Imam Ghazali - The Alchemy of Happiness

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THE ALCHEMY OFHAPPINESS

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AL-G HAZZALITRANSLATED By CLAUD FIELD

·~csNEW YORK

In S

. ed i 19 O.

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CONTENTS

PREFACE : VIlINTRODUCTION X\

I. T HE KN OWLEDGE OF SELF 3

2. THE KNOWLEIXi E Of Goo 13-.\i'"

3. THE K NOWL EDGE OF TIllS W ORLD 24

4. THE KNOWLEDGE OF THE NEXT WORLD 31

5. C ONCERNING M USIC 'AND DANCING AS AID S TO 'f HE

R ELIGIOUS LIFE .43

6. C ONCERNlNG S ELF-EXAMINATION AND THE

RECOLLECT ION OF GoO ' - : ;e~ ; " " ..,. :~ ·..52

7. MARRIAGE AS A H ELP OR HINDRA NCE TO TIlE - .

R ELIGIOUS LIFE ,.:; :.: ;~ :-: ~.."; ;6~<,~< _~.f~.. . - '~ . <;.~ . -

-8. T HE U)VE OF G OI ) ;:: . .74 'f

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EDITORIAL NOTE

THE ~bject of the Edit?rs of this seri7s is a ve~y

definite one. They desire above all things that, intheir humble way, these books shall be the ambassadors of goodwill and understanding between East andWest--the old world of Thought and the new of Ac- .:tion. In this endeavour, and in their own sphere, theyare but followers of the highest example in the land.They are confident that a deeper knowledge of thegreat ideals and lofty philosophy of Oriental: thoughtmay help to a revival of that true spirit of Charitywhich neither despises nor fears the notions of anothercreed and colour. Finally, in thanking press and publicfor the very cordial reception given to the "Wisdom ofthe East" .Series. they wish to state that no pains havebeen spared to secure the best specialists for the'treatment of the various subjects at hand.

L.CRANMER-BYNGS.A.KAPADIA

NORTHBROOK SOCIETY,185 PICCADILLY, W

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PREFACE

R ENAN, whose easy-going mind was the exactantithesis to ·the intense earnestness of Ghazzali,

call him"the most original mind among Arabian philosophers."' Notwithstanding this, his fame .as a philosopher has been greatly overshadowed by Avicenna,his predecessor.and Averroes, his successor and opponent. It is a significant fact that the EncyclopaediaBritannica devotes five columns to each 'of the othersand only a column and a half to Ghazzali. Yet it isdoubtful whether . it is as a philosopher that he wouldhave wished to be chiefly remembered. Several of hisworks, it is true, are polemics against the philosophers,especially his Tehafot-al-Falasifa,or"Destructionof the Philosophers," and, as Solomon Munk says inhis Melanges de philosphie Juive et Arabe, Ghazzalidealt "a fatal blow" to Arabian Philosophy in theEast, from which it never recovered, though it revivedfor a while in Spain and culminated in Averroes. Philosopher and sceptic as he was by nature, Ghazzali' schief work was that of a theologian, moralist, andmystic, though his mysticism was strongly 'balancedby common sense. He had, as he tells us in his Confessions, experienced "conversion"; God had arrestedhim "on the edge of the fire," and thenceforth 'what

Vll

I. Renan : A verroes et A veiroismc.

2. It may he noted that there was a contemporary sect called"La-adria"--'Ig.lluslir'

that the mystics were on t~e right pat~ and. true..Arfin " or Knowers of God. But in saying this hemeant ~hose Sufis whose mysticism did not carry the~into extravagant utterances like that of Mansur Halla],who was crucified at Baghdad (A.D. 922) for exclaiming "I am the Truth, or God." In his Ihya-ul-ulu:nGhazzali says: "The matter went so far that certa~n

persons boasted of a union with the ~eity, and t~at In

His unveiled prese~ce t~ey beh~ld h,Iffi, ~d enjoyedfamiliar converse with Him, saying; Thus It was spoken unto us and thus we speak.' Bayazid Bistami (ob.A.D. 875) is reported to have exclaimed, 'Glory.~ tome!' This style of discourse exerts a very pernICIOUSinfluence on the common people. Some husbandmenindeed, letting their farms run to waste, set up simil~r

pretensions for themselves; for ~uman n.ature .ISpleased with maxims like these, which per.~lt one. t.oneglect useful labour with the idea of acqu!nng SpIr!tual purity through t~~ attain,ment:of ~ertaIn m~sten

ous degrees and qualities. ThIS notion IS productIve. ofgreat injury, so that the death of one of these foolishbabblers would be a greater benefit to the cause oftrue religion than the saving alive often of them."

For himself Ghazzali was a practical mystic. Hisaim was to make men better by leading them from.amerely notional acquiescence in the stereotyped creedof Islam to a real knowledge of God. The first four .chapters of The Alchemy of Happiness a~e a co~~entary on the famous verse in the Hadis (traditional

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III The Alchemy of Happiness

B 0 i g says of the French poet, Rene Gentilho me, was true of him:

Human 'praises scareRather than soothe ears all a-tingle yetWith tones few hear and live, and none forget,

In the same work he tells us that one of his besetting weaknesses had been the craving for applause,and in his Ihya-ul-ulum C'Revival of the ReligiousSciences") he devotes a long chapter to the dangersinvolved in a love of notoriety and the cure for it.

After his conversion he retired into religious seclusion for eleven years at Damascus ( a corner of themosque there still bears his name "The Ghazzali Corner") and Jerusalem, where he gave himself up to intense and prolonged meditation. But he was too noblea character to concentrate. himself entirely on his ownsoul and its eternal prospects. The requests of his children--and other family affairs of which we have noexact" information--caused him to return home. Besidesthis, theconunueo progress of the Ismailians (connect~d WIth ~e famous Assassins), the spread of irreligIOUS doctrines and the increasing religious indifferenceof the masses not only filled Ghazzali and his Sufifriends with profound grief, out determined them tostem the evil with the whole force of their philosophy,the ardour of vital conviction, and the authority ofnoble example.

In his autobiography referred to above Ghazzalitells ~~ that, after emerging from a state of Pyrrhonicscepticism. he had finally arrived at the conclusion

Preface IX

x The Alchemy of Happiness

sayings of Muhammad), "He who knows himselfknows God. " He is especially scornful of the parrotlike repetition of orthodox phrases. Thus alluding tothe almost hourly use by Muhammadans of the phrase," I take refuge in God" (Na'udhib illah!) , Ghazzalisays, in the Ihya-ul-Ulum: "Satan laughs at such piousenjaculations, Those who utter them are like a manwho should meet a lion in a desert, while there is afort at no great distance, and, when he sees the evilbeast, should stand exclaiming, 'I take refuge in thatfortress,' without moving a step towards it. What willsuch an ejaculation profit him? In the same way themere exclamation, 'I take refuge in God,' will notprotect thee from the terrors of His judgment unlessthou really take refuge in Him." It is related of someunknown Sufi that when asked for a definition of religious sincerity he drew a red-hot piece of iron out ofa blacksmith's forge, and said, "Behold it!" This"red-hot"sincerity is certainly characteristic of Ghazzali, and there is no wonder that he did not admire hiscontemporary, Omar Khayyarn.

The little picture of the lion and the fort in theabove passage is a small instance of another conspicuous trait in Ghazzali's mind--his turn for allegory.Emerson says, "Whoever thinks intently will find animage more or less luminous rise in his mind." InGhazzali's writings many such images arise, somegrotesque and some beautiful. His allegory of the soulas a fortress beleaguered by the""armies of Satan" is astriking anticipation of the Holy War of Bunyan. Thegreatest of all the Sufi poets, Jalaluddin Rumi, born a

Preface Xl

century after Ghazzali's death (A.p. 1207), has paidhim the compliment of mcorporautl:g sev~ral of theseallegories which occur in the Ihya mt? his own Masnavi. Such is the famous one of the Chinese and Greekartists, which runs as follows: "

"Once upon a time the Chinese having challengedthe Greeks to a trial of skill in painting, the Sultan

"summoned them both into edifices built for the purpose directly facing each other, and commanded themto show proof of their art. The painters. of ~h.e twonations immediately applied themselves WIth diligenceto their work. The Chinese sought and obtained of theking every day a great quantity of colou.rs, but theGreeks not the least particle. Both worked m profoundsilence until the Chinese with a clangor of cymbalsand of'trumpets, announced the end of their labours.Immediately the king, with his courtiers, hastened totheir temple, and there stood amazed at the wonde.r~lsplendour of the Chinese painting and the exquisitebeauty of the colours. But meanwhile the Greeks, whohad not sought to adorn the walls with paints, but .laboured rather to erase every colour, drew aside theveil which concealed their work. Then, wonderful totell, the manifold variety of the Chinese colours wasseen still more delicately and beautifully reflectedfrom the walls of the Grecian temple, as it stoodilluminated by the rays of the midday sun."

This parable, of course, illustrates the favouriteSufi tenet that the heart must be kept pure and calm asan unspotted mirror. Similarly, the epilogue of the

' 11 T e Alchemy of Happiness

elepham in [he dark (vide chap. TO has been borrowedby Jalauddin Rumi from Ghazzali.

Another cha:act~ristic of Ghazzali which appealsto the !TI?dern mind IS the way in which he expoundsthe religious argu~ent from probability much as Bishop,Butler and Browning do (vide the end of ChapterI~ , in the present book). Ghazzali might have said,with Blougram:

Wi th me faith means perperual unbeliefKept quiet like tbe snake 'neath Michael's foot.,Who stands calm just because he feels it writhe,

.. Th.ls combination of ecstatic assurance and seeptlcl.sm IS one of those antinomies of the human mindwhich ~noy the rationalist and rejoice the mystic.Those in whom they co-exist, like Ghazzali in the

L eleventh cenutry and Cardinal Newman in the' nineteenth, are a perpetual problem to understand andtherefore perennially interesting:

He may believe, and yet, and yet,How can he?

. . Another ~oin~ . in which Ghazzali anticipatesBIshop Butler IS hIS representation of punishment asthe.natura~ working out of consequences. and not anar~ltrar~ mfJ icti~n imposed ab extra. He tries toranonalise the lu rid threatenings of the Koran.

In hi~ own day Ghazzali was accused of havingo~e doctrine for the multitude and one for himself andhIS intImate frien.ds, Professor 0,8. Macdonald of~artford, after going thoroughly into the matter. says,If the charge of a secret doctrine is to be proved

Preface XlIl

against Ghazzali it must be on other and better evidence than that which is now before us. "

At any rate, Ghazzali has. been accepted as artorthodox' authority by the Muhammadans, amongwhom his title is Hujjat-el-Islarn, "The Proof of Islam," and it has been said, "If all the books of Islamwere destroyed it would be but a slight loss if only thelhya of Ghazzali were preserved." The great 'modernreformer of Islam in India, the late Sir Syed Ahmed,has had some portions of this enormous work printedseparately for the purpose of familiarising the youngMoslems at Aligarh with Ghazzali,

The lhya was written in Arabic and Ghazzalihimself wrote an abridgment of it in Persian for popularuse which he entitled Kimiya'e Saadat ("The Alchemyof Happiness"). This little book contains eight sectionsof that abridgment. .

Theologians are the best judges of theologians,and in conclusion we may quote Dr. August Tholuck'sopinion of Ghazzali: "This man,if ever any have deserved the name, was truly a 'divine,' and he may bejustly placed on a level with Origen, so remarkablewas he for learning and ingenuity, and gifted withsuch a rare faculty for the skilful and worthy exposition of doctrine. All that is good, noble, and sublimethat his great soul had compassed he bestowed uponMuhammadanism, and he adorned the doctrines of theKoran with so much piety and learning that, in theform given them by him they seem in my opinion,worhty the assent of Christians. Whatsoever was mostexcellent in the philosophy of Aristotle or in the Sufi

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xi The Alchemy of Happiness

e discreetly adapted to the Muhammadantheol~g . ~rom e ery school he sought the means ofs~eddIng . light and honour upon religion; while hissInc~re Pl~~y and lofty conscientiousness imparted toall his wrrtmgs a sacred majesty. He was the first ofMuhammadan divines. ,.,

THE ALCHEMY OF HAPPINESS

INTRODUCTION,

K NOW, 0 beloved, that man was not created injest or at random, but marvellously made and

for some great end. Although he is not from everlasting, yet he lives for ever; and though his body is meanand earthly , yet his spirit is lofty and divine. When inthe crucible of abstinence he is purged from carnalpassions he attains to the highest, and in place of beinga slave to lust and anger becomes endued with angelicqualities. Attaining that state, he finds his heaven inthe contemplation of Eternal Beauty, and no longer infleshly delights. The spiritual alchemy which operatesthis change in him, like that which transmutes basemetals into gold, is not easily discovered , nor to befound in the house of' every old wornan. : It is toexplain that alchemy and its methods of operation thatthe author has undertaken this work, which he hasentitled, The Alchemy of Happiness. Now the treasuries of God, in which this alchemy is to be sought, arethe hearts of the prophets, and he who seeks it elsewhere will be disappointed and bankrupt on the day ofjudgement when he hears the word , "We have liftedthe veil from off thee, and thy sight to-day is keen. "

God has se~t on earth a hundred and twenty-fourxv

x i The Alchemy of Happiness

? sand prophets' to teach men the prescription ofIS ale ef!l1, .~nd . how (0 purify their hearts from

baser qualities In the curcible of abstinence. This alchemy may be briefly described as turning away fromthe world to God, and its constituents are four:

1. The knowledge of self.2. The knowledge of God.

3. The knowledge of this world as it really is.

4. !he knowledge of the next world as it reallyIS.

We shall now proceed to expound these fourconstituents in order.

I . ~1~t~~~he fixed number of the prophets according to Muhammadan

Chapter I

THE KNOWLEDGE OF SELF

KNOWLEDGE of self is the key to the knowledgeof God, accordingto the saying: "He who knows

himself knows God,"1 "and, as it is written in theKoran, "We will show them Our 'signs in the worldand in themselves, that the truth may be manifest tothem." Now nothing is nearer to thee than thyself, andif thou knowest not thyself how canst thou know anything else? If thou sayest "I know.myself," meaningthy. outward shape, body, face, limbs, and so forth,such knowledge can never be a key co the knowledgeof God. Nor, if thy knowledge as to that which iswithin only extends so far, that when thou art hungrythou eatest, and when thou art angry thou attackestsomeone, wilt thou progress any further in this path,for the beasts are thy partners in this? But real selfknowledge consists in knowing the following things:What art thou in thyself, and from whence hast thoucome? Whither art thou going, and for what purposehast thou come to tarry here awhile, and in what doesthy real happiness .and misery consist? Some of thyattributes are those of animals, some of devils, andsome of angels, and thou hast to find out to whichof these attributes are accidental and which essential.Till thou knowest this, thou canst not find out where

1

1. Traditional saying of Muhammad (S.A.W).

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T e Alchemy of Happiness

h. eal hap iness lies. The occupation of animals isat g, sleeping, and fighting; therefore, if thou art ana~ i rr:a l, busy thyself in these things. Devils are busy insnrrmg up mischief, and in guile and deceit; if thoubelongest to them , do their work. Angels contemplatehe beaut. of God, and are entirelv free from animal

quali ies, if thou an of angelic nature, then strivetowards thine origin, that thou mayest know and contemplate the Most High, and be delivered from thethraldom of lust and anger. Thou shouldest also discover why thou hast been created with these twoanimal instincts: whether that they should subdue andlead thee captive, or whether that thou shouldestsubdue them, and, in thy upward progress, make ofone thy steed andof the other thy weapon.

