Universal Dimensions of Islam Part 7

"Moses carved out a stone from the mountain, and, when I wrote the Torah therein, the stone turned into emerald. The knower's heart was made of harsh stone-when I wrote My name therein, it turned into an exalted book."9 * * *

The next verse is the first half of 2:148, which reads, "Everyone has a direction to which he turns." This is often understood as explaining the diversity of creation. In stage two of the commentary, Maybudi reads the verse as referring to the "kiblah" of people, their orientation in their worship. Each of us has a G.o.d on which our aspirations are focused, and that G.o.d is determined by our created nature, which was given to us by our Creator. This idea is commonplace in Islamic thought, and is alluded to in Koranic verses like 25:43, "Have you seen the one who has taken his own caprice as his G.o.d?" I have already explained how Ibn Arabi develops some of its implications in terms of "the G.o.d of belief." Here are Maybudi's words in stage two: Everyone has a kiblah toward which he turns. The folk of falsehood have turned their faces toward a crooked kiblah-by [G.o.d's] decree and abandonment. The folk of truth have turned their faces toward a straight kiblah-by [G.o.d's] decree and giving success. And the whole affair is in G.o.d's hand.10 In this straightforward interpretation, Maybudi takes the verse as a statement of the actual situation, of the static relationship between creatures and the Creator. But our situations are not in fact fixed, so we can always do something to change them. The fact that we are abandoned today does not demand that we will be abandoned tomorrow, nor does the fact that we receive success today mean that we have a lock on success. If we look with the eye of love, we can see that the verse is urging us to recognize our true Beloved and turn away from all the false objects of love that attract us. This is the way Maybudi interprets it in the third stage: He [G.o.d] says by way of allusion: "All people have turned away from Me. They have become familiar with others instead of Me. They have made the ease of their hearts to lie in something less than Me and accepted it as their beloved."

You, who are the n.o.bles on the Path, you, who claim to love Me-lift up your eyes from anything less than Me, even if it be the highest paradise. Then you will walk straight, following the Sunnah and the conduct of Muhammad, and you will fulfill completely the duty of emulating that greatest man of the world. For, his conduct, as the greatest of the prophets, was to turn his eyes away from all beings and not to see any refuge or to accept any resting place other than the shelter of Unity [aadiyyat].

When a man wears down his soul in the path of love

he'd better not incline to anyone less than the Friend.

In the path of love the lover must never

give a thought to paradise or h.e.l.l.

When someone puts himself right by following [Muhammad], the candle of his love for G.o.d will be lit in his path such that he will never fall away from the road of love. To this is the allusion in the verse, "Follow me, and G.o.d will love you" [3:31]. Whenever someone goes straight on the avenue of love, he will be secure from the varied directions that are the kiblahs of the shallow-minded. One fervent lover has said in his state, No matter that I don't have the world's kiblah-

my kiblah is the Beloved's lane, nothing else.

This world, that world, all that exists-

lovers see the Beloved's face, nothing else.

Al-allaj alluded to the kiblahs of the shallow-minded when he said, "The desirers have been turned over to what they desire." In other words, everyone has been placed with his own beloved.

The reality of this work is that all creatures have claimed love for the Real, but there was no one who did not want to be somebody in His court.

Whoever found himself a name found it from that Court.

Belong to Him, brother, don't think about anyone else!

Since everyone claimed to love the Real, He struck them against the touchstone of trial to show them to themselves. He threw something into them and made it their kiblah, so they turned their face to it, rather than to Him. In one it was possessions, in another position, in another a spouse, in another a beautiful face, in another vainglory, in another knowledge, in another asceticism, in another worship, in another fancy. He threw all of these into the creatures, so they busied themselves with them. No one spoke of Him, and the path of seeking Him stayed empty.

This is why Abu Yazid said, "I walked up to His gate, but I didn't see any crowding there, because the folk of this world were veiled by this world, the folk of the afterworld were veiled by the afterworld, and the claimants among the Sufis were veiled by eating, drinking, and begging. There were others among the Sufis of a higher level-but they were veiled by music and beautiful faces. The leaders of the Sufis, however, were not veiled by any of these. I saw that they were bewildered and intoxicated."

