exalted Possessor of Maj- esty, calls to His servants with a call of generosity. By way of gentleness He caresses them and in the attribute of clemency and mercy He turns the faces of their hearts away from others toward Himself. He is saying, “Do not take the stranger as friend, and do not approve of the enemy for your companionship. When you take a friend and take a companion, approve of him for the sake of God. Take the friend in God's work and approve of the companion in God's religion. When you seek the realities of faith, seek them from friendship with God's friends and enmity with the enemies of the religion.” MuṣṬafā said, “The firmest handle of faith is love in God and hate in God.” The enemies of the religion whose enmity is obligatory are first Satan, and second the com- manding soul. The soul is harder than Satan, for Satan does not go after the faith of the faithful, but rather their disobedience. The soul, however, pulls him to unbelief and wants his unbelief. Satan flees from [the formula] “There is no power and no strength but in God,” but the soul does not flee. Joseph the sincerely truthful suffered many trials-he was thrown into the well, sold into slav- ery, and remained in prison for years-but he never lamented the way he did at the commanding soul: “Surely the soul commands to ugliness” [12:53]. MuṣṬafā said, “Your worst enemy is the soul between your two sides.”
يَا أَيُّهَا الَّذِينَ آمَنُوا مَنْ يَرْتَدَّ مِنْكُمْ عَنْ دِينِهِ فَسَوْفَ يَأْتِي اللَّهُ بِقَوْمٍ يُحِبُّهُمْ وَيُحِبُّونَهُ أَذِلَّةٍ عَلَى الْمُؤْمِنِينَ أَعِزَّةٍ عَلَى الْكَافِرِينَ يُجَاهِدُونَ فِي سَبِيلِ اللَّهِ وَلَا يَخَافُونَ لَوْمَةَ لَائِمٍ ۚ ذَٰلِكَ فَضْلُ اللَّهِ يُؤْتِيهِ مَنْ يَشَاءُ ۚ وَاللَّهُ وَاسِعٌ عَلِيمٌ
📘 O you who have faith, if any of you turn back on your religion, God will bring a people whom He loves, and who love Him. This verse contains an allusion for the knowers and good news for the faithful. The allusion is that God is the guardian and defender of the creed of submission, the unswerving religion, the Muhammadan Shariah, and that it will always remain. What will this religion lose if some people turn away? If some people turn back, the Lord of Mightiness will bring others who embrace this religion with spirit and heart and nurture it joyfully. With them God will preserve the signposts of His commands and the foundations of His prohibitions. With their places He will decorate the carpet of the Shariah. Upon them He has inscribed the letters of love, for He says, “whom He loves, and who love Him.” Upon the page of their hearts He has written with the divine script: He wrote faith in their hearts [58:22]. He has illuminated their inmost eye with the lamp of recognition: So he is upon a light from his Lord [39:22]. The Divinity is their nurturer, the lap of prophethood their cradle, beginninglessness and endlessless their warders, the playing field of gentleness the lodge of their gaze, and the carpet of awe the resting place of their aspiration. This is just what God says in another place: “So if they disbelieve, we have already entrusted it to a people who do not disbe- lieve” [6:89]. The Prophet said, “A group among my people will never cease supporting the Real. None who oppose them will harm them, and then God's command will come.” The good news is that whoever does not turn back is counted among the friends, the folk of love and faith. Those who do not fall into the abyss of turning back have the good news that the name of love will fall upon them. God says, “If any of you turn back on your religion, God will bring a people whom He loves, and who love Him.” First He affirms His love, then the servants' love. Thus you know that so long as God does not love the servant, the servant will not love. WāsiṬī said, “Gehenna was nullified when He mentioned His love for them with His words, 'Whom He loves, and who love Him. ' What do defective attributes have to do with beginningless and endless attributes?” Ibn ʿAṬāÌ was asked what love is. He said, “Branches that grow in the heart and give fruit in the measure of intellect.” The Pir of the Tariqah said, “The sign of finding friendship's response is approval, the water of friendship increases through loyalty, the basis of friendship's treasure is light, the fruit of friend- ship's tree is joy. Whoever fails to keep away from the two worlds is excused from friendship. Whoever seeks from the Friend something other than the Friend is ungrateful. Friendship is friend- ship for God, all the rest disquiet.” Whom He loves, and who love Him. A great work and a magnificent bazaar rose up in water and clay and became the kiblah of the Real's friendship and the target of union's arrow. How could the traveler not be delighted that friendship is the nearest way station to the Protector? The tree that produces only the fruit of joy is friendship, the soil that grows nothing but the flowers of intimacy is friendship, the cloud that rains nothing but light is friendship, the drink whose poison turns into honey is friendship, the road whose dust is musk and ambergris is friendship. Friendship's inscrip- tion is beginningless, and friendship's burning brand endless. When the Friend's friendship is my habit and disposition, I am all from the Friend, and all of me is the Friend. Behold how long friendship's good fortune lasts! Listen how fitting is the tale of the friends! The field of friendship is a vast heart, and the kingdom of paradise is one branch of friendship's tree. He who drinks friendship's wine is promised vision. Whoever is truthful will one day reach his desire. God revealed to David, “O David, he who seeks Me will in truth find Me, but how can those who seek others find Me? “O David, tell the people of the earth, 'Turn toward companionship and intimacy with Me! Become intimate with My remembrance! Then I will be your heart's intimate.' “I have created the clay of my friends from the clay of My bosom friend Abraham, from the clay of My speaking companion Moses, and from the clay of My beloved MuḤammad. “O David, I have created the hearts of those who yearn for Me from My light and nurtured them with My majesty.