The first. step to self-knowledge is to know thatthou art composed of an outward shape, called thebody, and an inward entity called the heart, or soul.By "heart" J do not mean the piece of flesh situated inthe left of our bodies, but that which uses all the otherfaculti es as its instruments and servants. In truth it

. does not belong to the visible world, but to the invisible, and has come into this world as a traveller visits aforeign country for the sake of merchandise, and willprese.ntly r.eturn t~ its native land. It is the knowledgeof this entity and Its attributes which is the key to theknowledge of God.

Some i?ea of the reality of the heart or spirit,~ay be obtalped by a man closing his eyes and forgettl~g everything a~ound except his individuality. Hewill thus also obtain a glimpse of the unending nature

The Knowledege of Self . 3

of that individuality. Too close inquiry, however, intothe essence of spirit is forbi?den by. the Law. In theKoran it is written: "They WIll question thee concerning the spirit. Say: 'The Spirit comes by.the cOI?r:'andof m Lord"' . Thus much is known of It that It IS anindivrsible essence belonging to the world of decrees,and that ·it is not from everlasting, but .c~ea.ted. Anexact philosophical knowledg~ of. the spmt IS not. anecessary preliminary to walking m the path ?f :el.lgion, but comes rather as the result .of. self-~Is~Iplmeand perseverance in that path, as It IS ~ald m t~e

Koran: "Those who strive in Our way, verily We WIll

guide them to the right paths."For the carrying on of this spiritual warfare by

which the knowledge of oneself and of God is to beobtained, the body may be figured as a kingdom, ~he

soul as its king, and the different senses and facultiesas constituting an army. Reason may .be called thevizier, or prime minister, passion the reven~e-

. collector.and anger the police-officer. Under the guiseof collecting revenue, passion is continually pro~e toplunder on its own account, while resentm~nt IS al ~

ways inclined to harshness and extreme seventy. Bothof these the revenue-collector and the police-officer,have to be kept in due subordination to the king, butnot killed or excelled, as they have their own properfunctions to fulfil. But if passion and resentment master reason, the ruin of the soul infallibly ensues. Asoul which allows its lower faculties to dominate thehigher is as one who should hand over an angel to thepower of a dog or a Mussalman to the tyranny of an

The Alchemy of Happiness

lie er. The cultivation of demonic animal orangelic qualities results in the productio~ of corres-~ndIng cha.racters, which in the Day of Judgment .

will .be mam f~s ted in visible shapes, the sensual appearing as SWine. t~e ferocious as dogs and wolves,a d th~ pure as a~gels. The aim of moral discipline isto purify t~e h~art from the rust of passion and resentment, till, like a clear mirror, it reflects the lightof God.

Someone may here object, "But .if man has beencreat~d with animal and demonic qualities as well asangelic, how are we to know that the latter constitutehIS real essence, W,~ile the former are merely accidental and transitory? To this I answer that the essenceof ~ac~ creature is to be sought in that which is highest In It and peculiar to it. Thus the horse and the assare both burden-bearing a~im~ls,. but the superiorityof t~e horse to t~e ass consists In Its .being adapted foruse In battle. If It fails in this. it becomes degraded tothe rank o.f burden-bearing animals. Similarly withn:an: the highest faculty in him is reasons, which fitshim f?r t~e contemplation of God. If this predominates In. hlT~, when he dies, he leaves behind him alltendenCies to passion and resentment, and becomescapable .of associ~~ion with angels. As regards hismere animal qualities, man is inferior to many anima.ls, b~t reason makes him superior to them, as it isw:ltten. In the Koran: "To man We have subjected allthings In the earth." But if his lower tendencies havet;lUmphed, after d.eath he will ever be looking towardstne earth and longing for earthly delights.

The Knowledege of Self 5

Now the rational soul' in man abounds in marvels,both of knowledge and power. By means of it hemasters arts and sciences, can pass in a flash fromearth to heaven and back again, can map mit the skiesand measure the distances between the stars. By it alsohe can draw the fish from the sea and the birds fromthe air, and can subdue to his service animals like theelephant, the camel, and the horse. His five senses arelike five doors opening on the external world; but,more wonderful than this, his heart has a windowwhich opens on the unseen world of spirits. In thestate of sleep, when the avenues of the senses areclosed, this window is opened and man receivesimpressions from the unseen world and sometimesforeshadowings of the future. His heart is then like amirror which reflects what is pictured in the Tablet ofFate. But, even in sleep, thoughts of worldly thingsdull this mirror, so that the impression it receives arenot clear. After death, however, such thoughts vanishand things are seen in their naked reality, and thesaying in the Koran is fulfilled: "We have stripped theveil from off thee and thy sight today is keen."

This opening of a window in the heart towards theunseen also takes place in conditions approaching 'those of prophetic inspiration, when intuitions springup in the mind unconveyed through any sense-channel.The more a man purifies' himself from fleshly lustsand concentrates his mind on God, the more consciouswill he be of such intuitions. Those who are not conscious of them have no right to deny their reality.

6 The Alchemy of Happiness

or are such inrultions confined only to those ofprophetic rank. "l ust as iron, by sufficient polishingcan be made intc a mirror, so any mind by due discipline can be rendered receptive of such impressions.It was at this truth the Prophet hinted when he said,~ Eve y child is, born with a predisposition towardsIslam; then his parents make a Jew, or a Christian, ora star-worshipper of him." Every human being has inthe depths of his consciousness heard the question"Am I not your Lord?" ahd answered "Yes" to it. Butsome hearts are like mirrors so befouled with rust anddirt that they give no clear reflections, while those ofthe prophets and saints, though they are men "of likepassion~ with us" are extremely sensitive to all divineImpressions.

Now is it only by reason of knowledge acquiredand intuitive that the soul of man holds the first rankamong created things, but also by reason of power.Just as angels preside over the elements, so does thesoul rule the members of the body. Those souls whichattain a special degree of power not only rule theirown body but those of others also. If they wish a sickman to recover he recovers, or a person in health tofall ill he becomes ill, or if they will the presence of aperson he comes to them. According as the effectsproduced by these powerful souls are good or bad theyare termed miracles or sorceries. These souls differfrom common folk in three ways: (1) What othersonly see in dreams they see in their waking moments.(2) While others' wills only affect their own bodies,these, by will-power, can move bodies extraneous to


themselves. (3) The knowledge which ?th~r~ acquireby laborious learning comes to them by mnnnon.

These three, of course, are not the only markswhich differentiate them from comm~n people, but theonly ones that come within our cogmsance. ~ust as doone knows the real nature of God but God Himself, sono one knows the real nature of a prophet but aprophet. Nor is this to b~ w?ndere? at, as in ev~rydaymatters we see that it IS Impossible to expl~m thecharm of poetry to one whose ear is insuscepuble ofcadence and rhythm, or the glori~s of c?lour to onewho is stone-blind. Besides mere mcapacl~Y., there areother hindrances to the attainment of spiritual truth.One of these is externally acquired knowledge. To usea figure, the heart may be represented as a we~l, andthe five senses as five streams which are contmually .conveying water to it. In order to find out the real .contents of the heart these streams must be stopped fora time, at any rate, and the refuse they have broughtwith them must be cleared out of the. well. In otherwords, if we are to arrive at pure spiritual tr~th , wemust put away, from the time knowledge wh~ch hasbeen acquired by external processes and which toooften hardens into dogmatic prejudice.

A mistake of an opposite kind is made by shallowpeople who, echoing some phrases which they havecaught from Sufi tea~hers, go about decrying allknowledge. This is as if a person w~o w~s not anadept in alchemy were to go about saying, Alchem~is better than gold," and were to refuse gold when Itwas offered to him. Alchemy is better than gold, but

9The Alchemy of Happiness

real ale ern ists are very rare, and SO are real Sufis. Hewho has a mere smattering of Sufism is not superiorto a learned man, anymore than he who has tried afe~ experiments in alchemy has ground for despisinga ricb man.

Anyone who will look into the matter will see thathappiness is necessarily linked with the knowledge ofGod. Each faculty of ours delights in that for which itwas ~reate?: lust delights in accomplishing desire, anger In taking vengeance, the eye in seeing beautifulobjects, and the ear in hearing harmonious sounds.~he highest function of the soul of man is the perceptlO~ of truth; i~ thi~ ~ccordingly it finds its specialdelIght. ~ven In tnfling matters, such as learningchess, this holds good; and the higher the subjectma~ter of the knowledge obtained the greater the?ellght. A man would be pleased at being admittedinto the confidence of a prime minister, but how muchmore if the king makes an intimate of him and discloses state secrets to him!

An astronomer who, by his knOWledge, can mapthe stars and describe their courses, derives morepleasur~ from. his knOWledge than the chess-playerfrom his. Seeing, then, that nothing is higher thanGod, how great must be the delight which springsfrom the true knOWledge of Him!

~ person in .wh?m the desire for this knOWledgehas dIsappeared IS like one who has lost his appetitefor. healthy food, or .who prefers feeding on clay toeating bread. All bodily appetites perish at death withthe organs they use, but the soul dies not, and retains

The Knowledege of Self

whatever knowledge of God it possesses; nay in-creases it.

An important part of our knowledge of God ar~ses

from the study and contemplation of our own bodies,which reveal to us the power wisdom, and love of theCreator. His power, in that from a mere .dro~ He h~s

built up the wonderful frame of man; HIS wlsdo~. ISrevealed in its intricacies and the mutual ~daptablhty

of its parts and His love is shown by HIS not onlysupplying such organs as are absolutely necess~ry forexistence, as the liver, the heart, and the brain, butthose which are not absolutely necessary, as the hand,the foot, the tongue, and the eye. To these l!e hasadded, as ornaments, the blackness of the hair, theredness of lips, and the curve of the eyebrows.

Man· has been truly termed a "microcos.m," orlittle world in himself and the structure of. hIS bodyshould be studied not only by those. who WIsh. to become doctors, but by those who ~Ish to attain to amore intimate knolwedge of God, Just as close studyof the niceties and shades of language in a great poemreveals to us more and more of the genius of its author.

But, when all is said, the knolwedge of the soulplays a more important part in leading to the knowledge of God than the knowledge of our body and thefunctions. The body may be compared to a steed andthe soul to its rider; the body was created for th~ soul,the soul for the body. If a man knows not hIS ownsoul which is the nearest thing to him, what is the useof h'is claiming to know others? It is as if a beggar

IL


o as no the herewithal for a meal should claim[0 be able to feed a town.

I his chapter we have attempted! in somedegree, to expound the greatness of man's soul. Hewho eglects it and suffers its capacities to rust or todegenerate must .necessarily be the loser in this worldand he ext. The true greatness of man lies in hiscapacity for e.ternal progress, otherwise .in this temporal sphere he IS the weakest of all things, being subjectto hunger, thirst! heat, cold, and sorrow. Those thingsh~ takes most delight in are often the most injurious tohim, and those things which benefit him are not to beobtained without toil and trouble. As to his intellect aslight disarrangement of matter in his brain is suffici~nt to destroy or madden him; as to his power, thesung of a wasp is sufficient to rob him of ease andsleep; as to his temper, he is upset by the loss of asixpence; as to his beauty, he is little more than nauseous matter covered with a fair skin. Without frequent washing he becomes utterly repulsive and disgraceful.

In truth, man in this world is extremely weakandcontemptible; it is only in the next that he will be ofv.alue, if by means of the "alchemy of happiness" hen~es from the rank of beasts to that of angels. OtherWise his condition will be worse than the bruteswhich perish. and turn to dust. It is necessary for him:at the sa~e time that he is conscious of his superiorityas the climax of created things, to Jearn to know alsohis helplessness, as that too is one of the keys to theknOWledge of God.

Chapter 11

THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD

I T is a well-known saying of the Proph~.t that "Hewho knows himself, knows God"; that IS, by ~on

templation of his own being and a~tributes man arnves. at some knowledge of God. But since many who con

template themselves do n~t find God, i~ follows t~at

there must be some .special way of doing s~'. As amatter of fact, there are two methods of ar~Iv~ng atthis knowledge, but one is so .abstruse that It IS n~t

adapted to ordinary intelligences, and .the.refore ISbetter left unexplained. The other method IS as follows: When· a man considers himself ~e knows .th~t

there was a time when he was non-existent, as It ISwritten in the Koran: "Does it not occur to man thatthere was a time when he was nothing? " Further, ~e

knows that he was made out of a drop of. wat~r 10

which there was neither intellect,not hearing.sight,head.hands.feet.etc, From this it is obvi~us that,wh~tever degree of perfection he may have arnv~d at,he.dienot make himself,nor can he now make a single hair.

How much more helpless, then, was his conditionwhen he was a mere drop of water! Thus: as we h~ve

seen in the first chapter, he finds in hIS own being

II

Not only are man's attributes a reflection ofGod's attributes, but the mode of existence of man's·soul affords some insight into God's mode of existence. That is to say, both God and the soul are invisible, indivisible, unconfined by space and time, andoutside the categories of quantity and quality; nor canthe ideas of shape, colour, or size attach to them.People find it hard to form a conception of such realities as are devoid of quality and quantity, etc., but asimilar difficulty attaches to the conception of oureveryday feelings, such as anger, paid, pleasure, orlove. They are thought-concepts, and cannot be cognised by the senses; whereas quality, quantity, etc.,are sense-concepts, Just as the ear cannot take cognisance of colour, nor the eye of sound, so, in conceiving of the ultimate realities, God and the soul, we findourselves in a region in which sense-concepts can bearno part. So much, however, we can see, that, as Godis Ruler of the universe, and, being Himself beyond

.space and time, quantity and quality, governs thingsthat are so conditioned, so that soul rules the body andits members, being itself invisible, indivisible, andunlocated in any special part. For how.can the indivisible be located in that which is divisible? From allthis we see how true is the saying of the Prophet,"God created man in His own likeness."

And, as .we arrive at some knowledge of God'sessence and attributes from the contemplation of thesoul's essence and attributes, so we come to understand God's method of working and government anddelegation of power to angelic forces, etc., by observ-

\L


r~ ec ed in miniature, so to speak, the power, wis-and 0 e of the Creator. If all the sages of the

wo:ld we~e assembled, and their lives prolonged foran Jn~efinIte nrne, th.ey could not effect any improvement In the construction of a single part of the body.

. For instance, in the adaptation of the front andslde-t~eth . to the mastication of food, and in the constru~tIon of ~~e tongue, salivating glands, and throatfor .ItS deglutitIon, we find a contrivance which cannotbe Impr?Ve? upon. Similarly, whoever considers hishand, v.: lth Its fiv.e .fingers of unequal lengths, four ofthem with th:ee JO~nts and the thumb with only two,and the .v:ay In which it can be used for grasping orfor carrying, or for smitting, will frankly ackn;wledge th~t no amount of human wisdom could better itby alten.ng the number and arrangement of the fingers, or In any other way.

When a man ~urther considers how his various~ants of.food, lodgIng, etc., are amply supplied fromt e :torehous~ of creation, he becomes aware that~Od s me:cy IS as ~reat as His power and wisdom as

e has HImself said, "My mercy is greater than Mwrath," and according to the Prophet's saying "GodIS m~re fe~der" to His servants ' than a mother' to hersuckltng-chIld. Thus from his Own creation man~?~S ~o know God's existence, from the wonders oft~~ odJly fram.e. God's power and wisdom, and from

ample provrsio» made for his various needs God's

klove. In this way the knOWledge of oneself becomes aey to the knOWledge of God.

