LOUIS MASSIGNON'S NOTES

Abu al Mughith al- Husain ibn Mansūr al Hallaj, the celebrated Sufi of the fourth/tenth century, was also a great intellectual of his time. He compiled his sweeping views, deep thoughts, and penetrating intuitions in the Kitab al-Tawasin. Louis Massignon, the famous French orientalist, edited it from two manuscripts, added his own precious references, explanations, and footnotes; and published it from Paris in 1913. A number of points and gross misunderstandings about Hallaj are clarified by the text of the Kitab al Tawasin, as well as by the researches conducted by Louis Massignon leading to his editorial notes and explanations. The Academy approached Father R. A. Butler to translate those notes and explanations from French. The Arabic text of the Kitab al Tawasin is spread over from p. 9 to p. 78 of the publication.

We have traced two incomplete manuscripts, here called A and B. A is the Arabic Ms. British Museum Add. 9692 (Catal. No. DCCCLXXXVIII, paragr. 14, p. 405b-406a), fos. 317a-322b. The extract contained there is given without its title; the handwriting, with Maghrebine punctuation[1], points to a careless scribe, but one well acquainted with Sufi terminology: this copy may originate from between the 15^th and 17^th century (according to Rieu, Catal. 1. c. above). We have described elsewhere how thanks to a quotation by al Suhrawardi al Magtūl[2] we have restored to this extract its correct title.

B.—Later, in April 1911, we were lucky enough to trace the work, already known[3], of Rūzbahan al Baqli (d.606/1209) in the anonymous Shathiyat listed No. 1290 (correctly 1271), p. 103 in the printed catalogue of Da mad Zadeh Qadhi 'askar (Monla) Muhammad Murad Library in Istanbul.[4] In the last book of Rūzbahan's writing we found his Sharh al Tawasin[5], a commentary on al Hallaj's work which contains a sentence by sentence translation of this work in Persian. From this we can be sure of its title. We give here this Persian translation under B. in front of text A. It is invaluable for the understanding of this work.

A comparison of the two texts even when making allowance for the omissions committed, reveals very deep divergences regal ding the grouping of certain chapters, and shows the earlier existence of two quite distinct recensions.[6]

Thus re-established, there is no guarantee that our text is complete. But we have at least been able to establish the approximate number of the chapters: the titles of chapter I, II and VI appear explicitly in al Baqli's commentary, f°175b; further, those of chapter III, IV, V and VI are on f°190a, and those of chapter VII, VIII, IX and X on f° 108b, 110a and 1 llb. On the other hand, the copyist of ms. A has interpolated, without understanding them, those of chapter II and VI, on f°317b and 319b, at the end of the text, without any special signs. In the same way the last piece, which shows a homogeneous development, has been provisionally isolated as an independent 11th chapter.[7]

For easy use of references the text has been divided into paragraphs, following in this, as far as possible, the way in which al Baqli had divided his commentary for the purpose of inserting his clarifications. Ms. A has neither paragraphs[8] nor divisions nor glosses.[9] It only reports six times the name of the author (cf. below 11-e-24°, e- 31°, - f-1°, - f-18°; f-20°, k-1°) and gives in the margin the words which the copyist found missing on a second reading after the dictation.

C.- Al Baqli's commentary itself shows interesting variants from the text of his Persian version. They will be found mentioned under

D.—Second Ms. of the Shathiyat found back in April 1912.[10] Authenticity of the Text

Although Ms. A is only a copy dating approximately from the 16^th century and the Persian translation was made only in 570/1174 from an Arabic original, we will see further on that the Kitab al Tawasin as it is published here, undoubtedly does include, if not a work by, al Hallaj himself, at least the work listed under his name in Kitab al Fihrist, only about sixty years after his death in No. 1 of the “Corpus Hallãgiacum “under the title Kitab Ta Sin al Azal, which is the incomplete title of chapter 6 (f) of Kitab al Tawasin.

It seems that a personal disciple of the master had a final hand in the classification of the paragraphs of this work which, in all its parts and to the highest degree, shows the characteristics of al Hallaj's style: at times full of harsh, concentrated vehemence, at times with enthusiastic volubility and the clashing of inimitable verbal subtleties.

This may explain the passage where it is said (11-e-3°) that the one who has not plumbed the depths of his doctrine and has stopped at the “second circle “, has spoken of him as “al 'Alim ar rabbani “, the “Master instructed by the Lord”.[11] This is precisely the historic word[12] of Ibn Khafif (died at the age of hundred in 371/982) about al Hallaj whom he had visited in jail. There seems little likeliness that Ibn Khan if would have drawn this word from al Hallaj's work.

Another passage appears still more clearly interpolated: in chapter VI (f), paragr.20°-25° where al Hallaj, comparing himself to his masters Iblis and Fir'awn, repeats the famous word “Ana al Haqq” in an allusion[13] to his own execution.

Besides, in al Baqli's version this passage is not given at its proper place (f°108a), perhaps simply because he had already translated it earlier[14], in the second book of his Shathiyat (f°148 of the Ms. in its present pagination which was upset by the binder)[15] and felt it useless to reproduce it a second time.

In case the proof taken from these two interpolations were found corroborated by other arguments, it would be possible, without being implausible to attribute this revision post mortem to one of al Hallaj's immediate disciples whom the hostile texts denounce as “the prophet “[16] of this pretended God ; which means that he noted down his revelations for the purpose of spreading them among the people, i.e. that he edited his works. Moreover, a twofold similarity in the use of a konya, evidently chosen on purpose and with symbolic meaning,[17] identifies him beyond doubt: he is a Hashimite[18] of the Rabiah tribe, Abū Bakr Muhammad ibn 'Abd Allah, who for a while was under arrest in 309/922, and became head of the Hallajiyah of Ahwaz and Basrah after the death of his master. He can provisionally be considered as the author of the publication of the Kitab al Tawasin, very shortly after the execution of the “martyr.”

At any rate, there exists a striking identity between certain[19] propositions of the Tawasin and the fragments still extant of al Hallaj's undisputed works as they are preserved in the Sūfi “tafsir” which are compiled from al Sulami (d. 412/1021) onward to al Baqli.

The whole thesis of Iblis of “Tasin al iltibas” (cf. below VI f 12°fl.) is already set down with perfect clarity in this fragment of al Husayn ibn Mansūr al Hallaj:[20]

“When Iblis was told 'worship Adam', he spoke to God: Did then any other than Thou dare deprive my conscience of its honour as a worshipper, so that I may worship Adam! If Thou bast ordered it to me, it is after having forbidden it to me! God: I will chastise you eternally. Iblis: Willst Thou not look at me while chastising me? God: Yes, certainly I will! Ibl is: But then Thy sight of me will lift me above the sight of my chastisement! Do with me according to Thy will. God: I will make of you the “one worthy to be stoned!” Iblis: Hast Thou[32], for Thy praise, only another than Thy self?[33] Then do with me according to Thy will!”

As regards al Hallaj's theory of the 'veil of the name', the veil in which the beings are shrouded, limited, defined, which by the very fact protects them from the radiance of God's omnipotence, it is pointed out here, in Bustan al ma'rifah (cf. below k-15°), in the same terms as in the famous sentence:[34]

“حجبھم بالاسم فعاشوا، ولو ابرز لھم علوم القدرۃ لطاشوا، ولو کشف لھم عن الحقیقۃ لماتوا”

“(On creating them) He has sheltered them under the veil of the name, and so they live; but if He would show them the sciences of His Power, they would faint away; and if He would reveal to them the reality, they would die.”

Finally, al Hallaj's special theory of the “Primordial Wisdom” which is God himself and in which the saints are one with Him, is exposed in the same pressing as in dialectical terms formulae l that ma'rifah .Bustan (cf. below, XI,=k) k) k) as well Preserved in al Kalabadi s Hallajian fragments (143-a-13°,16°,17°,48°, 49°,51°,52°) and in the quotations of al Sulami (170-a-21°) and of al Baqli (380-a-33°,34°).

The work which fell under the official proscription of vizier Hamid ibn al 'Abbas,[35] must have been spread secretly and with great speed among the initiated.

We know that in Basrah a group of Sunni theologians with mystical leanings, of the Salimiyah school[36], took on from the outset the defense of al Hallaj's orthodoxy and even sanctity. It is therefore not surprising that the first allusions to the Kitab al Tawasin can be noticed, as we think, in a mystical work which one of the moderate members of this school had composed with great prudence.

It is the Qut al Qulub of Abu Talib al Makki (d.380/990), a work of great importance in the history of Islamic thought, when one considers that the main propositions of al Ghazali's Ihya 'ulum al din have simply and solely been borrowed from there, without any acknowledgement on his part.[37] Three passages from Qut al Qulub seem to reflect perhaps indirectly, the theories of the Tawasin:

- 1° Qūt II, 77 (chapter on the “maqam al khullah”) where in praise of his master Ibn Salim, al Makki declares that “his soul has freed itself from the space”,[38] طوی عنہ المکانa word which al Suhrawardi of Aleppo links formally with the word of the Tawasin on the Prophet “غمض العین عن الابن”, “He has blinked his eye out of the 'Where' “(below b-7°).

- 2° Qut II,79 (same chapter) defines the Primordial Wisdom, “following” masters who remain unnamed:

“المعرفۃ الاصلیۃ التی ھی اھل المقامات و مکان المشاھدات، فہی عندھم اوحدۃ لان المعروف بہاواحد، و المتعرف عنھا و احد”

which is the paraphrase of the Hallagian doctrine in Bustan al ma'rifah (cf. below k-1°fl.) as well as in the parallel fragments mentioned above.

- 3° Qūt I,47 (Dikr mu'amalat al 'abd fi al tilawah) refers to the theory that the recitation of the Qur'an must fix in the reciter the idea that it is God Himself who recites as the recitation goes on:

“و لیس للعبد فی کلامہ کلام، و انما جعل لہ حرکۃ اللسان بوصفہ۔۔۔ کما کانت الشجرۃ وجھۃ لموسی علیہ السلام و کلمہ اللہ عزوجل منہا۔۔۔”

“And the word belongs not to the faithful during the recitation, it is God who puts him within that movement of the reciting tongue ... like the (Burning) Bush in front of Moses from whose midst God spoke to him”. This is almost literally a repetition of al Hallaj's doctrine at this very place (below c-7).

In an unnamed work the Baghdad! Sufi Abu al Husayn ibn Muhammad ibn Sam'ūn (d. 387/997) writes this[39], as reported by ibn Hazm:[40]

[و رایت لرجل منھم یعرف بابن شمعون کلا منا نصہ]

“ان للہ تعالی مایۃ اسم و ان الموفی[41] مایۃ ھو ستۃ و ثلاثون حرفا لیس منھا فی حروف الھجاء شیء الا واحد فقط و بذلک الواحد یصل اھل المقامات الی الحق”

“God has a hundred names, and the one which completes this total (i.e. the hundredth) has 36 letters of which only one is found in the alphabet: the one by which those who have ascended the stages of mystical life, obtain admittance to God.”

No. 1 of al Hallaj's works as listed by Ibn al Nadim al Warraq (Kitab al Fihrist, ed. Flūgel, I, 192) is the Kitab Tasin al Azal[42] = chapter 6 of the Tawasin.

In the Akhbar al Hallaj[43] which are earlier than Ibn Bäkūyeh (d. 442/1050) who gave a sort of summary of them[44], a fragment of al Hallaj's works is found, and the Hallajian disciple who had handed it on, gave this reply to a witness who was inquiring about the significance of its text[45]:

“لا یسلم لآحد معناھا الا الرسول للہ صلعم استحقاقا ولی تبعا”

“The meaning of this passage is accessible only to the Prophet (may salat and peace be upon him !) because he had by himself a right to it, and to me, because I imitate him.” This seems to have been inspired by two passages of the Tawasin (b-7°, e-25°). Further, there is[46], on the authority of Ahmad ibn 'Asim al Baydhawi, a diluted tercet recension of the distich “Juhudi laka taqdisu ...

(cf. below f-10°). Leaving out the introduction in rhymed prose on the method of “tanzih “that is implied in the true notion of God (cf. above, p. II, the cited 'aqidah, and below p. 7) it reads thus :

ان ۔۔۔ اللہ ۔۔۔ لا تصورہ خطرۃ، و لا تعتریہ فترۃ، من عرفہ طا(ش) و انشایقول

“I heard al Husayn ibn Mansur dictate to one of his disciples: “God whom no intuition can represent, whom no prophet less age can attain; he who has known Him, becomes insane”; and he began to recite: “My madness is Thy holiness! My understanding is in Thee mere extravagance! Ah! the beloved one has dazzled me, forcing my gaze away! He who is the guide towards love, has shown that at a closer look every thing appears equivocal!”

In Abu al Qasim al Qushayri's (d. 465/1074) Quran commentary Latayf al isharat . . . [47] we find for the first time a passage literally borrowed from the Tawasin (cf. below 11 f-10°) for comment upon verse XV,42; the distich “Juhūdi ...

“۔۔۔ فالخواص عبادہ الذین محاھم عن شواھدھم ۔۔۔ و صانھم عن اسباب الفرقۃ۔۔۔ باستھلا کھم فی شھودہ استغراقھم فی وجودہ، فای سبیل للشیطان الیھم وای ید للعدو علیھم، و من اشھدہ الحق حقائق التوحید و رای العالم معترفا فی تقۃ التقدیر لم یکن نھبا للاغیار فمتی یکون للغیر علیہ تسلط، فی معناہ قالوا جحودی لک تقدیس و عقلی فیک تھویس فمن آدم الاک و من فی البین ابلیس!

“God's intimates are the faithful whom He has effaced from their own representations . . . whom He has cleansed from the things that kept them separate (from Him) . . . they have annihilated themselves in His own representation, they have been drowned in His own essence. How then would Satan attain them, how would the enemy take them by surprise? He whom God has shown the realities of the Tawhid, he who has seen the world's balance as it is established in the Creator's plan, how would other things entrap him, when would another than God ever be able to take him over ? It is in this sense[48] that it has been said:[49]

“By my refusal (to adore Adam), Thou affirmst his holiness ! Ah, my reason is folly for Thee ! Who is Adam if not Thou ? And he who is separated[50], it is Iblis !

In his Kashf al Mahjub[51] al Hujwiri (d. about 466/1074) recounts an anecdote of Abu at Harith (Thabit) al Bunani, a Sūfi of the middle of the second century[52] who already admitted the ancient theory of Iblis' double name, his former name being 'Azazil[53] (cf. here below, f-26°).

He attributes to at Junayd[54] the authorship of a dialogue with Ib1is where Iblis seems to draw inspiration from the theme which the Tawasin ascribe to him.

In his Kalirnat a! tasawwuf[55] al Suhrawardi of Aleppo formally attributes to al Hallaj's Kitab al Tawasin a sentence that features here (cf. below b-7°): and his testimony is all the more convincing as we know from his commentary on al Kalabadi's ta'arruf that he had made direct use of al Hallaj's works themselves.

Rūzbahan al Baqli (d.606/1209), apart from his commentary on the Tawasin referred to here above, quotes the Tawasin in his other works : the distich Juhudi (11-f-10°) in his Tafsir (380-a-17, 26°) and two fragments of the Tawasin (11-f-20°fl.k-1°) in his Shathiyat (1091-a-158°,201°), before the last book which is devoted to comment on the Tawasin.

9°: about 580/1184: seems to have Farid al Din 'Attar (d. aged 100 about 620/1223) known the Tawasin at least indirectly, since he develops their allegory of the butterfly and the candle (cf. 11-b-2° fl.) from his al Tayr (cf. 1 1001-e-l°). But the following p agen[56] Tadkirat al Awliya proves that he was anxious to show some disapproval of the “revealed” and “divine” character which certain circles of “zanadiqah” Sūfis of Baghdad attributed to the Tawasin:

۔ ۔ ۔ مرا عجب آمذ از کسی نہ روا دارذ کہ از درختی (Qur. xx.14) “انا اللہ” بر آیذ و درخت درمیانہ نہ چرا روا نباشذ کہ از حسین “انالحق” بر آیذ و حسین درمیان نہ و جنانک حق تعالی بزبان عمر سخن گفت کہ “ان لحق لینطق علی لسان عمر” و اینجانہ حلول کاردارذ و نہ اتحاد۔۔۔

قیل۔۔۔ و من العجب انھم یسمعون کلام اللہ تعالی من (Qur. xx.14) الشجرۃ بانی “انا اللہ لا الہ الا ھو” و یقولون “قال اللہ تعالی” کذا، و لا ینسبونہ الی الشجرۃ، و انھم یسمعون من شجرۃ وجود ابن منصور “انا الحق” و یقولون “قال ابن منصور” کذا و لا یقولون ان “اللہ قال کذا بلسان الحلاج” کماروی ان اللہ تعالی تکلم بلسان عمر رضی و لا حلول و لا اتحاد فیہ۔۔۔”

. . . And, a wondrous thing, when they listen[58] to God speaking through the Burning Bush and saying “it is I, God, the One who alone is God”, they say, quoting this word: “God, be praise to Hi has said ... “but they do not attribute it to the Bush; whereas wle they listen[59] to God speaking through the Burning Bush of Mansūr (al Hallaj's) being and saying “I am the Truth?”, they say quoting this word: “Ibn Mansur has said ... “and not “God has said through the mouth of al Hallaj ... “as on the other hand is said in the hadith about 'Umar: “God spoke through his mouth,” without there being any “hulul” or “ittihad”.