إِنَّمَا وَلِيُّكُمُ اللَّهُ وَرَسُولُهُ وَالَّذِينَ آمَنُوا الَّذِينَ يُقِيمُونَ الصَّلَاةَ وَيُؤْتُونَ الزَّكَاةَ وَهُمْ رَاكِعُونَ
📘 Your friend is only God, and His Messenger. Abū Saʿīd Kharrāz said, " When God desires to take one of His servants as a friend, He opens for him the door to His remembrance. When he takes pleasure in the remembrance, He opens for him the door to proximity. Then He lifts him up to the sitting place of intimacy. Then He seats him on the throne of tawḤīd. Then He lifts the veils from him, puts him into the abode of solitariness, and unveils majesty and tremendousness to him. When his eyesight falls on majesty and tremendous- ness, he remains without himself. At this point he becomes a servant in annihilation, so he falls under His protection and is rid of the claims of his soul. " Abū Saʿīd is saying, " When God wants to choose a servant and make him His friend among His servants, the first caress that He places upon him is to keep him in His remembrance such that he turns away from his own work toward the Real's work and turns away from remember- ing himself to remembering the Real. He comes forth from love for himself to love for the Real. Once he is at rest in remembering and loving the Real, He brings him near to Himself. The mark of nearness is the sweetness of obedience, dislike of disobedience, retiring from the people, and pleasure in seclusion. Then He sits him in the sitting place of seclusion, on the carpet of inti- macy, on the throne of tawḤīd, free of creatures, happy with the Real, unsettled in passion, the veils lifted, brought into the playing field of solitariness, with majesty and tremendousness un- veiled. He is a stranger to himself, one with the Real, consumed within himself, having reached the Patron. " He keeps on saying, " With reports I went forth seeking certainty, fear my resource, hope my companion. The goal was hidden from me and I was striving in the religion. All at once the lightning of self-disclosure flashed from ambush. With thought they see days like that, with the Friend like this. " Listen with your spirit to these words spoken beautifully by the Pir of the Tariqah: " O most generous supervisor! O most merciful Fount of Bounty! O veiled by majesty and disclosed by generosity, apportioner before Tablet and Pen, displayer of the celebration of guidance after a thousand misfortunes! May I be delivered one day from the bother of Eve and Adam and be freed from the bonds of existence and nonexistence! May I remove this remorse and regret from my heart and take ease with the Beloved for a breath, the cup of happiness in hand again and again in the sitting place of intimacy! " How long talk of Adam's attributes and creation? How long debate about the world's time and eternity? How long ambushing the servants, how long not disowning the world and Adam?
وَمَنْ يَتَوَلَّ اللَّهَ وَرَسُولَهُ وَالَّذِينَ آمَنُوا فَإِنَّ حِزْبَ اللَّهِ هُمُ الْغَالِبُونَ
📘 Whoever affiliates with God and His Messenger and the believers, he is of the folk of God and verily the folk of God, they shall have the victory, of God.
يَا أَيُّهَا الَّذِينَ آمَنُوا إِذَا قُمْتُمْ إِلَى الصَّلَاةِ فَاغْسِلُوا وُجُوهَكُمْ وَأَيْدِيَكُمْ إِلَى الْمَرَافِقِ وَامْسَحُوا بِرُءُوسِكُمْ وَأَرْجُلَكُمْ إِلَى الْكَعْبَيْنِ ۚ وَإِنْ كُنْتُمْ جُنُبًا فَاطَّهَّرُوا ۚ وَإِنْ كُنْتُمْ مَرْضَىٰ أَوْ عَلَىٰ سَفَرٍ أَوْ جَاءَ أَحَدٌ مِنْكُمْ مِنَ الْغَائِطِ أَوْ لَامَسْتُمُ النِّسَاءَ فَلَمْ تَجِدُوا مَاءً فَتَيَمَّمُوا صَعِيدًا طَيِّبًا فَامْسَحُوا بِوُجُوهِكُمْ وَأَيْدِيكُمْ مِنْهُ ۚ مَا يُرِيدُ اللَّهُ لِيَجْعَلَ عَلَيْكُمْ مِنْ حَرَجٍ وَلَٰكِنْ يُرِيدُ لِيُطَهِّرَكُمْ وَلِيُتِمَّ نِعْمَتَهُ عَلَيْكُمْ لَعَلَّكُمْ تَشْكُرُونَ
📘 O you who have faith, when you stand for the prayer, wash your faces and your hands up to your elbows.... If you find no water, have recourse to goodly dust. Outward purity has three sections: First is purity after impurity. Second is purity after excretion and sexual activity. Third is purity from the sheddings of the body, such as nails, hair, dirt, and so on. Each of these three sections has an explanation and an explication, and these will be spoken of elsewhere, God willing. Inward purity has three duties: First, purity of the limbs from disobedience, such as back- biting, lying, eating the forbidden, betrayal, and looking at women illicitly. When this purity is gained, the servant is adorned with obedience and reverence. This is the degree of the faith of the pious. Its mark is that the remembrance of the Real is always on their tongue, the fruit of the prom- ise in their heart, the freshness of His favors in their spirit. They are always visiting the sick, going to cemeteries, hurrying to supplicate for good people, and reaching for paradise. The second duty is purity of the heart from unapproved character traits, such as self-admira- tion, envy, pride, hypocrisy, avarice, animosity, and frivolity. Self-admiration ruins the mirror of friendship, envy reduces the worth of people, pride darkens the mirror of the heart, hypocrisy dries up the wellspring of obedience, avarice puts aside respect for people, animosity blocks up the water of familiarity, and frivolity takes away the tent-pole of companionship. When the servant has be- come pure of these defilements, he is numbered among the godwary. His mark is that he flees from concessions, he does not cling to ambiguity, he is always fearful, trembling, and fleeing from hell; he is content with a morsel and a tattered cloak, he has put aside the world and the world's folk, and he has melted himself in the crucible of sorrow. Faith is his basis, godwariness his traveling sup- plies, the grave his way station, and the afterworld his goal. With all this, he constantly weeps with the tongue of pleading and says, “O God, everyone is upon something, but I don't know what I'm upon. I fear only the moment when who I am appears. O God, I am always talking and speaking. So long as You do not show Yourself I will be searching and seeking. Because of unsettledness I run in the field of incapacity. I'm in the midst of the work, but I smell no scent. O God, my mount has stood back, my feet are worn down, my fellow-travelers have gone, and nothing has increased except bewilderment.” I am bewildered in Thee, take my hand, O guide of those bewildered in Thee! The third duty is purity of the secret core from everything except the Real. God says, “Say 'God,' then leave them” [6:91]. This purity is their adornment today, for tomorrow the cup of pure wine [76:21] will be in their hand. Today the light of hope shines in their hearts, but tomorrow the light of face-to-face vision will shine in their spirits. Today in their yearning the liver's water flows from their eyes, but tomorrow contemplation's water will flow in the stream of gentle favor. Today the dawn of happiness has come up from the rising place of freedom, but tomorrow the sun of so- licitude will advance in the heaven of face-to-face seeing. The mark of this purity is that one washes away love for this world, effaces the tracks of hu- man nature, and burns the veils of dispersion, so the heart is joyful in the garden of intimacy, and the spirit is occupied with the Real in the seclusion of face-to-face vision. How well was it said by that chevalier! “At last will be a day then this drum will give forth a sound, and that Generous One will whisper in secret to the lover's spirit. What a wonderful work, what a marvelous bazaar! Here we have intimate togetherness without being the same in kind. Since there is no one of the same kind, what is this intimacy? Since there is no one like Him, what is this love? Since you have not seen Him, what is this incapacity? Since the wine is still in the grape, what is this existence? Since waiting is all tribulation, what is this happiness in the heart? Since the eye of the secret core is veiled from Him, what is this ecstasy like fire? Since this path is all trial, what is this enjoyment in the midst of trial?” Though Your ache has put me in the fire, how I will ache if Your ache ever leaves me! Wash your faces and your hands up to the elbows.