The Knowledge of God 13

\~

T e Icherny of Happiness

il g a each of us go ems his own little kingdom. Toe a simple instance: SUppose a man wishes to write

the name of God. First of all the wish is conceived inhis heart. it is then conveyed to the brain by the vitalspiri s. the form of the word "God" takes shape in thehaught-chambers of the brain, thence it travels by the

nerve-channels, and sets in motion the fingers, whichin their tum set in motion the pen, and thus the name"God" is traced on paper exactly as it had been conceived in the writer's brain. Similarly, when Godwi lls a thing it appears in the spiritual plane, which inthe Koran is called "T he Throne" I; from the throne itpasses, by a spiritual current, to a lower plane called"The Chair'"; then the shape of it appears on the"Tablet of Destiny" 3; whence, by the mediation of theforces called "angels,'" it assumes actuality, and appears on the earth in the form of plants, trees, andanimals, representing the will and thought of God, asthe written letters represent the wish conceived in theheart and the shape present in the brain of the writer.

No one can understand a king but a king; therefore God has made each of us a king in miniature, soto speak, over ~ kingdom which is an infinitely.reduced copy of HIS own. In the kingdom of man God's"throne" is represented by the 'soul, the Archangel bythe heart, "the chair" by the brain, "the tablet" bythe treasure-chamber of thought. The soul, itself unlocated and indivisible, governs the body a's God gov-

I. Al Arsh.2. Al Kursi.3. Al Lauh AI Mahfuz.


ems the universe. In short , each of us is entrusted.with a little kingdom, and charged not to be careles~

in the administration of it.As regards the recongition of God's providence,

there are many degrees of Know.ledge. The mere. h ' sicist is like an ant who, crawhng o~ a sheet ?f~a~er and observing black letters spreading over It,should refer the cause to the pen alo~e. Th~ .astronomer is .like an ant of somewhat w:der VISion' ,:",hoshould catch sight of the fingers moving the pen, 1.e. ,he knows that the elements are under the 'power of thestars, but he does not know that. the stars ar~ under thepower of the angels. Thus, owm~ to the dlffere~t d~

grees of perception in people, disputes-must anse 10

tracing effects to causes. Those whose eyes never seebeyond the world of phenomena are like th?se whomistake servants ,of the lowest rank for the king. Thelaws of phenomena' must be con~ta?t. or there couldbe no such thing as science; but It IS a great error tomistake the slaves for the master.

As long as this difference in the perce~tive facultyof observers exists, disputes must necessanly go on. Itis as if some blind men, hearing that an el.eph~nt hadcome to their town, should go and examm~ It. Theonly knowledge of it which they can obtain ~om~s

through sense of touch; so one. handles the amm~l sleg, another .his tusk, another hIS ear, and, acco~dIng

to their several perceptions, pronounce It to be a column, a thick pole, or a quilt" each taking a parr forthe whole. So the physicist and astronomer con.fo~nd

the laws they perceive with the Lawgiver. A Similar

Il


rni sta e is aurib ed to Abraham in the Koran whereit is related that he turned successively to stars: moonand ~un as the objects of his worship, till grown awareof HIm Who m,ade all these, he exclaimed, "I love notthem that set. !'!~

\Ve have a 'common instance of this referring tosecond causes what ought to be referred to the FirstCause in the case of so-called illness. For instance, ifa man ceases to take any interest in worldly mattersconceives ~ distaste .for common pleasures, and ap~pears sunk In depreSSIon , the doctor will say, "This isa case. o~ melancholy, and requires such and such apreSCnptlon," The physicist will say, "This is a dryne~s of th~ brain caused by hot weather and cannot bere.lIeved. till t?e air become~ moist. n The astrologerWIll. anribute It to some particular conjunction or opPOSitIOn of planets, "Thus far their wisdom reaches "says the Koran. It does not OCCur to them that whathas really happened is this: that the Almighty has aconcern for the welfare of that man, and has thereforecommanded His servants, the planets or the elementsto produce such a condition in him that he may tur~a~ay fro~ the world to his Maker. The knowledge oft~IS fact IS a lustrous pearl from the ocean of inspirational knowledge, to which all other forms of knowledge are as islands in the sea.

~he doctor.' physicist, and astrologer are doubtless right each In his particular branch of knowledgebut they do not see that illness is, so to speak, a cord

4. Koran , chap . vi.


f love by which God draws to Himselt: the saints~oncerning whom He has said, "I was SIck and yevisited Me not." Illness itself is one of those forms ofexperience by which man arrives at. the knowle?g~ ofGod as He says by the mouth of HIS Prophet, Sickness~s themselves are My servants, and are attached toMy chosen." . .

The foregoing remarks may enable 'us to enter alittle mor.e fully into the meanin.g of ~?ose ~xclama,~tions so often on the lips of t~e Faithful: God IS"h~ly,

'Praise be to God," "There IS no god but God,. God .is great." Concerning the last we may s~y that It doesnot mean that God is greater than creanon, for creation is His manifestation as light manifests the sun,'and it would not be correct to say that the sun ISgreater than its own .light. It rather means t~a.t God'sgreatness immeasurably transcends out co~mt1ve ~ac

ulties, and that we can only form a very dIn: and l:nperfect idea of it. If a. chi~d as~s~s to expla,In to himthe pleasure which exists In wielding sovereignty, wemay say it is like the pleasure he feels 10 plaYI~g b~t

and ball, though in reality the two have nothing 10

common except that they both come un.der ~?e cat~gory of pleasure. Thus, the exclamation God ISgreat" means. that His greatness far exceed,S all ourpowers of comprehension. Moreo~er, s~ch Imperfectknowledge of God as we can attain to IS not ~ mere,speculative knowledge, but must be ~ccompanted bydevotion and worship. When a man dies he has to dowith God alone, and if we have to live with a person,our happiness entirely depends on the degree of affec-

\L


real alche ists are ery rare, and so are real Sufis. Hewho has a mere smattering of Sufism is not superioro a learned man. anymore than he who has tried afe~ experiments in alchemy has ground for despisinga rich man.

n. one who will look into the matter will see thathappiness is necessarily linked with the knowledge ofGod. Each faculty of ours delights in that for which itwas ~reated: lust delights in accomplishing desire, ange~ In taking vengeance, the eye in seeing beautifulobjects, and the ear in hearing harmonious sounds.~he highest function of the soul of man is the perceptJ o~ of truth; in this accordingly it finds its specialdelight. ~ven in trifling matters, such as learningchess. this holds good,' and the higher the subjectma~ter of the knOWledge obtained the greater the?ellght. A man would be pleased at being admittedInto the confidence of a prime minister, but how muchmore jf the king makes an intimate of him and discloses state secrets to him!

An astronomer who, by his knowledge, can mapthe stars and describe their courses, derives morepjeasur~ from . his knowledge than the chess-playerfrom his. Seeing, then, that nothing is higher thanGod, how great must be the delight which springsfrom the true knOWledge of Him!

. ~ person in .wh?m the desire for this knOWledgehas disappeared IS like one who has lost his appetitefor. healthy food, or who prefers feeding on clay toeating bread. All bodily appetites perish at death withthe organs they use, but the soul dies nor, and retains


whatever knowledge of God it possesses; nay increases it.

An important part of our knowledge of God ar~ses

from the study and contemplation of our own bodies,which reveal to us the power wisdom, and love of theCreator. His power, in that from a mere .dro~ He h~s

built up the wonderful frame of man; HIS wIsdo~ .lS

revealed in its intricacies and the mutual ~daptablhty

of its parts and His love is shown by HIS not onlysupplying such organs as are absolutely necess~ry forexistence, as the liver, the heart, and the brain, butthose which are not absolutely necessary, as the hand,the foot, the tongue, and the eye. To these J:Ie hasadded, as ornaments, the blackness of the hair, theredness of lips, and the curve of the eyebrows.

Man' has been truly termed a "microcos~," orlittle world in himself and the structure of. hIS bodyshould be studied not only by those who Wish: to become doctors, but by those who wish to attain to amore intimate knolwedge of God, just as close studyof the niceties and shades of language in a great poemreveals to us more and more of the genius of its author.

But, when all is said, the knolwedge of the soulplays a more important part in leading to the knowledge of God than the knowledge of our body and thefunctions. The body may be compared to a steed andthe soul to its rider; the body was created for the soul,the soul for the body. If a man knows not his ownsoul which is the nearest thing to him, what is the useof h'is claiming to know others? It is as if a beggar


a not the erewithal for a meal should claim£0 be able to feed a town.

In this chapter we have attempted, in somedegree, a expound the greatness of man's soul. Hewho neglects it and suffers its capacities to rust or todegenerate must necessarily be the loser in this worldand the next. The true greatness of man lies in hiscapacity for eternal progress, otherwise in this temporal sphere he is the weakest of all things, being subjectto hunger, thirst, heat, cold, and sorrow. Those thingshe takes most delight in are often the most injurious tohim, and those things which benefit him are not to beobtained without toil and trouble. As to his intellect, aslig t disarrangement of matter in his brain is sufficient 0 destroy or madden him; as to his power, thesting of a wasp is sufficient to rob him of ease andsleep; as to his temper, he is upset by the loss of asixpence; as to his beauty, he is little more than nauseous matter covered with a fair skin. Without frequent washing he becomes utterly repulsive and disgraceful.

In truth, man in this world is extremely weak andcontemptibl;; it is only in the next that he will be ofvalue, if by means of the "alchemy of happiness" herises from the rank of beasts to that of angels. Otherwise his condition will be worse than the brutes, 'which perish and turn to dust. It is necessary for him,at the same time that he is conscious of his superiorityas the climax of created things, to learn to know alsohis helplessness, as that too' is one of the keys to theknOWledge of God,

Chapter II

THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD

IT is a well-known saying of the Proph~.t that "Hewho knows himself, knows God"; that IS, by ~on

templation of his own being and a~tributes man arnves, at some knowledge of God. But smce many who con

template themselves do not find God, i: follows t~at

there must be some .special way of domg s~ .. As amatter of fact, there are two methods of ar~lv~ng atthis knowledge , but one is so .abstruse that It IS n?tadapted to ordinary intelligences, and ,the,refore ISbetter left unexplained. The other method IS as follows: When' a man considers himself he knows .th~t

there was a time when he was non-existent, as It ISwritten in the Koran: "Does it not occur to man thatthere was a time when he was nothing? " Further, ~e 'knows that he was made out of a drop ' of .wat~r 10

which there was neither intellect.not hearing.sight,head,hands,feet ,etc. From this it is obvious that,wha.tever degree of perfection he may have arriv~d at,he.didnot make himself,nor can he now make a smgle hair.

How much more helpless, then, was his conditionwhen he was a mere drop of water] Thus, as we haveseen in the first chapter, he finds in his own being

11

Not only are man's attributes a reflection ofGod's attributes, but the mode of existence of man's.soul affords some insight into God's mode of existence. That is to say, both God and the soul are invisible, indivisible, unconfined by space and time, andoutside the categories of quantity and quality; nor canthe ideas of shape, colour, or size attach to them.People find it hard to form a conception of such realities as are devoid of quality and quantity, etc., but asimilar difficulty attaches to the conception of oureveryday feelings, such as anger, paid, pleasure, orlove. They are thought-concepts, and cannot be cognised by the senses; whereas quality, quantity, etc.,are sense-concepts, Just as the ear cannot take cognisance of colour, nor the eye of sound, so, in conceiving of the ultimate realities, God and the soul, we findourselves in a region in which sense-concepts can bearno part. So much, however, we can see, that, as Godis Ruler of the universe, and, being Himself beyondspace and time, quantity and quality, governs thingsthat are so conditioned, so that soul rules the body andits members, being itself invisible, indivisible, andunlocated in any special part. For how.can the indivisible be located in that which is divisible? From allthis we see how true is the saying of the Prophet,"God created man in His own likeness."

And, as we arrive at some knowledge of God'sessence and attributes from the contemplation of thesoul's essence and attributes, so we come to understand God's method of working and government anddelegation of power to angelic forces, etc., by observ-

\L

L T e Alchemy of Happiness

e ected in miniature, so to speak, the power wisdom, and Jove of the Creator. If all the sages ~f thewO:ld we~e a~sembled, and their lives prolonged foran In~efinr te nrne, they could not effect any improvement In the construction of a single part of the body.

. For instance, in the adaptation of the front andslde-t~eth. to the mastication of food, and in the constru~tlon of ~~e tongue, salivating glands, and throatfor .ItS deglutition, we find a contrivance which cannotbe Improved upon. Similarly, whoever considers hishand. v.: ith its fiv.e fingers of unequal lengths, four of[hem with th~ee JO~nts .and the thumb with only two,~nd the ."':ay In which It can be used for grasping, orfor carrying, or for smitting, will frankly acknowledge th~t no amount of human wisdom could better itby alten.ng the number and arrangement of the fingers, or In any other way.

When a man further considers how his variouswants of. food, lodging, etc., are amply supplied fromthe ~torehous~ of creation, he becomes aware thatGod s me~cy IS as great as His power and wisdom asHe has HImself said, "My mercy is greater than My:vrath," and according to the Prophet's saying, "GodIS m~re te~der" to His servants than a mother to hersuckling-chIld. Thus from his own creation manc?mes ~o know God's existence, from the wonders ofhIS bodily fram.e. God's power and wisdom , and fromthe ample provision made for his various needs God'slove. In this way the knowledge of oneself becomes akey to the knowledge of God. .


IL

t... The Alchemy of Happiness

i 0 ow each of s governs his own little kingdom. Tote a simple instance: Suppose a man wishes to write

he name of God. First of all the wish is conceived inhis heart , it is then conveyed to the brain by the vitalspirits. the form of the word "God" takes shape in thethought-chambers of the brain, thence it travels by thenerve-channels , and sets in motion the fingers, whichin their turn set in motion the pen, and thus the name"God" is traced on paper exactly as it had been conceived in the writer 's brain. Similarly, when Godwills a thing it appears in the spiritual plane, which inthe Koran is called "The Throne'", from the throne itpasses, by a spiritual current, to a lower plane called"The ChairY: then the shape of it appears on the"Tablet of Destiny"3 ; whence, by the mediation of theforces called "angels," it assumes actuality, and appears on the earth in the form of plants, trees, andanimals, representing the will and thought of God, asthe written letters represent the wish conceived in theheart and the 8hape,present in the brain of the writer.

No one can understand a king but a king; therefore God has made each of us a king in miniature, soto speak, over a kingdom which is an infinitely .re.,duced copY' of His own. In the kingdom of man God's"throne" is represented by the soul, the Archangel bythe heart, "the chair" by the brain, "the tablet" bythe treasure-chamber of thought. The soul, itself unlocated and indivisible, governs the body a's God gov-

1. AI Arsh .2. AI Kursi .3. AI LauhAl Mahfuz.


erns the universe. In short, each of us is entrusted.with a little kingdom, and charged not to be careles~in the administration of it.

As regards the recongition of God's providence,there are many degrees of Knowledge. The merephysicist is like an ant who, crawling o~ a sheet ?fpaper and observing black letters spreading over It,should refer the cause to the pen alo~e. Th~ .astronomer is like an ant of somewhat ~Ider vlslon'~ho

should catch sight of the fingers moving the pen, i.e.,he knows that the elements are under the power of thestars, but he does not know that. the stars ar~ under thepower of the angels. Thus, owm~ to the dlffere~t d~

grees of perception in people, dlsputes:n:ust anse intracing effects to causes. Those whose ~yes never see 'beyond the world of phenomena are like those whomistake servants 9f. the lowest rank for the king. Thelaws of phenomena must be con~ta~t. or there couldbe no such thing as science; but It IS a great error tomistake the slaves for the master.

