Page 4 - Chapter One:
"According to this hadith, the Prophet and a few of his companions were sitting
together when a man appeared and asked him several questions. When the man departed, the
Prophet told his companions that this had been the angel Gabriel, who had come to teach
them their religion (din). As outlined by Gabriel’s questions and the Prophet’s
answers, the religion of Islam can be understood to have three basic dimensions. Those
familiar with the Koran, the wellspring of Islamic teachings, will recognize these three
as constant Koranic themes, though nowhere does the Koran provide such a clear and
succinct overview. The three are "submission" (islam) "faith" (iman),
and "doing the beautiful" (ihsan).
"The Prophet defined
submission as "to bear witness that there is no god but God and that Muhammad is His
messenger, to perform the daily prayers, to pay the alms tax, to fast during Ramadan, and
to go on the pilgrimage to Mecca if you can find the means to do so." He said that
faith is "to have faith in God, His scriptures, His messengers, and the Last Day, and
to have faith in the measuring out, both the good of it and the evil of it." He said
that doing the beautiful is to "worship God as if you see Him, for even if you do not
see Him, He sees you."
"The first two
categories, "submission" and "faith" are familiar to all students of
Islam. They correspond to the religion’s "Five Pillars" and its "three
principles," or to practice and belief, or to the Sharia (the revealed law) and the
creedal teachings. The "Five Pillars" are voicing the testimony of faith, doing
the daily prayers, paying the alms tax, fasting during the month of Ramadan, and making
the pilgrimage to Mecca. The "three principles" are the assertion of divine
unity (tawhid), prophecy, and eschatology. What needs to be noticed is that the third
category mentioned in the hadith - "doing the beautiful" - is just as important
for the Prophet’s definition as the other two, but its meaning is not nearly as
clear."
Commentary: For
reasons noted earlier, and to reiterate an important point, "religion" is a
problematic rendering of the term "Deen" or "din". While many scholars
and lay people have become habituated to treating "religion" and
"Deen" as synonyms, the fact of the matter is, such an equating process is a
conceptual imposition which judges two things to be the same when such is not the case.
Religion is a man-made
conceptual framework. ‘Deen’(Din) is a God-given methodology or path or way for
struggling toward realization of human potential.
Now, an individual
certainly might use the former (i.e., religion) to develop a theory about the latter
(i.e., Deen). However, the one is not the other, and the two should not be confused or
conflated.
Alternatively, someone
might wish to take exception with the contention that Deen is God-given and either (1)
argue there is no God, and, therefore, there is no Deen to be given by ‘that’
which does not exist, or (2) argue that God did not give the sort of Path or Way to which
Islam gives expression - although God may (according to such an argument) have given some
other Path or Way. Nonetheless, if one is attempting to understand the nature of the Sufi
perspective (as the author claims to be doing), then, one should try to interject as
little subjective, theoretical, or conceptual baggage, as possible, into the search for
understanding (something the author also has gone on record as indicating that this is a
goal of his).
Consequently, one would
be starting out on a much sounder, less distortive basis, as far as seeking an
understanding of the Sufi perspective is concerned, if one were to avoid treating Islam as
a religion, theory, conceptual framework, or theological system. Islam is a Deen.
Religions, theories,
conceptual frameworks, and theologies are things which are being imposed on Deen from the
outside, rather than dimensions inherent in Deen. The task or challenge is to try to come
to understand, as much as is humanly possible, what Deen is about from the Divine side of
things.
The Hadith which is
summarized by the author in the quote with which this Commentary began
identifies three important dimensions of Deen. These are "islam",
"iman", and "ihsan".
The author indicates that
while, time and again, all three of the foregoing themes are spoken of in the Qur’an,
he is of the opinion that nowhere in the Book revealed to Muhammad (peace be upon him) are
things stated in such a "clear and succinct overview". The author seems to
forget that the Prophet, himself, had said that the entire meaning of the Qur’an was
contained in Surah Fatiha and that, moreover, the entire meaning of this Surah was
contained within "Bismillah-ir-Rahman-ir-Raheem" (Through the Name of Allah, the
Beneficent, the Merciful) with which the Surah began, and, finally, that the entire
meaning of "Bismillah-ir-Rahman ir-Raheem" is contained within the dot beneath
the letter ‘Bey’ of "Bismillah".
In another Hadith the
Prophet stipulated there were seven levels of meaning within the Qur’an. To one who
does not have access to the kind of insight into the nature, depths, subtlety and richness
of the Qur’an to which the Prophet was alluding, then, the clarity and succinctness
contained within these levels of meaning will not be obvious, but one cannot use the
limited viewpoint of the former to gauge the quality of the latter.