It was in accordance with this sort of tasting that the Guide on the Path [Anari] said, "I know the drinking place, but I'm not able to drink. My heart is thirsty and I wail in the hope of a drop. No fountain can fill me up, because I'm seeking the ocean. I pa.s.sed by a thousand springs and rivers in hope of finding the sea.

"Have you seen someone drowning in fire? I'm like that. Have you seen someone thirsty in a lake? That's what I am. I'm exactly like a man lost in the desert. I keep on saying, 'Someone help me!' I'm screaming at the loss of my heart.'"11 * * *

I conclude by citing one more pa.s.sage, again from the commentary on the second surah, specifically verse 5. At the beginning of this surah, after saying that the Koran is the book within which there is no doubt, the text goes on to say that it is a guidance for the G.o.dfearing, and then it describes the G.o.dfearing-those who have faith in the unseen and perform the commanded practices. Verse 5 then reads, "Those are upon guidance from their Lord; those are the ones who prosper." The next verse turns to a description of those who do not prosper-those who reject G.o.d's guidance.

In the third stage of his commentary on verse 5, Maybudi goes into quite a bit of detail to suggest what sort of "prosperity" is at issue: Here you have endless good fortune and unlimited generosity. G.o.d has opened up the door of their insight and has looked upon their hearts with the gaze of solicitude. He has lit up the lamp of guidance in their hearts so that, what for others is unseen, for them is manifest, what for others is reports, for them is unmediated seeing.12 Next Maybudi turns to accounts of the Prophet's Companions and some of the early Sufis to suggest the difference between knowing something by means of transmitted reports, and knowing it by means of direct vision and immediate experience. Then he turns once again to the sayings of Anari and cites a highly poetical dialogue between the spirit (jan) and the heart (dil), which concludes by reminding us that all this talk of love and transformation represents tawid in practice, and it leads to the union in which G.o.d becomes the hearing with which the lovers hear and the eyesight with which they see.

The human substance is like a rusted mirror. As long as it has rust on its face, no forms appear within it. When you polish it, all forms will appear. As long as the opaqueness of disobedience is on the believing servant's heart, none of the mysteries of the spiritual realm [malakut] will appear within it, but, when the rust of disobedience is removed from it, the mysteries of the spiritual realm and the states of the Unseen begin to show themselves. This is precisely the "unveiling" [mukashafa] of the heart.

Just as the heart has unveiling, the spirit has unmediated seeing [muayana]. Unveiling is the lifting of the barriers between the heart and the Real, and unmediated seeing is seeing together [ham-didari]. As long you are with the heart, you are receiving reports. When you reach the spirit, you arrive at unmediated seeing.

Shaykh al-Islam Anari has let out the secret here in the tongue of unveiling, lifting from it the seal of jealousy. He said: On the first day of the beginningless covenant a tale unfolded between heart and spirit. No one was there-not Adam and Eve, not water and clay. The Real was present, the Reality was there.

No one has heard such a marvelous tale. The heart was the questioner, and the spirit was the mufti. The heart had an intermediary, but the spirit received the report by unmediated seeing. The heart asked a thousand questions from the spirit, and they all came to nothing. With one word the spirit answered them all.

The heart did not have its fill of asking, nor did the spirit of answering. The questions were not about deeds, nor were the answers about rewards. Whenever the heart asked about reports, the spirit answered from unmediated seeing. Finally, the heart came to unmediated seeing, and it brought back the report to water [and clay].

If you have the capacity to hear, listen. If not, don't hurry to deny, just stay silent.

The heart asked the spirit, "What is faithfulness [wafa]? What is annihilation [fana]? What is subsistence [baqa]?"

The spirit answered, "Faithfulness is to bind the belt of love, annihilation is to be delivered from your own selfhood, subsistence is to reach the reality of the Real."

The heart asked, "Who is the stranger, who the mercenary, who the familiar?"

The spirit replied, "The stranger has been driven away, the mercenary remains on the road, the familiar is called."

The heart asked the spirit, "What is unmediated seeing? What is love [mihr]? What is unneedingness [naz]?"

The spirit replied, "Unmediated seeing is the resurrection, love is fire mixed with blood, unneedingness is the handhold of need [niyaz]."

The heart said, "Add to that."

The spirit answered, "Unmediated seeing does not get along with explanation, love is paired with jealousy [ghayrat], and wherever there is unneedingness, the story is long."