وَتَرَىٰ كَثِيرًا مِنْهُمْ يُسَارِعُونَ فِي الْإِثْمِ وَالْعُدْوَانِ وَأَكْلِهِمُ السُّحْتَ ۚ لَبِئْسَ مَا كَانُوا يَعْمَلُونَ
📘 And you see many of them vying, that is, indulging in all manner of vices in earnest because of their habituation to them and their having been trained in them, and because they constitute natural traits of their souls. Sin is the vice of the rational-speech faculty because it is mendacity; enmity is the vice of the concupiscent faculty
وَلَوْ أَنَّ أَهْلَ الْكِتَابِ آمَنُوا وَاتَّقَوْا لَكَفَّرْنَا عَنْهُمْ سَيِّئَاتِهِمْ وَلَأَدْخَلْنَاهُمْ جَنَّاتِ النَّعِيمِ
📘 But had the People of the Scripture believed, [with] the faith of the true affirmation of the Oneness, and feared, and guarded against the idolatrous association of their acts, their attributes and their essences, We would have absolved them of their evil deeds, from among their remnants, and We would admitted them to, the three gardens.
وَلَوْ أَنَّهُمْ أَقَامُوا التَّوْرَاةَ وَالْإِنْجِيلَ وَمَا أُنْزِلَ إِلَيْهِمْ مِنْ رَبِّهِمْ لَأَكَلُوا مِنْ فَوْقِهِمْ وَمِنْ تَحْتِ أَرْجُلِهِمْ ۚ مِنْهُمْ أُمَّةٌ مُقْتَصِدَةٌ ۖ وَكَثِيرٌ مِنْهُمْ سَاءَ مَا يَعْمَلُونَ
📘 And had they observed the Torah, by ascertaining the exoteric aspects of knowledge [therein] and fulfilling the duties arising from the self-disclosures of the acts and observing their rules in transactions, and the Gospel, by ascertaining the esoteric signs and fulfilling the duties arising from the self-disclosures of the attributes and observing their rules, and, consolidated, what was revealed to them, of the knowledge of the origin and the final return as well as the affirmation of the unity of the kingdom and the spiritual realm of the world of lordship, which is the world of the [divine] Names, they would surely have received nourishment from above them, that is, they would surely have been provided from the higher spiritual world with divine forms of knowledge, rational realities of certainty and the gnoses of the Truth by which they are guided to knowledge of God and to knowledge of the angelic spiritual realm and the realm of divine power, and from beneath their feet, that is, [they would have also been provided] from the lower corporeal world with knowledge of the natural [physical] world and of sensory objects of perception by which they are guided to knowledge of the world of the kingdom and would come to know God by His exoteric and esoteric name, nay, by all of the names and attributes and would arrive at the station of the two mentioned affirmations of unity. Some of them are a just community, equitable, having arrived at the affirmation of the unity of the names and attributes, but many of them, have not arrived at the affirmation of the unity of the acts yet, let alone the affirmation of the unity of the attributes and thus their deeds are evil since they arise from the attributes of their souls, this being their densest veil.
وَاذْكُرُوا نِعْمَةَ اللَّهِ عَلَيْكُمْ وَمِيثَاقَهُ الَّذِي وَاثَقَكُمْ بِهِ إِذْ قُلْتُمْ سَمِعْنَا وَأَطَعْنَا ۖ وَاتَّقُوا اللَّهَ ۚ إِنَّ اللَّهَ عَلِيمٌ بِذَاتِ الصُّدُورِ
📘 [And remember] God's grace upon you, in guiding [you] to the path of arrival, and His covenant, that is, the bonds of the resolutions made for His sake as mentioned, since you accepted these from the source of prophethood by the purity of [your] primordial nature.
