Page 22 - Chapter
Two: "Those Sufi authors who studied the great figures of the past did so in
order to show how exemplary Muslims achieved the goal of human life, which in their view
was to live in the divine presence. Hence their typical genre was hagiography, which aims
at describing the extraordinary human qualities of those who achieve nearness to God. In
contrast, Muslim opponents of Sufism have been anxious to illustrate that Sufism is a
distortion of Islam, and they were happy to seize on every opportunity to show that
figures known as "Sufis" ignored the essentials of Islam, conspired with
unbelief and heresy, and immersed themselves in moral laxity."
Commentary: The
author of Sufism - A Short Introduction begins the foregoing extended
quotation with: "Those Sufi authors who studied the great figures of the past did so
in order to show how exemplary Muslims achieved the goal of human life, which in their
view was to live in the divine presence." Actually, the author’s way of saying
things is not quite correct.
In reality, we all,
already, "live in the divine presence". Things cannot be otherwise since all of
creation is underwritten, circumscribed, and permeated by the Divine presence.
Some people do not know
this at all. Other individuals suspect such is the case and, from time to time, may even
feel this to be so, to varying degrees. Still others experience this truth on an on-going
basis.
Even if one were to give
the author the benefit of the doubt and, for the purposes of this discussion, concede that
what the author meant by his statement is, more or less, what has been said above, his
contention is in need of further clarification and elaboration. To begin with, one has to
ask the question: what is meant by the phrase: "live in the divine presence",
because there are many ways to do so, just as there are many levels of being in the Divine
presence.
There are spiritual
stations of repentance, longing, patience, trust, gratitude, taqwa, and love - all of
which involve intimate, intense, but different, modalities of ‘living in the Divine
presence’. Each of the aforementioned spiritual stations easily could be sub-divided
into a series of experiential stages that focused on, or is preoccupied with, various
dimensions of a given spiritual station, and any, or all, of these stages would be an
expression of what it means - at least in part - to "live in the divine
presence".
For example, the station
of love has been characterized in the following way by some Sufi observers. According to
them, love begins with ‘compatibility’ and, then, if God wishes, proceeds to
work its way through stages of inclination, fellowship, passion, friendship, exclusive
friendship, ardent affection, enslavement, and, finally, bewilderment.
Each of these stages is
to "live in the divine presence", just as the completed station of love is to
"live in the divine presence", just as all of the other stations, or any of the
stages within those respective stations, is to "live in the divine presence".
Furthermore, because Divinity is infinite, one can never reach a point in which the Divine
Plenitude can be exhausted, and, as a result, a point will never be reached in which one
can say that "this" encompasses everything that is meant by the phrase
"live in the divine presence".
Alternatively, one could
speak about the spiritual conditions of ‘fana’ and ‘baqa’ - both of
which, but each in its own way, involve ‘living in the Divine presence’. Briefly
speaking, ‘fana’ is the spiritual condition in which one becomes absent to the
false self as Divinity makes its Presence known to awareness with such overwhelming
intensity that one loses track of everything but the Presence of Divinity.
‘Baqa’, on the other hand, is when the essential Self becomes realized as
something individual within the context of the Divine Presence.
To be in ‘fana’
is to "live in the divine presence". To be in ‘baqa’ is to "live
in the divine presence". Yet, ‘fana’ and ‘baqa’ are very
different spiritual conditions.
The goal of the seeker is
not to live in the Divine Presence since we already live in that Divine
Presence, whether we understand this or not. The goal of the seeker is not
to reach some distant spiritual plateau where, all of a sudden, we will be said to
"live in the divine presence’, for the seeker needs to understand there are
on-going goals which need to be realized at each step of the Path - namely, to recognize
the presence of Divinity across a wide spectrum of modalities of manifestation, as well as
to take from these engagements important experiential insights about oneself, life, the
Path, and one’s constantly changing and developing relationship with Divinity.
Consequently, to say, as
the author of Sufism - A Short Introduction does, that the purpose of life
is to "live in the divine presence" is not very helpful. In fact, if one waits
for some spiritual juncture way down the Sufi road which, supposedly, marks a
‘terminus’, of sorts, with respect to the spiritual journey and, at which time,
one will be said to "live in the divine presence", one will have missed the
opportunity "to live in the divine presence" through all the different states,
conditions, stages, and stations of the Sufi Path because all of these are but different
modalities of God’s living presence in the life of the seeker.
In truth, the purpose of
life is to come to understand, and give expression to, the Divine Himma, or Divine
Aspiration, which gave rise to Creation in the first place. In the Qur’an, God says:
" I have not created human beings and jinn except that they may worship Me."
(51:56-57) The crucial question, then, becomes: what is the nature of ‘worship’?
Elsewhere in the
Qur’an, the Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) is instructed to proclaim the
following: "Say: Surely, my prayer and my sacrifice and my life and my death are all
for Allah, the Lord of the worlds". (6:162) While this ayat or verse is, first and
foremost, true of the Prophet, the guidance being given is a prescription for the rest of
humankind and jinn with respect to how to approach not only every act of worship, but the
uses to which the gift of life should be devoted.
Sincere worship is done
from a niyat or intention which has no other goal than to be offered to God without any
attached riders. Fear of Hell does not motivate the niyat. Desire for Paradise does not
color this niyat. The hope of reward or return of any kind does not modulate such an
intention. The niyat is formed without any expectations being associated with, or
conditions imposed on, its existence. The sincere niyat is done without wishing that
spiritual states, stations, or advancement will be forthcoming in exchange for the niyat.