This passage is very important: first, because it expressly has i view two phrases of the Tawasin (11-c-7°,f-23°); further, because in order to make them palatable to orthodox thinking, it makes u:

of a hadith about 'Umar which al Baqli employed at the same period and for the same purpose;[60] and finally, because it gives evidence for the difference between the Hallagian doctrine[61] of the “deification” without confusion nor suppression of the sanctified man, and the monism of the later Sūfis for whom neither the saint nor the “Burning Bush” of Moses' vision personalize the God whose action they both proclaim.

Ibn 'Arabi (d. 638/1240), the true founder of Arab philosophical Pantheism, examines and adopts, while transforming it, the Hallagian theory of the two dimensions of the level of understanding, tūl wa 'ardh, sunan wa fardh, which al Hallaj had formulated in his Kitab al sayhur fi naqdh al dayhur;[62] it is analysed in Ibn Arabi's Futuhat al Makkiyah, t. I, p. 188 and t. IV, p. 367[63] most of all, in the course of a magnificent eulogy of al Husayn ibn Mansur al Hallaj. Now this theory is recounted in the Tawasin (cf. below 11-k-16°) with great clarity.

Muhibb al Din ibn al Najjar (d. 643/1245) relates,[64] like al Hujwiri,[65] an anecdote ascribed to al Junayd, where Iblis explains his refusal in the same manner as in the Tawasin (cf. 11-f-13°).

'Izz al Din al Maqdisi (d.660/1262), the celebrated Shafi'ite teacher, had studied the Tawasin closely. In his Sharh hal al Awliya[66] certain passages in rhymed prose bear the mark of direct inspiration from them (cf. 11-b-7°,e-23°). And in his famous Taflis Iblis[67] he not only retains the thesis of “Iblis martyr of love “with some adjustments, but also transcribes[68] entire sentences from the Tawasin (cf. 11-f-13°,14°,15°,28°,34°) for further expansion, without telling us from where he takes them.

'Afif al Din al Tilimsani (d.690/1291) while commenting upon the Mawaqif[69], declares, in connection with al Hallaj[70] and having his “Ana al Haqq” in mind:

“۔ ۔ ۔ فعرف المحجوبین بربہ عزوجل فراوہ و لم یروا ربہ تبارک و تعالی فانکروا۔ ۔ ۔”

“It was to make known his Lord, praise and glory be to Him! to these blind. But they saw only him (al Hallaj), they did not see his Lord, be He blessed and exalted! And they accused him of lies…, This is exactly the reasoning followed in the Tawasin 11-f-23).

'Ali al Jildaki (d.743/1342), the alchemist, notes[71] that the author of the Talwihat[72] based himself on a sentence from al Hallaj's Tawasin[73]

Towards 791/1389[74] Ibn Junayd al Shirazi mentions the commentary on the Tawasin by al Baqli (cf. above).

'Abd al Karim al Jili (d. about 826/1423)[75] figures out a theory of his own of the Islamic hell[76] where, he says, besides criminals perpetual despair are found sufferers that are in love wits their torments, and holy souls, among the damned, “whom God has placed in hell so as to spread His light through them and rest His gaze on them “while He is fathoming hell: t. II, p. 35

“۔ ۔ ۔ اعلم ان من اھل النار آماسا، عند اللہ افضل من کثیر من اھل الجنہ، ادخلھم دارالشقاوۃ لیتجلی علیھم فیھا فیکون محل نظرہ من الاشقیا، و ھذہ سر غریب، و امر عجیب، بفعل ما یشا و یحکم ما برید”

This theory, which was regarded as scandalous, seems to originate from the Tawasin (cf. 11-f-20°, 31°-35°) coupled with Hindu influences.[77] It is combined here with the thesis that hell will disappear after the Day of Judgement and that Iblis will recover[78] that first place he occupied of old in God's entourage when he was called 'Aza.zil (cf. 11-f-18°, 26°).

Similarly his doctrine of transmigration of the “Insaan al Kamil” from soul to soul, from the Prophet on to al Shibli, and from al Shibli on to his master Sharaf al Din Isma'il al Jabarti, comes straight from al Hallaj's theory of the Hūwa hūwa,[79] of the “shahid al ani”[80], and from a very formal passage of the Tawasin (cf. 1 I-b-5°, 6°. c-8° with the accusations of al Sūl[81] and the letters quoted by al Baghdadi)[82],

Shihab al Din Mahmūd al Alusi (d. 1270/1853), the author of the tafsir Ruh al Ma'ani, cites[83], among other sentences censured for “monism” (wandat al wujud), the following distich of al Hallaj:

“By my refusal (to worship Adam) Thou affirmst his holiness! Ah, my reason is for Thee folly! What is Adam if not Thou? And Iblis, he does not exist!”

This represents a monistic deformation (“ma, fi al kawn “)[84] of the famous distich of the Tawasin (cf. 11-f-10°).

Tawasin is the plural of “Ta Sin “: “Ta “and “sin “are, two of the unexplained initial letters that are found at the head of certain Quranic surahs: ط and سfigure as “awayl al sūwar “in Qur. XXVI (al Shu'ara), XXVII (al Namal) and XXVIII (al Qisas).[85]

As constantly in al Hallaj's work[86], they stand here for two words of which they are the initial letters : ta of taharah, the (primitive) purity (of the Absolute)”, his “tuhuriyah” in the “Azal” (eternity a parte ante), the one which no contingency can tarnish; sin of sana, the “glory “, revealed in the “Abad “(eternity a parte post), the final irradiation (tajalli) of the Absolute.[87] As to the nun of the end of I Jo, it indicates the “naval “, the gratuitous gift which Divine Truth bestows on the spirits and bodies it comes to inhabit, through the glimmering of its Light, through the attribute of desire and the glamour of love which Truth has predestined to them in the absolute of the Absolute.

This is at least the way in which al Baqli explains them at the beginning of his “Commentary” (f° 175b-176a).

Surname of the author: This is the only work where one reads the name of al Hallaj followed by “~.. J1 (~ l )~1W) “, or simply the surname “Al Gharib”.[88] It has to be taken here as an epithet like “Doctor Singularis “.[89]

2° God has designated and enlightened him in a special way. 3° His sinlessness as guidance.

6° He is the very origin and source of all prophetic lights. 7° Prior to all things, even to the Qalam.

8° His existence surpasses all limits of “before “and “after “. 9° It is in him that one sees and knows, for he is “the sign and

“he “is “He “, and “I “is “He “, and “He “is” He”. j 15° Mystical value of the four letters of his name.

16°-17° God has established him in his strength and nobody can escape His Wisdom.

The intelligence of the creatures is unable to grasp the reality, a fortiori the reality of the reality .. .

2° Image of the butterfly fluttering around the candle where it is caught in the flame and is consumed.

5°-6° I would be like this if I were really “He “, as the Sage must be; but that is not so.

7° This was obtained only by Muhammad who “blinked his eye “out of the “where “.

8°-10° Throw off your creatureliness so that “you “may be “He “and, by proving God, you may understand that He must in you be the “proof “of the “proofs “.

11° Distich (Moses): “Sayyarani at Haqq . . . “, God has made me become the reality itself. 12° The Truth is in me.

1° The route of the Sage to the third circle (circle of the Truth) passing through the door of the first circle (circle of the “reality of the reality “).

20-110 Dangers of this route: in the centre of the third circle: God (Qur. II, 262).

4°'7° Even the one who has advanced to the third circle, deceives himself about me and, turning aside, forgets me, whereas he ought to realize that like me he must establish himself in the centre of the divine essence (Qur. LXXV, 11-13).

8°-10° Image of the Sufi bird who finds it too hard to cut his wings in order to join me, and prefers to be drowned in the sea of the understanding.

12° (cf. Scheme No. II): of all the various points interior to the circle one only is the Truth. How to discern it?

Muhammad: he drew near to it... (Qur. LIII, 9, 11)'.
16°-21° The absolute simplicity of his receptiveness* to the divine

22° Imitate him, raise yourself like him above the contingencies. 22° bis Muhammad went near and drew back.

26°-27° This bow-shot is expressed in letters of which only one belongs to the Arabic alphabet: mim (=ma ahwa: the contents of divine revelation).

31° The fullness of speech belongs to God alone, in his reality. 32° Reality is inaccessible

f. VI. Ta Sin al azal wa al iltibas: fi fahm al fahm fi sihhat al da'awa bi 'aks al ma'ani.

1° Iblis and Muhammad are the only ones in this world who have received the mission from God to announce Him.

2° In appearance both have been called to the same task[92] and at the hour of trial[93] have withstood the temptation in the same way.

3°-5° But having proclaimed his refusal, Iblis persisted in it, whereas Muhammad retracted, seeking refuge in God and confessing that” He turns back the hearts... “

6°-9° Iblis, on the contrary, drove his attachment to the “tawhid” of God to the point of separating Him from every thing,[94] so as to adore Him in absolute isolation (tajrid) ; as a consequence, he was cursed when he ended in “tafrid and refused to prostrate himself before Adam (first dialogue with God).

10° The famous distich of Iblis: “Jūhudi !aka taqdisu... 11° End of the first dialogue.

13°-17° Second dialogue: between Moses and Iblis at Sinai.I8°-19° The twofold mission of Iblis.

2p°-25° Deliberation between Iblis, Fir'awn and al Hallaj on true “generosity “; the word “Ana al Haqq! “)

26° Symbolic value of the original name of Iblis: 'Azazil. 27°-28° Last dialogue between God and Iblis.

1° Four enclosures have to be penetrated (from the point of view of progressive knowledge) in order to attain the divine essence.

6°-10° A definition is logically inconceivable; as much by the “muwahhid “(man) as by the “muwahhad “(God) or by linking the One with the other.

2°-3° The “hūwa huwa “is the pronominal ha of every pronoun (hūwa) that is expressed.

4°-14° But God is beyond, and the “tanzih” preliminary to any construction of the notion of “God” is also necessary for the definition of the “tawhid”.

1°-6° Scheme of all possible terms of comparison ; God has to be isolated from all this!

7°-15° God is not even the “huwa hūwa “. Exposition and refutation of all formulae proposed for the “tawhid “(Is it genuine? beyond time? identical with the kalam or the iradah? Is it God from the point of view of the essence? Is it the essence? Is object and denomination one and the same? Does it mean” God is God “?)

16°-19° Negation of all secondary causes from the point of view of the divine essence: the four circles (azal, mafhūmat, ma'lūmat, jihat).

k. XI. Bustan al ma'rifah (= Orchard of Wisdom, in the meaning of “gnosis”):

1° The wisdom is hidden in the depth of radical “Non-Science”; without localization, nor delimitation, nor enumeration, nor effort, nor tension. a

3°-12° Criticism discarding all proposed definitions of Wisdom; transcendence of this notion.

15° The veil of the “name” and the “form “which removes the Creator from all creatures.

16°-17° The two dimensions of the level of the understanding (“length and breadth “) as applied to the domain of ethics (“behaviour “and “commandment of the law “) and to the physical world (spirits and bodies); wisdom is beyond, out of their reach.

24°25° Ineffable character of all this ; since the Creator remains the Creator, and the Creation the Creation.

“۔۔۔ متفرقات کلام حسین بن منصور را قدس اللہ روحہ شرح داذیم، طواسینش را بزبان شطاحان بغرایب نکت عبارۃ کنیم ان شاء اللہ، زبرا کہ ان [از] فصیلات رسومی بس عجایبست، و علومی بس غرایب و فقنا اللہ بشرحھا، و ایدنا بکشفھا للمسترشدین الصادقین بمنہ و جودہ”

Following his plan al Baqli takes up the study of the Tawasin only after having, in his Shathiyat commented upon the most ambiguous sentences of all famous Sūfis, including al Hallaj. Nobody better than he was fitted for such a task. The dictionary of Sūfi “istilahat “which he attached to his Shathiyat,[95] is by its precision far above those of al Hujwiri (d.466/1074)[96], Ibn ' Arabi ' (d. 638/1240), ' Abd al Razzaq al Kashi (d. 730/1330) and al Jurjani (d.816/1413). Moreover he tells us at the end of his commentary [97] that he made use “of the expressions of the mystics “and “of the symbols of the sages “which is perhaps an allusion to earlier glosses he may have had in hand.[98]

The commentary of the Tawasin by al Baqli takes up the third book of the second part of his Shathiyat[99], as he himself says in the preface۔[100] After having pointed out the symbolic meaning of the letters chosen for the title of Hallaj's work,[101] he comments upon the text sentence by sentence (f°-176a fl.).

We give here an analysis of those passages only where his utterly diffuse commentary carries useful and precise details about the apology which he sketches with sincerity, but also with an undertone of discomfort.

1° … سراجیrefers to Muhammad; cf. Our. XLII, 52; برج فلک اھتزاز mean اماکن قدرت و حکمت

6° … انوار او… refers to the hadith در حدیث است کہ نور او برھمہ انوار تقدم داشت

14°”واو او بود”, means here the “ayn al jam' “the mystical state which al Baqli explains thus: Muhammad was the sign (literally the miracles (آیات) of God; but the sign (فعل) = the act the attributes (صفات) = in consequence the divine essence (c..13)[102]; cf. the hadith yell SIB L? - X103

1° حقیقست: definition of the “tanzih” of God (cf. above, X = j). Cf. Qur. CXII, 1 fl.

3° Al Baqli, while translating this primitive gloss, adds another interpretation to it which agrees with this theory of the “sifah” and of the “dat” ضؤ مصباح تجلی صفت است

7° “نسبتش از حدثان منقطع کرد ماکان محمد ابا احد”

7° i.e. the word “Anni ... Allah ... “(Qur. XX, 14) was pronounced by the Burning Bush, as the word “Ana al Haqq was pronounced by me. Note after 12°: Al Baqli notes that Moses is taken here as the type of the “salikin “(not of the “majdubin “) whose stages are enumerated. Then he quotes Moses' word addressed to God (Qur. VII, 140) and observes that “Ana al Haqq “means” rl c.J.as `ems va”

i.e. “my tongue is the place through which God is pro-claimed “, as is said of 'Umar in the haditlo3l..J j.LJ x.13;

1°-4° (f°- 182a-183b). This symbol of (al) Husayn (ibn) Mansur cannot be understood by the beginners. By the “outer door, above the enclosure “[104] it indicates the divine action, the “فعل حق”, the “shawahid “of the “malkut “which God causes to shine through the world and which the heart of the beginner can only attain through “tafakkur, istidlal… The “second door, inside the enclosure” means the glory of the divine attributes, the ey u.,'Iv `l . , The third door, under the second enclosure “is the light of the origin of the attributes,نور اصل صفات . The “second enclosure” represents the knowledge of the essence, علم صفات, which is superior to the علم صفات a The “point above, on the left side, in the first enclosure is the himmah “of the Sage which is like the kernel of the seed of love in his heart; it is still at the stage of the knowledge of the “sifat” only. The “point below, on the right side, in the second enclosure” is this “himmah” of the Sage after he has attained the knowledge of the essence. The “point in the middle, at the left of the third enclosure” is the “tahayyur”, the bewilderment of this “himmah” in the deserts of the divine Omnipotence, The “third enclosure “[105] is the “knowledge of the essence of the essence” (cI3 c.d.; f, Is), and the “point which is in its centre”, the pre-eternity (علم ذات ذات) and the essence of the Absolute (کند قدم) 4° (f°183b). This ultimate Reality (. i-) is the being of God It is 3 S &l,l, 9 _AU; in one.

5° Al Baqli observes that this comparison is difficult to under-stand, for its purpose is to make us understand the annihilation ('l:.i) of the creation in the Creator, the bewilderment of man facing the divine qualities, names and attributes, and whirling round in the absolute of the essence and the principle of the absolute reality… Then al Baqli suggests two allegories for the understanding of these “four birds”: a) they are the “four elements”: summon them to appear before you, chop them with the blade of divine ebriety and of zeal, on the anxious threshold of the spirit, lest they might fly off carrying with them the knowledge of the Reality. Once you have destroyed the birds of the elements, torn off the wings of the six dimensions of space, and released the weight of existence from the birds' feet, then neither centuries nor ages nor places nor witnesses will subsist further, and you will reach the world of the Nothingness of the Nothing, where you will be astounded, where you will know who you are. Then will gleam in you the lights of the Absolute, and you will find yourself taken up in Him . . . b) Second allegory : take the four birds of the soul (nafs), the spit it (rah), the reason ('aql) and the heart (qalb), burn them in the fires of “qudrah”, disperse their ashes in the wind of “hikmah” from the peaks of the divinity through the deserts of “wandaniyah”, so that they disperse: the bird of the soul to the depths of “pre-eternity”, the bird of the heart to the glory of “post-eternity”, the bird of the reason to the gleaming lights of the divine “attributes”, and the bird of the spirit to the aura of the “absolute personal essence”. And after having them thus destroyed in God…, call them together again and assemble them in God's eternity, and ask them whether the birds of Pre-eternity, of Post-eternity, of the Attribute and of the Essence were able to teach them by their riddles one single atom of divine Wisdom, Unity and Serenity… The destroyed birds will in their defective language answer you: “No…” Cf.

6° It means : out of jealousy for His Reality God wants to manifest it only in His isolation (fardaniyah) and thus show the treasure of His absoluteness only to the Nothing (Annihilation is therefore required before God's manifestation of Himself). Cf. hadith کنت کنزا مخفیا فاحببت ان اعرف

Yet at the apparition of Reality the spirit is paralysed by fear, it is seized with emotion.