The heart said, "Add to that."

The spirit replied, "Unmediated seeing cannot be a.n.a.lyzed, love takes the sleeper in secret, and he who reaches unneedingness in the Beloved will never die."

The heart asked, "Has anyone ever reached that day by himself?"

The spirit replied, "I asked that from the Real. The Real said, 'Finding Me is by My solicitude [inaya]. Thinking that you can reach Me by yourself is your sin.'"

The heart asked, "Is there permission for one glance? I'm tired of interpretation and reports."

The spirit replied, "Here we have a sleeper, running water, his fingers in his ears. Will he hear the sound of the Pool of Paradise?"

The discussion of heart and spirit was cut off. The Real began to speak, and the spirit and heart listened. The tale unfolded until the words rose high and the place was emptied of listeners.

Now the heart finds no end to unneedingness, and the spirit none to gentleness. The heart is in the grasp of Generosity, the spirit in the shelter of the Holy. No mark of the heart appears, no trace of the spirit. Nonexistence is lost in existence, reports in unmediated seeing. From beginning to end this is precisely the tale of tawid. To this "I am his hearing with which he hears" gives witness.13

Footnotes

1 Theologically, this distinction is often drawn in terms of G.o.d's two commands: He issues the command "Be!" (kun) to all things, and they can do nothing but obey; this is the creative or "engendering" command (al-amr al- takwini). To human beings (and jinn) he also issues the command, "Do this and don't do that," and they accept or reject it on the basis of their own free choice; this is the "prescriptive command" (al-amr al-taklifi).

2 Mathnawi (Nicholson edition), Book 3, vss. 3287-88.

3 Chittick, Me & Rumi: The Autobiography of Shams-i Tabrizi (Louisville: Fons Vitae, 2004), p. 156.

4 Ibid., p. 228.

5 Ibid., p. 71.

6 Iya ulum al-din, Volume 3, Book 2, section on "The marks of the illnesses of the hearts" (Beirut: Dar al-Hadi, 1992, vol. 3, pp. 96-97).

7 I first wrote these sentences before the appearance of Annabel Keeler's ground-breaking study, Sufi Hermeneutics:The Qur'an Commentary of Rashid al-Din Maybudi (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006), which throws a great deal of light on Maybudi and his work.

8 This is of course the Guarded Tablet (al-law al-mafu), within which G.o.d writes with the Highest Pen (al- qalam al-ala). The Pen and Tablet are also known as the First Intellect and the Universal Soul.

9 Kashf al-asrar, edited by A. A. ikmat (Tehran: Danishgah, 1952-60), vol. 1, pp. 54-55.

10 Ibid., p. 407.

11 Ibid., pp. 412-13.

12 Ibid., p. 58.

13 Ibid., pp. 59-60. I have taken a bit of help in reading this pa.s.sage from parts of it that are also found in Majmua- yi rasail-i farsi-yi Khwaja Abdallah Anari, edited by M. Sarwar Mawlai (Tehran: Tus, 1377/1998), pp. 367-77.

Civilizational Dialogue and Sufism:

The Holy Qur'an and the Metaphysics of Ibn al-'Arabi

Reza Shah-Kazemi 1. "Civilized Dialogue" and the Holy Qur'an The notion of "civilizational dialogue" has been proposed in recent years as an antidote to the poison disseminated by the sensational prophecy of "the clash of civilizations" made by Samuel Huntington. What is meant by a dialogue between civilizations is of course simply "civilized dialogue", that is, a mode of dialogue between individuals of different cultures and religions which seeks to accept the Other within a civilized framework; a mode of dialogue which respects diversity and difference, and upholds the rights of all individuals and groups to express their beliefs and to practice their faith without hindrance. In the Holy Qur'an one finds a clear enunciation of the manner in which civilized dialogue should take place in a context of religious diversity; it does so in several verses, some of the most important of which we shall cite here as the essential background against which one should view the metaphysical perspectives on the Other opened up by Ibn al-'Arabi, verses to which we will return in the course of presenting these perspectives: For each of you We have established a Law and a Path. Had G.o.d willed, He could have made you one community. But that He might try you by that which He hath given you [He hath made you as you are]. So vie with one another in good works. Unto G.o.d ye will all return, and He will inform you of that wherein ye differed. (5:48) O mankind, truly We have created you male and female, and have made you nations and tribes that ye may know one another. (49:13) And of His signs is the creation of the heavens and the earth, and the differences of your languages and colors. Indeed, herein are signs for those who know. (30:22) Truly those who believe, and the Jews, and the Christians, and the Sabeans-whoever believeth in G.o.d and the Last Day and performeth virtuous deeds-surely their reward is with their Lord, and no fear shall come upon them, neither shall they grieve. (2:62) Say: We believe in G.o.d, and that which was revealed unto Abraham, and Ishmael, and Isaac, and Jacob, and the tribes, and that which was given unto Moses and Jesus and the prophets from their Lord. We make no distinction between any of them, and unto Him we have submitted. (2:136) And do not hold discourse with the People of the Book except in that which is finest, save with those who do wrong. And say: We believe in that which hath been revealed to us and revealed to you. Our G.o.d and your G.o.d is one, and unto Him we surrender. (29:46) Call unto the way of thy Lord with wisdom and fair exhortation, and hold discourse with them [the People of the Book] in the finest manner. (16:125) It is on the basis of such verses as these that Martin Lings a.s.serted that, whereas the universality proper to all true religions can be found within each religion's mystical dimension, or esoteric essence, one of the distinctive features of Islam is the fact that universality is indelibly inscribed within its founding revelation-as well as within its esoteric essence. "All mysticisms are equally universal ... in that they all lead to the One Truth. But one feature of the originality of Islam, and therefore of Sufism, is what might be called a secondary universality, which is to be explained above all by the fact that as the last Revelation of this cycle of time it is necessarily something of a summing up."1 The extent to which the religions of the Other are given recognition, and indeed reverence, in the Qur'an does indeed render this scripture unique among the great revelations of the world. It is thus a rich source for reflection upon the most appropriate way to address the various issues pertaining to dialogue with the religious Other. The Qur'anic message on religious diversity is of particular relevance at a time when various paradigms of "pluralism" are being formulated and presented as a counter-weight to the "clash of civilizations" scenario. In the last of the verses cited above, 16:125, "wisdom" (ikma) is given as the basis upon which dialogue should be conducted. The whole of the Qur'an, read in depth and not just on the surface, gives us a divine source of wisdom; imbibing from this source empowers and calibrates our efforts to engage in meaningful dialogue and to establish authentic modes of tolerance; it thus provides us, in the words of Tim Winter, with a "transcendently-ordained tolerance."2 Wisdom is a quality and not an order: it cannot be given as a blue-print, a set of rules and regulations; it calls for human effort, a readiness to learn, it needs to be cultivated, and it emerges as the fruit of reflection and action. As the words of verse 16:125 tell us, we need wisdom and beautiful exhortation, and we also need to know how to engage in dialogue on the basis of that which is asan "finest" "most excellent", or "most beautiful" in our own faith, if we are to authentically invite people to the path of the Lord. In other words, we are being encouraged to use wisdom, rather than any pre-determined set of instructions, in order to discern the most appropriate manner of inviting people to the "way of thy Lord", thus, how best to engage in da'wa. But we also need wisdom in order to discern that which is "most excellent" in the faith of our interlocutors in dialogue. This creative juxtaposition between da'wa and dialogue indicates implicitly that, rather than being seen as two contrasting or even ant.i.thetical modes of engaging with the Other, these two elements can in fact be synthesized by wisdom: if one's dialogue with the Other flows from the wellsprings of the wisdom of one's tradition, and if one makes an effort to understand the wisdom-that which is "most excellent"-in the beliefs of the Other, then this kind of dialogue will const.i.tute, in and of itself, a "most beautiful" form of da'wa. For one will be making an effort to allow the wisdom of one's tradition to speak for itself; to "bear witness" to one's faith will here imply bearing witness to the wisdom conveyed by one's faith-tradition, that very wisdom which, due to its universality and lack of prejudice, allows or compels us to recognize, affirm and engage with the wisdom contained within and expressed by other faithtraditions. For, as the Prophet said, "Wisdom is the lost camel (alla) of the believer: he has a right to it wherever he may find it."3 If wisdom is the lost property of the believer, this means that wherever wisdom is to be found, in whatever form, in whatever religion, philosophy, spirituality, or literature-that wisdom is one's own. It is thus an inestimable tool in the forging of an authentic civilization. One has to be prepared to recognize wisdom, as surely as one would recognize one's own camel, after searching for it. This translates into the att.i.tude: whatever is wise is, by that very fact, part of my faith as a "believer": my belief in G.o.d as the source of all wisdom allows or compels me to recognize as "mine" whatever wisdom there is in the entirety of time and s.p.a.ce, in all religions and cultures. This does not mean that one appropriates to one's own self-whether individual or social or religious-the wisdom of the Other; rather, it means that one recognizes the wisdom of the Other as being an expression of the wisdom of G.o.d, the one and only source of wisdom, however it be expressed. How, then, is it "mine"? Insofar as one's ident.i.ty is defined by one's relationship with G.o.d as the source of all truth, beauty and wisdom, one's "self" will be, in that very measure, inextricably bound up with the wisdom one perceives, however alien be the context or culture in which it is expressed. On the specifically Islamic level, such an approach produces this open-minded att.i.tude: that which is wise is-by its essence if not its form-"Islamic". It "belongs" to us, and we identify with it. This contrasts with the prejudiced att.i.tude: only that which is Islamic-in its form-is wise.