As long as this difference in the perce~tive facultyof observers exists, disputes must necessanly go on. Itis as if some blind men, hearing that an el.eph~nt hadcome to their town, should go and examme It. Theonly knowledge of it which they can obtain ~om:s

through sense of touch; so one. handles the amm~l sleg, another .his tusk, a.nother his ear, and, acco~dmg

to their several perceptions, pronounce It to be a column, a thick pole, or a quilt, each taking a parr forthe whole. So the physicist and astron?mer con.fo~nd

the laws they perceive with the Lawgiver. A Similar

- ::


mistake is attributed to Abraham in the Koran where. . 'It IS related that he turned successively to stars, moon,and ~u n as the objects of his worship, till grown awareof HIm \ ho made all these, he exclaimed, "I love notthem that set. ,, ~

We have a common instance of this referring tosecond causes what ought to be referred to the FirstCause in the case of so-called illness, For instance, ifa man ceases to take any interest in worldly matters,conceives ~ distaste .for common pleasures; and appears sunk In depression, the doctor will say, "This isa case of melancholy, and requires such and such aprescription." The physicist will say, "This is a dryness of the brain caused by hot weather and cannot bere.lieved. till t~e air becomes moist." The astrologerWill. ~ttflbu te It to some particular conjunction or opposiuon of planets. "Thus far their wisdom reaches"says the Koran. It does not occur to them that whathas really happened is this: that the Almighty has aconcern for the welfare of that man, and has thereforecommanded His servants, the planets or the elementsto produce such a condition in him that he may turnav:ay fro~ the world to his Maker. The knowledge oft~lS fact IS a lustrous pearl from the ocean of inspirational knowledge, to which all other forms of knowledge are as islands in the sea.

'~he doctor.. p~ysicist, and astrologer are doubtless fight each In his particular branch of knowledgebut they do not see that illness is, so to speak, a cord

4. Koran, chap. vi.


of love by which God draws to Himself. the saintsconcerning whom He has said, "I was Sick and yevisited Me not." Illness itself is one of those forms ofexperience by which man arrives at. the knowle~g~ ofGod, as He says by the mouth of HIS Prophet, SIcknesses themselves are My servants, and are attached toMy chosen." .

The foregoing remarks may enable us to enter alittle more fully into the meaning of those exclamations so often on the lips of the Faithful: "God is holy,"'Praise be to God," "There is no god but God," "Godis great." Concerning the last we may s~y that it doesnot mean that God is greater than creation, for creation is His manifestation as light manifests the sun ,and it would not be correct to say that the sun isgreater than its own light. It rather means t~a~ God'sgreatness immeasurably transcends out cogmuve ~aculties and that we can only form a very dim and Iffi

perfect idea of it. If a child asks us to expla~n to himthe pleasure which exists in wielding sovereignty, wemay say it is like the pleasure he feels 10 plaYI~g b~tand ball, though in reality the two have nothing 10

common except that they both come under the category of pleasure. Thus, the exclamation "God isgreat" means. that His greatness far exceed~ all ourpowers of comprehension. Moreover, such Imperfectknowledge of God as we can attain to is not a merespeculative knowledge, but must be accompanied bydevotion and worship. When a man dies he has to dowith God alone, and if we have to live with a person,our happiness entirely depends on the degree of affec-

\8 The Alchemy of Happiness

tion we feel towards him. Love is the seed of happiness, and love to God is fostered and developed byworship. Such worship and constant remembrance ofGod i ~p l ies a ~ertain degree of austerity and curbingof bodily appentes, Not that a man is intended altogether to abolish these, for then the human race wouldperish. But strict limits must be set to their indulgence. and as a man is not the best judge in his owncase as to what these limits should be, he had betterconsult some spiritual guide on the subject. Suchspiritual guides are the prophets, and the laws whichtheY.ha.ve lai? down under divine inspiration prescribethe limits which must be observed in these matters. Hewho transgresses these limits "wrongs his own soul "as it is written in the Koran. '

Notwithstanding this clear pronouncement of theKoran there are those who, through their ignorance ofGod, do transgress these limits, and this ignorancemay be due to several different causes: Firstly, thereare some who, failing to find God by observation,conclude that there is no God and that this world ofwonders ~ade itself, or . existed from everlasting.They are like a man who, seeing a beautifully writtenletter, should suppose that it had written itself withouta :v.ri ter, or had always existed. People in this state ofmind are so far gone in error that it is of little use toargue with them. Such are some of the physicists andastronomers to whom we referred above.

Some, through ignorance of the real nature of thesoul , repudiate the doctrine of a future life in whichman will be called to account and be rewarded or


punished. They regard themselves as ~o better thananimals or vegetables, and equally perishable.. Someon the other hand, believe in God and a future"lIfe b~twith a weak belief. They say to themselves, God lS

great and independent of us; our worship ?r abstinence from worship is a matter of entire mdI~ference

to Him." Their state of mind is like that of a SIck manwho, when prescribed a certain regime b~ his doct~r,

should say, "Well, if I follow it ~r don t ~ollow u,what does it matter to the doctor? It certainly doesnot matter to the doctor, but the patient may destroyhimself by his disobedience. Just as surely as unchecked sickness of body ends in bodily death, so doesuncured disease of the soul end in future misery,according to the saying of the Koran, "Only thoseshall be saved who come to God with a sound heart."

A fou rth kind of unbelievers are those who say,"The Law tells us to abstain from anger, lust, and hypocrisy. This is plainly impossible, for man is createdwith these qualities inherent in him. You,might as w.elltell us to make black white." Thesefoohsh people.ignore the fact that the law does not tell us to uprootthese passions, but to restrain them within due limit~ ,

so that, by avoiding the greater sins, we may obtainforgiveness of the smaller ones. Even the Prophet.ofGod said, "I am a man like you, and get angry likeothers"; and in the Koran it is written. "God lovesthose who swallow down their anger," not those whohave no anger at all.

A fifth class lay stress on the beneficence of God,and ignore His justice, saying to themselves, 'Well,

'. ' . . j.;.

\c


v:'hatever we do, God is merciful." They do not consider that, though God is merciful, thousands of human beings perish miserably in hunger and disease.They know that whosoever wishes for a livelihood orfor ~ea1t~, or learning, must not mercely say, "God ·ismerciful , ' but must exert himself. Although theKoran says,: ." ~yery livin,g creature's support comesfrom God, .". IS ~lso wntte~, "Man obtains nothingexcept by stn.vmg. The fact IS, such teaching is reallyf~om the devil, and such people only speak with theirlips and not with their heart. .

A sixth class claim to have reached such a degreeof sanctity that sin cannot affect them. Yet, if youtreat one ~f them with disrespect, he will bear agrud~e against you for years, and if one of them bedeprived of a morsel of food which he thinks his duethe w~ole world will appear dark and narrow to him:Even If any of t?em do really conquer their passions,they have no :Ight to make such a claim, for theprophets, the highest of human kind, constantly confessed and bewailed their sins. Some of them had such .a ,dread of sin that they even abstained from lawfulthings; thus , it is related of the Prophet that, one day,~hen a date had been brought to him he would not eatIt" as he was not sure that it had been lawfully obtame? Wherea~ these free-livers will swallow gallonsof wine and claim (I shudder as I write) to be superiorto the P:ophe~ whose sanctity was endangered by adate, while theirs is unaffected by all that wine! Surelythey , ~eserve that the devil should drag them down toperdition. Real saints know that he who does not


master his appetites does not' deserve the n~me of aman, and that the true Moslem is one who Will cheerfully acknowledge the limits -irnposed by the. Law. I:Iewho endeavours, on whatever pretext, to Ignore itsobligations is ' certainly under Satanic influence, andshould be talked to, not with a pen, but with a sword.These pseudo-mystics sometimes pretend to bedrowned in a sea of wonder, but if you ask them whatthey are wondering at they do not know. They shouldbe told to wonder as much as they please, but at thesame time to remember that the Almighty is theirCreator and that they are His servants.

Chapter III

THE Kt'\!OWLEDGE OF rnrs WORLD

THI~ ~orld is a ~tage or market place passed bypilgrims OR their way to the next. It is here that

they are to provide themselves with provisions for theway; or , to put it plainly, man acquires here by theuse of his bodily senses, some knowledge of the worksof Grad, and.. rh rou~ therr:, of God Himself, the sightof' whom, Will constitute his future beatitude. It is forthe acquirement of this knowledge that the spirit ofman has des~ended into this world of water and clay.~s lon,g as his senses remain with him he is said to be

In .thIs w?rld"; whe~ they depart, and only his essential attributes remain, he is said to have gone to"the next world." .

While.man is in this world, two things are necessary for him: first, the protection and nurture of hissoul; secon~ly, the care and nurture of his body. Theproper nourishment of the soul, as above shown,is theknowledge an.d love of God, and to be absorbed in thelove of anything but God is the ruin of the soul. Thebody, ·so to speak, is simply the riding-animal of thesoul and perishes while the soul endures. The soulshould take care of the body, just as a pilgrim on hisv.:ay .to Makkah. takes care of his camel; but if thepilgrim spends his whole ~ime in feeding and adorningh(~ cam~l, !he caravan will leave him behind, and heWIll perish In the desert.

22

The Knowledge of this World 23

Man's bodily needs are simple, being comprisedunder three heads: food, clothing, and a dwellingplace; but the bodily desires which were implanted inhim with a view fO procuring these are apt to rebelagainst reason, which is of later growth than they.Accordingly, as we saw above, they require to becurbed and restrained by the divine laws promulgatedby the prophets.

Considering the world with which we have for arime to do, we find it divided into three departments-animal, vegetable, and mineral. The products of allthree are continually needed by man and have givenrise to three principal occupations-vthose of theweaver, the builder, and the worker in metal . These,again, have many subordinate branches, such as tailors, masons, smiths, etc. None can be quite independent of others; this gives rise to various businessconnections and relations and those too frequentlyafford occasions, for hatred, envy, jealousy, and othermaladies of the soul. Hence come quarrels and strife,and the need of political and civil government andknowledge of law.

Thus the occupations and businesses of the worldhave become more and more complicated and troublesome, chiefly owing to the fact that men have forgotten that their real necessities are only three--c1othing,food, and shelter, and that these exist only with theobject of making the body a fit vehicle for the soul inits journey towards the next world. They have falleninto the same mistake as the pilgrim to Makkah, mentioned above, who, forgetting the object of his

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pilgrimage and himself, should spend his whole timei feeding and adorning his camel. Unless a manmaintains the strictest watch he is certain to be fascinated and entangled by the world, which, as theProphet said, is "a more potent sorcerer than Harutand Marut."'

The deceitful character of the world comes out inthe following ways. In the first place, it pretends thatit will always remain with you, while, as a matter offact, it is slipping away from you, moment by moment, arid bidding .you farewell, like a shadow whichsee~s stationary, but is actually always moving.Again, the world presents itself under the guise of aradiant but immoral sorceress, pretends to be in lovewith 'you, fo~dles you, and then goes off to yourenemies, leaving you to die of chagrin and despair.Jesus (upon whom be peace!) saw the world revealedin the form of an ugly old hag. He asked her howmany husbands she had possessed; she replied thatthey were countless. He asked whether they had diedor been divorced; she said that she had slain them all...I marvel," he said, "at the fools who see what yonhave done to others, and still desire you."

. This Sorceress decks herself out in gorgeous andJewelled apparel and veils her face. Then she goes

. forth to seduce, men, too many of whom follow her totheir own destruction. The Prophet has said that on theJudgment Day the world will appear in the form of ahideous witch with green eyes and projecting teeth.

1. .Two fallen angels.

The Knowledge of thisWorld 25

Men, beholding her, will say, "Me.rc~ on us! who isthis?" The angels will answer, "ThIS IS the wo~ld forwhose sake you quarrelled and fought and eI?bItteredone another's lives." Then she will be cast into hell,whence she will cry out, "0 Lord! where are those,my former lovers? God will then command that theybe cast after her.

Whoever will seriously contemplate the pasteternity during which the world ~as ~ot i.n existence,and the future eternity during WhICh It ~lll n~t be mexistence, will see that it is essentially like a Journey,in which the stages are represented by years, theleagues by months, the miles by days, and the steps bymoments. What words, then, can picture the folly ofthe man who endeavours to make it his perman~ntabode, and forms plans ten years ahead re~ardmg ·things he may never need, seeing that very possibly hemay be under the ground in ten days!

Those who have indulged without limit in thepleasures of the world, at the .time of death ~ill belike a man who has gorged himself to repletion ondelicious viands and then vomits them up. The deliciousness has gone, but the .disgrace .remains. Thegreater the abundance of the possessions which theyhave enjoyed in the shape of gardens, male and fema~eslaves, gold, silver, etc., the more keenly. t~ey w~llfeel the bitterness of parting from them. ThIS IS a ~ltterness which will outlast death, for the soul WhIChhas contracted covetousness as a fixed habit will necessarily in the next world suffer from the pangs ofunsatisfied desire. .

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A other dangerous property of worldly things isth~the at first appe~ as. more trifles, but each of

. so-:ca led rri rles branches out into COuntlessrem l,fi~tlons until they .swallow up the whole of am~ s" time and energy. Jesus (on whom be peace!)said, Th.e lover of the wo~ld is like a man drinkingsea-wa.ter, the more h~ dnnk~, the more thirsty hegets, till at last-. he perishes wah thirst unquenched."The Prophet saI~, "You can no more mix with thewo:ld without being contaminated by it than you cango Into water without getting wet. " .

The world is like a table spread for successiver~lays o~ guests who come and go. There are gold ands l ~ver dishes, abundance of food and perfumes. TheWIse guest eats as much as is sufficient for him smells~he perfu mes, thanks his host, and departs. The fool Ish guest, on the other hand, tries to carry off some ofthe gold, and silver dishes, only to find them wrenchedout o~ his hands and himself thrust forth, disappointedand disgraced.

We may close these illustrations of the deceitfulness of the ~orld w~th the following short parable.Suppose a ship to arrrve at a certain well wooded isl~d. The :apt;ain of the ship tells the passengers hewil! stop a few hours there, and that they can go onshore for a short time, but warns them not to delaytoo lo~g. ~ccordingly the passengers disembark andstroll In different directions. The wisest howeverreturn after a short time, and, finding the ~hip empty:choose the most comfortable places in it. A secondband of the passengers spend a somewhat longer time

The Knowledge of this World 27

on the island, admiring the foliage of the trees andlistening to the song of the birds. Coming on bo~rd,

they find the best places in the ship already occupied,and have to content themselves with the less comfortable ones. A third party wander still farther, and,finding some brilliantly coloured. stones.. carry themback to the ship. Their lateness In corrung on boardcompels them to stow themselves away in the lowerparts of the ship, where they find th~ir lo~d.s of stones,which by this time have lost all their brtlhanc~, ve~y

much in their way. The last group go so far In theirwanderings that they get quite out of reach of thecaptains's voice calling them to come on board, and atlast he has to sail away without them. They .wanderabout in a hopeless condition and finally either perishof hunger or fall a prey to wild beasts.

The first group represents the faithful who keepaloof from the world altogether and the last group theinfidels who care only for this world and nothing forthe next. The two intermediate classes are those who

. preserve their faith, but entangle themselves more orless with the vanities of things present.