لَقَدْ أَخَذْنَا مِيثَاقَ بَنِي إِسْرَائِيلَ وَأَرْسَلْنَا إِلَيْهِمْ رُسُلًا ۖ كُلَّمَا جَاءَهُمْ رَسُولٌ بِمَا لَا تَهْوَىٰ أَنْفُسُهُمْ فَرِيقًا كَذَّبُوا وَفَرِيقًا يَقْتُلُونَ
📘 [And We made a covenant with the Children of Israel] and We sent messengers to them, in accordance with their [spiritual] levels. Thus when they were veiled from all aspects, We sent [them] Moses to remove the veil of the acts and to call [them] to proclaim the unity of the kingdom but their souls did not desire it, because his call was opposed to their caprices greedy as these are in their acts and because of their vaunting of these [acts of theirs] and of their pleasures and lusts. Thus they denied him and took to worshipping the calf of the soul and transgressed in the Sabbath and did what they did, until when he who would believe in him believed in him and emerged from the veil of the acts, but supposed that this was absolute perfection [that he had attained]. So We then sent Jesus to remove the veil of the attributes and to call to the esoteric and to the proclamation of the unity of the spiritual realm, but their souls did not desire it, because his call was opposed to their caprices supposing [to have attained] perfection. Thus they denied him and they did what they did until he who would believe in him believed and emerged from the veil of the attributes, but remained in that state supposing that his soul had attained absolute perfection. Then We sent Muḥammad to remove the veil of the attributes and to call to the proclamation of the unity of the Essence, but their souls did not desire it and they denied him,
وَحَسِبُوا أَلَّا تَكُونَ فِتْنَةٌ فَعَمُوا وَصَمُّوا ثُمَّ تَابَ اللَّهُ عَلَيْهِمْ ثُمَّ عَمُوا وَصَمُّوا كَثِيرٌ مِنْهُمْ ۚ وَاللَّهُ بَصِيرٌ بِمَا يَعْمَلُونَ
📘 and they thought there would be no trial, [no] idolatrous association upon the affirmation of the unity of the acts and the manifestation of the call of Jesus, and so they were wilfully blind, to the self-disclosures of the vision of the attributes, and deaf, to hearing the knowledge thereof. Then God relented to them, by opening up the audition-channels of their hearts and their eyes, and they repented and so He accepted their repentance; then they were wilfully blind and deaf, during the call of Muḥammad to the witnessing of the Abiding Face and to hearing the knowledge of the affirmation of the unity of the absolute union; and God sees what they do, at all three stations, including [their] rejection of the calls, [their] denial of the prophets and so He will requite them in accordance with their state.
لَقَدْ كَفَرَ الَّذِينَ قَالُوا إِنَّ اللَّهَ هُوَ الْمَسِيحُ ابْنُ مَرْيَمَ ۖ وَقَالَ الْمَسِيحُ يَا بَنِي إِسْرَائِيلَ اعْبُدُوا اللَّهَ رَبِّي وَرَبَّكُمْ ۖ إِنَّهُ مَنْ يُشْرِكْ بِاللَّهِ فَقَدْ حَرَّمَ اللَّهُ عَلَيْهِ الْجَنَّةَ وَمَأْوَاهُ النَّارُ ۖ وَمَا لِلظَّالِمِينَ مِنْ أَنْصَارٍ
📘 [For the Messiah said, 'O Children of Israel] worship God, my Lord and your Lord, that is to say, make your acts of worship specific to the Essence that is qualified by all of the attributes and names, that which constitutes absolute existence. Do not designate Him with any one name or attribute, for His Lordship is equally related to all [of these names and attributes]. Whoever restricts His divinity to any one form and specificies it by a particular name, word or attribute, has verily affirmed the existence of some other than Him, by the necessity of names, forms and attributes existing besides Him, and whoever affirms other than Him, has verily committed an idolatrous act of association with Him, and whoever has committed an idolatrous act of association with Him, to him God has made forbidden, the garden of the witnessing of Him through His essence, His attributes and His acts, namely, the absolute all-encompassing garden, in other words He has veiled him in an absolute way; and his abode shall be, the Fire of privation on account of the injustice which he committed by his act of idolatrous association, and for wrongdoers there shall be no helpers, to help them and save them from the chastisement.
لَقَدْ كَفَرَ الَّذِينَ قَالُوا إِنَّ اللَّهَ ثَالِثُ ثَلَاثَةٍ ۘ وَمَا مِنْ إِلَٰهٍ إِلَّا إِلَٰهٌ وَاحِدٌ ۚ وَإِنْ لَمْ يَنْتَهُوا عَمَّا يَقُولُونَ لَيَمَسَّنَّ الَّذِينَ كَفَرُوا مِنْهُمْ عَذَابٌ أَلِيمٌ
📘 They have indeed disbelieved, [they have indeed] been veiled, those who say, 'God is the third of three', [that He is] one thing comprising three things: the act, the exoteric aspect of the world of the kingdom; the attribute, which is the esoteric aspect of the world of the spiritual realm; and the essence, in which the attribute subsists and from which the act issues. But He is not that 'one' they have imagined. Rather the act and the attribute are in reality the essence itself and there is no distinction [between them] except in relative terms. God is but the absolute One, for otherwise there would be a god for every one of His names and there would be a plurality of deities, glorified and exalted be He greatly above what the evildoers claim. If they do not desist from what they say, of the attribute and the act being other than the essence, those [of them] who are veiled, shall suffer a chastisement, that is painful because of their falling short in their knowledge of God despite their possessing the preparedness [for it].
أَفَلَا يَتُوبُونَ إِلَى اللَّهِ وَيَسْتَغْفِرُونَهُ ۚ وَاللَّهُ غَفُورٌ رَحِيمٌ
📘 Will they not turn in repentance to God, by falling back from their affirmation of a plurality in God to the absolute source of the union and seek His forgiveness for the sin of inspecting their existence and the existence of others besides them; God is Forgiving, shielding them with His essence, Merciful, to them by [bestowing upon them] perfected knowledge [of Him] and affirmation of the Oneness.
قُلْ أَتَعْبُدُونَ مِنْ دُونِ اللَّهِ مَا لَا يَمْلِكُ لَكُمْ ضَرًّا وَلَا نَفْعًا ۚ وَاللَّهُ هُوَ السَّمِيعُ الْعَلِيمُ
📘 [Say: 'Do you worship besides God] what cannot hurt or profit youḍ, since that [which they worship besides Him] possesses no agency by which to hurt or profit, nay possessing no existence quite besides agency. He says what besides God [cannot hurt or profit you], even though Jesus is what is meant, in order to point out that he [Jesus] can be considered as a thing [besides God] insofar as he is an entity, though he has no [independent] existence in reality.
