Signs, Truth, and The Way
An individual once asked the following question. "Which signs show that the relationship between a teacher and a student has gone awry.?" This inquiry was coupled with a request for something to be said about how one goes about bringing on line, and calibrating, our spiritual faculties – such as heart, sirr, ruh, kafi, and aqfah.
In one sense, the answer to the first question ( that is, which signs show that the relationship between a teacher and student has gone awry?) depends on the relationship at issue, for there may be many signs within a particular context which indicate that – in the words of Hafiz – ‘there is something just not right about this camel ride'. In another sense, however, there is one sign common to all relationships of spiritual abuse – a departure from the truth.
Whether someone is pretending to be a shaykh, but is not one, or someone has deluded himself or herself into believing that she or he is a spiritual guide, or someone has been led to believe – incorrectly – that one is a shaykh, the essence of the Sufi path is truth, and when one departs from that, then, one has taken a detour away from the Sufi path and, with it, one has ventured into a country where an authentic teaching relationship with another person is not possible (we can learn from everyone, but the nature of what is learned through one's relationship with an authentic guide cannot be acquired through just anyone).
The trust which is extended through ba'yat, and the sincerity which is at the heart of nisbath, as well as the process of bringing on line and calibrating one's different spiritual faculties (saluk or spiritual journeying) all are rooted in, and require, the presence of truth. An authentic teacher gives expression to that Presence, according to the spiritual capacity of the shaykh.
A seeker seeks through the truth, and a guide guides through the truth. The truth is what holds an authentic teaching relationship together.
There is no subjective dimension to the truth, and there is no objective dimension to the truth. The truth is what it is and does not change according to circumstance.
A good teacher – of whatever capacity – is someone who does not get in the way of the truth and, thereby, mislead the seeker. A good student - of whatever capacity – is someone who does not get in the way of truth and, thereby, descend into rebellion, of one kind or another, against the truth.
Ultimately, the teacher is always Allah, Who uses this or that medium of transmission to give expression to what is to be learned or acquired. While the vehicle of transmission – that is, a shaykh or pir – may color the nature of the transmission as a function of the teacher's spiritual capacity, this does not make the teacher-seeker relationship a subjective one.
In fact, it is the truth inherent in the Divine teaching Presence as given expression in the particular context of a shaykh-seeker relationship which guards against the potential for human, subjective distortions to skew the aforementioned relationship in problematic directions. When a teacher is inauthentic, then, subjective considerations (such as nafs, biases opinions, prejudices, theories, ignorance, impure niyat, dunya, and Iblis) undermine, distort, as well as work antagonistically against, Haqq's Presence being realized in a so-called ‘teacher'-student relationship.
Adab, or spiritual etiquette, is the medium of exchange for the truth. When adab is properly observed, then, justice is done to the truth in all circumstances – and just as the Prophet (peace be upon him) has indicated that our soul and our spouse and our children have a right over us, so, too, does the truth – in fact, all other rights flow from this, since it is through the truth that one comes to understand the nature of rights and the way to do justice to such rights.
To realize the truth, rights, justice, adab, and reality of Created existence, one has been given certain potentials by Divinity. Realizing these potentials requires struggle, for struggle is the anvil on which the character of one's suluk is forged, and through such struggle, God willing, potential is fulfilled, and the only difference between capacities in this respect, is the depth, breadth, and intensity of the truth which is experienced – that is, all realized spiritual capacities experience truth, but different dimensions of truth are grasped as a function of spiritual capacity that is blessed by Divine barakah in unique ways.
When people speak of annihilating the ego or nafs, this is an unfortunate turn of phrase, because, in fact, nothing is annihilated – rather, a transformation is undergone. Under normal circumstances of dunya, or entanglement with the machinations of the nafs of other people, the condition of nafs is rebellious.
Yet, under the tutelage of truth or Haqq, the twin eyes of unredeemed nafs – namely, passion and anger concerning one's relationship with dunya – undergo a transition in the phenomenology of their focus. More specifically, passion and anger switch their attention to Divinity and away from dunya or self-absorption.
As a result, the passion, love, and desire of the world become transformed into a passion, love, and himma for the truth of Divinity. Moreover, the anger of nafs denied becomes transformed into a fierce and rigorous defense of the truth rather than a stubborn commitment to the delusions and illusions of dunya.
