Praise be to God Who has inspired us with the wonderful signs of His creation and
granted us the goodness of His knowledge and love by sending us His Messengers, showing us His truths, both the manifest and the hidden.
Praise be to God Who has allowed us to peer into His hidden treasures, Who alone
adorned Himself with His divine attributes before languages came to be, and Who is alone in the uppermost stations of Beauty and Majesty where all seekers are drawn and hope to reach.
Sir Sayyid Ahmed in his book 'Tasanaf-i-Ahmadiyyah' says, "The simple belief of the Musalmans is that God is One, He exists by His own Holy essence. He brought all things from nothingness into thingness.
All things are dependent on Him for their existence. He is not dependent on anything. He is unique in His essence and in His attributes and in His works. Nobody takes part in His actions; His essence and His knowledge are not like our essence and knowledge.
His hearing is not like our hearing, nor are His intentions, His power, and His speech like our intentions, our power, and our speech. There is no resemblence between these except in name. Creating is His special attribute, for nobody can create a thing out of nothing.
Even the action of a man is created by Him, only that in the nature of a man He has created independent intention, and will, to do good and evil works. He is not contained in anything; nor does anything contain Him. He surrounds (encompasses) everything by His Essence and is near and with everything."
Man's knowledge is God's knowledge in limitation. When man's knowledge is apparent, God's knowledge is hidden. When ice (water in limitation) is apparent, water itself is hidden. All things manifest God, whether they are aware of it or not.
Shariat is a stage in which the seeker has to live according to laws of religion as strictly laid down, observing all the rituals.
Tariqat is the stage of renunciation which soon leads to the next stage of Haqiqat. Haqiqat, the truth, that stage in which the seeker is granted revelation of the true nature of the Godhead and which is retained. Maakrifatullah is that stage of the spiritual journey where the evolved soul of the seeker finds itself in Divine proximity, after getting His exact and true knowledge.
The greatest Sufi poet of that wonderful land of Sindh, Shah Abdul Latif Bhitai, includes ayats from Holy Qur'an into his poetry to elucidate his Knowledge of God, Whom he refers a s his Beloved. He says in his book "Shah Jo Risalo":
"Hot-u tuhinjay hanj-a mein, pucCheen koh-u pahee?
'Wafi Anfusikum afla tubsiroon' sojhay kar sahee,
KadDheen kan-a wahee, hot-u gGolhinN-a hatT-a tay."
"Beloved is in your lap, why ask others?
'His signs are in your soul', why not learn and contemplate,
To seek one's love, none went to market place."
"Hot-u tuhinjay hanj-a mein, pucCheen koh-u par yanN-a,
'Wa nuhn aqrab alaih min hablul wareed' tuhinjo toheen sanN-u,
Pahinjo aahay panN-u, aadDo ajeeban khay."
"Beloved within you and you seek Him here and there,
He is 'closer to you than your vein jugular,'
Yourself is the hurdle, between your Love and you."
"VorRiam-i sabh-u wathanN-a, yaar-a karinN-a jit-i jay,
'Allah bikuli shainn muheet' ay aarianNi ahjJanN,
Sabha main punhun paanN keenhay Mbio Mbaroch-a ree-a."
"I searched all places for my Beloved,
'God encompasses all and everything', one came to know,
Beloved is in all, nothing exists without Him."
"To Allah belong the East and the West:
Withersover ye turn, there is Allah's countenance.
For Allah is All-Embracing, All-Knowing."
.....Qur'an (2:115)
In another chapter 'Sur Kalyan(Peace)' Bhiati )as translated by Elsa Kazi from Sindhi to English says:
"The One Creator, the all great;
Lord of the universe,
The living, the original;
Ruler with power innate;
The giver, the sustainer,
The unique, compassionate;
This master praise, to Him alone
Thyself in praise prostrate.
The generous, who does create
The universe in pairs."
"None Shares His Glory, "He was, is, shall be"
Who this doth say
Accepts Mohammad as 'guide'
With heart and love's true sway;
None from amongst those lost their way
Or ever went astray."
"He is without a partner", when
This glorious news you break
With love and knowledge, Mohammad
Accept, as cause him take
Why would you then obeisance make
To others after that?"
"The Echo and the call are same,
If you sound's secret knew,
They both were one, but two became
Only when 'hearing' came."
The monotheism which a gnostic seeks is not the monotheism which a philosopher would
understand it to be. To a philosopher, unity or oneness of Allah means that there is only
one Essential Being to the exclusion of any other. A gnostic maintains that oneness of
Allah means that Allah is the only really existing being. The existence of everything else is
illusory. The spiritual journey is a journey of the human being as the illusory being to the
stage where he may not see anything but Allah. This journey can only be undertaken if
one has purified one's heart and one's soul through constant spiritual effort.
There lovers chant and dance in His remembrance with burning love, there sincere
servants seek His pleasure as Messengers from His divine presence.
He is the First to be worshipped, without beginning.
He is the Everlasting without end.
He is the King Who alone creates and invents.
He is the Owner and Ruler of His kingdom both seen and unseen, angels and human beings.