قُلْ يَا أَهْلَ الْكِتَابِ لَا تَغْلُوا فِي دِينِكُمْ غَيْرَ الْحَقِّ وَلَا تَتَّبِعُوا أَهْوَاءَ قَوْمٍ قَدْ ضَلُّوا مِنْ قَبْلُ وَأَضَلُّوا كَثِيرًا وَضَلُّوا عَنْ سَوَاءِ السَّبِيلِ
📘 [Say: 'O People of the Scripture] � [do not follow the whims of a people] who went astray formerly, by becoming veiled to the lights of the attributes, and have led many astray, and strayed, now, from the even way', the path of the [inclusive] unity of the essence, which is to be upright before God.
يَا أَيُّهَا الَّذِينَ آمَنُوا كُونُوا قَوَّامِينَ لِلَّهِ شُهَدَاءَ بِالْقِسْطِ ۖ وَلَا يَجْرِمَنَّكُمْ شَنَآنُ قَوْمٍ عَلَىٰ أَلَّا تَعْدِلُوا ۚ اعْدِلُوا هُوَ أَقْرَبُ لِلتَّقْوَىٰ ۖ وَاتَّقُوا اللَّهَ ۚ إِنَّ اللَّهَ خَبِيرٌ بِمَا تَعْمَلُونَ
📘 that is nearer to God-fearing, that is to say, the intellect is more able to disengage from the doubts that garb the attributes of the soul and to assume the attributes of God, exalted be He, as a protective guard, as it is the noblest of excellent qualities which if actualised is followed by all [the rest]. And fear God, take Him as your guard to ensure that equity issues forth from you, for the fountainhead of perfections and excellent virtues is His Essence, exalted be He; surely God is aware of what you do, whether this issues from the attributes of your souls or from Him.
۞ لَتَجِدَنَّ أَشَدَّ النَّاسِ عَدَاوَةً لِلَّذِينَ آمَنُوا الْيَهُودَ وَالَّذِينَ أَشْرَكُوا ۖ وَلَتَجِدَنَّ أَقْرَبَهُمْ مَوَدَّةً لِلَّذِينَ آمَنُوا الَّذِينَ قَالُوا إِنَّا نَصَارَىٰ ۚ ذَٰلِكَ بِأَنَّ مِنْهُمْ قِسِّيسِينَ وَرُهْبَانًا وَأَنَّهُمْ لَا يَسْتَكْبِرُونَ
📘 You will truly find, to the end [of the verse]. Friendship and enmity are [to be understood] in terms of correspondence and oppositeness. Whenever someone affiliates with another that is an indication of an interconnecting factor of genus between them, and whenever he displays enmity towards another that is an indication of discrepancy and contrareity between them. Since the Jews were veiled from the essence and the attributes and only engaged in the affirmation of the unity of the acts, their correspondence to the idolaters who are veiled absolutely was stronger than their correspondence to the believers who are affirmers of unity absolutely. As for the Christians, because when they emerged from the veil of the attributes they affiliated only to the veil of the essence, their correspondence to the believers was stronger, which is why they are nearer in love of them than others, while the idolaters and the Jews are the most hostile because of the intensity of their veiledness. Do you not see how He has explained the reason for their nearness in terms of their knowledge and worship [of God] and their lack of disdain. For worship leads to the garden of the acts in which they become disengaged from the acts of their souls, doing what God commands [of them]; and knowledge leads to the garden of the attributes, [knowledge] by which they are exalted above the garden of the souls and [by which] they arrive at the station of the heart which is the locus for the [divine] unveiling. [Their] reception of divine knowledge and their lack of disdain are indications that they do not see their souls as qualified by the attributes of worship and knowledge; nor do they ascribe their acts and knowledge to them [their souls], rather to God, since otherwise they would be disdainful and would manifest pride;
وَإِذَا سَمِعُوا مَا أُنْزِلَ إِلَى الرَّسُولِ تَرَىٰ أَعْيُنَهُمْ تَفِيضُ مِنَ الدَّمْعِ مِمَّا عَرَفُوا مِنَ الْحَقِّ ۖ يَقُولُونَ رَبَّنَا آمَنَّا فَاكْتُبْنَا مَعَ الشَّاهِدِينَ
📘 And when they hear what has been sent down to the Messenger, thou seest their eyes over- flow with tears because of the truth they recognize. They say, “Our Lord, we have faith, so write us down among the witnesses.” This verse alludes to the fact that faith is to be heard, seen, recognized, spoken, and done. They hear is evidence that it is to be heard. Thou seest their eyes overflow with tears is evidence that it is to be seen. Because of the truth they recognize is evidence that it is to be recognized. They say is evidence that it is to be spoken. Then, at the end of the verse, He says “That is the recompense of the beautiful-doers” [5:85]. Beautiful-doers is evidence that its deeds are to be done. He began with hearing because first there is hearing. The servant hears the truth, it makes him happy, he accepts it, he comes into work, and he acts upon it. The Lord of the Worlds is pleased with the group in whom all these traits are found. It has been said that three things are the marks of recognition, and that this group has all three to perfection: weeping, supplication, and approval-weeping for disloyalty, supplication for be- stowal, and approval of the decree. Anyone who claims to have recognition and does not have these traits is not truthful in his claim, is not counted among the recognizers, and has no standing among the chevaliers and the religious. The Pir of the Tariqah said, “Recognition is two: the recognition of the common people and the recognition of the elect. The recognition of the common people is by hearsay, and the recogni- tion of the elect is by face-to-face vision. The recognition of the common people comes from the source of munificence, but the recognition of the elect comes from what they find.” Concerning the recognition of the common people He says, “When they hear what has been sent down to the Messenger.” Concerning the recognition of the elect He says, “He will show you His signs, and you will recognize them” [27:93]. When they hear is praise of the folk of the Shariah, and He shall show you His signs is a felici- tation for the folk of the Haqiqah. When someone speaks of the Shariah and turns his back in any respect, he becomes a heretic. When someone speaks of the Haqiqah and looks at himself in any respect, he becomes an associater.