One should note that the universal vision of wisdom was at its strongest when Islamic civilization was at its most authentic and confident-witness the extraordinary a.s.similation and transformation of the various ancient forms of wisdom in the early 'Abbasid period; this was an exemplification of the calibrated appropriation and creative application of wisdom-from the intellectual legacy of the Greeks, and the Persians, Indians and Egyptians, Mesopotamians, a.s.syrians, etc.-on a grand, civilizational scale, transforming and enriching Muslim philosophy, science, and culture.4 By contrast, it is the exclusivist, prejudiced approach to wisdom that prevails today, when Islamic "civilization" can hardly be said to exist anywhere. It would also appear to be the case that when Islamic civilization existed, da'wa was not invested with the emotional intensity which it has acquired in our times. Modernism-with its highly developed tools of propaganda, its tendencies of ideologization, bureaucratization, and uniformalization-has influenced Muslim thought and behavior and made Muslim da'wa much more like Christian missionary movements; in traditional Islam, the da'wa that existed was far more low-key, personal and took the form of preaching through personal example-it is not accidental, that, as Thomas Arnold's masterly study reveals, the main "missionaries" of traditional Islam were mystics and merchants.5 The emotional intensity with which da'wa is invested in our times would appear to be, on the one hand, a function of the very weakness of Islamic culture, a defensive reflex used to disguise one's "civilizational" deficiencies; and on the other, it is a kind of inverted image of the missionary Christian movements to which the Muslim world has been subjected in the past few centuries, a mimetic response to one's erstwhile colonizers.

One cannot deny, however, that da'wa has always played a role in Muslim culture, and that it has a role to play today. To ignore da'wa, within a Muslim context, is to render questionable one's credentials as a "valid interlocutor" on behalf of Islam. But one ought to be aware of the kind of da'wa that is appropriate in our times, and to seek to learn from the most subtle and refined spirituality of the Islamic tradition in order to make wisdom the basis of one's da'wa. The kind of da'wa being proposed here is one which seeks to be true to the wisdom which flows from the Qur'anic message of religious diversity, a message read in depth, according to Sufi hermeneutics, and in particular the metaphysics of Ibn al-'Arabi.6 This would be a form of da'wa which contrasts sharply with the kind of triumphalist propaganda with which we are all too familiar in our times: a disdainful and arrogant call, issuing from harshly exclusivist att.i.tudes which manifest the claim that "my" religion is alone right and all others are wrong. A dialogue based on wisdom would also be a form of dialogue which contrasts quite sharply with a relativistic pluralism which, by reducing all religious beliefs to a presumptuous lowest common denominator, ends up by undermining one's belief in the normativity of one's religion-a belief which is so central to the upholding of one's faith with integrity. The kind of da'wa-as-dialogue being proposed here charts a middle path, avoiding two extremes which are in fact closer to each other than is immediately obvious: a fundamentalist type of da'wa which alienates the Other on account of its blatant exclusivity, and a pluralistic mode of dialogue which corrodes the Self on account of its thinly veiled a.s.sault on normativity. An effective, realistic, and practical mode of dialogue must do justice both to the Self which one ostensibly represents, and to the Other with whom one is in dialogue; there has to be room for the expression of one's belief in the normativity of one's tradition-the belief that one's religion is the best religion, failing which, one would not adhere to it.7 The right of the Other to bear witness to his faith should, likewise, be respected.