When the foregoing occurs, God willing, then, the nafs which, in its unredeemed state, had been an obstacle to the truth, now becomes an ally of, and staunch advocate for, the truth. But, the spiritual journey does not end here; instead, the minimal conditions for proceeding on with the spiritual journey, have, by the Grace of Allah, been satisfied.
In addition to the foregoing – and one should not look on all of this as some sort of set of developmental stages which unfold in a linear fashion, for the process is quite non-linear, with many spiritual dynamics occurring in a somewhat simultaneous fashion along many different channels of synergistic feedback loops – the various dimensions or potentials of the heart (and these run from, for instance, the quality of qalb – i.e., that which turns between the influences of unredeemed nafs to such qualities as the fo'ad which sees through truth), are brought on line and calibrated through the observance of zikr. And, while all zikr gives expression to the truth and brings one into contact with the truth so that the truth may cleanse the heart of impurities, the fact of the matter is, there is a science and art to the saying of zikr – a science and art which cannot be picked up through rational, discursive means, but must be transmitted through an authentic shaykh ... this is part of the barakah which comes with being associated with a legitimate silsilah, and which no interloper into spiritual matters (student or so-called teacher) can pass on or acquire through alternative means.
Different zikrs have different effects, and even the same zikr said by different individuals or at different junctures in one's life can have diverse effects. Spiritual capacity resonates in various ways in relation to different zikrs, and knowing what to say, when to say it, for how long, under what circumstances, and with what protections are all part of the science and art of zikr.
One cannot arbitrarily invent algorithms which are going to permit the uninitiated to achieve the decryption of such secrets. Furthermore, even if someone happens upon a zikr and begins to say it, the alchemical impact of one's contact with this version of a form of the Philosopher's Stone, may be limited, or null and void, or even, in some cases, problematic – unless, of course, Allah wishes otherwise – because the catalytic properties of the shaykh's himma and protection in relation to a seeker (and through the shaykh, the Prophet's himma and protection, and through the Prophet, Allah's Himma and Protection ... and the former two are but different manifested expressions of the latter) are largely absent, unless, again, Allah wishes otherwise.
Sometimes the saying of zikr goes on in conjunction with spiritual experiences of one kind, or another. Sometimes this does not take place.
Only an authentic teacher can help one understand and respond to the former with an appropriate observance of adab, and only an authentic teacher can assist one to put any lack of spiritual experience in perspective. The goal of zikr is not spiritual experiences, states, or stations.
The purpose of zikr is to clean the heart so that the latter permits the truth to be given unimpeded transit through that medium without scattering (the Prophet said that there is a polish for everything and the polish of the heart is zikr Allah). The difference between a properly functioning heart (in a spiritual sense) and an unclean heart is the difference between a laser and ordinary light – and, thus, the Prophet said to beware of the vision of a Mu'min for he(she) sees by the light of Allah, and faith is the light of the heart ... the greater the faith, the more coherent is the light of truth's transmission.
Under ‘normal' conditions of the unredeemed nafs and its entanglements with the nafs of others (i.e., dunya), the heart is filled with resonances other than awareness of the Presence of Divinity. One of the primary reasons for this is because the sirr is not functioning properly, and, consequently, is ceding access to the heart in relation to all manner of worldly and nafs-based impressions.
Therefore, there is a need to empty the sirr, because as long as the sirr is filled with such impressions and allows these to seep, at will, into the heart, the heart cannot perform its intended function which is to remember Allah. The practice employed by the masters of tasawwuf in order to empty the sirr is muraqabah, which is to engage in contemplation of a Divine theme which is given by one's shaykh – and, here again, if one is in a relationship with a spiritually inauthentic individual, the theme, context, niyat, adab, and truth of the practice are all wrong, and no, or little, spiritual good can manifest itself through such conditions.
When the sirr has been emptied of the pollution of nafs, dunya, Iblis, and unbelief, then, it guards the entrance to the heart and ensures, God willing, that nothing but the remembrance of Allah enters into the heart. This process of emptying cannot be learned from books because it depends on the existence and quality of the nisbath between a teacher and a seeker for proper transmission and observance of such a practice.
The ruh or spirit is the mine of love, for although the heart has several dimensions which are related to love (one of which concerns human kind and creation, and another which is devoted exclusively to Allah), what begins in the heart, soars with the advent of spirit. Love is the key which unlocks the secrets of the ruh.
However, love is not a uni-dimensional phenomenon. There are many levels, facets, and dimensions of love.
