The Ninth Flash — An Addendum to the Second Question — The Flashes

An Addendum to the Answer to Your Question about Muhyiddin al‑‘Arabi

Question: Muhyiddin al‑‘Arabi considered the Unity of Existence to be of the highest level. Likewise, some of the great saints who took the path of love followed him. However, you say that this way is not of the highest level and is not real; that it is rather the path taken, to a degree, by those who become intoxicated and immersed in the divine, and of the people of love and ecstasy. So what, briefly, is the high level of the affirmation of divine unity pointed out by the clear verses of the Qur’an, through the mystery of the legacy of prophethood? Can you explain it?

The Answer: It is a hundred times beyond the ability of an utterly powerless unfortunate like myself to judge those elevated stations with his limited thought. I shall just explain one or two extremely brief points proceeding from the effulgence of the All‑Wise Qur’an. Perhaps they will be useful in understanding the matter.

First Point

There are numerous reasons for becoming embroiled in the way of the Unity of Existence. One or two of them may be described as follows:

The First Reason: Because they could not squeeze into their brains the maximum degree of the creativity of dominicality, nor entirely establish in their hearts the idea that everything, through the mystery of divine oneness, is held directly in the grasp of dominicality and that all things have existence through divine power, choice, and will, those who took that way were obliged to say that everything is either Him, or does not have existence, or is imaginary, or is His manifestation or emanation.

The Second Reason: The mark of passionate love is to want never to be separated from the beloved and to flee desperately from such separation; to tremble at the thought of parting, to fear distance from the beloved as though fearing Hell, and to abominate transience; to love union with the love of one’s own spirit and life, and to yearn with endless desire to be near to the beloved as though longing for Paradise. Thus, through adhering to a manifestation of divine immediacy in all things, those who took the way of the Unity of Existence disregarded separation and distance; supposing union and meeting to be permanent, they said: “There is no existent but He;” through the intoxication of love and as demanded by the ecstasy of permanence, meeting, and union, they imagined that in the Unity of Existence was a most pleasurable way of illumination whereby they could be saved from the dreadfulness of separation, and made it their refuge.

That is to say, the first reason sprang from the fact that the hand of their intellects was unable to reach up to some of the truths of belief, which were extremely broad and elevated; they were unable to comprehend them, and had not developed completely in regard to belief. While the source of the second reason was the extraordinary unfolding of their hearts from the point of view of love, and their wondrous expansion and breadth.

However, the supreme level of divine unity, which the Purified Ones – who were the people of sobriety and great saints of the legacy of prophethood – saw through the explicit expositions of the Qur’an is both extremely elevated, and shows both the maximum level of dominicality and creativity and that all the divine names are real. It preserves the Qur’an’s principles and does not spoil the balance of the decrees of dominicality. For they say that:

Together with the oneness of His essence and His being free of space, with His knowledge Allah the Most High encompasses and determines directly all things together with all their attributes, and through His will He chooses and specifies them, and through His power He creates them and maintains their existence. He creates and directs the whole universe as though it were a single being. He creates the huge spring with the ease of creating a flower. Nothing obstructs anything else. There is no fragmentation in His regarding things. He is present everywhere at the same instant through the disposal of His knowledge and power. There is no division or distribution in His disposal. This mystery has been expounded and proved decisively in the Sixteenth Word and in the Second Aim of the Second Stopping‑Place of the Thirty-Second Word.

Since, according to the rule, “Comparisons are incontestible,” no attention should be paid to defects in comparisons and allegories, I shall set forth a very faulty comparison so that the difference between the two ways may be understood to a degree.

For example, let us imagine a huge, matchless, and wondrously adorned peacock which can fly from east to west in an instant, and opens and closes its wings, which stretch from north to south, are adorned with hundreds of thousands of fine patterns, and in every single feather of which are included brilliant arts. Now, there are two men observing it; they want to fly with the wings of the intellect and heart up to the elevated qualities of this bird, to its wondrous decorations.

One looks at the peacock’s condition and form and the marvellous inscriptions of power on all its feathers; he loves it with extreme passion and ardour; he in part abandons his attentive reflective thought, and clings to love. But then he sees that every day those lovable decorations change and are transformed. Those objects of his love, which he worships, disappear and are lost.

While he should have said that through true divine unity, which he could not encompass with his mind, and absolute dominicality and the oneness of the divine essence, they were the artistic decorations of an Inscriber possessing universal creativity, he said instead – in order to console himself – that the spirit of the peacock was so sublime that its maker was within it, or that the peacock had become him, and that since its spirit had become one with its being, and its being had combined with its outward appearance, its spirit’s perfection and being’s exaltedness displayed those manifestations, displaying every moment a different inscription and beauty; it was not a true creation through its will, but rather a manifestation, an emanation.

As for the other man, he said that those harmonious, orderly decorations so full of art definitely required will, choice, intention, and purpose. It was impossible for there to be a manifestation without will, an emanation without choice. Yes, the peacock had a beautiful and elevated nature, but it could not be the doer; it was passive. It could not become one with the active agent. Its spirit was fine and exalted, but it could not be the creator and disposer, only receptive and a means. For observedly in each of its feathers was an art performed with infinite wisdom and an inscription and decoration made through an infinite power. And these could not occur without will and choice.

The arts indicating perfect wisdom within perfect power, and perfect dominicality and mercy within perfect wisdom were not the work of some sort of manifestation. The scribe who had written that gilded notebook could not be inside it and be united with it. The notebook rather only had contact with the nib of the scribe’s pen. In which case, the wondrous decorations of the similitude of the peacock known as the universe were a gilded missive of the peacock’s Creator.

Now, look at the peacock and read the missive. Say to its Scribe: “What wonders Allah has willed! Blessed be Allah! Glory be to Allah!” The person who supposes the missive to be the scribe, or the scribe to be inside the letter, or fancies the missive to be imagination, has surely mislaid his reason in the veils of love, and been unable to see the true form of reality.

Among the varieties of passionate love, the one most giving rise to the way of the Unity of Existence, is love of this world. When it turns into true love, love of this world, which is temporary, is transformed into the Unity of Existence.

A person loves a personal beloved with worldly love. Then, unable to accept in his heart his beloved’s transience and ephemerality, he consoles himself by saying that his beloved is a mirror reflecting the beauty of the True Object of Love and Worship, and attaches himself to a reality, so acquiring permanence for him through true love.

In the same way, when due to the constant blows of death and separation the strange love of the person who takes the huge world and the universe in its totality as his beloved is transformed into true love, he seeks refuge in the way of the Unity of Existence in order to save that great beloved of his from death and separation. If he has extremely powerful and elevated belief, it becomes a pleasurable, luminous, acceptable level, as with those resembling Muhyi’d‑Din al-‘Arabi. However, it is possible he may fall into various abysses, embrace materiality, and become submerged in causes.

As for the Unity of Witnessing, it is harmless; it is an exalted way of the people of sobriety.