وَمَا لَنَا لَا نُؤْمِنُ بِاللَّهِ وَمَا جَاءَنَا مِنَ الْحَقِّ وَنَطْمَعُ أَنْ يُدْخِلَنَا رَبُّنَا مَعَ الْقَوْمِ الصَّالِحِينَ
📘 And why should we not believe, in His essence with a true faith and in what has come to us of His words, or not believe in God as all-comprehensive, and what has come to us of the truth, in differentiated mode; [and hope that our Lord should admit us] with the righteous peopleḍ', who have remained upright in the subsistence after [experiencing],
فَأَثَابَهُمُ اللَّهُ بِمَا قَالُوا جَنَّاتٍ تَجْرِي مِنْ تَحْتِهَا الْأَنْهَارُ خَالِدِينَ فِيهَا ۚ وَذَٰلِكَ جَزَاءُ الْمُحْسِنِينَ
📘 Gardens underneath which rivers flow, in the way of the three self-disclosures together with the knowledge of these [three]: that is the requital of those who are virtuous, who witness the unity at the source of multiplicity by their uprightness before God.
وَالَّذِينَ كَفَرُوا وَكَذَّبُوا بِآيَاتِنَا أُولَٰئِكَ أَصْحَابُ الْجَحِيمِ
📘 But those who, have been veiled from the essence and, disbelieve, in the signs of the attributes - they are the people, of total privation in the Hell-fire of the attributes of the soul.
يَا أَيُّهَا الَّذِينَ آمَنُوا لَا تُحَرِّمُوا طَيِّبَاتِ مَا أَحَلَّ اللَّهُ لَكُمْ وَلَا تَعْتَدُوا ۚ إِنَّ اللَّهَ لَا يُحِبُّ الْمُعْتَدِينَ
📘 O you who believe, with a cognitive knowledge, do not forbid the good things that God has made lawful for you, of the unveilings of states and the self-disclosures of the attributes by falling short of your wayfaring, and do not transgress, by the insolence of the soul and the manifesting of itself through its attributes. Rather make God your shield for actualising those perfections by seeing them from Him and for His sake, not from you or for your sake, lest you then become insolent, if you are [truly] affirmers of [His] Oneness.
لَا يُؤَاخِذُكُمُ اللَّهُ بِاللَّغْوِ فِي أَيْمَانِكُمْ وَلَٰكِنْ يُؤَاخِذُكُمْ بِمَا عَقَّدْتُمُ الْأَيْمَانَ ۖ فَكَفَّارَتُهُ إِطْعَامُ عَشَرَةِ مَسَاكِينَ مِنْ أَوْسَطِ مَا تُطْعِمُونَ أَهْلِيكُمْ أَوْ كِسْوَتُهُمْ أَوْ تَحْرِيرُ رَقَبَةٍ ۖ فَمَنْ لَمْ يَجِدْ فَصِيَامُ ثَلَاثَةِ أَيَّامٍ ۚ ذَٰلِكَ كَفَّارَةُ أَيْمَانِكُمْ إِذَا حَلَفْتُمْ ۚ وَاحْفَظُوا أَيْمَانَكُمْ ۚ كَذَٰلِكَ يُبَيِّنُ اللَّهُ لَكُمْ آيَاتِهِ لَعَلَّكُمْ تَشْكُرُونَ
📘 God will not take you to task for idle talk in your oaths, but He will take you to task for the oaths you have bound. The expiation thereof is the feeding of ten indigent people with what you usually feed your own family, or clothing them, or freeing a slave. When overpowered by ecstasy the chevaliers of the Tariqah sometimes swear oaths renewing the covenant and affirming the compact. They say things like, “By your rightful due, I will not gaze at other than You, I will not speak to other than You, and I will not leave Your covenant!” By virtue of tawḤīd these oaths are idle talk and negligence in the witnessing of Unity. How can it be the servant's place to give himself worth, to fancy that he is someone, or to consider his own words to have such status that he can swear an oath to Him? Rather, what is fitting for the servant is to welcome His rulings with beautiful approval. Whether He summons or drives away, he should not protest and not turn away. He should not speak of the realities of union and separation. He should take what He gives, and accept what comes. He should know that in reality it is He who is lovingly kind to perfection and it is He who determines and governs in every state. The Pir of the Tariqah said, “O closer to us than ourselves, O more lovingly kind to us than ourselves, O caresser of us without us by Your generosity-not because of our worthiness, not because of our works. The burden is beyond our capacity, the practice not proper to us, the favor not within our ability. Whatever we have done has damaged us, whatever You have done subsists for us. Whatever You have done in our place You have done by Yourself, not for our sake.” Expiation in the Shariah is well-known to the folk of knowledge-freeing slaves, feeding people, and clothing them. So also, in the tongue of allusion, expiation in the Tariqah is of three sorts: expending the spirit by virtue of ecstasy, expending the heart in the soundness of intention, and expending the soul by constant effort. If you are not able to do this, then abstain and fast from prohibited and blamable things.
وَعَدَ اللَّهُ الَّذِينَ آمَنُوا وَعَمِلُوا الصَّالِحَاتِ ۙ لَهُمْ مَغْفِرَةٌ وَأَجْرٌ عَظِيمٌ
📘 God has promised those who believe, among you, with the cognitive affirmation of Oneness, and perform righteous deeds, that help them to arrive at the entific affirmation of Oneness and prepares them for it, they shall have forgiveness, by their attributes, and a great wage, from the self-disclosures of His attributes, exalted be He.