11° It means: “fearfully sheltered under the cloak of Reality” Muhammad cried out: “Ah!”, so as “to prevent the Creation” (of his discovery).

1° Commentary :”بذین نقطہ عین عین عین عینیت کہ موجودات است در وجود کنہ کنہ کنہ، و حقیقت علت، کہ منزھست از مقالت و اشارت۔۔۔”

2° Husayn here affirms he has attained the high degrees of absolute knowledge. His claim is pardonable, for if uncreated knowledge belongs to God alone, it is however communicated to the Sage to some extent. “He who denies me,” al Husain says, shows that he is still at the stage of the “shawahid” of my “malkut”, whereas I have entered the world of “jabrut”.

3° “He who is at the second enclosure” sees through the light of the “science of the attributes”.

4° “He who arrives at the third enclosure”,[107] wanders through the deserts, struck with emotion, and his sight is still confused by the differences it perceives between the divine attributes; it thus makes him believe that al Hallaj is wrong, as he does not see in the same way.

7° Husayn shows that even he who thus penetrates the ultimate enclosure in Reality, skirts it “without seeing me, me who am drowned” at the very bottom of the “waves of the Absolute”, because he remains preoccupied with the knowledge of himself;[108] he passes on, fleeting, instead of taking refuge in me.

10° The bird understood at Hallaj's reply, since he drowned himself, Nobody can know God but in God and through God. 12° In this enclosure of the Understanding there exists only one spot where one finds God (حق). The other points are only “the radiance of God's knowledge” (تجلی علم حق); and so every creature is drowned in this ocean of Wisdom, except Muhammad. He endures, like “a pearl in the shell of the divine act”, under “the ground wave in the abyss of the sea of pre-eternal science.”

13° … حاضر…غائب…, i.e. “absent from himself” when
he found himself in God's presence…

23° Al Baqli is here not quite sure of the meaning. He suggests this: the two “qaws” or “bows” are the azal (pre-eternity) and the abad (post-eternity);[109] they are separated by the “ayn” or the “bayn”. When God decided to admit Muhammad to the essential vision, on this side of the bow of “azal wa abad”, he shot him with the twofold arrow of “dunuw” and “maqam “to the bottom of the essence beyond all contingencies and all beings.

25° He who has entered the second bow, has by the very fact left the created forms. The second bow is the قرب قرب the دنو of the لوح محفوظ , whereas the ordinary corresponds to the J;x.,, cyt of the profane.

27. Al Baqli supposes this “mim” to be the “mim” of i.e. , i.e. the secret, the key of “what God has revealed”, the “why” of Revelation. This the Prophet does not communicate to the creatures, for they are not able to bear it.[110] Alone the birds of the spirit, who are haunting the waters of these oceans, at their return drop “shells” from their crops, the pearls of the “Ana al Haq”![111] and of the “Subhani!”.[112]

28-29 Al Baqli constructs the following allegory: the first bow is the “mulk fi'l al jabrut”, and its string is the above mentioned “mim”; the second bow is the “mulk al malkut”; the arrow from the two bows joined together is the “tajalli al khass”, the intimate enlightenment which God projects on the target of Muhammad's heart. In connection with the “mim”, al Baqli remarks, that absorption into the divine thus leads the mystics to use isolated, enigmatic letters like those found at the beginning of certain surahs.

35 Al Hallaj, “al raf iq al a' la”, shows us here that the Sage has no master, disciple, or friend other than God, and has no other predilection than that for God, without any preference between joy and suffering; he is inferior to God, a desert of sanctity (lost in the) desert of wisdom, sign of the word engulfed in the centre to which it returns.

دعوی او صدق است، معنی او رفق است، معانی او امانیست، (از مشاھدہ و مکاشفہ امانی او مشاھدۂ حق است) طرقہا آن از حلق دور است، (طریقت اور مستقیم است)، اسم او محمودست، رسم او تفریدست، او در معرفت فرید است> نکرہ او از عجز در معرفت نکرہ است، گناہ گارست، گناھش قلب عرفانست، و آن در نکرہ وثیقہ جمال رحمن است، اسمش وثیقۂ عبودیتست (آنرا “عروہ وثقی” ارشاد ربوبیت گویند) اسم او عارفست، معرفت طریقت اوست، سمت او حرقہ نیران تجلیست، نحوست[113] امتحان صفت اوست

او ناموس حق است، شموس حقائق میادین شان اوست،

صورت آدم علیہ السلام ایوان اوست (یعنی قلب ایوان اوست)، شیطان عالمش مایوس است، طریق مطموس مجھول شان معرفت اوست، رسم مدروس بر جمیع خلق در معرفت عیان اوست، عرائس تجلی بستان روح اوست محو طموس در طمس نفس بنیان سر اوست37 Further

جند خاطرش منکرست)[114] از عشق باطنش، ارکان طبیعتش Further 38

اوراق اشجار انوارش در مشارب تجلیست، اکمام اسرارش39 Further

از اثقال حدثاں فارغ است، مقالت او سکرست و آن رکن حالت اوست او عاجز آمد از حمل ابن واردات پنداشت کہ او فانی است (190a) او باقی بود، مادون حالت او غضب حق است، از حق اوراست اصطفایت

Cf. the divine word[115] سبقت رحمتی غضبی.Then[116] he recalls the previous “Ta Sin “: “Safawi “(= Sala), “Dayrah “, “Nuqtah “and announces the following Ta Sin which was “the cause of scandals and calumnies.”[117]

Introductory remarks of al Baqli : In “Ta. Sin “, in the form of a riddle, we find this mystery of Wisdom which is Predestination : pre-eternal felicity of the blessed;- pre-eternal distress of the damned. It appears under the twofold symbol of Muhammad's election for happiness (gifts of wisdom, mission and prophecy), and of the dam-nation of the chieftain of the Wicked, who “with God's permission played dice and lost the game on the esplanade. He lost his share of felicity “, because he spok in quibbles (iltibas) over the “fahm fahm”[118] and used pretences[119] that were contrary to his inmost thoughts (bi ` aks al ma`ani).

1°عین۔۔۔, i.e. “'ayn (al) haqiqah”, God, when He tested Iblis, in His foreknowledge.

4° Husayn Ibn Mansur, al Baqli says, compares here the mission of Iblis, chief of the Angels, with that of Muhammad, chief of mankind. The one is the treasurer of the pre-eternal blessings, “latifat azaliyat “, the other the treasurer of the post-eternal hardships, “qahriyat abdiyat”, they correspond to the two symmetric attributes of God who acts “qahran wa lutfan “. Cf. Qur. XVI, 95.

7°…بیا شفتند … i.e. he turned his eyes (literally: his glances and his eyes' blinking) from Reality (haqiqah) and took shelter in the secret of his conscience. He was mistaken, thinking that Adam was another” than God, and confused” tawhid “with “tafrid “.

8° )5 e:„.1 I )9 ... What are contingencies in comparison with the divine “fardaniyah”? Far from committing any sin by adoring Adam, Iblis would thus have remained worthy to contemplate the “fardaniyah “.

9° By his answer Iblis denied this “other “(Adam), because he saw him, without thinking that in reality no “other “than God himself was there, He alone present in the ambiguity of the “'ayn (al) jam' “... Adam veiled God from him, because in Adam he perceived only Adam 127 ... as a being essentially “other than God “; this caused him to strive for “isolating God more thoroughly “from him (Adam) (ifrad al fardaniyah) ... And this is why, in order to show plainly how poor and despised he had become for expressing the “infirad “of God in his “tawhid “, he recited the distich “Juhudi .

دربین آدم و [حق] ابلیس نوذ، و بین در بین نبوذی ۔۔۔

i.e. “In reality Iblis is not (in spite of his saying so) “in between “Adam and God, for there is no “in between “from the one to the other. If Iblis had been “muwahhid “, he would not have refused to prostrate himself, for in front of the Divine Presence the muwahhid does not see (f° 46b)[120] anybody else (“ghayr”). Iblis did not understand that Adam was the “act” of God 0' l), and that the act of God is God's mirror[121]: if he only had looked into this mirror, he would have caught sight of Him in His essence. according to the famous word “I have not looked into anything where I did not catch sight of God”[122].

11° محبی دلیل ام If Iblis had really been a “lowly lover”, he would have prostrated himself…

کہ خدمت من .[123] Iblis is wrong to pride himself of pre-Excellency over Adam, of anteriority in the divine pre-science; he does not understand his mistake when affirming thatارادت تو در من سابق است since God thought of
Muhammad before thinking of him according to the hadith لولاک لما خلقت الکون [124] and since Adam's form is no other than that of Muhammad.

…کہ تو مرا از آتش آفریدۂ … This alleged motive is a simple excuse,-”it means to disobey, as do the cowards when they refuse to join the rank and file, and wait to be forced.”

تراست تقدیر و اختیار… If Iblis had been sincere, he would not have tried to prevail over God's elected.

12° “Qurb” and “bu'd”, in “tawhid”, are the same thing only for the one who has not to face temptations; “hi jr” and “wasl” are the same thing only for the one who is not damned. But Iblis, he, has disobeyed ... (he has been tempted and rejected)…

13°-17° (f°106b): This talk between Iblis and Moses is quoted by the hadith and the stories : As Moses was coming out of art ecstatic talk with God, Iblis asked him : “Are you aware that it is with me that you have been talking?” Moses, stupefied, felt confused: but God spoke to him : “Chase this accursed one away, this is the way in which he is accustomed to speak to the siddiqin.” Likewise one finds in the Qissat (al) anbiya the account of Jesus' temptation on Mount Massisah. Al Baqli translates here this account in extenso (f°106b-107a), the threefold temptation by Iblis suggesting to Jesus that he is “the god of the earth” (twice), then “the creator of heaven and earth”, and how Gabriel, then Michael, then Israfil, together with 'Azazyayil (sic) came to deliver Jesus and finally put Iblis in chains “at the bottom of the pit of the Occident, under the watch of 600,000 angels”; “otherwise, declared Iblis later on to Jesus, I would have done with you what I did with Adam.” Then al Baqli goes on to comment upon the text in detail; all these words of Iblis, he observes, are but false pretences, wile and deceit, although he says, he is in the state of the “Malamatiyah.”[125]

before Adam, I would have been like you (who prostrated yourself on Mount Sinai)”, which proves that Iblis does not know that Adam and the Sinai were in both cases likewise two mirrors of the “tajalli”, of the “divine radiance”, and that Moses was only obeying an order. And his answer

014) “it was only a test”, is not correct, for from God's point of view the order was altogether an order (“amt.”), and if Iblis saw in it only a test, this means that he. did not love God purely, for pure love does not distinguish the causes, changes or tests of the divine order.

By his word . 0l4) “it was equivocal”, Iblis avows his incapacity to express the exterior alteration, the disfigurement he has undergone, for he henceforth will suffer in himself from a permanent contradiction between his interior “batin” which feels the divine splendour,and his exterior “zahir” which has become ugly and cannot reflect it any more nor even get a “tinge” of it.[126]

His answer من مذکورم(§15) leads al Baqli to this reflection: certainly, God does pronounce his name, but it is in order to expel him far away from Himself : cf. above § 9, and Qur. II,32.

خدمت ام ۔۔۔ صافی ترست[127], He dares lay claim to the “purest obedience “, he, from whom the pre-eternal omnipotence snatches it!

اکنون۔۔۔ حظ اورا: God has no need of any associate, nor does He desire or appeal to any of his creatures for help.

طمع ۔۔۔ برخاست : whoever is created in contingency, is createdطامع “desiring “; how can Iblis while remaining &U, lay claim to the divine “infirad “? By this term L.Js he alludes to the word.l “happiness” 015), which would establish an “association” (shirk) in the divine “iradah”.

فردم ۔۔۔ 016) : i.e. rejected, reprobated, not in “tawhid . (§16). If Iblis had had an atom of intuition of what “tawhid” is, he would have seen but God[128] and would not have said “Ana Khayr minhu! “(Qur. VII, 11). Likewise, if al Husayn ibn Mansur had enjoyed the highest degree of contemplation, he would not have said “Ana al Haqq! “, for he would have renounced his “Ana “(his “I”) for a single atom of the gleaming sun of pre-eternity ... he would have annihilated himself in it . . . Alas, who has ever reached there? Who has ever been tinged by the Absolute, or trans-figured by pre-eternity? Who has ever been set free from his post-eternal “I “, were it even by suffering to the utmost, by flagellation, crucifixion and branding?128 Cf. Qur. CXII, 1-4.

8° (f°108a) , , , fly Thus in the beginning he knew well how to do good, but then he did evil and, by dint of looking at the “af'al “(the acts of God — the created beings) lost sight of their absolute Author.[129]

In what follows, al Baqli gives at once text of §35; but for greater convenience in following the order of the text, we insert here his commentary of §§ 20°-25° as it figures on f'148b fl. of his work.

20° (f°148b). Al Baqli observes at first that Husayn (ibn) Mansur falls here into “the ocean of the wandah, inflamed with love for the beauty of God to the point of revealing the intimate.' mysteries “of love in accents of rapture. While in the state of drunkenness, his “batin “is sincere, but his “zahir “is ailing; and his ailment comes from ignorance, for he is unaware of his own knowledge (the one of which he speaks). According to the experts of these fits of abnormality, the knowledge of mysteries, when it manifests itself, cannot be understood by reason, Cf. the words of Moses to al Khidhr (Qur. XVIII, 67), and the famous word (f'149a) “Li al rububiyah sirr…”[130] on the “secret of the divine omni potence.”

This secret is the mystery of the divine pre-science, the secret of predestinaton (qadr)[131]; were it revealed, it would lead to the destruction of God's covenant with the prophets; why would Moses thus go and make a harangue to Fir'awn on God's behalf if God had warned him that Fir'awn “would remain an infidel “? Cf. Qur. IV, 163. The discipline of religion (din) lies in keeping (kitman)[132] the secret (sirr).

What Husayn ibn Mansur here admires in Iblis and Fir'awn, is their energy (rajuliyah). This is shown by several Ahadith:

ان اللہ یحب الشجاعۃ و لو بقتل حیۃ۔ جاھل سخی بخدای نزدیک تر از عالم بخیل۔ ان ھذا الدین لیوید بالرجل الفاجر۔

Cf: استاذ من۔۔۔024) regarding “rajuliyah” ... Having fallen down from his state of pre-eminence into the “sea of the knowledge of perception “... (1° 150a), Iblis was thrown back by the “tawhid “to the shore of the “tajrid “where he declared that any acknowledgement of “wasãyt “[133] was a crime of “shirk “, of “association” with God ... He did not understand that the reality of the “tafriqah “[134] is `' jam' “, and that “Adam is He “(cf. above §10°), God! Fir'awn, considering himself as the representative of God' authority, believed he was representing God himself, the sight of the divine authority veiled God from him, he mistook the “shahid”, the witness he was, with the “mashhud”, the God for whom he bore witness; cf. Qur. XXVIII, 38.

22° Here (al) Husayn explains Iblis' word by the fact that absorbed in the contemplation of the past, he imagined that no other than he would see God. As to Fir'awn's word, it is an excuse based on the ignorance of his people rather than an affirmation of himself… As regards the hadith[135] where God blames Gabriel for having filled the mouth of the agonizing Fir'awn with sand so as to prevent him from confessing his repentence[136], it simply means to show how merciful God is even to the rebels (f°150b)…

23° من اثرام…”I am the Sign of it!” The whole world is a sign representing God, but there is “sign” and “sign”. The world is but the Jtail … whereas Adam is the موقع تجلی افعال following Qur. XV, 29, where the word j) corresponds to the “tajalli”.[137] God has “irradiated' through Adam making him his “real sign”, and not برسم حلول, by “way of incarnation”. Cf. hadith خلق آدم علی صورتہ the word of a mutasawwif الصوفی اثر اللہ فی الارض and the definition of Sufism u, افراد قدم از حدوث[138].

من بحق حق امi.e. “I subsist in God, not in myself”. Here al Baqli brings his theory of the supreme word of al Hallaj's ecstasies “Ana al Haqq”, “I am the Truth”!.[139] According to al Baqli[140] this means)” موضع شریعت و حقیقت بوذ، و محل نظر تجلی بوذ “He was the point (of contact) between the (revealed) Law and the (divine) Reality[141], the only point from where the divine radiance was visible” for his contemporaries, just as the Prophet had been for his time, according to the exegetes[142] of verse XVII, 83 of the Quran. These exegetes deal lengthily with the principle of the “Ana al Haqq”, with the questions of the “Ana al Haqq.” Such words come to the lips of the Sage when he becomes aware that he “realizes”[143] the “tawhid”, that he is all “tinged” with it. It is God who then, from the tongue of the Sage, speaks “I am the Truth”, consolidating him in the divine unity[144] within the conquering fires of the “wandaniyah”. In God then the Sage no longer perceives some soul, or created being, or difference (f°15la); he wants to proclaim the divine “I” (ananiyah), even though he lacks authority to do it (rububiyah). And as he sees God under an equivocal aspect (iltibas) and perceives no other hindrance (baynunah)[145] from the simple vision than his own “I “, dominated as he is by God's reality, he lays claim to the pure divine authority (by saying “I am the Truth”!). Indeed, he is not different from God, for he is all busy with God in God, satiated with the light of the “tawhid”, so much so that the “tawhid “[146] becomes for him impiety (kufr)[147] and reciprocally ... God is his “location” (ayniyah) ... The Sage then passes with Jesus beyond the “veils[148] of the Kingdom”, and the form of Adam[149] escapes from the boundary of compulsion[150], for his human fabric, being thus sheltered in the shade of a wall, will not perish, like all contingent beings, in the bright sun of destruction.[151]

30° In the whole of the Tawasin Husayn describes Iblis, who by his condemnation has become the contrary of what he was when he was named 'Aza.zil, by means of “obscure” (“معمی”) comparisons. از بدایت ۔۔۔ آمد which means : from his initial state which was “shaqawah” (unhappiness), he has not reached his final stage which is “la'nah” (curse), for his “unhappiness” is nothing else than his “curse”, and reciprocally.