As the author of Sufism
- A Short Introduction presents his summary of the Hadith outlining
"islam", "iman", and "ihsan", he makes several slips. For
instance, while delineating the different aspects of "iman", he, inexplicably,
leaves out any mention of the angels - a fundamental part of iman. Later on in his
overview he says that the first of the "Five Pillars" is "voicing the
testimony of faith".
Actually, the first
pillar of ‘islam’ is a matter of ‘bearing witness that there
is no god but God and that Muhammad (peace be upon him) is the Messenger of God. Bearing
witness is more than just a matter of voicing a testimony of faith.
Bearing witness requires
a certain internal acceptance of, and positive attitude toward, what is being voiced. In
fact, saying the five daily prayers, fasting during the month of Ramadan, paying zakat,
and going on pilgrimage are all practical, concrete expressions of what is entailed by
‘bearing witness’, but ‘bearing witness’ also extends beyond these
four other pillars. This is because the first pillar specifies one needs to bear witness
that there is no reality but God and that Muhammad (peace be upon him) is the Messenger of
God, not just in the context of the four other Pillars but with respect, as well, to every
aspect of life.
To be sure, the first
article of faith (as opposed to the first pillar) also requires one to embrace the truth
that there is no reality but God and that Muhammad (peace be upon him) is the Messenger of
God, but, now, one must do so at a deeper level. Faith is not a matter of mere conceptual
belief but is a species of knowledge from which doubt has been removed to a degree that is
commensurate with the level of faith.
The greater the faith,
then, the greater the amount of doubt which has been removed from a certain kind of
spiritual knowledge. The smaller the faith, then, the lesser the amount of doubt which has
been removed from one’s spiritual knowledge - although to still qualify as, at least,
a minimum degree of faith, there must be both the presence of some kind of knowledge,
along with the absence of some degree of doubt concerning that knowledge.
For instance, at one
juncture, the Qur’an corrects some bedouins who had declared before Muhammad (peace
be upon him) that they professed faith in God and the Messenger. The Prophet was
instructed, through the Quranic revelation which descended at that time, to tell those
bedouins not to say they believed, but to say, rather, that they had submitted, since
faith had not, yet, entered their hearts.
According to the author
of Sufism - A Short Introduction, ‘iman’ is a matter of
"creedal teachings". However, ‘iman’ is neither a creed nor a set of
doctrinal teachings.
Faith cannot be taught
merely by listing various doctrines or beliefs. In fact, although exemplars or models of
faith can be documented - and the Qur’an, as well as the life of the Prophet, are
filled with such documented exemplars and models, the essence of faith can only be
acquired, God willing, through individual struggle.
Indeed, in a sense, faith
is the spiritual knowledge one acquires during this struggle and from which God has
removed some degree of doubt concerning the truth of what one has learned. Consequently,
to have faith in God and the angels, in the scriptures and the Prophets, as well as in the
Last Day and the preordained measure of things - both good and evil - requires something
more than a mere listing of beliefs, doctrines or creeds.
When, as the Qur’an
indicates in many places, God increases or promises to increase someone in faith upon
faith, this is not a matter of adding more belief to existing belief, or more doctrine to
existing doctrine, or more creed to existing creed. When faith is added to faith, then, on
the one hand, some degree of knowledge is being added to what one already knows, and, on
the other hand, some additional degree of doubt is being removed from whatever level, or
kind, of doubt one previously had concerning spiritual knowledge.
Being convinced that
something is true is not the same thing as having faith in the truth of that same
something. Among other things, conviction need not require any knowledge about that in
which one is convinced, but to have faith without an attendant knowledge of an appropriate
nature is a contradiction in terms.
The author of Sufism
- A Short Introduction translates "ihsan" as "doing the
beautiful". There are other ways of characterizing this term - one such way being
"spiritual excellence".
These different ways of
rendering the reality toward which "ihsan" is directing our attention are not
necessarily antithetical to one another. There is a beauty about the performance of
‘spiritual excellence’, and ‘doing the beautiful’ is, certainly, an
expression of spiritual excellence.
In any case, the author
maintains that while students of the Islamic tradition are familiar with the notions of
submission and faith, or ‘islam’ and ‘iman’, respectively,
nevertheless, when one comes to the third element, ‘ihsan’, mentioned in the
Hadith summarized by the author, "its meaning is not nearly as clear" as is that
of ‘islam’ and ‘iman’. This contention needs to be explored a little.