يَا أَيُّهَا الَّذِينَ آمَنُوا إِنَّمَا الْخَمْرُ وَالْمَيْسِرُ وَالْأَنْصَابُ وَالْأَزْلَامُ رِجْسٌ مِنْ عَمَلِ الشَّيْطَانِ فَاجْتَنِبُوهُ لَعَلَّكُمْ تُفْلِحُونَ
📘 O you who have faith! Wine, arrow-shuffling, idols, and divining arrows are a filth and of the deeds of Satan. The Prophet said, “Wine is the gatherer of sin and the mother of loathsome things”: Wine is the root of loathsome things and the key to great sins, the basis of misdeeds, the seed of misguided acts, and the source of discord. It dries up the springhead of obedience, holds back the water of remembrance, and opens the door to heedlessness. The soul becomes drunk from wine and is held back from the prayer. The heart becomes drunk from heedlessness and is held back from secret whispering. The Pir of the Tariqah spoke to these heedless people in the tongue of admonition: “O drunk- ards full of appetite! O sleepers in heedlessness! Have shame before that Lord who knows the treachery of the eyes and sees the inside of the hearts! He knows the treachery of the eyes and what the breasts conceal [40:19]. Oh, where is a whip like that of ʿUmar or a sword like that of ʿAlī to give these discourteous drunkards the Shari'ite punishment in the world of justice and to get these sleeping, heedless people to move! Does the poor wretch who drinks wine not know that when he puts the cup in his hand, the Throne and the Footstool tremble? From the Exalted Presence comes the call, 'By My exaltation and majesty, I will give them to taste of My chastisement in boiling water and Zaqqūm!'” Arrow-shuffling is gambling. When someone plays everything and loses all in a gambling house, he is considered great and recognized as a preceder. This is an allusion to the path of the chevaliers: They throw themselves down on the highway of predetermination so as to become abased before every piece of straw and to come out from the bonds of every color, counting them- selves as nothing. As long as you stay in bond to color, nature, the spheres, and the stars, how can you be allowed to say, “Speak like a Qalandar”? [DS 972]
وَأَطِيعُوا اللَّهَ وَأَطِيعُوا الرَّسُولَ وَاحْذَرُوا ۚ فَإِنْ تَوَلَّيْتُمْ فَاعْلَمُوا أَنَّمَا عَلَىٰ رَسُولِنَا الْبَلَاغُ الْمُبِينُ
📘 And obey God, by being annihilated in Him so that you become compliant in what He uses you for, as [compliant as] one who is dead; and obey the Messenger, by subsisting after the annihilation so that you become upright therein, mindful of the differentiations, alive through his life; and beware, of the manifestation of [your untransformed] remnants at the point of uprightness; but if you turn away, then know, that the shortcoming is yours and the Messenger's duty is only to proclaim openly [the message] and not to commit [you to it].
لَيْسَ عَلَى الَّذِينَ آمَنُوا وَعَمِلُوا الصَّالِحَاتِ جُنَاحٌ فِيمَا طَعِمُوا إِذَا مَا اتَّقَوْا وَآمَنُوا وَعَمِلُوا الصَّالِحَاتِ ثُمَّ اتَّقَوْا وَآمَنُوا ثُمَّ اتَّقَوْا وَأَحْسَنُوا ۗ وَاللَّهُ يُحِبُّ الْمُحْسِنِينَ
📘 There shall be, upon those who believe, with faith based on the unseen by the affirmation of the unity of the acts, and who perform, in accordance with what their faith entails, deeds that bring them out of the veils of the acts and set them right for the vision of the acts of the Truth, no fault or constraint in what they enjoy of different types of shares, so long as they avoid the remnants of their acts and take God as their shield against acts issuing from themselves, and believe, in the unity of the attributes, and perform deeds, that bring them out of the veils of the attributes and set them right for the witnessing of the divine self-disclosures by their effacement therein, and then guard themselves, against the remnants of their attributes and take God as their shield upon the issuing of His attributes upon them, and believe, in the unity of the essence, then guard themselves, the remnants of their essences and take God as their shield upon their existence through the pure annihilation and [their] consumption in the source of the essence and who are virtuous by witnessing the differentiations at the source of the union and by their uprightness at the subsistence after the annihilation; for God loves the virtuous, those who witness the unity at the source of multiplicity, who are mindful of the dues of the differentiations at the source of the union by means of the Truth-given existence.
يَا أَيُّهَا الَّذِينَ آمَنُوا لَيَبْلُوَنَّكُمُ اللَّهُ بِشَيْءٍ مِنَ الصَّيْدِ تَنَالُهُ أَيْدِيكُمْ وَرِمَاحُكُمْ لِيَعْلَمَ اللَّهُ مَنْ يَخَافُهُ بِالْغَيْبِ ۚ فَمَنِ اعْتَدَىٰ بَعْدَ ذَٰلِكَ فَلَهُ عَذَابٌ أَلِيمٌ
📘 O you who believe, in the unseen, God will surely try you, at the point of your wayfaring and your entry into pilgrim sanctity for the visiting of the Kaʿba of arrival, with something, of the shares that come your way and by which you are given to consider that these are a means to arriving at this [Kaʿba of arrival], so that God may know, at the level of differentiated knowledge that is consequent to the event from which recompense ensues; who fears Him, in the state of absence, since fear (khawf) only applies in the case of those who believe in the unseen, as it is connected in the narrative that is addressing acts. As for the state of presence, then [what applies is] either reverential trepidation (khashya), in which case, by the self-disclosure of Lordship and Exaltedness, or awe (hayba), in which case, by the self-disclosure of the Essence. Thus fear is an attribute of the soul, reverential trepidation is an attribute of the heart, while awe is an attribute of the spirit. Whoever transgresses thereafter, by committing acts [entailing the enjoyment] of shares after the [divine] trying, his shall be a chastisement, that is painful for his veiling himself from [divine] love by his act.