31° خروجش ۔۔۔ مارسش i.e. “Iblis” came out of the fire and seemed to be light: but his light was borrowed and so he had to leave the light as one being contrary to it”.

“نور تعریش “is the “light of knowledge” borrowed (by Iblis) from the light of the Tablet.

32° “تتراصیہ” (sic) i.e. the sudden end (rl)) of his power (قھر) sunk in error.

3 [1]محل سہفاوی در محل فیض محل و صیص و مقباض “the place where Iblis is dying from thirst, is the very place where abundance is over-flowing”. u°=“

صوا عقش موقر بوذ شراھمش برھمی بوذ = “He shouts with

ھجرانش مصور بوذ صورامش مخیل بوذ... “His (pretended) shyness is but simulation (since he has been expelled)”.در غیب عمیاہ او ھام بوذ : in the abyss his blindness is nothing but his own dreaming (inspired by pride)…

تطہمش i.e. . . . (and) his boasting, his deceits, tricks and impostures تزیین و اغرار بوذ و مکر و خداع

33° (f° 109b) یا اخی ۔۔۔ رصما i.e. “if you cast down your eyes, out of the divine mystery (ghayb), and if you try to “imagine to yourself your imagination (wahm), as the “imagination” (wahm) is the “worry” (hamm) of your heart, and is nothing but the “whispering” (waswasah) (f ° 110a) of Satan, you thus will (know) the plight of Satan himself (in) your own “imagination” (wahm), (in) your own “worry!”

و رجعت غما ۔۔۔ If you thus know the particular condition (hal) of Iblis, your heart will be broken, and from grief over his punishment you will fall into grief over annihilation.

34او عالم تر بوذ بسجود etc. By such words he means to say that Iblis was so before[152] his destiny underwent trans-formation. But now Iblis' condition is quite opposite, as God (in the Quran) and the Prophet (following the Tradition) have said. And this is all that Husayn says about the “talbis Iblis”[153] and the “iltibas”.

35° (We insert here the commentary on §35 which al Baqli gives on f ° 108a, ahead of the preceding§§):

مشاھدت… , Al Baqli rectifies : it regards the “contemplation” of the “hadhrat malkut” ( Presence of [ God's ] Kingdom), not of God himself. Otherwise God would not say of Iblis what he says of him in Qur. II, 32. At the beginning, indeed, while still obedient, Iblis enjoyed “contemplation”. It is a feeling of hatred that detained him from worshipping Adam who was manifestly chosen for the divine “tajalli” and “tadalli” of the divine essence and attributes, cf. Qur. XV, 29. Adam alone is in possesssion of the “very special radiance of the divine essence” ul3 0.2;.I and God has said : He had created him with “both his hands” (Qur. XXXVIII, 75), “qidam” and “baqa” (“absolute” and “perennity”), cf. hadith hlo? JI PSI a, au~y.~ where the “forty mornings” mean to say “four thousand years”. Upon this, al Baqli (f ° 108b) sets out a long commentary of Qur. XXXVIII, 71-75, on Adam's creation out of “mud taken from below the Throne”…

1°-2° (f° 109a). By these (four) circles (enclosing) four (inaccessible) stages (of the divine knowledge), Husayn here means that “nobody can pretend to the knowledge of : the pre-eternal will (mashiyat azal),-the absolute providence (hikmat qidam), the perennial pre-determination (qadar baqi), and the sciences of the knowable in God.” Myself, claims Iblis, I have known through these four sciences that they resolve upon my punishment, no matter whether I prostrate myself or not. On the Tablet of the “mashiyah” it is written that I am “impious” (kafir), on that of the “hikmah” an “accursed one” (mal'un), on that of the “qudrah” a “reprobate' (matrud), and on that of the “Mother of the Book “[154] a “blind” (mahjub). Thus, if I escape from the first, it is only to fall into the second ... Cf. Qur. VI, 18, and the proverb :جف القلم بما ھو کا بن الی الابد

3° فلا ولا۔۔۔ولا! The first “No!” is negation (nafi), the second denegation (juhad), the third prohibition (nahy), the fourth ignorance (nakirah). If I remain in the first “No!”, it leads me from the denegation to the negation. Being t accursed, my “No!” would tumble me from the “No!” of the negation into the (final) “No!” of the “ignorance”, but I do not want to fall into it, for “in the centre of the ignorance” (6).<; ) there is the “knowledge” of the “tawhid! “(Al Baqli uses here very aptly a later passage of the Tawasin, k-1°, stressing thus its importance). (My sticking to) these (first four) “No!” (without entering them), I will keep out of the “knowledge of the ignorance” ('irfan nakirah) as well as of the “ignorance of the knowledge” (nakirah 'irfan)![155] Had I learnt that by prostrating myself I would get rid of the trial, I would have done so… But I have known from God[156] that He wants to reject me, I am but a contingent being, and He is the Absolute…

Al Baqli adds here the following reflection: “Understand, O Sage, that Iblis is here on the point of knowing these divine attributes, and that God informs him that he is rejected. He despairs, and delivers himself up to the destiny decreed for him, drowning himself in the sea of God's “mighty hand” (jabr), for he realizes that his “impiety” (kufr) is twofold: he has disobeyed (when rejecting the order to prostrate himself), and he has claimed he had un ravelled the secret of God's pre-determination (qadar) which is the secret of the divine essence itself. Cf. the two hadith

(f ° 109a). In short, the “mashiyah” is God's secret, hi very “authority” (rububiyah). Hence it does not behove anybody to say he declines a divine order (amr). For who ever speaks thus, under the pretext of knowing tin mashiyah “[157], denies at one and the same time the obedience owed by the creature ('ubudiyah) and the authority of the Creator (rububiyah).

is the living God” means the “alif of His Majesty (kibrya)”, for God is great, exalted, living, everlasting.

3° الواحد۔۔۔ازو i.e. the light of the “tawhid” and the light of the “wandaniyah” are in, of and for the divine essence (alone).

4° God, he says here, is “exempted” from the need that the “tawhid” be separated from Him. The symbol (fig. p. 58, col. 1) of “al wandaniyah” is “alif and dal”: the alif, which stands for his essence, is unique; it possesses his attribute (sifah)[159] represented by the dal : it is unique, alone in the uniqueness of the knowledge of the “tawhid”. This (primordial) alif[160] subsists “upon” God, as the alifs of the (created) language subsist “upon” him.[161]

6° صفت موحد۔۔۔ i.e. the “tawhid” is the divine attribute (sifah).

7°اگر گویم کہ من ۔۔۔ i.e. God is “exempted” from the “Ana” (“I”) of my “Qala” (in Persian : “guft” he says”), of my “tawhid”.

10° (f ° 110a). “I associate with a limitation (since I define): i.e. God is “exempted” from “hulul” in whatever place, the ambiguity springs from the fact that one tends to link Him with contingencies; words like “tawhid, muwahhid, muwahhad” are full of ambiguity, but in reality the unique is unlimited, He is above the symbols of the “muwahhidin “, for He remains distinct from the expressions made us of by the creatures. “He who speaks of God by way of allusions is dualist (Zoroastrian), and he who speaks of Him by way of symbols is an idolater! “[162], al Baqli concludes.

1° (f° 110a).نازع است i.e. the “secrets of the divine authority (rubūbiyah) are contradictory, because God's perennity is incompatible with the contingency of the created beings; none of them has access to it.”

باوو ازع است “they do not deny Him, being the whole of the whole of God.”

ضمیر ۔۔۔ صایر است i.e. the “dhamayr” (pronouns) of the tawhid “represent created beings, the “dhamir, mudhmar dhamayr “, “pronoun, antecedent, pi onouns “, are but tit. “stations of the hearts “(amakin qulub ast), whereas God does not need them.

2°lm , its “ha “is his “huwiyah “; it is a “symbolic indication “(isharah); but God remains behind any possible “symbolic indication.”

موحد را نگویند , for any definition introduces into the circle of the contingent beings; the worlds[163] are but atoms of his omnipotence.

8° کہ توحید اگر گویم کہ ازو , the reality of the “tawhid “is twofold, “tawhid “of the Ceator and “tawhid “of the creatures. The latter are the divine signs (ayat = revealed verses, miracles), the former are the divine attributes, inseparable from the essence.

9° The light of the essence hides from the sight of the creation behind the veil of the “signs” (ayat) when it appears. Where does it retire when there is no “where”, nor “there”, nor “what” (ma), nor “here” (da)? The “where indeed, marks a limit (hayth), a limit is necessary only for the contingent beings, this “where “does not exist for God in His inmost being (dhimn), since it is His creation, as the “accidents, bodies, spirits, masses “are His creation.

12° مشمولہ ۔۔۔ it means the “spirits” of the natural things, “united” to the (four) elements of matter (kawn).

مفعولاتthey stand for the “marsumat “of God (engraved signs, like in a royal edict). The atoms of the “dawayr” thus assembled according to centuries and ages, accidents and substances, are all found subsisting in God with the totality of things, yet God remains independent of this totality: without “infisal” that would withdraw Him from them, and without “ittisal” that would confuse Him with them. But by this very separation from the “maf'ulat

He pursues His action on them by means of bis attributes tajalli, 'ilm “and “iradah”.

Already 'Ali has said داخل الاشیاء کالاشیاء (f°l l lb), al Baqli notes. Husayn's purpose in these “Tasin al twahid” and “Tasin al asrar “was to show by symbols “how to isolate the Absolute (ifrad qidam) from contingency (hadath).”[164] He thus has explained by way of ellipses (موجز) that every symbol changes over into a created being, that there can be no co-incidence between the absolute and the contingent, and that their joining in the understanding is inconceivable. He has shown that the “tawhid” does not emanate from God and does not join the creature, for in God, “tawhid” is God, and in the creature “tawhid” is but a created being…

Evolving this theme al Baqli comes to the conclusion that the divine substance cannot undergo any inclusion (hulul) into the circle of the contingent beings ... “Nothing is like God”: لیس کمثلہ شئ

2° I.e. here, in this circle, I have featured the totality of the faith corresponding to all believers from among men endowed with comprehension ('irfan).

5° دایر corresponds to ماہر؛ الہام., to [حایر] to ؛کردش to عایر؛ اوصاف to نعوت to بیان (f°112a) and صابر to شواھد AI Baqli then gives §6 which perhaps is but the end of his commentary.

12° توحید ذات بوذ (al Husayn's aim) may God show hi His mercy ! is to refute personally the heresy of “hulūl “. Giving thus his refutation of the “Hulūliyah “bears evidence that he is not a “hulūli “himself! It means “extracting the absolute from the contingent “and acting like the Prophets and the “siddiqin “who have been preserve from the heresies of “tashbih, tamthil, kayfiyah and hula] This is why, al Baqli adds, for those who think that t ,. Baghdadians killed (al Husayn) unjustly, this sentence carried the reason of the later assassination of the Caliph and the inundation which flooded Baghdad.[165]

19° Here (f°112b) these syllables are symbolic: ذا of “what is (ذات), شا of “what one wanted “(مشیئۃ) , قال “what one said “(ill), L. of “what one named with qualities.”

Husayn thus describes four “degrees” (martabah): the is “azal “, the “pre-eternity “which one has to understed here only as “the century of the centuries “, not as divine “azal “. The second is “al mafhumat”, the “I telligibles “, i.e. what is created (khalq). The third “al jihat “, the “dimensions “, i.e. the “kawn “(mat extended in space). The fourth is “al ma'lūmat “, cognoscibles “, i.e. knowledge ('ilm).

In no case will the spirit which seeks the path of Wisdom find it (symbol: the four “La”. “No! “inscribed on figure), for he is seized by stupor. If he penetrates through the door of knowledge, it is “pre-eternity “that stupefier him. If through that of the pure idea (safa), it is t “unintelligible “(la mafhumat); if through that of t' comprehension (ma'na), it is the “unknowable “(la ma'1 mat) ... If through that of the understanding (fahm), it is t , “immaterial “(literally: the unextended “: la jihat) ... The divine unity subsists without subjection to the contingent vicissitudes, to the knowable, the intelligible, the temporal.

Al Bagli then gives a sentence in Arabic[166] which perhaps does not belong to the original text.

Likewise further on, the §§23-24 seem to have been added to the original text by some earlier glossarist, if not al Baqli himself. (f°113a). Al Baqli, resuming the speech (qala), then concludes: O Sage! be not surprised by all that Husayn has been uttering and showing in symbols in connection with the “tawhid”. All he has said is but a drop from the oceans of the “tawhid”. 'Ali had said many more things, he whose love, “whenever he dived sparkling into the sea of the tawhid, brought pearls back from it”…

As to the symbolism of the “circles “(cf. figures) used here by Husayn, it does not offend the laws of the Sunnah. Does not God himself use the “spider “as a symbol (Qur.XXIX, 41)? And is it not recorded by the hadith that one day the Prophet traced a line on the ground and said: “This is my road”, and then another, saying: “This is Satan's road”?

Al Baqli then draws the general conclusion of his commentary (f°113a), but before we analyse it, we insert his commentary on the fragments of the Bustan al ma'rifah which he has cited elsewhere.

1° (f°166b), i.e. the reality of “irfan “consists for man in recognizing his incapacity ('ajz) to comprehend God in His very Wisdom. For God's Wisdom (ma'ruf) is exactly as unlimited as the ignorance of his creature…

(f°167a). This is why the Prophet, after the ecstasy, said لا احصی ثناء علیک and ان من لاعلم لجھلا And Abu Bakr (Siddiq Akbar) stated this: العجز عن درک الادراک ادراک “Not to comprehend the comprehension is already to comprehend!”[167]

5° (f°168b). Commenting upon the famous and so often incriminated tercet of al Hallaj : “Subhana man azhara nasutahu, sirra sana lahutihi (a) 1 thaqibi... “, al Baqli notes that “nasut “can but be an allusion to Adam's creation, and that moreover Husayn (ibn) Mansur justified himself elsewhere when defining the Essence of Wisdom by these words (here, text of §§24°-25° compared with Qur. V, 77). When a man,al Baqli winds up, expresses so strongly that he “extricates the Absolute from contingency “, how might it be supposed that in another passage he could declare himself a “hululi”?

طواسین حسین را بطون و کفایت حق سبحانہ شرح تمام شد، بعبارت اھل حقیقت و اشارات اھل معرفت، در وقت باریذن سرشک خون جان، و خواندن زند و بازند ملطفہ جانان، کلماتی کہ در بحر صین قلزم قدم، جز نقش ابریز احمر کیمای سر قدر نیست، و خطابی کہ جز نقش بیشانی اقمار سرایر نور احمر نیست، "رمز قرمس"[168] و "شاھد[169] بادیۂ بصر" در ورق شجر طوبی، جان مصور کردم آن لقبی کہ روزی در تفکر ابن فصول غریب بوذم ، بتنہا نشستہ بوذم 'انکہ از راہ دیذۂ معنی کلاہ دار شطاح حسین ابن منصور دیذم، مرا بستوذ بزبان غیب و حقائق فہم انکہ [f 113 b] باخر گفت "عرفت[170] [حقیقۃ] القرمس[171]، و [قطعت][172] بادیۃ[173] البصر"، بعد از ان خرم شذم، دانستم کہ از من راضیست۔

“Herewith closes thanks to God's assistance and protectio glory be to Him ! the commentary on Husayn's “Tawasin”, followin the words of the mystics[174] and the symbols of the Sages[175] Shedding the blood of my soul, I wept when I read this “Zand an Pazand”[176] of the souls overwhelmed with grace, (I wept) before these words which alone can equal the secret of predestination splendidly engraved in the red gold of the alchemists, in the Erythrean China sea of the Absolute, before this speech with which alone can compare the calligraphy of the secrets of the redness i the face of the moons, before this “mystery of the kulah”[177] this “witness of the desert of Vision”[178], engraved on the leave of the Tuba Tree.[179] These surnames *I gave to (Husayn's) sou on a day I was reflecting on these chapters[180] of the “Doctor Singularis”.[181] I was alone; by way of intellectual vision perceived Husayn ibn Mansur, the “shattah”[182], his hair dressed with a kulah: he congratulated me in the tongue that comes fro beyond, with words that struck without exception; and closing, he said to me (f ° 113b): “You have come to know what the kulah is[183] and have proceeded into the desert of Vision!”. At these words I felt happy, I had understood that he was satisfied with me.”[184]

In order to show the true import of the Tawasin, it is necess to sum up[185] the original features of al Hallaj's teaching, indeed, his “madhab kalami”, for it should not be forgotten that the author, of the Fihrist ranges him among the Mutakallimun:

An accepted tenet of Sunni orthodoxy holds that there are grounds for speaking of any direct “communications” between God and man any time. Even the Prophets have only been entrusted with set juridical texts aiming at the observance of a covenant by men, a' it is this written covenant which in its fulness constitutes their line with God. Muhammad himself has thus not been entrusted direct i but through the ministry of an angel. God remains inaccessible.