Worship is not just
ritual prayer (which is performed just five times a day), or fasting (which is performed
once a year), or pilgrimage (which is observed once in a life time). Worship encompasses
one’s whole life and the uses to which its seconds, minutes, weeks, months, years,
and decades are put as a function of the underlying intentions out of which those uses
arise.
The Prophet Muhammad
(peace be upon him) is reported to have said: "Many are there among you who fast and,
yet, gain nothing from it except hunger and thirst, and many are there who pray throughout
the night and, yet, gain nothing from it except wakefulness." The Prophet Muhammad
(peace be upon him) also is reported to have said that "God does not accept the
prayer of the unaware heart".
A heart is unaware to the
extent that it engages in prayer, or any kind of would-be acts of worship, due to
intentions other than serving Divinity in the aforementioned, unconditional manner. The
greater the degree to which motivations besides the purpose for which we were created
enter into our intentions, hearts, and acts, then, to that extent, is the prayer or
worship done through an unaware heart. On the other hand, that heart which observes
worship through the proper niyat - an intention that sincerely serves the Divine purpose
for which humankind and jinn were created, such a heart knows something of what it means
to "live in the divine presence".
The Prophet Muhammad
(peace be upon him) is reported to have said: "The nearest a slave is to Allah is
when that individual is in prostration." The heart, sirr, ruh, kafi, and aqfah all
have their modality of prostration, and each of these gives different expression to what
is entailed by living "in the divine presence".
On another occasion, the
Prophet is reported to have said: "Prayer is the sacrifice whereby every believer
comes closer to God". Therefore, anything which permits one to struggle
against permitting the false self to corrupt the sincerity of niyat is a form of prayer
since it constitutes a sacrifice that brings one closer to Allah by virtue of the way it
helps to serve the purpose for which one has been created.
The Qur’an indicates
that: "Whoever submits one’s whole self to Allah and is a doer of good has,
indeed, grasped the most trustworthy hand-hold."(31:22) When an individual truly and
sincerely submits his or her whole self to God, then, everything which is manifested
through that individual becomes an act of worship, and, therefore, is a expression of
goodness - or, one can switch the foregoing around and say that the goodness which, by the
Grace of God, is expressed through a sincere intention - one that constitutes an
unconditional commitment to serve only Divinity - such an intention becomes an act of
worship.
What and who is this
"self" to which the Qur’an is directing our attention in the foregoing
verse? Moreover, what is meant by the submission of the ‘whole’ self, and what
are the means through which one brings this self wholly to abandonment of all goals,
aspirations, hopes, dreams, wishes, and desires other than the purpose of our creation -
that is, what is the means and nature of the submission which is mentioned in the Quranic
verse above?
The self in question is
our ‘fitra’ or primordial spiritual potential. The method of submission is Deen,
and the whole Self has abandoned ‘other’ than Divinity - that is, submitted -
only when the Path of Deen has been traversed through all its stations. This is the
realized Self whose every act is an expression of the kind of worship which God wished for
humankind and jinn who had been created for just that purpose, and only that purpose.
Surah Shams of the
Qur’an begins in the following manner:
"In the Name of
Allah, the Compassionate, the Beneficent,
By the sun and his
brightness,
And, by the moon when she
follows him,
And, by the day that
reveals him,
And, by the night that
enshrouds him,
And, by the heavens and
Him Who built it,
And, by the earth and Him
Who spread it,
And, by the soul and Him
Who created it,
Teaching it knowledge of
lewdness and godfearing,
The one who purifies
one’s soul succeeds, and
The one who corrupts
one’s soul fails."
A Sufi saint of the
twentieth century has said, in conjunction with the foregoing portion of the Qur’an,
that the rhetorical style of the Qur’an is such that whenever God wishes to bring
something to the attention of the one engaging His Book of Revelation, then, a succession
of oaths are employed prior to a given principle or precept in order to lend stress and
emphasis to the importance of what is being related. This Sufi saint has said that no
where else in the Qur’an does one find so many oaths in succession as one does in the
passage quoted above from Surah Shams.
The principle or precept
to which our attention is being directed is this. The one who purifies his or her soul
succeeds, and the one who corrupts his or her soul fails.
All purification begins
with niyat or intention. All corruption begins with niyat or intention.
Niyat is the primary
battleground of spiritual struggle. Furthermore, while ritual prayer, fasting, zakat, and
pilgrimage can, if God wishes, all lend logistical support to such a struggle,
nevertheless, the basic pillars of Islam do not exhaust the possibilities of Deen, and, in
fact, the individual’s observance of these pillars, itself, stands in need of various
kinds of purification which are accessible only through other dimensions of Deen.
The cure for an unaware
heart is not more prayers or acts of worship from the same unaware heart. The remedy for
an unaware heart is that which, if God wishes, will purge the condition of being unaware
from the precincts of the heart, and since the heart is a complex, multi-faceted,
multi-layered spiritual instrument, purification is not necessarily accomplished overnight
or in a simplistic, linear manner.
The goal of the Sufi Path
is not, as the author of Sufism - A Short Introduction maintains, just to
"live in the divine presence". Rather, the goal is to realize the most purified
condition which is available to each of us as individuals, and this goal is only achieved
when, through the process of purification which constitutes Deen, we come to know who we
are in essence and, simultaneously, are able to give, God willing, full expression to the
unique spiritual capacity which Divinity has gifted us as our means of worshiping Allah
... fully, wholly, completely, sincerely, truly, and freely.
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