Although we have said so much against the world,it must be remembered that there are some things inthe world which are not of it, such as knowledge andgood .deeds. A man carries what knowledge hepossesses with him into the next world, and, thoughhis good deeds have passed, yet the effect of themremains in his character. Especially is this the casewith acts of devotion, which result in the perpetualremembrance and love of God. These are among

T e Ichemy of Happiness'

"th se good things" which, as the Koran says, "passo a fa .:

?ther good things there are in the world, such asmarn age, food , clothing, etc., which a wise man usesjust in proportion as they help him to attain to the next~vor l d . Other th1ngs which engross the mind, causingJt to cleave to this world and to be careless of the nextare purely evil and were alluded to by the Prophe~whe he said, "The world is a curse, and all which isin it is a curse, except the remembrance of God and(hat which aids it. ., ,

Chapter IVTHE KNOWLEDGE OF THE NEXT WORLD

As REGARDS the joys of heaven.and the pains ?fhell which will follow this life, all believers In

the Koran and the Traditions are sufficiently informed. But it often escapes them that there is also aspiritual heaven and hell, concerning the former ofwhich God said to His Prophet, "Eye hath not seen,nor ear heard, neither hath it entered into the heart of ,man to conceive the things which are prepared for therighteous." In the heart of the en.li.ghtened man.t?ere ,is a window opening on the realities of the spiritualworld, so that he knows, not by hearsay or traditionalbelief but be actual experience; what producesI,

wretchedness or happiness, in thesoul just as clearlyand decidedly as the physician knows what producessickness or health in the body. He recognises thatknowledge of God and worship are medicinal, andthat ignorance and sin are deadly poisons for the ~oul.

Many even so-called "learned" men, from ?hnd!yfollowing 'others' opinions have no real certainty In

their beliefs regarding the happiness or misery ofsouls in the next world, but he who will attend to thematter with a mind unbiassed by prejudice will arriveat clear convictions on this matter.

The effect of death on the composite nature of29

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man is as follows: Man has two souls, an animal souland a s i itual soul, which latter is of angelic nature.The seat of the animal soul is the heart, from whichthis soul issues like a subtle vapour and pervades allthe members of the body, giving the power of sight tothe eye, the power of hearing to the ear,. and to everymem?er the faculty of performing its own appropriatefunctions. It may be compared to a lamp carried aboutwithin a cottage; the light of which falls upon thewal ls wherever it goes. The heart is the wick of thislamp, and when the supply of oil is cut off for anyreason, the lamp dies. Such is the death of the animalsoul. With the spiritual, or human soul, the case isdifferent. It is, indivisible, and by it man knows God.It is. so to speak, the rider of the animal soul andwhen that perishes it still remains, but is like a horseman who has been dismounted, or like a hunter whohas lost his weapons. That steed and those weaponsw~re granted the human soul that by means of them itrnlght pursue and capture the Phoenix of the love andknowled~e of God. If it has effected that capture, it isnot a grief ?ut rather a relief to be able to lay thoseweapons aside, and to dismount from that wearysteed. Therefore the Prophet said, "Death is a welcome gift' of God to the believer." But alas for that~oul which loses its steed and hunting weapons before~t has ~ptured the prize! Its misery and regret will beindescribable.

. A !it~le further consideration will show how en-tirely dIstm~t the human soul is from the body and itsmembers. LImb after limb may be paralyzed and cease

Knowledge of the Next World 31

working, but the individuality of the soul is u.nimpaired. Further, the body which you ?ave now l~ nolonger the body which you had as c~ll~, bU~ enttr~lydifferent, yet your person~lity. now IS Identical. withyour personality then. It IS, therefore, 7asy to c~n

ceive of it as persisting when th~ body !s done w!thaltogether, along with its essential attributes whichwere independent of the body, such as the kn0v:ledgeand love of God. This is the me~in} of t~at .saymg of

. the Koran, "The good things abide. But If, mst~ad.ofcarrying away with you knowledge, .you depart .m Ignorance of God, this ignorance also IS an essential attribute, and will abide as darkness of soul :nd the se~d

of misery. Therefore the ~orcu: says, He .who ISblind in this life will be bhnd m the next life, andastray from the path."

The reason of the human spirit seeking to returnto that upper world is that its origin was from thence,and that it is-of angelic nature. It was sent down into

. this lower sphere against its will to acquire knowledgeand experience, as God said in the Koran: "G? downfrom hence all of you; there will come to you mstruction from Me, and they who obey. the in~t~ction n~ednot fear, neither shall they be grieved, The verse, ."I breathed into man of My spirit," also points to thecelestial origin of the human soul. Just as the health ofthe animal soul consists in the equilibrium of its component parts, and this equilibrium is restored, whenimpaired, by appropriate medicine, so. ~he. j health.ofthe human soul consists in a moral equilibrium which


IS ain. 'ned and repaired, when needful, by ethicallOS c on an moral precepts.

As regards its future existence, we have alreadyseen that the human soul is essentially independent ofthe body, All objections to its existence after deathbased on the supposed necessity of its recovering itsfo~er body fall , therefore, to the ground. Some theologians have supposed that the human soul is annihilated after death and then restored, but this is contraryboth to the reason and to the Koran. The former shows~s that death does not destroy the essential individualtty of a man, and the Koran says, "Think not thatthose who .are sl~i~ i~ th~ path of God are dead; nay,they.are alive, rejoimng 10 the presence of their Lord,an,d l.n the grace bestowed on them," Not a word issaI.d 10 th~ ~w about any of the dead, good or bad,bemg, annihilated. Nay, the Prophet is said to havequestioned the spirits of slain infidels as to whetherthey had found the punishments, with which he hadthreaten.ed them, real or not. When his followersaske.d hI~ what was the good of questioning them, hereplied, They hear my words better than you do."

Some Sufis have had the unseen world of heavenand hell revealed to them when in a state of death-liketrance. On their recovering consciousness their facesbetray th~ nature of the revelations they have had bymarks of JOY 0: terror. But no visions are necessary toprove what WIll o:cur to. every thinking man, thatv.:hen de~th has stripped him for his senses and lefthim nothmg but his bare personality, if while on earthhe has too closely attached himself to objects per-


ceived by the senses, such as wives, children, wealth,lands slaves male and female, etc., he must necessarily suffer' when bereft of those obj~cts. Wherea~,on the contrary, if he has as far as poss~ble turned hISback on all earthly objects and fixed hIS supreme affection upon God, he will welcome death as a me~nsof escape from worldly ental1gl~ments, and of umo,nwith Him whom he loves. In his case the Prophet ssayings will be verified: "Death is a bridge whi.chunites friend to friend," and "The world IS a paradIsefor infidels, but a prison for the faithful."

On the other hand, the pains which souls sufferafter death all have their' source in excessive love ofthe world. The Prophet said that every unbeliever,after death, will be tormented by ninety-nine snakes,each having nine heads. Some simple-minded peoplehave examined the unbelievers' graves and wonderedat failing to see these snakes. They do not understandthat these snakes have their" abode within the unbeliever's spirit, and that they existed in him even beforehe died, for they were his own evil qualities symbolised,such as jealousy, hatred, hypocrisy, pride, deceit,etc., everyone of which springs, directly or remotely,from love of the world. Such is the doom of thosewho, in the words of the Koran, "set their hearts onthis world rather than on the next." If those snakeswere merely external they might hope to escape theirtorment, if it were but for a moment; but, being theirown inherent attributes,how can they escape?

Take, for instance, the case of a man who hassold a slave-girl without knowing how much he was

IL

3d. The Alchemy of Happiness

attached to her till she is quite out of his reach. Thenh~ 10 e o~' her•. hitherto dormant. wakes up in him

\ .I h ~uch imensuy as to amount to torture, stinginghim like a snake, so that he would fain, cast himselfinto fire or water to escape it. Such is the effect oflove of the world, which those who have it oftensuspect not till the world is taken from them. and thenthe torment of vain longing is such that they wouldgladly exchange it for any number of mere externalsnakes and scorpions.

Every sinner thus carries with him into the worldbeyond death the instruments of his own punishment;and the Koran says truly, "Verily you shall see hell'you shall see it with the eye of certainty," and "hel!surrounds the unbelievers." It does not say "will sur-round them" .for it is round them even now. .

Some may object, "If such is the case, then whocan escape hell, for who is not more or less bound tothe world by various ties of affection and interest?"To. this we answer -that there are some, notably thefaqirs, who have entirely disengaged themselves fromlove of .the world. But even among those who haveworldly possessions such as wife, children, houses,etc.: there"are those, who, though they have some affection for these, love God yet more. Their case is!ike th~t of a '~an who, though he may have a dwell109 which he is fond of in one city, when he is calledb~ the king to take up a post of authority in anotherCity ~ does so ,gladly, as the post of authority is dearerto him than hIS former dwelling. Such are many of theprophets and saints.


Others there are, and a great number, who havesome love to God but the love of the world so preponderates in them that they will have to suffer a good.deal of pain after death before they are thoroughlyweaned from it. Many profess to l~ve Go~, but a manmay easily test him~elf ?y .watchIng which way ·thebalance of his affection inclines when the ~omm~nds

of God come into collision with some..of hIS d~slres.

The profession of love to God whi,ch i~ insufficient torestrain from disobedience to God tsa he.

We have seen above that one kind of spiritual ~ell

is the forcible separation from worldly things to w.hl~h

the heart cleaves too fondly. Many carry about withinthem the germs of such a hell without ?eing aware ofit; hereafter they will feel like some king who, afterliving in luxury, has been dethroned and made .alaughing-stock. The second kind of spiritual hell IS

that of shame, when a man wakes up to see the nat~re

of the actions he committed in their naked realtty.Thus he who slandered will see himself in the guise ofa cannibal eating his dead brother's flesh, and he ~hoenvied as one who cast stones against a wall, whichstones, rebounding, put out the eyes of his own children.

This species of hell, i.e. of shame, may- be symbolised by the following short parable: Suppo.se acertain king.has been celebrating his son's ~arrlage.

In the evening the young man goes off WIth somecompanions and presently returns to the palace (a~ hethinks) intoxicated. He enters a chamber where a lightis burning and lies down, as he supposes, by his bride.

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I the m? ning,. when soberness returns, he is aghasto find himselr In a mortuary of fire worshippers, his

couch a bier, and the form which he mistook for thatof his bride the corpse of an old woman beginning todecay. On emerging from the mortuary with hisgarments all soiled, what is his shame to see hisfather, the King, approaching with a retinue ofsoldiers. Such is a feeble picture of the shame thosewill feel in the next world who in this have greedilyabandoned themselves to what they thought were delights.

The third spiritual hell is that of disappointmentand failure to reach the real objects of existence. Manwas intended to mirror forth the light of the knowledge of God, but if he arrives in the next world withhis soul thickly coated with the rust of sensual indulgence he will entirely fail of the object for which hewas made. His disappointment may be figured in thefollowing way: Suppose a man is passing with somecompanions through a dark wood. Here and there,glimmering on the ground, lie variously colouredstones. His companions collect and carry these andadvise him to do the same. "For," say the, "we haveheard that these stones will fetch a high price in theplace whither we are going." He on the other hand,laughs at them and calls them fools for loading themselves in the vain hope of gain, While he walks freeand unencumbered. Presently they.emerge into the fuIJdaylight and find that these coloured stones are rubies ,emeralds, and other jewels of priceless value. Theman's disappointment and chagrin at not having


gathered some when so easily ~ithin his rea~h my bemore easily imagined than descnbed. SUCh. will be ~he

remorse of those hereafter, who, ~hIle paSSl?gthrough this world, have been at no pam~ ~o acquirethe jewels of virtue and the treasures of religion.

. This journey of man through the world ~y bedivided into four stages-the .sensuous, the exp~rlI.nen

tal, the instinctive, the rational. In the first he IS like amoth which, though it has si~ht, has no memory, and

. will singe itself again and agam at th~ same ~ndle. Inthe second stage he is like a dog w~lch, havm~ oncebeen beaten, will run away at the Sight of a stick.. Inthe third he is like a horse 9r a sheep, both of whl~h

instinctively fly at the sight of a lion or a wolf, theirnatural enemies, while they will not fly from a cam~1

or a buffalo, though these last are much greater .Insize. In the fourth stage man altogether transcends thelimits of the animals and becomes capable, to so~e

extent, of foreseeing and providing for the future: HISmovements at first may be compared to ordinarywalking on iand, then to traversing the sea in a sh~p,then, on the fourth plane, where he is ~onversant wl~h

realities, to walking on . the sea, while beyond thisplane there is a fifth, known to the prophets ~nd '

saints, whose progress may be compared to flyingthrough the air.

Thus man is capable of existing on several different planes, from the animal to the angelic. and precisely in this lies his danger, i.e., of falling to the very

. lowest. In the Koran it is written, "We proposed theburden ti.e., responsibility or free-will) (to the heav-

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ens and e e~rth and the mountains, and they refusedo u~de.rtake It. But man took it upon himself: Verily

he IS Ign?rant.·', Neither animals nor angels canchange their appointed rank and place. But man maySInk t.o the am.mal or soar to the angel, and this is themeaning of his undertaking that "burden" of whichthe.K~ran speaks. The majority of men choose to remain In the two lower stages mentioned above andt~ e s.tationary are always hostile to the travelle'rs orpilgrims, whom they far out-nu mber.

. .Many of the former class, having no fi xed convl c ~lons about the future world, when mastered bytheir sens~a l appetites, deny it altogether. They sayth~t hell IS merely an invention of theologians tofrighten peopl~ , and they regard theologians themselves wI th, th l,nl y .veiled contempt. To argue withfools of this kind IS of very little use. This muchhowever, may be said to such a man, with the possiblere~uJt of making his pause and reflect: "Do you reallythink that the hundred and twenty-four thousand 'prophets and saints who bel ieved in the futu re lifewer~ all ,~ron g, and you are right in denying it? " If herepl ies. Yes! I am as sure as I am that two are morethan one, th~,t there is no soul and no future life of joyand penalty, t~en the case of sucha man is hopeless;all one can do IS to leave him alone, remembering theword~ of the Koran , "Though thou call them to instruction, they will not be instructed."

I. The number of prophets according to Muhammadan tradition.


But, should he say that a future life is possible butthat the doctrine is so involved in doubt and mysterythat it is impossible to decide whether it be true ornot, then one may say to him: "Then you had bettergive it the benefit of the doubt! Suppose you are aboutto eat food and someone tells you a serpent has spatvenom on it, you would probably refrain and ratherendure the pangs of hunger than eat it, though yourinformant may be in jest or lying. Or suppose you areill and a charm-writer says, 'Give me a rupee and I .will write a charm which you can tie round your neckand which will cure you, ' you would probably givethe rupee on the chance of deriving benefit from thecharm. Or if an astrologer says, 'When the moon hasentered a certain constellation, drink such and such amedicine, and you will recover, ' though you mayhave very little faith in astrology, you very likelywould try the experiment on the chance. that he mightbe right. And do you not think that reliance is as well

. placed on the words of all the prophets, saints, andholy men , convinced as they were of a future life, ason the promise o f a charm-writer or an astrologer?People take perilous voyages in ships for the sake ofmerely probable profit, and will you not suffer a littlepain of abstinence now for the sake of eternal joyhereafter? " .

The Lord Ali once, in arguing with an unbeliever,said, "If you are right, then neither of us will be inthe worse in the future, but if we are right, then weshall escape, and you will suffer." This he said notbecause he himself was in any doubt, but merely to

L

40 The Alchem- of Happiness

I axe an i ~p r~ss i on on the unbeliever. From all that~ ha e sa~ d H fo Jows that 'man's chief business in

this world IS to prepare for the next. Even if he isdoubtfu l about a.future existence, reason suggests thathe shou ld,act as If there were one, considering the treme~dou s Is~ues at stake. Peace be on those who followthe mstrucnont '

Chapter V

CONCERNING MUSIC AND DANCINGAS AIDS TO THE RELIGIOUS LIFE

T HE heart of man has been so constituted by theAlmighty that, like a flint, it contains a hidden

fire which is evoked .by music and harmony, and ren-o ders man beside himself with ecstasy. These harmo

nies are echoes of that higher world of beauty whichwe call the world of spirits; they remind man of hisrelationship to that world, and produce in him anemotion so deep and strange that he himself is powerless to explain it. The effect of music and dancing isdeeper in proportion as the natures on which they actare simple and prone to emotion; they fan into a flamewhatever love is already dormant in the heart, whetherit be earthly and sensual, or divine and spiritual.