But the matter was different with Sufis of at Hallaj's life-ti ' in their practice of asceticism which bore the brand of Jewish-Ch stian tradition, they emphasized the desire for direct contact w' God in prayer. A significant utterance was in those days[186] ascribe to Ja'far Sadiq (d. 145/762): he had fainted during his prayer because said, “by dint of repeating the +verse, he had heard God (Himself pronounce it.”[187] And the precept of the Salimiyah was that the faithful, while reciting, should well impress on his mind that it was God Himself who was addressing him in those verses and was speaking to him at that very moment.[188] One century later, however this precept will appear shocking[189] to al Kilani who says that “to believe it is God who speaks through the tongue of the reciter and it is God one hears when hearing the recitation of the Quran, is to admit hulul.”[190] The mystical schools, by then, will take refuge in “sifatite” pretexts, claiming that the matter was not thus to attain God in his entirety, but only this or that real attribute of His, this or that particular divine perfection described in the verses. Their sum total is not equivalent to the divine essence.[191]

But in al Hallaj's days the Muslim mystics had not yet grow aware of the conflicting aspects between their prayer methods an the Sunni orthodoxy. For them prayer meant this “taking up contact” of the whole soul with God entirely.[192]

This method alone makes it possible to understand what the “sima” (hearing of recitations) then was, and the importance the gave it, and the sense of eclecticism with which they used to listen to the Quran or the traditions of the various prophets or to mystical verses or rhythmical phrases of their own composition. All this was for them equally inspired, was equally part of the “tajalli,” O God's “universal radiance” through all living beings in their act o speaking. This is why al Hallaj, one day in Mecca, when asked by 'Amr al Makki what he was composing, gave this reply: “This is comparable to the Quran.”[193] It was not impious sarcasm that made him speak thus but the clear feeling that he had been corn posing in a state of ecstasy comparable to that in which Muhammad he thought, had heard his revelations.

And Abu Uthman al Maghribi (d. 373/983) wrote[194] not by wa of symbol, but in terms of strict truth:

المکونات کلہا یسبحون اللہ باختلاف اللغات، و لکن لا یسمع تسبیحھا و لا تفقہ عنھا ذاک لا العلماء الربانیون الذین فتحت اسماع قلوبھم

All created beings praise God, each one in its own language; ye nobody hears and understands it but the masters, the elected of th Lord, those to whom a hearing heart has been granted.

من صدق مع اللہ فی احوالہ فہم عنہ کل شئ و فہم عن کل شئ فیکون لہ فی اصوات الطیور و صریر الابواب علما بعلمہ و بیان بتبینہ

He who relies on God in all, gets to know everything in Him an understands everything; the very chirping of the birds, the very gratin of the doors are full of meaning for him, and eloquent, as they ar for God.

For these mystics the Arabic alphabet of the Quran and the Quranic text itself did not have that “pre-eternal excellence” which they will get in the mystical literalism of Islam in Ibn 'Arabi's days.

For them the letters belonged to the created beings,[196] and th Quran as a text written in Arabic was created. And in their ecstasie they found back that divine element of the word which for them wa the “eternal Quran.”

Nobody more than al Hallaj expressed this feeling in his writing His Tawsain most of all betray this belief in a “supra-person; consciousness of the truth” which by means of his very subtle comman of the Arabic language would now and then make him speak “in the first person” on behalf of Muhammad or of Iblis, and would m him say “I” in the name of that supereminent “He” who is the subj. par excellence of any verb; every phrase being but an act variant of the eternal witness by which God takes pleasure to att. Himself to Himself, even by means of the humble beings that has created to Himself.[197]

2. Theory of the Huwa Huwa (lahut wa nasut) Al Hallaj, while affirming the transcendence of the idea of God did not at all mean to say that it is inaccessible to man. And the old Jewish-Christian tradition preserved in the Quran[198] an. declaring that “God had made men in his own image,” al Hallaj deduced a doctrine of creation parallel to a doctrine of “deification man allowed to identify himself with God, while finding back himself, through ascetical practice, the reality of that “image God” which God had impressed on him. Several of the Hallaj fragments leave no possible doubt about this. In the longest of them he declares this: prior to all things, before the creation, before His knowledge of the creation, God in His unity was convers with Himself in ineffable speech and contemplating in itself splendour of His essence: this radical simplicity of His admiration of His acclamation in front of it, is the Love “which in His essend is the essence of the essence,”[199] Love that is above all mod I specification in attributes. In His perfect isolation (infirad) G. thus loves Himself and irradiates (tajalli) through Love. And it this primeval irradiation of Love in the divine Absolute which determined the multiplicity of His attributes and His names.

God then, “by His essence, in His essence,” decided to project outside of Himself His supreme happiness, this Love in the “infirad (isolation), so that He would be able to gaze at it[200] and speak to He then took a look at pre-eternity (azal) and drew from the nothing an image (surah), the image of Himself, of all His attributes and His names: Adam. His divine regard made of this figure (shakh His image for all eternity to come, He hailed it, glorified it, elected and, as He irradiated through it and in it, this created figure (shak became Huwa huwa, He, He![201]

“Praise be to (God) who disclosed (to the angels) that His hum anity is the mystery of the glory of His sparkling Divinity! And who, since then, has shown Himself to His creation in the form of one who eats and drinks so that His creation has been able to perceive Him as in a glimpse that is filtered through the eye-lid!”

The first verse alludes to the scene where the angels are summoned to acknowledge the huwa huwa in Adam. The following verses apply the theory of the “shahid al ani” to the person of Jesus.[203] The whole tercet is a witness to Hallaj's attempts to naturalize[204] within the Arab Islam an idea which is borrowed from the theological vocabulary of Syrian Christianity,[205] the idea of the two natures in God, Lahut and Nasut. These two Christian terms designate the “two natures” of Christ, the Verb Incarnate,[206] his divine eternal nature, and the human nature he took on through Incarnation.

According to al Hallaj,[207] followed in this by the Salimiyah, what matters,[208] is that God will come to judge mankind on the Last Day under His nasut, under human form. This idea seems to be of Christian origin. The same holds for the surprising hadith owned by al Ghazali[209] on the immolation of Death under the shape of a ram marked with freckles[210] on the day of the Last Judgement.

For al Hallaj nasut means indeed the whole human nature, body and spirit, or, as he said, in “length” and in “breadth”.[211] God's nasut is the Huwa, huwa in its entirety. In consequence the divine nature could unite itself to the human composite only by a sort of hulul comparable, as he notes expressly, to the hulul of the human spirit in the body of man,[212] by an incarnation that “impresses” God[213] on it. The comparison with the hulul of the human spirit leads al Hallaj to designate the “divine nature” in this “infusion” with the name of Ruh[214] which in these texts cannot be understood in its usual meaning of “human spirit, angelic spirit,” nor in the special meaning of “virtual intellect” as which it was then used by Abu Said al Kharraz[215] who made of the word ruh the equivalent of 'aql as in the translations of the Plotinian works. Al Hallaj's ruh al natiqah is not the “virtual intellect,” but the “active intellect.”[216] It is a sort of “divine person,” an interlocutor with whom he holds familiar converse. Al Hallaj's poetical works are nothing but continuous conversations between his spirit (rūh) and this divine Spirit on the subject of their common love. No other mystic of those days showed himself more familiar with his God, in a constant use of “Thou and I” and “we”, without any transposition of the symbols of worldly love,[217] for there exists no mystical poetry at one and the same time more ardent and more radically “dematerialized”[218] than that of al Hallaj.

Here are a few passages of his works[219] on the common love between these two ruh, on the “hulūl l” of the divine Ruh in the human ruh, strictly parallel with others on the unionof the lahut and the nasut:

انت بین الشغاف و القلب تجری مثل جرء الدموع من اجفان

و تحل الضمیر جوف فوادی کحلول الارواح فی لابدان

یا ھلالا بدا لاربع عشر لثمان و اربع و اثنتان[221]

“Thou art there, between the walls of the heart and the hear insinuating Thyself there as a flow, like tears under the eye-lid Thou comest down on the conscience at the bottom of my hear as the spirits come down on the bodies! Ah! nothing immobilish moves without Thy moving it with a secret spring. O Crescent![222] Thou showest Thyself to me on the fourteenth of the month[223] as well as on the eigth, the fourth and the second!”

انا من اھوی و من اھوی انا نحن روحان حللنا بدنا

“I have (become) the One whom I love, and the One whom I love, has become I! We are two spirits come down in one unique body! To see me is to see Him! To see Him is to see us!”

علم النبوۃ مصباح من النور معان الوحي فی مشکات مامور

فاللہ ینفخ الروح فی جلدی لخطر و ینفخ اسرافیل فی الصور

اذا تجلی لروحی آن یکلمنی رایت فی غیبتی موسی علی الطور

“The knowledge of the Prophecy is like the lamp of the divine light, whereas the hidden sense of the Revelation remains in its niche.[226] But behold, God inflates my skin with the Spirit, as a reminder, just as Israfil will blow the Trumpet of the Last Judgement! When He thus irradiates in my spirit in order to speak to me, in my rapture I see Moses on Mount Sinai!”

مزجت روحک فی روحی کما قمزج الخمرۃ بالماء الزلال

Thy Spirit has mingled itself with my spirit like the wine one mixes with pure water![228] Whence, if a thing touches Thee, it touches me! Behold, “Thou” art “I” in every state!

دخلت بناسوتی لدیک علی الخلق و لولاک لاھوت خرجت من الصدق۔۔۔

“I have introduced my humanity before Thee in this world, whereas Thou hast called forth the Lawlaka[230] of the Divinity[231] from the depth of sincerity...”

What was this divine ruh, the second person of these dialogues The controversy against the hululism of al Hallaj took on two form The one saw a Christian influence in it,[232] the other a belief in th eternity of the Spirit conceived as “the numerical unity of the hum intellect,” an idea borrowed either from Greek or from Hind philosophy, ruinous in any case to the unity of God as it is professed by Islam. This second theory was formulated by al Birani who said that certain Sufis believe in the co-existence of the two ruh, the one created, the other uncreated, in the mystic who has attained Wisdom[233]:

و الی مثل ذلک اشارات الصوفیۃ فی العارف اذا وصل الی مقام المعرفۃ فانہم یزعمون انہ یحصل نہ روحان، قدیمۃ لایجری علیھا تغیر و اختلاف بہا یعلم الغیب و یفعل المعجز، و اخری بشریۃ للتغیر و التکوبن

The controversy on the true nature of the Hallajian Spirit, the so-called “mas'alat al ruh”, was kept alive throughout the fourth century of the Muslim calendar by attempts to bring about the fusion between the Greek metaphysics of the 'aql (reason) and the experimental mysticism of the ruh (spirit).[234]

An echo of this is found in al Sulami,[235] when he reports that his master, the Hallajian al Nasrabadi (d. 372/982) had in this connection[236] to defend al Hallaj's reputation:

سمعت ابرھیم بن محمد النصرا بادی و عوتب فی شئ حکی عنہ یعنی عن الحلاج فی الروح فقل لمن عابتہ ان کان بعد النبیین و الصدیقین موحد فہو الحلاج!

It seems impossible to reduce this Hallajan Ruh to the understanding, the faculty of comprehension, the intellectus possibilis, following the ancient Greek theory which the commentary of Alexander of Aphrodisias had ascribed to Aristotle : whence Averroism, after Ibn Sina, will conclude thus : numerically speaking there is only one intelligence (virtual intellect) for all mankind,[237] in it alone the souls survive, without any personal immortality, in the impersonal perennity of the idealistic pantheism.[238]

In al Hallaj's Ruh we have to see the intellectus agens, that thing which produces the “kindling” of the knowledge in the soul by means of a spiritual image that bursts into flame within the soul.[239] This “kindling” is called the consciusness, and the state of consciousness is the first stage among the stations (mawajid) of ecstasy (wajd),[240] where the Truth is found, not a simple rational truth, but God, “this supreme subsisting truth which is the truth of no thing in particular ...”[241]

It is this Al Haqq which al Hallaj celebrated in the verses here below and which Ibn Khafif (d. 371/982) considered to be the quintessence of his doctrine of the divine union:[242]

وحدنی واحدی توحید صدق ما الیہ من المسالک طرق

ھو الحق و الحق للحق حق و لابس ملبس الحقائق حق

“It is the Unique One who has unified me by His own “tawhid”,[243] for there is no road that is the way that leads to Him! He is the True God, and the True God is truth, whence he who has clothed himself in the garb of the truths, becomes also the Truth! Behold, His luminous radiance is already flashing, and t lightening beam is already sparkling with flashes !”[244]

The doctrine of lahut and nasut, which seems to have been peculiar to al Hallaj, was too heavily indebted to its Christian origins[245] to allowed to strike roots in Muslim mysticism. Apart from his din disciples, it was adopted, it seems, only by the Salimiyah whose theory was denounced by al Kilani.[246] This theory held that “on the L Day God will appear in a human form (fi surati adamiyi, muham madiyi…)” to sit in judgment on men, and it corresponded well w al Hallaj's word that “God's nasut gives the judgements their form (الاحکام محکمۃ بنا سوتیتہ), just as His lahut serves the masses, atom atom, as support of their subsistence (الھیاکل وقائمۃ علی ذرۃ بلا ھوتیتہ).”[247] Then these two words disappear[248] for two centuries from the Si vocabulary, while al Hallaj's admirers, anxious to escape the excomn nications still in force against hululi interpretation of his doctrine, tried to give reassuring explanations of his work.[249] The terms lahut a nasut appear again only at the beginning of the 13^th century of I Christian era, in the works of Ibn al Faridh (d. 632/1234) and of 1 'Arabi (d. 638/1240). But what a change has occured in the meantime (طویل).

و لم الہ باللاھوت عن حکم مظہری ولم انس بالناسوت مظہر حکمتی

says Ibn al Faridh[250]: “I do not leave out from the lahut my bodily form which obeys the Law (entirely human) ! And in the nasut I not forget the place (=my heart) from where rises my Wsisdom (entirely divine).” This means: it suffices that I change my viewpoint, and I see that here I am “all God” and there “all man”.[251] “Div nature” and “human nature” are here but the two symmetrical aspects of an identical a priori monism, the two eternal faces of a unique absolute reality; when trying to solve the antinomies, the favourite method of the later Sufis was to declare the two opposite notions identical. That initial “difference of level” which generates the energy exists no longer, as it did with al Hallaj. No longer is there t “difference of limited potential” which brings about the intercourse between the Creator (al Haqq) and his image, the Huwa huwa which reverberates around Him. There are only two immobile, identical terms left, and they are interchangeable by agreement. According Ibn 'Arabi, man is equally and just as much “necessary” for God, God is “necessary” for man, for the one bears witness to the other reciprocally.[252] Besides, Ibn 'Arabi's[253] criticism of the Halla.[254] Ana al Haqq tells enough to illustrate this theory. With Ibn 'Ai lahut becomes the constant, lasting, unfading spiritual aspect of whole of things, whereas nasut is its changing, unstable, reviving material aspect. Significantly, Ibn 'Arabi's school gives certain phrase of al Hallaj a new garb. Whereas, telling God that he felt overcome by the Huwa huwa, he had written: cs9 WSJ Thine “I “is in my Humanity,[255] Ibn 'Arabi's school rectified . . . }'Sim 'J ) . . . in my Divinity![256]

As to the name Huwa, huwa itself of the Hallajian concept, it was, under the influence of foreign[257] ideas on the universe/man as macrocosm/microcosm that the term was gradually replaced by the name “Insan Kamil”, the “Insan Qadim” of the Manicheans,[258] the “Adam Qadmon” of the Cabbala, the “Perfect Man, Type of a superior humanity.”

The term appears in the 13th century with Ibn'Arabi[259] and Sa'd al Din al Hamawi[260] and becomes classical after 'Abd al Karim al Jili's (d. after 826/1423) publication of a treatise of this title. In terms of modern Sufism one could say that the here published “Tasin al Siraj” has for subject Muhammad in so far as he is insan Kamil.

Tul means “length”, ardh is “breadth”. According to al Hallaj in this very passage (cf. k-16°), our understanding has two dimensions (extension and comprehension); the plan of its “world-outlook” (Weltanschauung) has two dimensions; for the principle of contra-diction means nothing else than the necessity, perceived by reason, to proceed by dichotomy. Touching briefly upon the contents of doctrines he had developed elsewhere, al Hallaj adds that this duality of the plan of our understanding in terms of reality corresponds to the duality of the created world : spiritual and material; and also to the duality in the realm of ethics: theoretical religious duty (fardh), and practical individual intention (sunan).