يَا أَيُّهَا الَّذِينَ آمَنُوا لَا تَقْتُلُوا الصَّيْدَ وَأَنْتُمْ حُرُمٌ ۚ وَمَنْ قَتَلَهُ مِنْكُمْ مُتَعَمِّدًا فَجَزَاءٌ مِثْلُ مَا قَتَلَ مِنَ النَّعَمِ يَحْكُمُ بِهِ ذَوَا عَدْلٍ مِنْكُمْ هَدْيًا بَالِغَ الْكَعْبَةِ أَوْ كَفَّارَةٌ طَعَامُ مَسَاكِينَ أَوْ عَدْلُ ذَٰلِكَ صِيَامًا لِيَذُوقَ وَبَالَ أَمْرِهِ ۗ عَفَا اللَّهُ عَمَّا سَلَفَ ۚ وَمَنْ عَادَ فَيَنْتَقِمُ اللَّهُ مِنْهُ ۗ وَاللَّهُ عَزِيزٌ ذُو انْتِقَامٍ
📘 O you who have faith, do not slay game when you are ritually consecrated. He forbade hunting to the ritually consecrated because such a person has the intention of visiting the Kaabah. In terms of allusion, He is saying, “When someone aims for My house and turns his face to the eminent, holy Kaabah, hoping to be in My neighborhood, at least desert game should be protected and secure from him, for in his undertaken goal he has brought himself into the crowd of the pious and the good, and the attribute of the pious is this: 'They do not harm an ant, nor do they have hidden thoughts of evil.'” It has been said that ritual consecration is of two sorts: the hajji's consecration in the body, and the recognizer's consecration in the heart. As long as the hajji is consecrated in the body, game is forbidden to him. As long as the recognizer is consecrated in the heart, seeking, wanting, and free choice are forbidden to him. The mark of the heart's consecration is three things: to be on loan to the creatures, to be a stranger to oneself, and to be at ease from attachment. The fruit of the heart's consecration is three things today and three things tomorrow. Today it is the sweetness of whispered prayer, the birth of wisdom, and the soundness of perspicacity; tomorrow it will be the light of contemplation, the call of gentleness, and the cup of wine.
أُحِلَّ لَكُمْ صَيْدُ الْبَحْرِ وَطَعَامُهُ مَتَاعًا لَكُمْ وَلِلسَّيَّارَةِ ۖ وَحُرِّمَ عَلَيْكُمْ صَيْدُ الْبَرِّ مَا دُمْتُمْ حُرُمًا ۗ وَاتَّقُوا اللَّهَ الَّذِي إِلَيْهِ تُحْشَرُونَ
📘 Permitted to you is the hunting of the game, of the sea of the spiritual world in the way of gnoses, intelligibles and cognitive shares amidst the celestial bodies of the divine presence, and food from it, in the way of profitable knowledge, the learning of which, for the purposes of transactions and for [the refinement of] character traits, is an obligatory duty, a means of enjoyment, for you, O wayfarers along the path of truth, and for the travellers, those journeying to the Hereafter, seeking to obtain the gains of the everlasting bliss; but forbidden to you is the hunting of the game, on the land of the corporeal world in the way of sensory objects and ego-centric shares. Take God as your shield in your journeying so that you might journey with Him. And make your souls God's shield [for you] against the issuing from them of preventive evils, and be certain that, to Him you shall be gathered, at the annihilation in the Essence, so expend effort in wayfaring and do not stop because of the impediments behind the veil.
۞ جَعَلَ اللَّهُ الْكَعْبَةَ الْبَيْتَ الْحَرَامَ قِيَامًا لِلنَّاسِ وَالشَّهْرَ الْحَرَامَ وَالْهَدْيَ وَالْقَلَائِدَ ۚ ذَٰلِكَ لِتَعْلَمُوا أَنَّ اللَّهَ يَعْلَمُ مَا فِي السَّمَاوَاتِ وَمَا فِي الْأَرْضِ وَأَنَّ اللَّهَ بِكُلِّ شَيْءٍ عَلِيمٌ
📘 God has appointed, the Kaʿba of the presence of the union, the House, that is forbidden to the entry into it of other [than God], as they say: 'Majestic is the Truth's Eminence above that It should serve as a watering-place for every water-seeker; as a rising for mankind, from their true death and a revivification for them thereby and by His life, His power and all of His attributes; and the sacred month, that is, the time of arrival, which is the time of the true pilgrimage in which the manifestation of the attributes of the soul is prohibited; the offering, that is, the soul sacrificially slaughtered in the courtyard of that Kaʿba, and the garlands, and especially the noble and obedient soul that is strong and compliant, for to seek nearness by means of such [a soul] is better and its status upon subsistence and the resurrection through the second existence and the true life shall be more exalted; that, in other words, appointing that presence as a rising for you, is so that you may know, by His knowledge upon your resurrection through it, that God knows, the realities of things in the world of the unseen and the witnessing, and that His knowledge encompasses all things; and since your knowledge cannot encompass His, then:
اعْلَمُوا أَنَّ اللَّهَ شَدِيدُ الْعِقَابِ وَأَنَّ اللَّهَ غَفُورٌ رَحِيمٌ
📘 Know that God is intense in punishment and that God is forgiving, ever-merciful. He is intense in punishment toward the enemies and forgiving, ever-merciful toward the friends.5 The intense in punishment is severity and harshness toward the enemies. The forgiving, ever- merciful is caresses and generosity for the friends. He combined severity and gentleness in one verse so that the servant would live in fear and hope between severity and gentleness. When he looks at severity, he fears, and when he sees gentleness, he hopes. Fear is the fortress of faith, the antidote to caprice, and the weapon of the faithful. Hope is the steed of service, the supplies for striving, and the provision of worship. It has also been said that the servant's faith and certainty have two wings: fear and hope. How can a bird fly with one wing? In the same way, the faithful cannot travel the road of the religion in fear without hope or in hope without fear. True faith is like a balance: One pan is fear, the other pan hope, and the beam is love. The pans are hung from knowledge. Just as a balance must have pans, so hope and fear must have knowledge, which is why He put Know that at the beginning of the verse. Fear without knowledge is the fear of the Khawarij, hope without knowledge is the hope of the Murji'ah, and love without knowledge is the love of libertines.
مَا عَلَى الرَّسُولِ إِلَّا الْبَلَاغُ ۗ وَاللَّهُ يَعْلَمُ مَا تُبْدُونَ وَمَا تَكْتُمُونَ
📘 The duty of the Messenger is only, to convey [the Message], not to effect conjunction, and God knows, your secrets and your outward acts, what you reveal, of deeds and character traits, and what you hide, of intentions, knowledge, and states, and whether these are good for you to seek nearness to Him therewith, and whether you are preparing therewith for the encounter with Him or not.
Book A Free Trial