Accordingly there has been much dispute amongtheologians as to the lawfulness of music and dancingregarded as religious exercises. One sect, the Zahirites,' holding that God is altogether incommensurablewith man, deny the possibility of man's really feelinglove to God, and say that he can only love those of hisown species. If he does feel what he thinks is love tohis,Creator they say it is a mere projection, or shadowcast by his own fantasy, or a reflection of love to the~ ....the ~o - 4 Ishall esc,because hrL"h-..--,,------------

tutsiders.


creature; music and dancing, according to them haveonly to do 'with creature love, and are therefo~e unlawful as religious exercises. If we ask them what isthe meaning of that "love to God" which is enjoinedby the religious law, they reply that it means obedience and worship. This is an error which we hope toconfute in a later chapter dealing with the love ofGod. At present we content ourselves with saying thatmusic and dancing do not put into the heart what isnot there already, but only fan into a flame dormantemotions. Therefore if a man has in his heart that loveto God which the law enjoins, it is perfectly lawful,nay, laudable in him to take part in exercises whichpromote it. On the other hand, if his heart is full ofsensual desires, music and dancing will only increasethem and are therefore unlawful for him. While, if helistens to them merely as a matter of amusement, theyare neither lawful nor unlawful, but indifferent. Forthe mere fact that they are pleasant does not makethem unlawful anymore than the pleasure of listeningto the singing of birds or looking at green grass andrunning water is unlawful. The innocent character ofmusic and dancing, regarded merely as a pastime, isalso corroborated by an authentic tradition which wehave from the Lady Ayesha.iwho narrates: "One festival-day some negroes were performing in a mosque.The Prophet said to me, 'Do you wish to see them?' Ireplied, ' 'Yes.' Accordinly he lifted me up with hisown blessed hand, and I looked on so long that he said

2. Muhammad's favourite wife.

Concerning Music and Dancing 43

more than once, 'Haven't you had enough'?" Anothertradition from the Lady Ayesha is as follows: Onefestival day two girls came to my ?ouse and began toplay and sing. The Prophet came ill and lay down onthe couch turning his face away. Pres~ntly Abu ~akrentered and seeing the girls playing, exclaimed,

, 'h 'h "'What! the pipe of Satan ill the Pro~ et ,s ouse.Whereupon the Prophet turned and said, Let themalone, Abu Bakr, for this is a festival-day.'''

Passing over the cases where music and <ia?cing/ rouse into a flame evil desires already dormant m the

heart we come to those cases where they are quitelawful. Such are those of the pilgrims who ~elebratethe glories of the House of God at. M~kkah m song,and thus incite others to goon pilgrimage. and ,ofminstrels whose music and songs stir up martialardour in the breasts of their auditors and incite theJ?to fight against infidenls. Similarly,. mournful ~~SICwhich excites sorrow for sin and failure m rehgi~uslife is lawful; of this nature was the mUSiC of DaVId.But dirges which increase sorrow for the dead a~e notlawful for it is written in the Koran, "Despair notover what you have lost." On the other hand" j~yfulmusic at weddings and feasts and on such occaSions asa circumcision or the return from a journey is lawful.

We come now to the purely religious use of mus~cand dancing: such is that of the Sufis who by thismeans stir up in themselves greater !ove ~~wards .~od,and, by means of music, often obtain spiritual VISions

3. Subseuently the first caliph.


ecstasies, their heart becoming in this condition asclean as silver in 'the flame of a fumance and attain-I ,

109 a degree of purity which could never be attainedby any amount of mere outward austerities. The Sufithen becomes so keenly aware of his relationship tothe spiritual world that he loses all consciousness ofthis world, and.often falls down senseless.

It is not, however, lawful for the aspirant toSufism to take pan in this mystical dancing withoutthe permission of his "Pir , " or spiritual director. It isrelated of the Sheikh Abu'l Qasim Girgani that, whenone of his disciples requested leave to take part insuch a dance, he said, "Keep a strict fast for threedays; then let them cook for you tempting dishes; if~h:n , you ~till. prefer the 'dance,' you may take part inIt. The disciple, however, whose heart is not thoroughly pu.rged from earthly desires, though he may 'have obtained some glimpse of the mystics' path,should be forbidden by his director to take part insuch dances, as they will 'do him more harm thangood.

Those who deny the reality of the ecstasies andoth~r spiritual experi~nces of the Sufis merely betraytheir OWIl' narrow-mIndedness and shallow insight.Some allowance, however, must be made for themfor. it is as difficult to believe in the reality of states ofw?lch one has no personal experience as it is for ablind .man . to under~tand the pleasure of looking atgreen grass and runrnng water, or for a child to comprehend the pleasu.re of exercising sovereignty. A wiseman though he himself may have no .experience of


those siates, will not therefore deny their. reality, forwhat folly can be greater than his ~ho demes the reality of a thing merely because he himself .has not experienced it! Of such people it is written 10 th,e ~or.an,"Those who have not the guidance will say, This IS amanifest irnposture. :"

As regards the erotic poetry which is. recited inSufi gatherings, and to which people sometlm~s makeobjection, we must remember th~t, when In s~ch

poetry mention is made of separation from or umonwith the beloved, the Sufi, who is an adept in the loveof God, applies such expressions to separation from orunion with Him. Similarly, "dark locks" are taken tosignify the darkness of unbelief; "the brightness of t~e

face," the light of faith, and drunkenness of the ~ufi secstasy. Take, for instance, the verse;Thou may'st measure out thousands of measures of wine,But., till thou drink it, no joy is thine., .

By this the writer means that the true delig~ts of r~lig

ion cannot be reached by way of formal Instruction,but by felt attraction and desire. ~ man may. con~ersemuch and write volumes concermng love, faith, piety,and so forth, and blacken paper to any extent, but tillhe himself possesses these attributes all this will dohim no good. Thus, those who find fault with theSufis for being powerfully affected, even to ecstasy,by these and similar verses, are merely shaIIow anduncharitable. Even camels are sometimes so powerfully affected by the Arab songs of their driv~rs thatthey will run rapidly, bearing heavy burdens, still theyfall down in a state of exhaustion.

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~ Sufi h~rer , however, is. in danger of blasphemy If he applies some of the verses which he hearsto God. For instance, if he hears such a vese as "Thouart changed from thy former inclination " he must notapply it to God, who cannot change, but to himselfand his own variations of mood. God is like the sunwhich is always shining, but sometimes for us Hislight is eclipsed by some object which intervenes between us and Him.

Regarding some adepts it is related that they attainto such a degree of ecstasy that they lose themselves inGcd.Such was the case with Sheikh Abu'l HassanNun, who, on hearing a certain verse, fell into an ecstatic condition, and, coming into a field full of stalksof newly cut sugar-canes, ran about till his feet werewounded and bleeding, and, not long afterwards, expired. In such cases some have supposed that thereo~curs an actual descent of Deity into humanity, butthlS, would be as great a mistake as that of one who,having for the first time seen his reflection in amirror, shou.ld suppose that, somehow or other, hehad becom~ InCorporated with the mirror, or that thered-~~d-~1J.Ite hues which the mirror reflects werequalities inherent in it.

The sta~es of ecstasy into which in the Sufis fallvary accordIng to the emotions which predominate inthem--love, fear, desire, repentance, etc. These statesas we have !TIentioned above, are often the result notonly of heann? verses of the Koran, but erotic poetry.Some have objected to the reciting of poetry, as wellas of the Koran, on these occaisions; but it should be


remembered that all the verses of the Koran are notadapted to stir the emotions--such, for instan~e, as thatwhich commands that a man should leave his motherthe sixth part of his property and his sister the half, orthat which orders that a widow must wait four mon.thsafter the death of her husband before becomingespoused to another man. The natures w?ich can bethrown into religious ecstasy by the recital of suchverse are peculiarly sensitive and very rare.

Another reason for the use of poetry as well as ofthe Koran on these occasions is that people are sofamiliar with the Koran, many even knowing it byheart, that the effect of it has been dul~ed by constantrepetition. One cannot be always quotmg new versesof the Koran as one can of poetry. Once, when somewild Arabs were hearing the Koran for the first. timeand were strongly moved by it, Abu Bakr said tothem "We were once like you, but our hearts havegrow~ hard," meaning t?~t the.Ko~an loses some ofits effect on those familiar WIth It. For the samereason the Caliph Omar used to command the pilgrimsto Makkah to leave it quickly. "For," he said, "I fearif you grow too familiar with the Holy City the awe ofit will depart from your hearts." .

There is, moreover, something pertaining to thelight and frivolous, at least in the eyes of the commonpeople, in the use of singing any musical instruments,such as the pipe and drum, and it is not befitting ~hat

the majesty of the Koran should be, even temporarily,associated with these things. It is related of theProphet that once, when he. entered the house of

i1.


Rabia, the daughter of Muaz, some singing-girls whoe e there began extemporising in his honour. He

abruptly bade them cease, as the praise of the Prophetwas too sacred a theme to be treated in that way.There is also some danger, if verses of the Koran areexclusively used, that the hearers should attach tothem some private interpretation of their own, and thisis unlawful. On the other hand, no harm attaches tointerpreting lines of poetry in various ways, as it isnot necessary to apply to a poem the same meaningwhich the author had.

Other features of these mystic dances are the bodily contortions and tearing of clothes with which theyare sometimes accompanied. If these are the result ofgenuine ecstatic conditions there is nothing to be saidagainst them, but if they are self-conscious and deliberate on the part of those who wish to appear"adepts, "then they are merely acts of hypocrisy. In any case themore perfect adept is he who controls himself till he isabsolutely obliged to give vent to his feelings. It isrelat~d of a certain youth who was a disciple of SheikhJunaid that, on hearing singing commence in an assembly of the Sufis, he could not restrain himself butbegan to-shriek in ecstasy. Junaid said to him, "Ii youd~ that again, don't remain in my company." Afterthis the youth used to restrain himself on such occasions, ~ut at last one day his emotions were so powerfully stirred that, after long and forcible represessionof them, he uttered a shriek and died.

To conclude,: in holding these assemblies, regardmust be had .to time and place, and that no spectators


come from unworthy motives. Those who participatein them should sit in silence, not looking at one another, but keeping their heads bent, as at prayer, and "concentrating their minds on God. Each should watchfor whatever may be revealed to his own heart, .andnot make any movements from mere se~~-consclousimpulse. But if anyone of them stands up in a. stat~ ofgenuine ecstasy all the rest should stand up With him,and if anyone's turban falls off the others should alsolay their turbans down. . .

Although these matters are comparative noveltiesin Islam and have not been 'received from the firstfollowers of the Prophet, we must remember that .allnovelties are not forbidden, but only those WhIChdirectly contravene the Law. For. i~stance, . the"Tarawih," or night prayer, was first Instituted by theCaliph Omar. The Prophet said, Live with each ~3:n ,according to his habits and disposition" therefore It ISright to ,fall in with usages that pleas~ people, whennon conformity would vex them. It IS true that the

.Companions were not in the habit.o! rising. on the ,entrance of the Prophet, as they disliked this practice;but where it has become established, and abstainingfrom it would cause annoyance, it is better to conformto it. The Arabs have their own customs, and the Persians have theirs, and God knoweth which is best.

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Chapter VI

CO CERNING SELF-EXAMINATIONA1 mTHE RECOLLECTION OF GOD.

KNO!V, •.0 bro~her, that in the Koran God hathsaid, We wil! set up a just balance on the Day

of Resurrection. and no soul shall be wronged in~ything." Whosoever has wrought a grain of good orIII shall then behold it." In the Koran it is also written,"Let every soul see what it sends on before it for theDay of Account." It was a saying of the Caliph Omar"Call yourselves to account before ye be called to ac~count"; and God says, "0 ye believers, be patient andstrive against your natural desires. and maintain thestrife manfully." The saints have always .understood

. th~t . they have come into this world to carryon aspiritual traffic, the resulting gain or loss of which isheaven or}ell. They have, therefore, always kept aJealous eye upon the flesh, which, like a treacherouspartner in business, may. cause them great loss. Hetherefore, is a wise man who, after his morningprayer, spends a whole hour in making a spiritualreckoning, and says to his soul, "Oh my SOUl, thouhast only one life; no single moment that has passedcan be recovered for in the counsel of God the number

50

Concerning Self-Examination 51

of breaths allotted thee is fixed, and c~not be increased. When life is over no further spiritual trafficis possible for thee; therefore what thou dost, do now;treat this day as if thy life had been already spent, a~d

-rhis were an extra day granted thee by the specialfavour of the Almighty. What can be greater follythan to lose it?"

At the resurrection a man will find all the hoursof his life arranged like a long series of .trea~ure

chests. The door of one will be oponed, and It ~lll be ·seen to be full of light: it represents an hour ~hICh hespent in doing good..His he~rt will be filled wI~h SUC?joy that even a fraction of It would make the Illha~I

tants of hell forget the fire. The door of a sec~n? WIllbe opened; it is pitch-dark within, and from It ISSU~S

such an evil odour as will cause everyone. to. hold. hISnose: it represents an hour which he spent III ~ll-doIll~,

and he will suffer such terror that a fraction of Itwould embitter Paradise for the blessed. The door of athird treasure-chest will be openend; it will be seen tobe empty and neither light or dark within: this repr~'

sents the hour in which he did neither good nor evil,Then he will feel remorse and confusion like that of aman who has been the possessor of a great treasureand wasted it or let it slip from his grasp. Thus thewhole series of the hours of his life will be displayed,one by one, to his graze. Therefore a man s?ould sayto his soul every morning, "God has given theetwenty-four treasures; take heed lest thou lose anyoneof them, for thou wilt not be able to endure the regretthat will follow such loss."


The saints ha e said, "Even suppose God shouldforgive thee, after a wasted life, thou wilt not attain tothe ranks of the righteous and must deplore thy loss;therefore keep a strict watch over thy tongue, thineeye, and each of thy seven members, for each of theseis, as it were, a possible gate to hell. Say to thy flesh,'If thou art rebeflious , verily I will punish thee'; for,though the flesh is headstrong, it is capable of receiving instruction, and can be tamed by austerity." Such,then, is the aim of self-examination, and the Prophethad said, "Happy is he who does now that which willbenefit him after death."

We come now to the recollection of God. Thisconsists in a man's remembering that God observes allhis acts and thoughts. People only see the outward,while God sees both the outer and the inner man. Hewho really believes this will have both his outer andinner being well disciplined. If he disbelieves it, he isan infidel, and if, while believing it,he acts contraryto that belief, he is guilty of the grossest presumption.One day a negro came to the Prophet and said, "0Prophet of God! I have committed much sin. Will myrepentance be accepted, or not?" The Prophet said"Ye~." Then the negro said, "0 Prophet of God, ali~he" tl"me 1::vas committing sin, did God really beholdIt? Yes, was the answer. The negro uttered a cryand fell lifeless. Till a man is thoroughly convinced ofthe fact thathe is always under God's observation it isimpossible for him to act rightly.

A certain sheikh once had a disciple whom hefavoured above his other disciplies, thus exciting their


envy. One.day the sheikh gave each of them a fowland told each to go and kill it in a place wh~re no o~ecould see him. Accordingly each killed hIS fowl In

some retired spot and brought it back, with the ~xce~tion of the sheikh's favourite disciple, who brought hisback alive, saying, "1 have found no such place; forGod sees everywhere." The sheikh said to the others,You see now this youth'S real rank; he has attained tothe constant remembrance of God."