The Hallajian theory of sayhur and dayhur, as Ibn 'Arabi says, is connected with this duality of the created world: the title of al Hallaj's work on this subject,[261] Kitab al sayhur fi naqd al dayhur, literally means “Book of the Cone of Shade in which the Moon[262] disappears, on the destruction of times.” It was no doubt aimed at the hellenizing doctrine of the world's eternity.[263]

The simple fact that in the 4^th century of the Muslim calendar a mystical philosopher thus affirmed the “duality” of the world (spiritual and material), a duality totally unknown to early Islam[264] Is in itself a most noteworthy thing.[265]

Moreover, from the lines of magnificent praise which Ibn 'Arabi wrote about al Hallaj, it must be understood that this theory of tul wa 'ardh corresponds in his view exactly to the Greek theory which the translators of the Neoplatonic writings had accredited to Islam: the theory of the apparent dualism between 'alam al amr (='alam al ghayb —'alam al arwah) and alam al khalq (='alam al shahadah = 'alam al ajsam,[266] the two complementary aspects of the sa basic pantheistic monism. Does al Hallaj's tul in the “spiritu world” coincide with the divine action and the uncreated Spirit well as with the created spirits?[267] Ibn 'Arabi, monist as he i

[و من ذلک] سر النافلت و الفرض، فی تعلق العلم بالطول و العرض، من کان علۃہ عیسی فلا یوس، فانہ الخالق المحی، و المخلوق الذی یحیی۔ "عرض" العالم فی طبیعتہ، و "طولہ" فی روحہ و شربعتہ و ھذا النورمن "الصیہور و الدیہور" المنسوب الی الحسین بن منصور، لم ار متحدا رتق و فتق و بربہ نطق و اقسم بالشفق و للیل و ما و سق و القمر اذا اتسق و رکب "طبقا عن طبق" مثلہ فانہ نور فی غسق، منزلۃ الحق لدیہ منزلۃ موسی من التابوت و لذلک کان یقول "بالاھوت و الناسوت" و این ھو ممن یقول "العین واحدۃ" و یحیل الصفۃ الزائدۃ، و ابن فاران من اطور، واین النار من الور "العرض" محود و "الطول" ظل ممدود، و الفرض و النفل شاھد و مشھود ۔ ۔ ۔

Mystery of the distinction between “supererogatory” and “obli. gatory works” : it follows from the fact that discursive knowledge is a priori linked with two dimensions : length and breadth. Ah! he whose illness is Jesus, cannot be healed,[269] for Jesus is one with the Creator who comes back to life, and the creature who is brought back to life.[270] The “breadth” of the universe is his (bodily) nature, its “length” is his Spirit and his Law. This is the Light revealed by the doctrine of the “cones of shade” and of the “course of ages”[271] for which we are indebted to Husayan ibn Mansur. True, I do not know of any unitarian believer[272] who was his equal in “sewing and unsewing”[273] when speaking of his Lord, discerning the twilight, the night and that which it encompasses, and the moon when it is hidden, and who knew like him how to order all these complementary facts, He was a light in the growing dusk, God was staying in him as Moses stayed in the wicker-basket.[274] This is why al Husa ibn Mansur spoke of lahut and nasut without having anything in common with those who say: “the essence is unique” pass over the added attribute.[275] No! Mount Faran[276] is be no means Mount Sinai! And the focus is different from the light! The world's breadth is limited whereas its “length” is th` shadow which gives it a limit, the supererogatory work and the obligatory work[277] are linked with each other in the same necessary relationship as are he who gives witness (man) and to whom witness is given (God)![278]

In point of fact, this monistic “Husayn ibn Mansur” celebrated here by Ibn 'Arabi is quite different from the al Hallaj as we can known from his authentic works. Ibn 'Arabi, once more, as is his habit, h given a vigorous “reshaping” to the theory he had examined analytst cally.

Al Hallaj starts here from data provided by direct mystical experimentation, in an attempt to resolve the ever so often posed dilemma between Providence and Predestination, the ever so often denounced conflict between the good which God orders us to do (precept), and the evil which He foresees we actually will do (decree). Instead of soothing this conflict, al Hallaj accepts it as a hard fact. For he knows by experience that it is not knowledge, but love which apprehends the divine essence. It is not intellectual knowledge of the general decree established on divine pre-science that will “deify” us, but humble obedience of a heart willing to adhere at any instant to the divine command. For the precept (amr) is uncreated, whereas the decree (iradah mashiyah) is created.[280] Whence he decides in one statement the discussion of the two terms which the scholastics of his days[281] had been leading so passionately: الامر عین الجمع، والارادۃ عین العلم the precept is the essence of the union, the decree (only) the essence of the knowledge. Hence “any heart whose concern for reward makes it turn away from the sacredness of the precept (hurmat al amr), is a hireling, is not a true servant of God.”[282]

This categorical distinction between two notions generally considered similar as attributes of God was banned by al Kilani[283] in the following century, in connection with the Salimiya school who had adopted[284] and developed the distinction precisely by reference, among other examples, to the subject of the “Ta Sin al Azal.”[285] When ordering Iblis to prostrate himself before Adam, God's precept was formal, but not his decree. Otherwise Iblis would have prostrated himself necessarily, since all that is decreed by God, takes place by the very fact of being decreed. Following the summary which at Kilani gives of this doctrine, God's demand on his servants is a full demand (by precept and by decree) only as regards good, i.e. acts of obedience. As regards evil, i.e. acts of rebellion, He wants them by decree only, not by preceptارادھا بہم لا منہم : He does want their downfall, but without this being their own fault. Al Kilani refutes this doctrine by dint of Quranic verses (II, 254; V, 45; VI, 112). According to him, God wants transgression fully and directly.

Ibn Salim drew quite interesting conclusions from this doctrine.[286] He said this conflict between the divine “precept” and the “decree” is what causes trial (ibtila) and produces suffering (bala). God orders a man to do one thing (precept), and wants its contrary to occur (decree)! He orders obedience (precept), and forbids that obedience be made possible (decree)! Al Hallaj had understood[287] this deeply: the perfect knowledge of the good and the evil man is due to commit (decree), is full of bitterness,[288] for it never excuses you from totally adhering to the practice of good alone (precept Sage draws his sorrowful serenity from the very possession) he e simultaneously of these two opposite evidences : God's order has is formal, and he loves it at the very moment God allows it to be transgressed, at the very moment he knows that God has wanted (iradah) in this way ! The essence of suffering (bola) lies there and in order to become a saint, one has to accept it fully. This is what Iblis did not do, seeing in ibtila (trial) only iradah (decree) without amr (precept).[289] On the pretext of knowing that by decree he is doomed to fall, Iblis “lets himself go”: he gives up struggling for obedience to the precept, so that “there be no fault of his own” when he falls.[290]

Al Hallaj, on the contrary, practising what he used to preach, did not give in; he accepted the contradiction in its entirety. He, the' righteous observer of the precepts of Law, in order to penetrate the conflict more deeply, decided to take the transgressions of the others on himself, desirous to undergo the sanctions of the Law he was observing, to incur the public anathema so as to bring the proof of his love for obedience. It is under the stimulus of this conviction that he delivered those strange speechs from the public places of Baghdad, in front of the `Attab Mosque, near the Suq al Qati'ah, or in the mosque of al Mansur, where he admonished his listeners to help him suffer and be persecuted unto death, by calling him a kafir and denouncing him to the authorities.[291] There is every likelihood that, taken as a whole, these speeches are authentic; were they not, they would nonetheless show proof of how strongly al Hallaj's ciples were imbued with his teachings so as to bring the course of his life and his public speeches in line with them.[292]

In connection with the Hallajian idea of the created mashiyah, i.e. the “created” nature of the divine decree, the following usefully be quoted, even though it has suffered alterations from the hand of the copyists : b the similitudes it suggests, it shows in by the Halls) decisive manner how great an influence this doctrine of exercised on the further development of metaphysical thinking in Middle Ages:[293]

قال الحسین (بن منصور) اول ما خلق اللہ تعالی ذکرہ ستۃ اشیاء فی ستء وجوہ، قدر بذلک تقدیرا، الوجہ الاول المشیۃ خلقہا علی النور[294]، ثم خلق النفس ثم الروح ثم [خلق] الصورۃ ثم الاحرف ثم الاسماء ثم اللون ثم الطعم ثم الرائحۃ ثم خلق الدھر[295]، ثم خلق العماء ثم خلق النور، ثم الحرکۃ ثم السکون ثم الوجود ثم العدم، ثم علی ھذا خلق بعد خلق، علی الوجوہ الاخر الاول ما خلق اللہ تعالی الدھر[296] ثم القوۃ ثم خلق النور، ثم الصورۃ ثم الروح[297] ھکذا خلقا بعد خلق، فی کل وجہ من الستۃ خلقہم فی غامض علمہ لا یعلمہ الا ھو قدرھم تقدیرا و احصی کل شئ علما

It would be premature to translate this text which seems truncated and[298] words have been partly altered. But the idea, new in[299] cf a classification of the stoikheya, of the created first Islam[300] of a classification of the stoikheya, of the created first prifaisal which combined together constitute the world, is of princip importance indeed. Although it speaks of “six created print great, ranging in the order of “six aspects”, it seems to be inspired ciples, the Greek emanation theories. The number “six” is even found by Abu Nasr al Fãräbi's (d. 339/950) exposition of the Neoplatonic in emanation system,[301] a little later. But al Hallaj's first term, the “Will” (in the meaning of “decree”), is directly opposed, on purpose[302], to the first Plotinian term العقل, the Reason[303]; it is this latter which, on the strength of the famous hadith Jiall awl La L!y[304] will be victorious and impose itself upon all later Muslim metaphysicians.”[305] And in the following century, the theology of the Druze will even identify المشیئۃ with العقل[306] However, the Hallajian conception of the “will”, and the reaction it represents against the Greek intellectualism, will receive an heir in the great Jewish philosopher Solomon Ibn Gebirol (d. 1058),[307] for whom the first emanation is the will, al mashiyah[308]; the same view was also held by his contemporary Bahya ibn Paquda.[309]

[1] We have re-established the Oriental punctuation in our text A.

[2] Cf. Rev. Hist. Rel. LXIII-2, 1911, p. 200, n. 5.

[3] Founded 1189/1775 in the "Tchahar Shambah" district. Catalogue published in 1311/1893, 179 pages.

[4] Cf. Jami, Nafahat al this. page 64 and 288, and Hajj Khalifah, No. 7522, ed. by Flugel, IV, 38

[5] Quoted among his works by Ibn Junayd in his Shadd al izar, ms. MB. Supp 677, f°11la (cf. bibliogr. 591-a-2°).

[6] Text A reads thus: a (1°-17°), b (1°-8°), c (1°-11°), d (1°-11°), a (1°11', 13°-22°, 31°-33°, 23-0300, 34°-39°) f (1°-9°, 11°-35°), g (1°-5°), h (2°-10°), i (1°-7°) j (missing), k (1°-26°).

Text B reads thus: a (1°-2°, 5°-17°) b (1°-8°) c (1°-12°), d (1°-11°) e (1°-20°, 23°-39°) f (1°.2°, 4°-3°, 5°-19, 35°-36°), g (1°-4°), f (30°34°1, h (1°-10'. i (1°-2°, 8°-14°), j (1°24°1.

[7] Entitled Bust an al ma'rifah in ms. Sulaymaniyah 1028 (majmtl'ah, 25th risalah; fol. 1-3): this title is the 38th of the list of al Hallaj's works in ms. Berlin KB 15.

[8] Except for the four short pieces of verse found there.

[9] Except in 11-b-3° (?).

[10] In manuscript Shahid `Ali Pasha 1342 (majmu'ah, 19th risalah (185 pages) copied on Wednesday 29 Jumada II, 849/1445; the Tawasin commentary covers pp. 147.168 ).

[11] Possessor of the infused knowledge, but the word belongs to the Hallajian (cf 170-d 129°) and the Salimiyan vocabulary (Qut I, 142).

[12] Cf. the Sufi Tabaqat, from those of al Sulami on to those of al Sha' rani (ed. 1305/1887, I, p. 107).

[13] In the present or the future? The text is ambiguous; one might suppose that while waiting in jail for the inevitable execution, he could foretell with some accuracy the kind of punishment established by Quranic law for the crime of which he was accused.

[14] Without saying from which work of al Hallaj he took it. Cf. similarly for chap. XI (k-I°, 24° and 25°).

[15] See study in Bibliographic critique ... No. 1091-a.

[16] Account of Abu al Hasan Ahmad ibn Yusuf al Tanukhi, in Nishwar , (cf. 162-a-19°).

[17] Abu Mughith and Abu'Umarah are both kunyah of al Hallaj, the latter ',quoted only in the Tawasin (cf. f-20°, k-1°).

[18] Here in the meaning of "family native of al Hashimiyah"?

[19] Perhaps all; but the Hallajian type of "Muhammad" in the fragments known by now does not fully coincide with the one of Tasin al Siraj.

[20] Preserved by al Baqli (Tafsir, in Qur. II, 32): Ms. KB and ms. NO; is missing in ms. QA.

[21] Ms. KB: 63.1

[22] Corr. Goldziher; ms. KB : '- VI Missing in NO.

[23] . cS•y'`ll (sic) in KB,

[24] i in KB.

[25] Ms. KB : j.,lal) Q7.

[26] + dl (in NO.)

[27] Ms. KB : j.,lal) Q7.

[28] Missing in KB. 28. Ms. KB :"

[29] . + (in NO).

[30] (sic) in KB ; cf. Qur. XXIX, 9, XXXVI. 81, XLIII. 50,

[31] XLVI, 32-33.KB : J Meaning : Art

[32] Thou not, for Thyself, "the one who glorifies Thee", to the exclusion of any other than Thyself ?

[33] c-C belongs to ,a.,>

[34] First sentence of al Hallaj in the collections of Sufi Tabaqat, from Sulami's on to Sha'rani's.

[35] Cf. Ibn Zanji, in AI Khatib Tarjamat a! Hallaj (cf 125-a-55°).

[36] Disciples of Abu Muhammad Ibn Salim who, like him, was a pupil of Sahl al Tustari.

[37] Later, al Ghazali admitted, en passant, the debt he had towards this book. (Cf. AI Munqid min a! dhalal, Cairo edition, 1303, p. 28; the verse cited on p. 33 is from Qut al Qulub II, 78).

[38] Text :

[39] Biography in Jami, Nafahat al Uns, ed. Lees, pp. 260-261, and in Ms. Köprulu 1167; cf. Amedroz, in JRAS, July 1912, pp. 584-586.

[40] "Milal ... " IV, 226 (corr. the name). Cf. ZDMG. t. LIII, p. 68

[41] The one which completes the hundred after the 99 known names of God, the "Ism A'zam". Cf. already al Tirmidi (d. 255/869) Khatam al Awliya, quest. 131 to 141.

[42] Title I stops there (cf. p. I, n. 3).

[43] Mss. MB 888, fol. 333a-341a, Sulaymaniyah 1028, XXV, fol. 3-15.

[44] Kitab bidayat ha! al H... wa nihayatihi, in ms. Zahiriya, Damascus, catal. p. 30, No. 81 (majmu'ah).

[45] Ms. MB 888, f°339b, Ms. Sol. f.

[46] Ms. MB 888, 1'° 336b.

[47] Ms. Yéni Jami` No. 101, p. 175. Al Qushayri quotes it again in Qur. XXIII, 99.

[48] Al Qushayri's restricted carefully wording is to be noted.

[49] Again a restriction : he does not dare to name al Hallaj.

[50] From Thee; cf. Maqdisi (d. 660/1262) in Sharh ha! a! awliya, Ms. Paris 1641 f 257a : c.1 4I ti.A'.1 v,Jl J U uj"

[51] Persian text, Engl. transl. by Nicholson, p. 411-412.

[52] Cf. al Makki, Qut a! Qulub, I, 47, 60 . . . and Sha'rani, 1. c. I. 35-36‑

[53] Correct the punctuation `Azrail adopted by Nicholson.

[54] Pp. 129-130.

[55] Ms. India Office, Persian 1922 No. 5, f° 24°-30°.

[56] Cf. 1101-c-14'; perhaps taken over from another author who may also be the source of an analoguous passage in al Hujwiri, I.c.

[57] Cf. 1101-c-B.

[58] When reciting the Quran, Surah Taha.

[59] When reading the Tawasin.

[60] Cf. here below; and al Hujwiri Kashf al Mahjub, ed by Nicholson, p. 254.

[61] Condemned by Islam, obviously.

[62] On this work see discussion in Bibliographic 10-c-5°.

[63] Printed in Cairo in 1269/1852-1274/1857. Cf. 421-b-I°, 27°Cf. Safadi commentary of Ibn Zaydun, ed. in Baghdad, 1327, pp. 83-84.

[64] Cf. here above, No. 6.

[65] Ms. BN• 1641 f° 249a, 257a.

[66] printed in Cairo 1324/1906.

[67] Pp. 23, 25, 26.

[68] Ms. India Office 597, without pagination.

[69] In mawgif al dalallah.

[70] In his Ghayat al Surur (Cf. Bibliographic ... 531-a, and Rev. Hist. Relig. LXIII-2, 1911, p. 200 No. 5).

[71] It is al Suhrawardi of Aleppo.

[72] Cf. 11-b-7°.

[73] In Shadd al izar. Cf. Bibliogr. 591-a.

[74] Buried in Baghdad on the left river bank, near the present Sultan `Ali mosque, in a small oratory named after him.

[75] In Al Insan a! Kamil, Cairo ed. 1304 t. II, p. 35.

[76] Cf. Rev. Hist. Relig. LXIII-2, 1911, p. 206, No. 3

[77] Cf. Al Insan al Kamil, II, p 40, line 21.

[78] Cf. Bibliogr. 1091-a-223°, 224°.

[79] Cf. Bibliogr. 130-a-1°.

[80] Bibliogr. 126-a-10°.

