‘Layla visits her lover Majnun in the wilderness‘, from the ‘Khamsa’ of Nizami. Assigned to Muhammad Sharif. Mughal India, c. 1585-1590. The Keir Collection of Islamic Art, on loan to the Dallas Museum of Art K.1.2014.18, f. 157 b

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Today’s sharing from the Blue House of Via-HYGEIA, is excerpted from Azizuddin Nasafi’s ‘The book of the Perfect Man’, Fayard, Paris, 1984. Our English translation comes from Isabelle de Gastine’s French translation of the original Persian. This is the complete seventh treatise, from page 102 to 107. We published the sixth treatise some time earlier. The fifth will come soon, as God allows.

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A group of dervishes-may God increase their numbers-ask to my frail person to write a treatise about love: what are the romantic impulse and love; what are the degrees of love. I have answered to its request and prayed God to help and assist me, so that I may stay free of errors and faults, because ‘He is Mighty and eager to grant!‘

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Of inclination, desire, romantic impulse and love

Know that-be blessed in the two realms-that the recitation of the dhikr (Note: Arabic: ذِكْر;[a] Arabic; lit. ’remembrance, reminder, mention’)-the inner re-memorization and inner litany-is distributed into four levels:

Some are at the level of inclination; others are at desire’s landing; others gather at the romantic impulse’s pier, and finally some dwell in love’s station. The sufi who has achieved this ascent, has reached the fourth level. As long as the reciter has not properly reached it, his spirit does not know a successful ascent. We will delineate in detail these four levels, so that the pilgrim, in his practice of dhikr, knows at which level he stands.

On the first level, the reciter’s body is in a state of retreat and with his tongue he recites the invocation, but his heart ‘is at the bazar busy negotiating‘. This litany is the least efficient but, still, not entirely deprived of merit.

On the second level, the reciter pronounces the litany, while his heart is absent. It is with great difficulty that he can bring his heart to be present. Most of the reciters are located in this level.

On the third level, the reciter, whose heart is completely focused with the invocation, is so absorbed that if he has to fulfill an interfering external task, it would be through some efforts. In symmetry with the second level, when he was struggling to be present with his heart, on the third level, he now strives to focus with his heart on everything but the re-memorization: this is the level of Proximity; few reciters reach it. Only the person who has known the impulse of the lover towards the beloved will understand these words. The lover, ceaselessly, rememorates the beloved; not an instant does he flicker from re-memorizing the beloved. He only wants to celebrate her and is eager to hear her being celebrated. Any other activity is quasi impossible.

On the fourth level, the reciter, whose heart is completely focused by the object of his re-memorization, alike on the third level when the inner litany was busying the heart, it is the very object of the litany that he is fixed upon. There are great discrepancies between these two levels.

O Dervish! It happens some time that the lover is so much absorbed by the beloved that he forgets even her name-what do I say?- he forgets everything, but the beloved.

As we said in our introductory words, the first level corresponds to the level of inclination; the second to the landing of desire; the third to the pier of romantic impulse and finally, the fourth to the station of love.

O Dervish! To the person who aspires to be in the company of someone else, this aspiration is called ‘inclination‘.  When the inclination grows and becomes extreme, it is called ‘desire‘; when the desire grows and become extreme, it is called the ‘romantic impulse‘. When the romantic impulse grows and become extreme, it is called ‘love‘. Therefore, love proceeds from the impulse raised to its extreme; the impulse from desire, and so on…

O Dervish! When love-this blessed traveler-is your host, cherish it! Empty yourself so to receive it in the space of your heart, because love does not allow sharing.

‘Love invades me alike blood in my veins and under my skin. It made me empty so to be filled by the beloved; love dwells in every cells of my beings; there is nothing left of me but my name, all the rest is my beloved.’

O Dervish ! Love is the Buraq (Note: Arabic: الْبُرَاق /ælˈbʊrɑːk/ “lightning”) of the pilgrim; the ride of those who are treading upon the path. Everything the intellect gathers in fifty years, love burns it in-the-blink-of-an-eye, purifying and making limpid the person who loves. Never the pilgrim, lost in the fog of hundreds of empty recitations, will walk the path of the lover who does it in a glance; the reasonable Man belongs to this world, while the lover to the other. How could the footsteps of the reasonable Man catch up on the path the footsteps of the Lover?