The question might then be asked: how can these competing truth-claims be reconciled with the needs of dialogue-will the result not simply be two mutually exclusive monologues engaging in an unseemly type of compet.i.tive religion rather than respecting each other in an enriching dialogue of comparative religion? There is an existential argument one can make, whatever be the faith adhered to, on behalf of this "exclusivist" claim, and this argument is based on the fact that religion is not simply a conceptual schema, it is a transformative power. In the "clash" between rival religions, one is not only confronted by competing, mutually exclusive truth-claims; one is also presented with alternative paths to realization of a Reality which radically transcends all conceptually posited truths. One's perception of the "truths" which fashion and delineate one's path to Reality will be deepened, and the truth-claims will be correspondingly corroborated, in proportion to one's progress along that path: therefore the claim that one's religion is "more true" than other religions is a claim about the transformative power which one has directly experienced, and it is this which bestows an existential certainty-rather than any kind of logical infallibility-about one's claim on behalf of the spiritual power of one's religion, a degree of certainty which is absent from a purely conceptual truth-claim one might make on behalf of the dogmas of one's religion. Religion is more about realization than conceptualization; or rather, it is about an initial set of concepts which call out for spiritual action,8 and which find their consummation in spiritual realization.9 The Buddhist notion of doctrine-all doctrine-as an upaya, a "saving strategy" is an example of a wise doctrine which we might use here to help explain this point. This notion means, essentially, that all doctrines are veils which transmit some aspects of the truth while obscuring others: the communicable aspect of the truth in question is transmitted, but at the price of obscuring its incommunicable dimension, if it be taken too seriously, that is: if the communicable aspect of the truth be taken as the whole truth. The key spiritual function of doctrine is to point to a reality beyond itself, and is likened, within Buddhism, to a finger pointing at the moon: one is urged to look at the moon indicated by the finger, and not focus exclusively on the finger.10 This reduction of the spiritual end to the conceptual means is what fanatical dogmatism does; by contrast, a more supple approach to dogma results in seeing it as a means to an end: the dogma as theory leads to spiritual praxis, and moral transformation, thanks to which the "eye of the heart" is opened up, enabling it to "see" that Reality to which the dogma bears witness, but which it cannot encompa.s.s or exhaust.

In regard to the function of language in the search for truth, Rumi makes this point, which resonates with the idea of an upaya, and which highlights the need for spiritual action as an accompaniment to doctrinal learning: Someone asked: Then what is the use of expressions and words?

The Master [i.e. Rumi] answered: The use of words is that they set you searching and excite you, not that the object of the quest should be attained through words. If that were the case, there would be no need for so much striving and self-naughting. Words are as when you see afar off something moving; you run in the wake of it in order to see it, it is not the case that you see it through its movement. Human speech too is inwardly the same; it excites you to seek the meaning, even though you do not see it in reality.

Rumi then reinforces the point, stressing the incommensurability between the kind of learning that comes through reading, on the one hand, and the understanding that arises from the spiritual discipline of self-transcendence, on the other: Someone was saying: I have studied so many sciences and mastered so many ideas, yet it is still not known to me what that essence in man is that will remain forever, and I have not discovered it.

The Master answered: If that had been knowable by means of words only, you would not have needed to pa.s.s away from self and to suffer such pains. It is necessary to endure so much for yourself not to remain, so that you may know that thing which will remain.11 Similarly, another great Persian poet 'Abd al-Raman Jami (d.1492), who masterfully synthesized the esoteric teachings of the school of wadat al-wujud in his, Lawai, expresses succinctly the transcendence of this higher wisdom, in terms of which thought-all thought, including the mentally posited conceptions of the dogmas of religion-is not just surpa.s.sed, it is even rendered "evil": O heart, how long searching for perfection in school?

How long perfecting the rules of philosophy and geometry?