[81] Bibliogr. 201-a-20'.

[82] Nashwat al mudam ... , printed in Baghdad 1293/1876, p. 77.

[83] Which appears already, it seems, in one of the works of al Kawrani (d. 1101/1690), the author of Maslak a! Mukhtar. It is not certain that when giving this quotation, al Alusi was aware that al Hallaj had put this distich into Iblis' mouth: it seems that for al Alusi " Juhudi . , . " (my refusal) means " my denial of Thee ", O God ... when I say "I am God"

[84] (Ana al Haqq).

[85] The choice of letters like these for the title of a mystical work is not entirely unprecedented. AI Baqli cites also the Ha Mim al qidam of al Wasiti (d. 320/932) which Jakus al Kurdi attributed to al Hallaj (C, 1'° 175b=1091-a-223°, 224°).

[86] Cf. here (a-15°, f-26°), and in the fragments collected by al Sulami (cf. Bibliogr. 170-d-41°, 42°).

[87] Al Baqli ascribes the same origin to 303b).

[88] Cf. here e-24°, f-I°, 20°, k-1°, C, f° 171a, 172a=1091-a-213°, 214°).

[89] In the Western middle-ages "Doctor Illuminatus, Subtilis" etc.

[90] Here, in particular, the " " (ta) is reminiscent of the Surah

"Ta Ha" (XX), the " " (Sin) of Surah "Ya Sin" (XXXVI) and the " v "(Nun) of Surah "al Nur" (XXIV) (according to Shathiyat, f°176a).

[91] Here, in particular, the "ta" designates the " taharah" (purification) of the conscience (sirr) freed from all imagination, and the deluge (tufan) of the Tawhid in it; the "sin" designates the priority (sabaq) of the understanding, and the "nun" the flames (niran) of Reality (Shathiyat, f° 178b).

[92] i.e. to proclaim the uniqueness of God, the one in front of the Angels, the other in front of those called "-Asa 19 ~9ezq' Sl j.".

[93] Muhammad, in the "mi`raj" looking straight in the face of God.

[94] This tends to show that Iblis was a better "muwahhid" than Muhammad, and asserts that it is not the lucidity of faith which saves, but the humility of loving obedience.

[95] . F's 133a-136b.

[96] In Kashf al Mahjub, tr. by Nicholson, pp. 367-392.

[97] F° 113a, here p. 105.

[98] They shine through, here and there: b-3°, f-24° (end), f-36', h-7° (end), (end), j-6°, 20', 23', 24°.

[99] The present pagination of the present manuscript which had been upset by the binder, runs in the following order : f° 175b-191b, 46b, 105b-113b.

[100] F°.

[101] Summary here above, p. 1-2.

[102] Cf. a more extensive explanation of this in his “tafsir”; cf. here below.

[103] Copied from the Gospel text CD sly ..1a9 oily v., , John XIV, Early Arabic translation in Ibn Hazm, Fasl . . . , Cairo ed., t. II, p. 67. Al Baqli quotes this hadith in his tafsir (ms. Berlin f° 186a, 332b1.

[104] See fig., above, p. 25, col. 1.

[105] Represented in the fig. (above, p. 25, col. 1) by a simple point in the centre.

[106] Cf. in al Kalabadi, Hallagian fragment on this hadith (Bibliogr. 143-a-6').

[107] At the point situated in the middle of the “tahayyur” (cf. above, p. 25, col. 1).

[108] In the following passage he represents this with the image of the bird who wants to continue his flight.

[109] Sahl al Tustari calls this the “sirr al rububiyah”. Its manifestation would destroy every thing (cf. Ibn `Arabi, Fusus . . . ed. 1891, p. 130).

[110] It is the explanation to which he gives preference in his tafsir (ms. Berlin 1°138b, 206a, 218), although he there also supposes that the “two bows” designate الحدوثیۃ andالافعالیۃ (f° 354b).

[111] The famous word of al Hallaj (cf. in Der Islam III, 3 (1912) pp. 248-257).

[112] The word of Bistami (c!. id. p. 255).

[113] corr.:تحرصش

[114] (Missing in ms. Shahid Ali Pasha).

[115] It is not found in the Quran.

[116] F°190a.

[117] The understanding of the understanding.

[118] He continues probing into the depths of the decrees (iradah) of the divine knowledge ('ilm), while refusing at the same time to unite himself to the divine will by obedience to the order (amr). Al Hallaj said in another place :

[119] . Instead of recognizing in it the “image” of God, the “huwa huwa”.

[120] Sic, because of the binder's mistake mentioned earlier.

[121] off : the ms., by mistake, has

[122] aw9 4ul I~ 9 yl c ~. JI L,, is attributed to al Hallaj by several (Maqdisi, Sharh hal al awliya); in reality it is earlier and stems from Amir ibn Qays (Hujwiri, Kashsf ... ms. Paris, supp. Pers. 1086, f192b Kalabadi, Ta'arruf, s. Vienna, 57b, Kharkushi, Tahdib ..., ms. Berlin, 199b), and from Muhammad 'bn Wasi' cf Kalabadi, i.c., 57b and Sha'rawi, Tabaqat . . . I, 36).

[123] F° 105b.

[124] Cf. here, p. 136.

[125] Those of the Sufis who for the sake of humility, endeavour to have a bad reputation (on their origin in Khurasan cf. KharkUshi, I.e., at the beginning).

[126] “talwin”. “The zahir” of the true sage should not clash with his “batin”: hence he must be “beautiful like Joseph” (C).

[127] In Adam.

[128] Alludes to what happened to al Hallaj.

[129] Cf. al Hallaj's sentence in at Sulami, Tafsir (in Qur. XVIII, 107).

[130] This word, current among the Salimiyah (Qut al qulub, II, 90) comes from their master Sahl al Tustari (cf. al Ghazali, Ihya . . . I,74 and Imla. AI Kilani, Ghunyah . . . I,83, and Ibn 'Arabi, Fusus, ed. 1891, p, 139)

[131] The proper subject of the “Tawasin.”

[132] This has remained the Persian expression par excellence.

[133] The “mediator” between God and man: i.e. cult and prophetic revelation (cf. at Hallaj's and Faris' theory on the “Isqat al Wesayt”).

[134] “Separation” of the creature from the Creator.

[135] Quoted in the Persian text.

[136] For the discussions on this subject see al Baqilani, here below.

[137] Taken from Qur. VII, 140.

[138] Cf. Junayd (1. c. below); Harawi (ms. Nuri 'Othmaniyeh, 2500, in Life of al Hallaj).

[139] God, according to the favourite term of the Sufis.

[140] Cf. what he says of this in his tafsir, in Qur. XLI, 53; XLVIII, 10.

[141] Dilemma “Shari'ah Haqiqah”.

[142] Sufis. cf. Kasirqi (here below).

[143] Tahqiq - It is the station called “tahqiq (al) ananiyah”.

[144] Tamkin (al) tawhid.

[145] Literally “separation”, cf. al Hallaj's verse “Bayni ...” in a note below.

[146] Muslim formula of the inaccessibility of the divine unity.

[147] Since he feels himself “transformed into God”: cf. what at Hallaj says in extracts, in ms. London, 888, f° 339b.

[148] Ms. قرامof theملکوت

[149] i.e. the “spiritual form”.

[150] -' : divine compulsion.

[151] Al Baqli here adds”J tl.;>I ! , quotation preceded by “God has said”: but it is not Quranic.

[152] Al Baqli seems here to force the text in order to make it orthodox For al Hallaj adopts here manifestly the terminology of the Kharejites and the Mu`tazilites for whom a “muwahhid” may be damned (theory of the mortal sin and faith, cf. Farq, of al Baghdadi, 98).

[153] Ibn al Jawzi's Talbis Iblis (ms. As'ad Effendi, no. 1641) has put the title in common with this Hallagian theory.

[154] “Umm (al) Kitab”, which designates the archetypal Quart.

[155] Double attribute of the divine Wisdom, following the Tawasin: below k-1°.

[156] By these four kinds of knowledge by which I pretended to penetrate.

[157] I.e. God, in His pre-scient will, knows that His order will not be obeyed

[158] Cf. § g-5°.

[159] Which expresses him.The great horizontal alif. in the figure.

[160] This primordial alif.

[161] Cf. the Sufi adage As c L l 6.5)4 ,, yiS 1;>,.J (Shathiyat f° 104b).

[162] Ms. C ; corr : v~y>

[163] Following the word of al Junayd -i11 aI v j,,a:J 1 (al Qushayri, Risalah IV, 48).

[164] i.e. “It was a divine vengeance”.

[165] One no longer wonders “how” to understand, after having understood.

[166] Ms: 0.4}

[167] Cf. 1'° 160a.

[168] Ms: -~~

[169] Corr.; the ms. carries : :%9~

[170] A , cf. transl, f°160a,

[171] Ms : ,r”-'~°J1, cf, transl, f°160a, addition [

[172] The word is here missing: supplied following transl, f°160a,

[173] Ms :

[174] ~a 4a JAI here opposed to ? j J1 .

[175] ~i~• Jal : here opposed to r4 'I .

[176] Allusion to the Avesta and its commentary; meaning : sacred book.

[177] For this translation see p. 108, note 2 and 3.

[178] Id.

[179] The tree of the Paradise (Qur. XIII, 28).

[180] The “Tawasin”.

[181] “Gharib “seems to me here a proper name (cf. above, p. 2).

[182] Sufi author of shath, the sentence has a double meaning.

[183] Qurums, Arabic synonym of the Persian kolah, designates the cone cap of the dervishes; it also is the royal tiara which according to the custom those under death sentence had to wear on their head (c!. Dozy, Supplement .. , s• v .1). the allusion is therefore twofold : to the meaning of Sufism,- and to al Hallaj's execution (courtesy of R.A. Nicholson).

[184] This vision of al Hallaj which occurred to him while he was working at the commentary on the Tawasin, made a rather strong impression on al Baqli. it seems, which prompted him to lend it a particular attention. A special passage (f°160a) in his Shathiyat is devoted to it under the title “On a Portrait he (—al Hallaj) made of me “. In almost literal paraphrasing it reads thus : “O Doctor Singularis ! Charmer of the hearts! Master of the language of the Sages ! Is it true (that you told me) : ` You have come to know what the kolah is and have proceeded into the desert of Vision', since you write such a commentary on the terms (nukat) that are used by those who are lovers of the Absolute ? Beware of what your are saying! Where is now the soul that had become the universe of the love of yourself? Where is that heart of which your love was possessed? Behold, you have wearied the workers of the Kingdom (malkut) with this word and have fettered the hearts of the lovers of the divine yoke (jabrut) L with this enigma! Text (f°160a) = p. 132 of the ms. Shahid ' Ali Pasha :

[198] (Ms l, Munich id 83, f 1 b).. id. 62 Cf. also Ibn Barrajan (d. 536/1141), tafsir, on Qur. In Ghunyah I, 84

[199] The possibility of divine incarnation in a creature.

[200] Cf. alGur p' 73 : S gants's (d. 465/1072) word in al Ghazali, al maqsad al asna, ed. mil_ l tag I tse11-1...eu lilo

[201] Cf at Ghazali, Ihya.., II,199-200.

[202] In at Qushayri, Risalah, ed. by Ansari, IV, 121.

[203] Through at Sulami, in at Baqli, tafsir on Qur., XVII, 46-47, Ms. Berlin, f° 204b.

[204] Id in al Baqli, on Qur. XXVII, 16, Ms. Berlin, f° 278a (cf. al Qushayri, Risalah).

[205] Cf. significant texts of at Muhasibi, Ibn 'Ata, al Hallaj (in al Kalabadi), collected and discussed in my study. As a reminder, I summarize here the position of the dogmatic schools of the time on the question of the “Quran Kalam Allah “At first, the two extreme positions mu'tazilah and hanãbilah : the Word of God is the text of the Quran literally : created for the ones, uncreated for the others. Ibn Kiram makes a distinction : God's Kalam is uncreated, but this means only his virtual power to create his qawl in his own essence. Ibn Kullãb works out the concept which afterwards at Ash'ari and at Qalanisi give final precision : the concept o? Kalam nafsi ; this alone is eternal in the divine essence (azali, says Ibn Kullab, qadim, al Qalahisi; against Al Ash'ari who places il outside the essences; cf. Tawasin, I, 9).

[206] Cf. theory of the “kalam” and the “primordial love” according to al Hallaj: a fragment translated by at Baqli in Shathiyat (f°s 171a-174b); cf. below.

[207] Cf. Ta Sin al tanzih (here, p. 63).

[208] LXXXII, 8 etc.: in spite of the manifest danger of possible tashbih. This is why with Abu Thawr al Kalbi the Sunnite position tried to establish that in this tradition d713 o ,jy the “ha” referred to Adam, not to God. But Ibn Hanbal reported the hadith as ala surat al Rahman (Out., I, 168). Cf. al Tirmidi (Khatam at awliya, question 143).

[209] In at Baqli, Shathiyat Fs 171a-174b. Cf. fragments in Sulami, tafsir, on Qur., III, 16, in al Baqli, tafsir, on Qur., VI, 19; and his proposition which was condemned, in lbn al Da'i, tabsirah . . . 402:

[210] Text of al Hallaj.

[211] Compare al Hallaj's fragments on the creation of Adam, in al Sulami, tafsir, on Qur., V, 23; XXIII, 12; LX1V, 3; LXXXII, 8; and his definitions, followin~ lbn Fatik (in Ms. Berlin, 3492, f° 42; reproduced in Hall al rumuz ... of a Maqdisi).

[212] According to the Haririyah Jesus said : God, in His desire to contemplate His own splendour, created Adam as a mirror in which He would see Jesue who is His splendour. Ibn Taimiyah, in t XXVI of his tafsir a! Kawakib, Ms. Damascus, Zahiriyah, 151).According to lbn Taimiyah (criticism, l.c. above: fatwa against the Haririyah).

[213] Ibn Khafif (d. 371/982), in spite of his sympathy for at Hallaj, considered' him as an impious man (cf. Ibn Bakuyeh, and al Daylami; Bibliographie 362-a-14°)• Monistic commentary of Daud at Qaysari (d. 751/1350) in Sharah al Fusus, c. VIII, f° 263a): God's nasut is double. On the one hand it is macrocosm (the universe which is eternal; mystery of the /chat), on the other it is microcosm (huwa huwa = al insan al kamil) and as such appeared at the manifestation (zuhur) of Adam (cf.

[214] Cf. the apocryphal Arab gospel reproduced in Ikhwan al Safa, ed. Bombay, 1306, IV, 115-117, and ed. Dieterici, Abhandlungen ... pp. 601-605).

[215] The first Muslim author to use these two terms nasut ( insaniyah) an( lahut (= ilahiyah) is, I think, Abu 'Is& Muhammad ibn Harun al Warraq, philosopher suspected of zandaqah, in his refutation of the Christian sects (Rudd . preserved in full by Ibn `Adi, in Ms. Paris 167; cf. Graf, Christlich-arabische Lit. 49.He borrowcd also other terms: malkut, sayhur, haykal ... , Ms. London, 888.

[216] Cf. al Kilani, ghunyah . . . 1, 83, and Ibn at Da'i, tabsirah . . . , 391).

[217] In faysal al tafriqah ... ed. Cairo, 1319. p. 38.

[218] Kabsh amlah, the Lamb of the Apocalypse.

[219] Tul wa 'ardh.

[220] Cf. here, p. 133.

[221] Cf. the Shi'ite Ibn Babuyeh, in I 'tiqadat ... , Ms. London, Add 19.623, f° 24a. Cf the so-called Athanasian symbol (Denzinger, 10th ed. § 40, p. 19).

[222] Text collected in my thesis.

[223] This implies a whole doctrine which is very important: cf. al Baqli, tafsir, on Qur. XVII, 87; and our quotations of al Tirmidi and al Qahtabi, here below.

[224] As it would be called in Sanscrit; not the bodhi, but the purusha (cf. Patanjali, Yoga-Sutra, p. 38 of M. N. Dvivedi's English translation, Bombay 1890. Compare with the other recension, translated into Arabic by al Biruni and partly published in his tarikh a! Hind The full wording can be read on the margins of Ms. Koprulu 1589).

[225] As in the ruba'iyat of Ibn Abi al Khair (d. 440/1048, ed. Ethé or in the qasidahs of Ibn al Faridh.

[226] “The loving souls relinquish all their goods and follow Amor fully stripped,” said Jean de Saint-Simon (d. 1636) in his amusingly simple language (in Maximes . . . , Paris 1651, p. 230).

[227] His poetical works, for he rarely mentions this condemned doctrine in the prose fragments which are preserved of him; (cf. in at Sulami, tafsir, on Qur.

[228] Isnad of Ibn Fatik in Sulami, tabaqat, of al Za'barani, in Akhbar al Hallaj, and of Daqqaq in al Harawi, tabaqat (cf. Jami I c. ed. Lees, 174).

[229] Distinction between “qalb” and “fuwad”: in al Makki, Qut al Qulub, I, 113-129, The dhamir is the Huwa.

[230] Lari (marginal gloss of the nafahat of Jami, Ms. Paris, Persian 227, p. 89) excuses this poetical licence, supposing that “ba'da dãlika should be supplied before ithnatän XXX, 45, cf. the “letter to Ibn 'Ata” (in al Kharkushi, and al Sha'rawi, tabaqat.. I, 108).