He is the Master Whom none resembles, ever besought and in need of none. Nothing can contain Him and He contains everything.
He is the Self-Subsistent Who sustains the seven earths and the seven heavens and all universes with His power.
He is unique in His perfect attributes.
He is the Living, the Everlasting, Whose life knows no end.
He is the Knower in His ancient knowledge.
He is the Expert in creation, the All-Encompassing in both hidden and manifest knowledge.
He is the Witness before Himself of His own Oneness.
He is the All-Hearing without necessity to listen.
He is the All-Seeing without necessity to look, the Watchful Who overlooks nothing concerning His angels and His servants.
He is the Preserver Who never forgets, the Guardian of His creation, the All-Powerful of old Who brought an unlimited creation into existence.
He is the Provider of all without being asked.
He is the Light of lights with which the hearts of His believers are enlightened. His Kingdom no more diminishes in the wake of His generosity than an endless ocean whose waves keep peaking upon the shore.
"When Hell was created,
The hearts of angels flew away
From their proper places.
When human beings were created
Those hearts came back."
How Do We Know That God Exists?
Where Are We Going?
A Shaykh (a religious scholar) once visited a Sufi center, known as a Khaniqah. In his talk he posed the
question "How do we know that God exists?" Then he proceeded to tell a story:
A traveler on foot stopped at the crossroads when he encountered a small group
of people gathered around a wise teacher. The traveler approached the wise
teacher and asked "How do you know that God exists?" The teacher paused for a
while and said, "I will answer your question, but first you must answer a question
of mine. Where are you going?"
The traveler replyed, "I am going to find my camel, he has wandered away." The wise teacher said, "I do not see a camel anywhere,
how do you know that your camel exists?" The traveler replied, "I see his traces
here in the sand, look, see for yourself." The wise teacher said, "In the same way, I know that God exists, I see His traces everywhere."
These are the questions that have ensconced themselves in the hearts of human beings since the Dawn of Humankind. Maakrifat of God, from that very dawn, came to soothe the soul of
the seeker and to alleviate his or her suffering in the throes of this worldly life, to relieve the yearning hearts from the distress which pulled them into depression and sadness.
The state of the world, always of concern to those who looked beyond their day-to-day living, has always troubled those whose hearts are full of pity and compassion for the lot
of humankind, for the Earth and her state, for Nature and its preservation and protection.
Gnosticism is the teaching based on Gnosis, the knowledge of transcendence arrived at by way of interior, intuitive means. Although Gnosticism thus rests on personal religious experience, it is a mistake to assume all such experience results in Gnostic recognitions. It is nearer the truth to say that Gnosticism expresses a specific religious experience, an experience that does not lend itself to the language of theology or philosophy, but which is instead closely affinitized to, and expresses itself through, the medium of myth. Indeed, one finds that most Gnostic scriptures take the forms of myths. The term "myth" should not here be taken to mean "stories that are not true", but rather, that the truths embodied in these myths are of a different order from the dogmas of theology or the statements of philosophy.
The gnostic knowledge of God provides solace and respite, like oases for the thirsty souls seeking comfort and
provision for the journey across the desert of this mundane existence. The Knowledge of God, is like a wellspring, bubbling forth cold, refreshing pure water to quench the eager thirst of the
weary travelers on the way. This knowledge enables us to be One with the Only One that exists.
God has no form. He has no shadow. There is nothing in comparison to Him. He has
neither wife nor child. He is neither darkness nor light. He is not like the sun, nor the
moon, nor the stars. God is one power, a power which is able to control and subdue all
other powers. From the single atom to all of the universes, this is a power which is
intimately mixed within all things. It has nothing, no shadow, no aid. It is the One who is
alone, the Original One. It is a point, a power, which has neither beginning nor end. There
is no language for it, nor does it have a religion. It does not possess a race; there are no
colors in it, no black or white. It is a power, a point which is within every creation.
It has no mouth, no tongue to speak, yet through our mouths that power is speaking. It
has no eyes, yet it is observing through our eyes. It has no ears, yet it replies to the
sounds that we hear with our own ears. It has no nose, but it senses fragrance through
our sense of smell. It has no hands, but that power makes our hands the agency for giving
and receiving. It has no feet or legs, but it walks throughout all the universes. Such is that
power.
He Alone exists and everything, everywhere is just His manifestation. You, me, this, that, all, everything is His manifestation. Clean the mirror of your heart so that He can see His face clearly in there. Maulana Rumi in his Mathnawi says:
"The Beloved is all, the lover just a veil.
The Beloved is living, the lover a dead thing.
If Love withhold its strengthening care,
The lover is left like a bird without wings.
How will I be awake and aware
If the light of the Beloved is absent?
Love wills that this Word be brought forth.
If you find the mirror of the heart dull,
The rust has not been cleared ferom its face."
In the early history of the Sufi Path of a gnostic, who ventures out in the search of the knowledge of God, only that person was considered to be a Sufi, who sought God's nearness by adhering to the tenets of Islam as revealed in the Holy Qur'an and Shariah.