There is affection, compatibility, inclination, fellowship, passion, friendship, exclusive friendship, ardent affection, enslavement, and bewilderment. Most people never get beyond affection and a certain amount of compatibility and inclination.
There is a Hadith Qudsi which says:
Whoever seeks Me, finds Me;
Whoever finds Me, comes to know Me;
Whoever comes to know Me, loves Me;
Whoever loves Me that person I slay;
Whomever I slay, I owe that person blood-money;
And, to whomever I owe blood-money, I am the recompense.
One cannot slay oneself. One must be slain, and this comes as God's discretion.
Precursors to fana may be present in one's love of the shaykh or in one's love of the Prophet (peace be upon him), but the fullness of fana does not come until one is slain and one follows the example of the Prophet (peace be upon him) by dying before one dies. The aforementioned stages of love, are way stations along one's route to a funeral.
In fana, the individual is not annihilated, but, rather, invisible to perception. The vision of fana is consumed with the Presence of Divinity – a Presence which seemingly makes the presence of al-a'yan al-thabita, which is, itself, an expression of the Hidden Treasure, fall beyond the horizon of one's grasp and awareness of Presence.
A man once came to the Prophet (peace be upon him) and said: ‘Truly, I love you in God Almighty.' The Prophet replied: ‘Then, take adversities for a garment, and wear poverty for a cloak.' The stations of repentance, longing, sincerity, patience, taqwa, dependence, gratitude, steadfastness, ihsan, and so on are the stations of adversity and poverty through which the testament of love is lived and given -- and Allah can shape, color, direct, and extend these stations in any direction Divinity wishes.
There may, or may not be, mystical experiences associated with the foregoing journey. Some Sufi masters have said that, sometimes, the greatest saints of the Path never have even one mystical experience and such people are hidden beneath the canopy of Divinity, even from themselves. To be fana with respect to fana is, by the Grace of Allah, truly something. To realize baqa and have no wish to be other than ‘abd Allah, as was the wish of Muhammad (peace be upon him), is to serve the truth and realize truth according to the full potential of spiritual capacity.
The Sufi Path is not about powers, kiramat, the Unseen, or different worlds. The Sufi path is about realizing our God-given capacity for worshiping Divinity through bearing witness to the truth that there is no reality but Divinity, within or without, and the realized individual is but Divinity perceiving the Divine through a created eye.
And what of the kafi and aqfah? What are the practices associated with bringing on-line and calibrating these inner faculties?
The Buddha once addressed a group of seekers. He picked up a bunch of leaves from the ground of the forest and held them up for those who were gathered around him to see. He said, ‘just as these leaves which I hold in my hand are but a small sampling of the leaves which exist in this forest, so, too, what I relate to you is but a small portion of that which is to be related about the truth, but I give you what is necessary for you to escape the realm of suffering.
I am not the Buddha, and I am not a Prophet, and I am not a shaykh, but I relate to you what I understand of what is necessary to travel in the direction of truth according to my capacity to do so. And, what I have to say in this regard is but a small part of what those who are much better, more knowledgeable, and far wiser than me have to say on such matters
I close with two stories. The first is about a young man who was applying to various colleges for purposes of gaining admission to higher education.
This individual was invited to one of the schools to which he had applied for a tour of the facilities as well an interview. During the interview, the official from the university asked the youth if he had any questions .
The young man thought for a moment and said: ‘Well, you, know, the central library only has about 30,000 books, and I thought this might adversely affect doing research here. I was a little concerned about this.'
The official replied with: ‘Well, son, I'll tell you what. When you get done reading the books we have, we'll buy you some more.'
The second story is as follows. There was a Sufi who went around a certain town proclaiming that he was greater than God. Naturally, this annoyed the religiously-minded of the locality, and they decided to bring the misguided mystic in for questioning before an auspicious board of experts in religious law.
The conveners of the forum began questioning the man as to whether what they had heard of his alleged claims were true. Had he claimed to be greater than God?
The man answered in the affirmative. He awaited further developments.
Upon hearing the man's response, there was outrage expressed in the room. One of the leaders, who was able to re-gather some semblance of self-composure finally said: ‘Don't you know even the most basic elements of our faith? Don't you understand that nothing is greater than God?'
The man nodded and said: ‘This is exactly what permits me to say what I do. Nothing is greater than God, and I am nothing, therefore, ...' and his voice trailed off in an Aristotelian smile.
Ah, humankind, the nothing which is something, and the something which is nothing. A mystery indeed.
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