[231]

[232]

[233]

[234] The image of the crescent figures also in another prose fragment which has been preserved by al Sulami (in tafsir, on Qur. II, 109) and which is quite noteworthy : one sees the crescent, he says, from everywhere; but if we remove all that separates our gaze from it, it is He who gazes (through our eye), it is no more He who is gazed upon.و اذا ارتفعت الرسوم صار ناظرا و لا منظورا

[235] When the moon is full.

[236] These well known verses are expressly attributed to al Hallaj by al Baqli, in tafsir, on Qur. V, 59. Accordiug to Ibn at Dubaythi (d. 637,'1239, in Dayl Tarikh Baghdad) and Watwat (cf. Bibliogr. 422-a-1°, 503-a-20°), they belonged to a piece of five verses of at Hallaj.

[237]

[238] . Cf. Qur. XXIV, 35. The “nafkh al Ruh” is precisely characteristic of the Christian mysticism, in the description which the Ikhwan al Safa give of the various mysticisms (ed. Bombay, 1206, IV, p. 107-108; cf. Dieterici, 1. c., p. 595).

[239] Following the Asharite theologian Abu Hatim al Tabari (d. 440/1048) who gives two recensions (in al Khatib).

[240] The word means also “Water of Youth”. It is the doctrine of the imtizaj.

[241] Following Ms. London, 888, f ° 340a.

[242] Allusion to the famous hadith : Ll Sy91 : It is only because of you (God speaking to the Prophet) that I have created the heavens! (Cf. the journal al Manar, XI, 827).

[243] I.e. you unite to my Humanity that necessary essence of the prescience which is divine; Ms. : A ; job

[244] In a very close analysis of al Hallaj's madhab by al Balkhi (d. 324/932), in at istakhri (Bib!. Geogr. Arab., t. I., pp. 148-149), the doctrine ascribed to him is this :

[245] Tarikh al Hind, text, p. 34, transl. by Sachau, 1910, I, 69; al Biruni compares this doctrine with that of Patanjali's Yoga Sutra. AI Biruni was very well informed in matters of Sufism. On p. 43 (text trans!. I, 87-88), he gives, together with phrases from at Shibli and at Bistami, an anonymous sentence on the “isharah” which figures in al Sulami, tafsir, on Qur. III, 16, and in al Bagli, tafsir, in the same verse, under the name of ibn Mansur = at Hallaj. This theory of the two ruh should not be confused with the old Semitic (and Jacobite) dualism of the sensuous soul (nafs) and the spirit (ruh) which was generally adopted in Islam.

[246] Under the name of ruh the orthodox theologians of the classics! period understand nothing but the created spirit of man. They think with at Ash'ari that it dies and rises with the body; or with the Kirãmiyah the Sãlimiyah and the 1mamiyah, that it is immortal since the very moment of creation (1bn at D”a'i, tabrirah . . . 391,433). But in the beginning the term ruh has a more indistinct meaning and is sometimes used for God. Ibn Hanbal does not clench the matter: “whoever says that ruh is makhluq, is a heretic, and whoever says it is qadim, is an infidel!” (id. l.c. p. 433). The Sufis are divided; Abu Bakr al Wasiti (d. 330/932) says that ruh is the first of all creatures in dignity (cf. Yafi 'i,Nashr . . . , Ms. Cairo, 1'° 43a), but at Ghazali seems to think it is uncreated, since “qayim bi (al) dat (“masayl ukhrawiyah”, in Ibn al Da'i, l.c. p. 399).

[247] In tarikh al Sufiyah, extract in at Khatib (cf. 250-a-35°). Cf. chapter “fi masalat al ruh” which follows immediately after the refutation of the Hallajian “hululi” Faris ibn 'Isa, in Kashf al Mahjub of at Hujwiri (ed. by Nicholson' 260-264). him

[248] It is only the Ash'arite theologian AbU ishaq Isfarayni who made admit that the ruh is created (Yafi 'i, Nashr . . . , Ms. Cairo, f' 43a).

[249] Nous (= nus) of Anaxagoras. Cf. Nazzam (farq, 119) and Ibn `Arabi ( futuhat) . . . III, 210). 1

[250] Ij ay:' which bursts into flame in the sublin'tu”a (self)” (al Ralik j, in at Sulami, tabaqat).(tab' (3%11 J'. j`I Lp, a , ly. (same passage, cf. Bibliogr., 170-a-24°).

[251] This formula, which is the exact opposite of that of Ibn `Arabi, (cf. here ,L 183), is that of Saint Anselm (De viritate).

[252] In at Harawi, taboqat ... (cf. Bibliogr., 1059-a-13°) who gives two recensions of it; the second, following Abu `Ali al Daqqaq (d. 405/1014) differs from the first, of Ibn Khafif, only in the first two words c5- V^,~,a> : “My Lord made me appear in broad daylight ... “(cf. Qur. XII, 51).

[253] The “tawhid” of the “sidq” is the “tawhid” of the “abyss of sincerity”, the “tawhid” as the Divinity herself conceives it (Qur. LIV, 55).

[254] On al Hallaj's nur sha'sha'ani, criticised during the trial of 301/913, cf. the Nusayris (Ms. Paris 1450, 13a) and the Druze (nuqat, 82): cf. Dozy, Suppl., s.v.

[255] It is 'Umar at Suhrawardi's objection (d. 632/1234) in 'Award ... IV, 273.

[256] First condemned proposition, in Ghunyah . . . , I, 83.

[257] In Ms. London 888. f°339a.

[258] Except with the Nusayris (Ms. Paris 1450, 52b) and the Druze (nuqat, 84, 92).

[259] v.g. Abu Ja'far al Sadalani, in Hujwiri, Kashf al Mahjub.

[260] Nazm a! suluk, verse 455: following the commentary of al NAbulusi Kashf a! sirr a! ghamidh.

[261] Cf. his other verse, in Nazm al suluk, v. 387 :

[262] Theory of the “shahid” and the “mashhud”.

[263] Theory of the “shahid” and the “mashhud”.

[264] See below, p. 184.

[265] In Ms. London 888, f°339b.

[266] In Turkish Ms., Wien Cat. III, p. 508. No. 4, f° 13a. It is not a slip of the pen, for this Ms. contains several other pieces of al Hallaj, showing similar deformations.

[267] Duality of God's nasut : the insan al Kabir (Universe) and the insan a! Kamil (microcosm).

[268] Cf. Friedlander, The Heterodoxies of the Shiites ... , II, 104.

[269] In Fusus a! hikam, ed. by Bali Khalifah,, printed 1891, pp. 258-259. PP. 270. In 'Ulum al haqayq, in Majmu'at a! rasayl, ed. by Kurdi, Cairo 1328, 4, 495.

[270] undo271. This work, quoted by at Qushayri (Risalah, ed. by Ansari, III, 181) is ubtedly of at Hallaj, as at Sibt Ibn al Jawzi clearly attests in his biography of al Sulami, where he examines this passage of at Qushayri (in Mirat al zaman, under the Year 412/1021), it is manifestly a mistake of at Ansari when, commenting upon at Qashayri, he supposes that it was a work of at Sulami (l.c.). Cf. Ibn

[271] `Arabi, Futuhat..., IV, 367.

[272] “Sahur, sayhur” is a Syrian word (cf. Lisan a! Arab, s.v. ;tea° 143 and 50-51).

[273] Ms. Shahid And perhaps Ibn at Rawandi. Hajj Khalifah (sallam al wusu! .. , , 1887, cribes Pasha tt as fouo s . I~ JI j u91,-.,,l.1zJ1 vj,~J connection l t,Jn with a'Ax aJl l~~ Jl, deg ~~ 9 9 t-d I `tai, L9' I96::,=J 13'sS I .. 1.;,..Q. 1 3

[274] Hadith on the arwah, “spirits”, “ressembling men, eating, walking . (following lbn 'Abbas, Mujãhid . . . in al Baqli, tafsir, on Qur. XVII, 87.

[275] Only later, when the Ash'arite school adopts the doctrine of the Ruhaniyin, it also makes a formal distinction between the 'alam ruhani and th 'alum jismani (cf. Shahrastani, Cairo ed., II, 94 fl. 104, 106).

[276] Al Farabi, Fusus fi at hikmah, ed. by Dieterici, p. 71.

[277] In this case, tul would in al Hallaj mead the same as lahut, and 'ardh the same as nasut. But we see from the Tawasin themselves that this is not so; the Divinity or lahut is that ma'rifah which, it is said has no tul and no 'ardh. Moreover, al Hallaj, describing the action of the auruf (letters), speaks of their tut (cf. Ibn 'Arabi, Futuhat .. , I, 188); tul, with him, is a term having in view the created world, since for him the letters are created. But it is only natural that Ibn 'Arabi, who supported the “uncreated letters”, was mistaken in this matter.

[278] Futuhat . . . , first edition, IV, 367: this passage is an explanatory note on on chapter XX, which is found in t, I, p. 168.

[279] Alliteration on Ls-e-4- and Ls-r.;.? , and play on words with which means both “cause” and “sickness”.

[280] Jesus is in Islam the type of allpowerful physician, and Ibn 'Arabi makes of him the model man of his monistic theory. If he has a double aspect, human and divine, this is simply on account of an unavoidable dichotomy which the working of our reasoning imposes a priori on any definition. In his Fusus al hikam Ibn 'Arabi gives a detailed exposition of this theory in which he takes Jesus as a model, ed. 1891, p. 254-255.

[281] Cf. p 142.

[282] i.e. here “monistic”.

[283] The jam' an the tafriqah of the Sufis. Cf. Qur. LXXXIV, 16-19; and also the Kalam min Allah sabq min qabl an fataq wa rataq, 282nd title in the list of Ibn 'Arabi's works (in Tahir beg, tarjamah hal wa fadhayl Shaykh Akbar, 2nd ed Istanbul. 1329.

[284] Tabut; comp. Fusus . . , 391.

[285] i.e. the universe; God's nasut accourding to 'lbn Arabi, totality of the divine attributes: “place of residence” of the omni present Spirit (Fusus ... , 251)

[286] The mountain where the revelation to Muhammad took place in its totality, as opposed to the mountain of Moses' revelation,

[287] Fardh and natal.

[288] Shahid and mashhud, according to Ibn 'Arabi, are two terms united by logical necessity and perfectly symmetrical, equal and identical.

[289] Literally “order” and “will”. For more clarity we translate with “precept” and “decree”. ding

[290] Cf. below p. 153. The setting into motion of predestination according to pre-science is creation, whereas the setting into motion of the order according to bounty is uncreated, pre-eternal as the bounty itself.

[291] Here as well as in the questions of tanzih, tawbah and asma, one used. how much the Mu'tazilite philosophy had been working on the concepts at Hallaj. As regards iradah and amr in particular, see the doctrines of at Nazi al Khayat, Mu'amir . . . , al Ka'bi, in the treatises of Baghdadi and Shahrastad, But al Hallaj differed from them in as far as he affirmed God as Khaliq of 'al 'ibad (against al Jubbai). Mention must here be made of the discussion between Abu `Ali at Jubbai and at Ash'ari on the “reality of obedience” (haqiqat a! ta'ah), al Jubbai saying it was “conformity with iradah”, whereas al Ash'ari, following in this al Hallaj, retorted it was “conformity with amr” (in Baghdadi, Farq, 167).

[292] In at Baqli, tafsir, on Qur. LIV, 50. 'Ayn al jam' is the technical term used by at Kharraz, at Shibli (cf. at Baqli, on Qur. XX, 12, LVIII, 22), and at Hallaj for “supreme sanctity”; in al Sulami, on Qur. XXXVI, 21.

[293] In Ghunyah . . , L 83. So also Jbn 'Arabi; by establishing the equation iradah=amr, he is led to make a second equation by which he confuses wittingly the 'alam al amr which is uncreated, with the 'alam al arwah which is created; this confusion is perpetuated by the later Sufism, by al Maqdisi, at Nabulusi who in his commentary on Ibn at Faridh (petite Taiyah, v. 1001, quoted the following verse of at Siddiqi at Bakri 1 1141 y L3L lm yo U *), SaJI amyl .11 J.)

[294] So also al Qasim at SayyAri (d. 342/953): cf. in at Baqli, tafsir on Qur. XXXIX, 9, Ms. Berlin, f°313a.

[295] Extracts of Abu at Hasan Ibn Salim, in Makki, Qut a! Qulub, I, 128.

[296] In Makki, l.c.

[297] Hence his verse which de Slane regarded blasphemous : القاہ فی الیم مکتوفا فقال ایاک! ایاک! ان تبتل بالماء al “God has thrown him (the iradah) into the sea, with both hands tied at the back, shouting at him: look out! look out! (I do not want (amr) you to be made wet in the water” (lbn KhallikAn, in Bibliog., 471-a-4°).

[298] Cf. in al Kalabadi (Bibliog. 143-a-52°).

[299] Below: f-14.

[300] Cf. below the whole “Tasin at mashiyah” (h-1°). His suffering remains vain, because it is imperfect and void of the expiatory force which would validate It. Iblis suffers from his inability without ever submitting to it (cf. here pp. 99-100). The kharejite Yunus at Samarri had already realized this Shahrastãni I, 187).

[301] Testimonies of Ibrahim Ibn Fatik, Ibrahim at Hulwãni Abu 'Imran ibn Musa, etc., in the collection Akhbar a! Hallaj.

[302] Cf. in this connection Exod. XXXII, 31 and the teaching of St. Paul (Rom, IX, 3). And also the Christian theories on the “probation” of sanctity through temptation and even possession. Cf. Galat. III, II.

[303] Published by at Sulami (d. 412/1021) in tafsir: on Qur. XXV, 2. With 262 respect to the variants we have collated the following manuscripts: Fãtih 260, 261, Wali at Din. 148; Yéni Jami', 43; Koprulu, 91, 92; Hakim Ughli, 99; Qãdhi O Qur. 82, 83. We give here only a few variants (cf. also copy in at Baqli, tafsir XXV, 2) without discussing the age of the recensions

[304] Var. ; الذھن (Wali at Din); الجوھر (QA 82).

[305] Var. : المقادیر (Fatih, 260, 261, 262).

[306] Sic: QA 83, The other Mss. Give الوجہ (QA 82).

[307] Var: الذھن (Q A 83).Fatih, 260, 261, 262

[308] Yeni adds here: ثم النفس

[309] The Theory of the physician al Rãzi known to al Hallaj, (cf. `Attar) is of Greek origin. (cf. al Birūni tarikh al Hind, chapter 32. p. 163). Having no definite indications as to the influence under which this idea entered early sufism, we mast at least remember the 10 séphiroth of the Jewish Cabbala, and the 10 emanations of the Manichean system (listed in Fihrist, p. 332; cf. the Hindu Vaishesika, and the 6 degrees of creation according to Shaikhism (Rev. Monde Mus., XII, 451). A first attempt in Islam had been made by the Ismaili gnostic Ahmad al Kayyãl (cf. Shahrastáni ed. 1317, II, 18). Cf. the work of the “Six Days” (Genesis).

In Ma'ani al nafs, ed. by Isaac Broydé Paris 1896, p. 13.

This method springs from al Hallaj's theory of the divine inspiration and of the ` ayn a/ jam` , the state where the saint is with God in a direct “state of relationship “which a prophet does not have; of the re,>a11c), ;Jly, written at the top of a book of al Hallaj, seized in 309/922 19.3. Very old too; al Sulami (d. 412/1021) does not seem to have invented the he onions reported by him (cf. Goldziher, Vorlesungen…1911, p. 192, n. 7, 1); Which o ywoul(imarbeizesfaisal thie collectionsr of al Kalabadi (d. 380/990), Bahr al fawayd (Ms. Fatih, No. 6978) and Yeni Jami`, No. 274) and of Muhammed ibn `Ali al Hakim al Tirmidi (d. 285;898 Usul (Ms. Yeni Jami`, 302, Koprulu is 464-465),

studied before assessingal how old the Sufi tradition

d ,al Hallaj. They will be given the required developments in my thesis on La Passion 195. Al Makki (d. 380/990) in Qut al Qulub, I, 47 (cf. I, 13).

“Dixit Avennasar ( = Abu Nasr) principia, per quae constituuntur corpora et ipsorum accidentia esse sex gradus altos. Causa prima continetur in primo gradu: secunda in secundo, intellectus agens in tertio, anima in quarto, forma in quinto, materia in sexto . . . (Averroes (Ibn Rushd) tractatus de animae beatitudine, Latin transl. by Calonymos, Venice, t. X, ad calcem, 1562, ch. V : extract in Tholuck, “Die spekulative Trinitatslehre. . . Berlin, Dummler, 1826,

p. 51). The third is Ji~all JA I , the fourth Lta.Ji , the fifth o)yo=Li , the

sixth ~9 g71 or °4,.;:12.11

Cf. theory on ',fig!, here, p. p. 196.

Cf. here. p. 158. No. 5.

Cf. Goldziher, Zeitschrift fur assyriologie, XXII, 317.

Ibn :Arabi, v.g, (Futuhat, I, 326); and Kamalpashazadeh, tahafut (on the margin of that of al Ghazali, Cairo, 1321, p. 60).

Kitab al nuqat . . , ed by Sybold, p. 82.

In Fons Vitae, ed. by Munk. I am indebted for this observation to Dr. Goldziher who made me aware of how important this passage is.

His theory on the “Origo Largitatis et Causa Essendi” reminds us :also of al Hallaj's theory (tut wa `ardh).