When Zuleikha tempted Joseph she cast a clothover the face of the idol she used to worship. Josephsaid to her, "0 Zuleikha, thou art ashamed before ablock of stone, and should I not be ashamed beforeHim Who created the seven heavens and the earth?" Aman once came to the saint Junaid and said, "I cannotkeep my eyes from casting lascivious looks. How shallI do so?" "By remembering," Junaid answered, "thatGod sees you much more clearly than you see anyoneelse." In the traditions it is written that God has said,"Paradise is for those who intend to commit some sinand then remember that My eye is upon them and forbear." Abdullah . Ibn Dinar relates, "Once I waswalking with the Caliph Omar near Makkah when wemet a shephered's slave-boy driving his flock. Omarsaid to him, "Sell me a sheep." The boy answered,"They are not mine, but my master's." Then, to tryhim, Omar said, "Well, you can tell him that a wolfcarried one off, and he will know nothing about it.""No, he won't", said the boy, "but God will." Ornarthen wept, and, sending for the boy's master, purchased him and set him free, exclaiming, "For this


sa ing ou art free in this world and shalt be free inthe next. ..

There are two degrees of this recollection of God.The first degree is that of those saints whose thoughtsare altogether absorbed in the Contemplation of themajesty of God, and have no ' room in their hearts foranything else at all. This is the lower degree of recollection for when a man's heart is fixed and his limbsare so controlled by his heart that they abstain fromeven lawful actions, he has no need of any device orsafeguard against sins. It was to this kind of recollection that the Prophet referred when he said, "He whorises in the morning with only God in his mind, Godshall look after him, both in this world and the next. "

. Some of these recollectors of God are so absorbedin the thought of Him that, if people speak to themthey do not hear, or walk in front of them they do notsee, but stumble as if they collided with a wall. Acertain saint relates as follows: "One day I passed by aplace where archers were having a shooting match.S?me way off a man was sitting alone. I approachedhim and attempted to engage him in talk but herepli.ed, ~The remembrance of God is batter th'an talk."I said, "Are you not lonely?" "No," he answered,God and two angels are with me." Pointing to thearchers, I asked, "Which of these has carried off the "prize?" "That one," was his reply, "to whom God hasallotted it." Then I inquired, 'Where does this roadcome from?" Upon which, lifting up his eyes toheaven, he rose and departed, saying, "0 Lord! "many


of Thy creatures hold one back from the remembranceof Thee!"

The saint Shibli one day went to see the SufiThaury; he found him sitting SO still.in contemplat.ionthat not a hair of his body moved. He asked him,"From whom didst thou learn to practise such fixity ofcontemplation?" Thaury answered, "From a cat whichI saw waiting at a mouse-hole in an attitude of e,:engreater fixity than this." Ipn Hanif relates; ~I ~as. mformed that in the city of Sur a sheikh and hIS ~ISClple

were always sitting lost in the recollection of God. Iwent there and found them both sitting with their facesturned in "the direction of .Makkah. I saluted themthrice, but they gave no answer. I said, 'I adjure youby God, to return my salutation. 'I The youth raisedhis head and replied, '0 Ibn Hanif! The world lastsbut for a little time, and of this little time only a littleis remaining. Thou art hindering us by requiring us toreturn thy salutation.' He then bent his head again andwas silent. I was "hungry and thirsty at the time, butthe sight of those two quiet carried me out of myself. Iremained standing and "prayed with them the afternoonand evening prayer. I then asked them" for somespiritual advice. The younger replied, '0 Ibn Hanif,we are afflicted; we do not possess that tongue whichgives advice.' I remained standing there three daysand nights; no word passed between us and "none of usslept. Then I said within myself, 'I will adjure them

1. A Moslem is bound by the Koran to return the salutation of aMoslem.

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-6 T e Alchemy of Happiness

b. .God to give me some counsel.' The younger, diVI mg my thoughts, again raised his head: 'Go andseek such a man, the visitation of whom will bringGod to thy re~em~rance and infix His fear in thyheart, and he will give thee that counsel which is conveyed by silence and not be speech. ,,,

Such is the "Recollection" of the saints which~on si sts in being entirely absorbed in the contemplanon ~f God. The second degree of the recollection ofGod IS that of "the companions of the right hand."?These 'are aware that God knows all about them andfeel abashed in His presence, yet they are not carriedout ~f themselves by the thought of His majesty, butremain cle~rly conscious of themselves and of theworld. Their condition is like that of a man whoshould be suddenly surprised in a state of nakednessand should hastily cover himself, while the other classresemble one who suddenly finds himself in the presence of the. King and is confused and awestruck. Theformer subject every project which enters their mindst? a tho~ough scrutiny, for ~t the Last Day three quesnons wI.ll be asked respecnng every action: the first"Why dl~ y~u do th.is?" "the second, "In what way didy~u?do this? the third, For what purpose did you dothis' T~~ first will be asked because a man should actfrom. divine ~nd .not merely Satanic or fleshly impulse. fr. this q~estlon IS satisfactorily answered, the secondWIll test In what way the action was done wisely orcarelessly and negligently, and the third,' wheth~r it

~ , Koranic phrase for the righteous,


was done simply to please God, or ~ to gain the approval of men. If a man understands the meaning of thesequestion's he will be very watchful over the state of hisheart, and how he entertains thoughts which are likelyto end in action. Rightly to discriminate among such,thoughts is a very difficult and delicate matter and he,who is not capableof it should attach himself to somespiritual director, intercourse with whom may illuminate 'his heart. He should avoid with the utmost carethe merely worldly learned man who is an agent ofSatan. God said to David, "0 David! ask no questionsof the learned man who is intoxicated with love of theworld, for he will rob thee of My love," and the Prophet said: "God loves that man who is keen to discernin doubtful things, and who suffers not his reason tobe swayed by the assaults of passion." Reason and'discrimination are closely connected, and he in whomreason does not rule passion will not be keen to discriminate.

Besides such cautions discrimination before actinga man should call himself strictly to account for hispast actions. Every evening he should examine hisheart as to what he bas done to ,-see whether he hasgained or lost in his spiritual capital. This is the morenecessary as the heart is like a treacherous businesspartner, always ready to cajole and deceive; sometimes it presents its own selfishness under the guise ofobedience to God, so that a man supposes he hasgained, whereas she has really lost.

A certain saint named Amiya, sixty eyars of age,counted up the days of his life. He found they

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amo n ed to twenty-one thousand six hundred days.He said a himself, "Alas. if I have committed one sin

. every day, how can I escape from the load of twenty- .one thousand six hundred sins?" He uttered a cry. andfell to the ground; when they came to raise him theyfound him dead. But -most people are heedless andnever think of ,calling themselves to account. If forevery sin a man committed he placed a stone in anempty house, he would SOOn find that house full ofstones; if his recording angels' demanded wages ofhim for writing down his sins, all his money wouldsoon be gone. People Count on their rosariest' withself-satisfaction the numbers of times they have recited~he name of God, but they keep no rosary for reckon- .mg the numberless idle words they speak. Therefore 'the Caliph Omar said, "Weigh well your words andd~eds before they be weighed at the judgment." Hehimself before retiring for the night, used to strike hisfeet with a scourge and exclaim, "What hast thou doneto-day?" Abu Talha was once praying in a palmgrove, when the sight of a beautiful bird which flewout of it caused hin: to make a mistake in counting thenumber o.f prostrauons he had made. To punish himself for .hlJ inauenuon, he gave the palm:..grove away.Such saints knew that their sensual nature was proneto go astray, therefore they kept a strict watch over itand punished it for each transgression. '

3.. !wo of these are attached to every man.

4. ' The.Muhammadan rosay consists ofninety-nine beads, each representmg a name of God.

Concerning.Self-Examination 59

If a man finds himself sluggish and averse fromausterity and self-discipline he should consort with onewho is a proficient in such practices s? as to catch thecontagion of his enthusiasm. One saint used to say,"When I grow luke-warm ' in .sel~-discipli~e, I l~k atMuhammad Ibn Wasi, and the SIght of him rekindlesmy fervour for at least a week." If one canno.t ~nd

such a pattern of austerity close at hand, then It IS agood thing to study the lives o~ the saints; ~e shouldalso exhort his soul somewhat III the following way:"0 my soul! thou thinkest thyself intelligent and artangry at being called a fool, and yet what else arethou, after all? Thou prepared clothing to shield theefrom the cold of winter, yet makest no preparation forthe after-life. Thy state -is like that of man who in midwinter should say,'I will wear no warm clothing, buttrust to God's mercy to shield me from the cold.' Heforgets that God, at the same time that He createdcold, showed man the way to make clothing to protecthimself from it, arid provided the material for thatclothing. Remember this also, a soul, that thy punishment hereafter will not be becuase God is angry withthy disobedience; and say not, 'How can my sin hurtGod?'It it thy lusts themselves which will have kindled the flames of a hell within thee; just as, from eating unwholesome food, disease is caused in a man'sbody, and not because his doctor is vexed with himfor disobeying his orders.

"Shame upon thee, a soul, for thy overweeninglove of the world! If thou dost not believe in heavenor hell, at any rate thoubelievest in death, which will

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s arch from thee all worldly delights and cause thee tof I he pangs of separation from them which will be• , t

mtenser just in proportion as thou hast attached thyselfto them. Why art thou mad after the world? If thewhole of itt from East to West, were thine 'and worshipped thee, .yet it would all, in a brief space, turn todust along WIth thyself, and oblivion would blot outthy name, as those of ancient kings before thee. Butnow, seeing thou hast only a very small fragment ofthe world , and that a defiled one, wilt thou be so madas to barter eternal joy for it, a precious jewel for abroke.n cup of earthenware, and make thyself thelaughing stock of all around them?"

Chapter VII

MARRIAGE AS A HELP OR HINDRANCE TO THE RELIGIOUS LIFE

M ARRIAGE plays such a large part in humanaffairs that it must necessarily be taken into ac~

count in treating of the religious life and by regardedin both its aspects of advantage and disadvantage.

Seeing that God, as the Koran says, "only createdmen and genii for the purpose of worshipping," thefirst and obvious advantage of marriage is that theworshippers of God may increase in number. Theologians have therefore laid it down as a maxim that it isbetter to be engaged in matrimonial duties than in

.supererogatory devotions.

Another advantage of marriage is that, as the Prophet said, the prayers of children profit their parentswhen the latter are dead, and children who die beforetheir parents intercede for them on the Day of Judgment. "When a child," said the Prophet, "is told toenter heaven, it weeps and says, 'I will not enter inwithout my father and mother. t" Again, one day the.Prophet seized hold of a man's sleeves and drew himviolently towards himself, saying, "Even thus shallchildren draw their parents into heaven. " He added,

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6_ The Alchemy of Happiness

"Children crowd together at the gate of heaven andc out for their fathers and mothers, till those of thelatter who are outside are told to enter in and jointheir children. "

It is related of a certain celibate saint that he oncedreamt that the Judgment Day had come. The sun hadapproached close to the earth and people were perishI~g . of thirst: a crowd of boys were moving aboutgiving them water out of gold and silver vessels. Butwhen the saint asked for water he was repulsed, andone of the boys said to him, "Not one of us here isyo~r son. n As soon as the saint awoke he made prepa-

. rations to marry. .

Another advantage of marriage is that to sit withand be frierildy to one 's wife is a relaxation for themind after being occupied in religious duties and after such relaxation one may return to one 's devotionswith renewed zest. Thus the Prophet himself, when hefound ~e weight o~ hi~ revelations press too heavilyupon him touched his Wife Ayesha and said, "Speak tome, 0 Ayesha, speak to me! n This he did that fromthat familiar human touch, he might receive strengthto support fresh revelations. For a similar reason heused to bi? the Muezzin Bilal give the call to prayer,and sometimes he used to smell sweet perfumes. It is awell-known saying of his, "I have loved three things~n the wor1d: perfumes, and women, and refreshmentm prayer. On on~ occasio~ Omar asked the Prophetwhat were the things specially to be sought in the

. world.He answered, "A tongue occupied in the remembrance of God,a grateful heart, and a believing wife. "

Marriage as a help or Hindrance 63

A further advantage of marriage is that thereshould be someone to take care of the house; cook thefood, wash the dishes, and sweep the floor, etc. !f aman is busy in such work he cannot ~cqui.re learn~ng,

or carryon his business, or engage In hIS devotionsproperly. For this reason Abu Suleiman has said, "Agood wife is not a blessing of this world merely, butof the next, because she provides a man leisure inwhich to think of the next world"; and one of theCaliph Omar's sayings is, "After faith, no blessing isequal to a good wife. "

Marriage has, moreover, this good in 'it, that tobe patient with feminine peculiarities, to provide ~e

necessaries which wives require, and to keep them III

the path of the law, is a very important part of religion. The Prophet said, "To give one's wife the moneyshe requires is more . important than to .give alms :"Once, when Ibn Mubarak was engaged in a campaignagainst the infidels, one of his companions asked him,"Is any work more meritorious than religious war?""Yes, n he replied, "to feed and clothe one's wife andchildren properly." The celebrated saint Bishr Hafisaid, "It is better that a man should work for wife andchildren than merely for himself." In the Traditions ithas been. recorded that some sins can only be atonedfor by enduring trouble for the sake of one's family.

Concerning a certain saint it is related that hiswife died and he would not marry again, thoughpeople urged him, saying it was easier to concentratehis thoughts in solitude. One night he saw in a dreamthe door of heaven opened and numbers of angels

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64 The Alchemy of Happiness.

escending. They came near and looked upon him,and 0 e said, "Is this that selfish wretch?" and hise 0 answered, "Yes, this is he." The saint was too

alarmed to ask whom they meant, but presently a boypassed and he asked him, "It is you they are speakingabout," replied the boy; "only up to a week ago yourgood works were being recorded in heaven along withthose of other saints, but now. they have erased yourname from the roll." Greatly disturbed in mind assoon as he awoke, he hastened to be married. Fromall the above considerations it will be seen that marriage is desirable.

We come now to treat of the drawbacks to marr~age. One of th~se is that there is a danger, especially'In the present time, that a man should gain a liveli?ood by uniawful means in.order to support his fam- 'ily, and no amount of good works can compensate for.this. The Prophet said that at the resurrection a certain 'man with a whole mountain-load of good works willbe brought forward and stationed near the Balance.'He will then be asked, "'By what means did you support your family?' He will not be able to give a satisfactory answer, and all his good works will be canc~lled: 3.?d. proclamation will be made concerninghim, ThIS IS the man whose family have devoured allhis good deeds!'"

Another drawback to marriage is this, that to treat .one's family kindly and patiently and to bring their

1. The Mizan, or Balance for weighing good and evil deeds which willbeerected on the Judgment Day. .


affairs to a satisfactory issue can only be ~one bythose who have a good disposition. There IS. greatdanger lest a man should treat his family ?arshlly, orneglect them, and so bring sin upon hlms~lf. T~eProphet said: "He who deserts his wife and chltdren IS

like a runaway slave; till he returns to them non,~ ofhis fasts or prayers will be accepted by God. Inbrief, man has a lower nature, and, till he can controlhis own lower nature, he had better not assume the responsibility of controlling anot~er's. -Someone "askedthe saint Bishr Hafi why he did not marry. I amafraid," he replied, "of that verse in the Koran, 'Therights of women over men are precisely the same asthe rights of men over women.,,,

. A third disadvantage of marriage is that the caresof afarruly often prevent a man from concentrating histhoughts on God and on a future life, and may, unl~sshe is careful, lead to his destruction, for God has said,"Let not your wives and children turn you away fromremembering God." He who thinks he can concentr~te

himself better on his religious duties by not marrying ._had better remain single, and he who fears falling intosin if he does not marry, had better do so.