O Dervish! Of true love-as it should be properly talked upon-I cannot write anything that wouldn’t immediately be taken as an article of heresy. But, of symbolic love I will write now what follows, so that those who think & ponder may conceive it.

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Of the degrees of symbolic love

Know that symbolic love has three levels:

At the first level, the lover rememorates the beloved. He hangs around close to the street where she lives. He takes as a qibla (Note: The qibla, Arabic: قِبْلَة, lit. ’direction’, is the direction towards the Kaaba in the Sacred Mosque in Mecca, which is used by Muslims in various religious contexts, particularly the direction of prayer for the salah) her house and circumambulates around endlessly; he scrutinizes the door and the walls in hope to catch a glance of the beauty of the beloved, even though from afar; and from this glanced vision the lover’s bruised heart may be comforted.

At the second level, the lover finds himself in such a state that he does not have the capacity to withstand the view of the beauty of the beloved. When, finally, he recognizes her, a shaking takes over his limbs, he cannot utter a word-it is even likely he may faint.

O Dervish ! Love is a fire that sets ablaze the person who loves. The source of this fire is the heart. The fire, through the gaze of the eyes, penetrates deep into the heart and it makes its homeland.

‘If the heart did not exist, where would love have its homeland?

And if Love did not exist, what would be the purpose of the heart?‘

The flames of this fire take over all of the limbs, and, little by little, burn and purify the heart of the lover, to such an extant that the heart becomes very fragile and vulnerable, and that the lover cannot withstand the view of the beloved. The lover, when the beloved is manifested, is about to be destroyed. Moses-Peace be upon him!-was at that level when he asked to meet with his God. And the All Mighty answered: ‘You cannot see me!‘ He did not say: ‘I will not disclose myself to you!‘.

O Dervish! It is at this level that the lover prefers separation than union. He finds more quietude and rest in it. Through-out the day, he talks within himself with the beloved; sometimes, the beloved gratifies the lover with her favors and the lover blossoms; sometimes she expresses her wrath, and the lover contracts. The witness of these states notices these expansions and these contractions, but he ignores their cause.

At the third level, finally, the beauty of the beloved deports, from the heart of her lover, everything that is not her and she invades him fully. Then the lover erases himself: from now on, he sees everything through his beloved. He may have a meal, he may sleep, come & go: for him it is the beloved who is having a meal, who sleeps, who comes & goes. Delivered from the grief of separation and the nostalgy of absence, he is tamed to the beauty of the beloved and gets his strength from it. Up to now, it was feared that at the view of the beloved the lover would disappear; now, this fear is gone. If the lover, from the outside, perceives the beloved, he wouldn’t move and would remain unchanged, because his beloved-being in his inside and has taken over his heart as a homeland-is the closest to him. From now on, for him, outside & inside are one.

Some say that the lover, burned by the fire of love, is made to the fullest spiritual & subtle; that the beauty of the beloved-which has made its homeland in the heart of the lover and has taken over him completely- is also fully subtle & spiritual. They also add that what is on the outside is (compared to the inside) dense and material, and that the spiritual goes to the material & vice-versa.

O Dervish! As for me, i would humbly say that when the beauty of the beloved invades fully the heart of the lover, so that there is no place for any other thing, then the lover erases himself and sees only the beloved.

Thus, there is only trouble & concern when there are two people. At this rank, where the lover erases himself, expectation ceases. There is anymore, neither separation nor union, neither fear nor hope, neither contractions nor expansion.

O Dervish! The person who is not a lover is impure; he does not know purity and does not access it. And the person who is a lover and still discloses his love remains soiled and does not know purity too, because this fire, that has penetrated via the eyes into his heart, he makes it exit through the tongue. This heart half-calcinated, remains on the path. Of this heart, there are no more usage, neither in this world nor in the other.

O Dervish! I have composed these three treatises: ‘Of the Peregrination‘, ‘Of The Rules of Mystical Retreat’’, & ‘About Love‘ in the city of Shiraz, and placed them upon the tomb of Sheikh Abu Abdallah Khafif, may he be blessed! Glory to the Lord of the two worlds!

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Source

Coming soon: 

Azizuddin Nasafi – From ‘The Book Of The Perfect Man’:

‘Of The Peregrination’ (which is the fifth treatise).

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