Strictly speaking, the
Prophet did not characterize ‘ihsan’ as either a matter of "doing the
beautiful" or ‘spiritual excellence". The Prophet said that ihsan was a
matter of worshiping or serving God as if one could see Him but that even if one could not
see God one should know that God certainly sees you. Others have characterized those who
embody this principle as exhibiting ‘spiritual excellence’ or as ‘doing the
beautiful’.
Every act of a human
being is a potential forum for worshiping or serving God. To worship or serve God through
‘ihsan’ is to have a level of focus, awareness, and intensity introduced to
one’s activities which may be somewhat different from, but is related to both
‘islam’ and ‘iman’.
In fact,
‘ihsan’ is a continuation of ‘islam’ and ‘iman’. Just as
‘iman’ added something to ‘islam’ without abandoning the latter, so
too, does ‘ihsan’ add something to both ‘islam’ and ‘iman’
without abandoning either of these other dimensions of Deen.
In other words,
‘iman’ lends an intensity and focus to ‘islam’ which was absent in the
beginning of things. Similarly, ‘ihsan’ lends an intensity and focus of its own
to ‘iman’ and ‘islam’ which has to do with a specific kind of
knowledge - namely, the awareness of God’s Presence in all facets of life - an
awareness that may be absent from both ‘islam’ and ‘iman’ even though
‘ihsan’ is an intense, focused, and nuanced form of both ‘islam’ and
‘iman’ .
In the terminology of the
Sufi Path, ‘islam’ (in the sense of accepting, and being inclined toward, the
"Five Pillars"), ‘iman’ and ‘ihsan’ are all expressions of
different degrees of ‘nisbath’ or the character and quality of the link between
‘fitra’ (essential capacity or potential) and Divinity as mediated through Deen.
‘Islam’ (in the sense of accepting, and being inclined toward the "Five
Pillars") contains within itself the seeds of ‘iman’, just as
‘iman’ carries within itself, the seeds of ‘ihsan’.
According to the
Qur’an, the name which God gave to Deen upon its being completed - in the sense of
being fully explicated by Allah through revelation, was Islam. Deen is more comprehensive
than that portion contained within Deen which is subsumed under the "Five
Pillars" and which is known as ‘islam’.
At the same time, the
‘islam’ of the "Five Pillars"marks the beginning stages of
acknowledging, aligning oneself with, and realizing the nature of Deen in the broader
sense that also incorporates ‘iman’ and ‘ihsan’ - and more. Although
‘islam’ is often translated as meaning "submission", the submission at
the starting point of the "Five Pillars"is not the same level of submission as
is entailed by the spectrum of possibilities contained within ‘iman’, nor is the
submission of the initial entry point, the same as the submission which is marked by
‘ihsan’ - but, all three are species of submission.
When ‘iman’ and
‘ihsan’ are, by the Grace of God, added to the "Five Pillars, then, one is
engaging Deen in its broadest sense. This is when true submission enters the picture, and
the individual begins, by the Grace of God, to exhibit the qualities of being an ‘abd
or servant of God in a fuller, more realized sense of Deen.
‘Ihsan’ is not
something apart from ‘islam’ and ‘iman’. Each of these informs the
other in accordance with their respective domains of engagement, commitment,
understanding, and awareness. Taken collectively, they give expression to important
dimensions of Islam - but the potential of Islam is not exhausted by them.
There are many
unspecified dimensions and aspects: of "bearing witness", as well as of the
knowledge entailed by ‘iman’, as well as of the nature of worship when one does
so through the realities of condition of ‘ihsan’. These unspecified aspects
extend into, envelop, and permeate every aspect of life and spiritual potential when
pursued to their outer limits of possibility for any human being of a given spiritual
capacity.
On the way toward
struggling to realize the ‘reality without a name’, the Sufi Path assists the
individual to explore all of these unspecified dimensions and aspects of
‘islam’, ‘iman’ and ‘ihsan’, without abandoning any of the
specified facets of these three expressions of Deen . When, by the Grace of God, Deen
leads to the realization of the essential identity and unique spiritual capacity of
‘fitra’, then, the full purpose of Islam is served.
In short, the Sufi Path
is the study of the process of becoming a fully realized and functioning servant of God
according to one’s God-given capacity to do so. This Path starts with
‘islam’ in the more restricted sense of the "Five Pillars, and works toward
Islam in the more extended sense of a Deen that leads, eventually, God willing, to the
realization of the full potential of one’s essential nature or ‘fitra’, and
when this occurs, then, the ‘reality without a name’ blossoms and bears its
intended fruits.
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