We now come to the qualities which should besought in a wife. The most important of all is chastity.If a wife is unchaste, and her husband keeps silent, hesets a bad name and is hindered in his religious life; ifhe speaks.his life becomes embittered; and.if he div~rces her, -he may feel the pang of separation. A Wifewho is beautiful but of evil character is a great calamity; such a one had better be divorced. The Prophet

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said, "He who seeks a wife for the sake of her beautyor wealth will lose both."

The second desirable quality in a wife is a gooddisposition. An ill-tempered or ungrateful or loquacious or imperious wife makes existence unbearable,and is a great hindrance to leading a devout life.

The third quality to be sought is beauty, as thiscalls forth love and affection. Therefore one shouldsee a woman before marrying her. The Prophet said,"The women of such a.tribe have all a defect in theireyes; he who wishes to marry one should see herfirst." The wise have said that he who marries a wifewithout seeing her is sure to repent it afterwards. It istrue that one-should not marry solely for the sake ofbeauty, but this does not mean that beauty should bereckoned of an account at all. .

The fourth desirable point is that the sum paid bythe husband as the wife's marriage portion should be .moderate. The Prophet said, "She is the best kind ofwife whose marriage portion is small, and whosebea~ty is ·great." He himself settled the marriageportion of scme women at ten dirhems,' and his owndaughters' marriage-portions were not more than fourhundred dirhems.

Fifthly, she should not be barren. "A piece of oldmatting lying in the corner of the house is better thana barren wife.,,3

Other qualities in a desirable wife are these: sheshould be of .a good stock, not married previously,

2. The dirhem-about six pence.~ . Saying of Muhammad.

Marriage as a help or Hindrance

and not too nearly related to her husband.

REGARDING THEOBSERVANCES OF MARRIAGE

Mar,riage is a religious institution, and sho?ld betreated in a religious way, otherwIse ·the ~attmg ~fmen and women is no better than the matting of ammals. The Law enjoins that there should be a feast onthe occasion of every marriage; When AbdurrahmanIbn Auf married the Prophet said to him, "Make amarriage feast, even if you have only a goat to:make itwith." When the Prophet himself celebrated hIS marriage with Safia he made a marriage-feast of dates andbarley. It is also right that marriage should be ~ccompanied with the beating of drums and of mUSIC, forman is the crown of creation. . .

Secondly, a man should remain on good termswith his wife. This does not mean that he should never .cause her pains, but that he should bear any annoyanceshe causes him, whether by her unreasonableness oringratitude, .patiently. Woman is created weak, andrequiring concealment; she should meretore be bo~newith patiently, and kept secluded. ~e p;ophet. said,"He who bears the ill-humour of hIS WIfe patientlywill earn as much merit as Job did by the patient endurance of his trials." On his death-bed also he washeard to say, "Continue in prayer and treat your wiveswell, for they are your prisoners." He himself used tobear patiently the tempers of his wives. One dayOmar's wife was angry and scolded him. He said toher, "Thou evil-tongued one, dost thou answer me

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ba k. " She replied, "yes! the Lord of the Prophets isbetter than thou, and his wives answer him back." Herep ied, "Alas for Hafsa [Ornar's daughter andMuhammad' s wife] if she does not humble herself";and when he met her he said, "Take care riot toanswer the Pr-ophet back. " The Prophet also said,"The best of you is he who is best to his own family,as I am the best to mine."

Thirdly, a man should condescend to his wife'srecreations and amusements, and not attempt to checkthem. The Prophet himself actually on one occasionran races with his young wife Ayesha. The first timehe beat her, and the second time she beat him.Another time he held her up in his arms that she mightlook at some performing negroes. In fact, it would bedifficult to find anyone who was so kind to his wivesas the Prophet was to his. Wise men have said, "Aman should come home smiling and eat what he findsand not ask for anything he does not find." However,he should not be over-indulgent, lest his wife lose herrespect for him. If he sees anything plainly wrong onher part, he should not ignore but rebuke it, or he willbecome 11 laughing-stock. In the Koran it is written,"Men should have the upper hand over women," andthe Prophet said, "Woe to the man who is the servantof his wife," for she should be his servant. Wise menhave said, "Consult women, and act the contrary towhat they advise." In truth there is something perverse in women, and if they are allowed even a littleli~ence, they get out of control altogether, and it isdifficult to reduce them to order again. In dealing with


them one should endeavour to use a mixtuf: of severity and tenderness, with a greater proportion of thelatter. The Prophet said, "Woman was for"?ed of acrooked rib; if you try to bend h~r, you Will breakher' if you leave her alone, she WIll grow more andmo;e crooked; therefore treat her tenderly."

As regards propriety, one cannot be too carefulnot to let one's wife look at or be looked at by astranger, for the beginning of all mischief is in theeye. As far as possible, she should not be allowed outof the house, nor to go on the roof, nor to stand at thedoor. Care should be taken, however, not to be unreasonably jealous and strict. The Prophet one day askedhis daughter Fatima, "What is the best thing forwomen?" She answered,' "They should not look onstrangers, nor strangers on them." The Prophet ~as

pleased at this remark, and embraced her, saying,"Verily, thou art a piece of my liver!" The Commander of the Faithful, Omar, said, "Don't givewomen fine clothes, for as soon as they have themthey will want to go out of the house." In the time ofthe Prophet women had permission to go to themosques and stand in the last row of the worshippers;but this was subsequently forbidden.

A man should keep his wife properly suppliedwith money, and not stint her. To give a wife herproper maintenance is more meritorious than to givealms. The Prophet said, "Suppose a man spends onetinar" in religious war, another in ransoming a slave,

About ten shillings,

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a, ,ird in c~arity, and gives the fourth to his wife, thegl mg of this last surpasses in merit all the others puttogether.~

, A man s~o ld not eat anything especially good byh lmsel ~, or, If he has eaten it, he should keep silentabout It and not praise it before his wife. It is betterfor husband and wife to eat together, if a guest be not

. present, for the Prophet said, "When they do so Godsends!fis blessing. upon them, ~d the angels pr~y forthem. The most Important point to see to is that the

.supplies given to one's wife are acquired by lawfulmeans.

If a man's wife be rebellious and disobedient hesh~uld at first admonish her gently; if this is not'suffi,clent he should sleep in a separate chamber for threenights .. Shor -d this also fail he may strike her but noton the mouth, nor with such force as to wound her.Sho~ld sh~ be.remiss in her religious duties, he shouldmamfest hIS ~Ispleasure to her for an entire month, asthe Prophet did on one occasion to all his wives'.

The greatest care should be taken to avoid divorce, for, t?ough divorce is permitted, yet God dis~p~roves.:of It, because the very utterance of the word,dIvorce ,causes a woman pain, and how can it be

right to pam anyone? V0en divorce is absolutely necessary, the formula for It should 'not be repeated thriceall at once but on three different occasions.' A womanshould be divorced' .kindly, not through anger anrcontempt, and not without a reason. After ' divorce

5. The formula for divorce has to be repeated thrice to make it comple.

Marriage as a help or HindranCe 71

man should give his former wife a present, and nottell others that she has been divorced for such andsuch a fault. Of a certain man who was institutingdivorce-proceedings against his wife it is related thatpeople asked him, "Why are you ,divorcing her?" Heanswered, "1 do not reveal my wife's secrets." Whenhe had actually divorced her, he was asked again, andsaid, "She is a stranger to me now; 1 have nothing todo with her private affairs."

Hitherto we have treated of the rights of the wifeover her busband, but the rights of the husband overthe wife are even more binding. The .Prophet said, "Ifit were right to worship anyone except God, it wouldbe right for wives to worship their husbands." A wifeshould not boast of her beauty before her husband, sheshould not requite his kindness with ingratitude, sheshould not say to him, "Why have you treated me thusand thus?" The Prophet said, "1 looked into hell andsaw many women there. 1 asked the reason, andreceived this reply, 'Because they abused their husbands and were ungrateful to them.'"

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Chapter VIIITHE .LOVE OF GOD

HE love or.God is the highest of all topics, and is. the final aim to which we have been tending hith

e:t0 . We have spoken. of spiritual dangers as theyhmder the love of God in a man's heart and we havespoken o! ~ari~us good qualities as belng the necessa!1' prelimmanes to it. Human perfection resides inthis, that the love. of God should conquer a man'sheart and possess It wholly, and even if it does notpossess it wholly it should predominate in the heartover the love of all other things. Nevertheless, rightlyto understand the love of God is so difficult a matterthat one sect of theologians have altogether denied thatman can love a Being who is not of his own species,and the~ have ?efined the love of God as consistingmerely In obedience. Those who hold such views donot know that real religion is.

All ~oslems are agreed that the ' love of God is aduty. God says concerning the believers "He lovesthem and they love Him, "1 and the Proph~t said, "Tilla man loves God and His Prophet more than anythingelse he has not the right faith. "When the angel ofdeath

72

1. Koran.

The Loveof God 73

came to take the soul of Abraham the latter said,"Have you ever seen a. friend take his friend's li~e?"God ,answered him, "Have you ever seen , a .fne~dunwilling to see his friend?" Then Abraham said, 0Azrael! Take my soull" The following prayer wastaught by the Prophet to his companions, "0 God,grant me to love Thee and to love those who love,Thee, and whatsoever brings me nearer to Thy love, .and make Thy love more precious to me than coldwater to the thirsty." Hassan Basri used to say, "Hewho knows God loves Him, and he who knows theworld hates it. " .

•We come now to treat of love in its essential

nature. Love may be defined as an inclination to thatwhich is pleasant. This is apparent in the case of thefive senses, each of which may be said to love thatwhich .gives it delight; thus. the eye loves beautifulforms, the ear music, etc. This is a kind of love weshare with the animals. But there is a sixth sense, orfaculty of perception, implanted in the heart, whichanimals do not possess, through which we becomeaware of spiritual beauty and excellence. Thus, a nranwho only acquainted with sensuous delights cannotunderstand what the Prophet meant when he said heloved prayer more than perfumes or women, though'the last two were also pleasant to him. But he whose .inner eye is opened to behold the beauty and perfection of God will despise all outward sights in comparison, however fair they may be.

The former kind of man will say that beautyresides in red-and-wh.ite ·complexions, well propor-

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tioned lim bs and so forth, but he will be blind tomoral beauty, such as men refer to when they speak ofsuch and such a man as possessing a "beautiful" character. But those possessed of inner perception find itquite possible to love the departed great, such as theCaliphs Ornar and Abu Baler, on account of theirnoble qualities, though their bodies have 'long been ,mingled with the dust. Such love is directed nottowards any outward form, but towards the innercharacter. Even when we wish to excite love in a childtowards anyone, we do not describe their outwardbeauty of form, etc., but their inner excellence.

When we apply this principle to the love of Godwe shall find that He alone is worthy of our love, andthat, if anyone loves Him not, it is because he doesnot know Him. Whatever we love in anyone we lovebecause it is a reflection of Him. It is for this reasonthat we love Muhammad, because he is the Prophetand the Beloved of God, and the love of learned andpious men is really the love of God. We shall see thismore clearly if we consider what are the causes whichexcite love.

The first cause is this, that man loves himself andthe perfection of his own nature. This leads himdirectly to the love of God, for man's very existenceand man's attributes are nothing else but the gift ofGod, but for whose grace and kindness man wouldnever have emerged froni behind the curtain of nonexistence into the visible world.. Man's preservationand eventual attainment .to perfection are also entirelydependent upon the grace of God. It would indeed be

The Love of God 75

a wonder, if one should take refuge from the heat ofthe sun under the shadow of a tree and not be gratefulto the tree without which there would be no 'shadowat all. Pre~isely in the same way, were it not for God,man would have no existence nor attributes at all;wherefore, then, should he not love God, unless he.beignorant of Him? Doubtless fools cannot love HIm,for the love of Him· springs directly from the knowledge of Him, and whence should a fool have know-

, ledge?

The second cause of this love is that man loves his, benefactor, and in truth his only Benefactor is God,

for whatever kindness he receives from any fellowcreature is due to the immediate instigation of God.Whatever motive may have prompted the kindness hereceives from another, whether the desire to gainreligious merit or a good name, God is the Agent Who

. set that motive to work.

The third cause is the love that is aroused bycontemplation of 'the attributes of God, His power andwisdom, of which human power and wisdom are butthe feeblest reflections. This love is akin to that wefeel to the great and good men of the past, such as theImam Malik and the Imam Shafi,2 though we neverexpect to receive any personal benefits from them, andis therefore a more disinterested kind of love. Godsaid to the Prophet David, "That servant is dearest toMe who does not seek.Me from fear of punishment orhope of reward, but to pay the debt due to My Deity.". .

2. Founder of the sects which bear their names.


d in the Psalms it is written, "Who is a greater trasg essor than he who worships Me from fear of hell

o ope of heaven? If I" had created neither, should Ia then have deserved to be worshipped?"

The fourth cause of this love is the affinity between man and God, which is referred to in the sayingof the Prophet. "Verily God created man in His ownlikeness. " Furthermore, G9d has said, "My servantse~ks proximity to Me, that I may make him Myfriend, and when I have made him My friend I be-.come his ear, his eye, his tongue" Again, God said toMoses, "1 was sick, and thou didst not visit me?"Moses replied, "0 God! Thou art Lord of heaven andearth: how couldest Thou be sick?" God said, "Acertain servant of Mine was sick; hadst "thou visitedhim, thou wouldst- have visited Me."

This is a somewhat dangerous topic to dwellupon, as it is beyond the understanding of commonpeople, and eyen intelligent men have stumbled intreating of it, and come to believe in incarnation andunion with God. Still, the affinity which does existbetween man and God disposes of the objection ofthose theologians mentioned above, who maintain thatman cannot love a .being who is not of his ownspecies. However great the distance between them,man can Jove God because of the affinity indicated inthe saying, "God created man in His own likeness."

The Love of God 77

THE VISION OF GOD

All Moslems profess to believe that the Vi~i~n ofGod is the summit of human felicity, because it is sostated in the Law; but with many this is a mere lipprofession which arouses"no emotion in their hearts.This is quite natural, for how can a man l~ng for athing of which he has no knowle~g~? We will ~ndea

vour to show briefly why the Vision of God is thegreatest happiness to which a man can attain.

In the first place, everyone of man's faculties h~s

its appropriate function which it delights to fUI~l. T~lS

holds good of them all, from the lowest bodilyappetite to the highest form of intellectual apprehension. But even a comparatively low form of mentalexertion affords greater pleasure than the satisfactionof bodily appetites. Thus, if a man happens to ~ "

absorbed in a game of chess, he will not come to hISmeal , though repeatedly summoned. And the higherthe subject matter of our knowledge, the greater is ourdelight in it; for instance, we would take more pleasure in knowing the secrets of a king than the secrets ofa vizier. Seeing, then that God is the highest possibleobject of knowledge, the knowledge of Him mustafford more delight than an other. He who knowsGod, even in this world, dwells, as it were, in' aparadise, "the breadth of which is as the breadth ofthe heavens and the earth,"? a paradise the fruits ofwhich no envy can prevent him plucking, and the ex-

3. Koran.

\,

8 TheAlchemy of Happiness

t of which is not narrowed by themultinide ofthose who occupy it.

. But the ?~light. of knowledge still falls short of thedelight of VISI?n, Just as our pleasure in thinking ofthose we love IS. much less than the pleasure affordedby .the actual. sight of them. Our imprisonment in~dles of clay and. water, and entanglement in thethings of sense constitute a veil which hides the Visiono~ ~od from us, although it does not prevent OUf attammg.to som~ knowledge of Him. For this reasonGod said to Moses on Mount Sinai, "Thou shalt not'see Me,,,4

The truth of the matter is this, that, just as theseed of man becomes a man, and a buried datestonebeco~es a palm-tree, so the knowledge of Goda~q~llre on earth will in the next world change into theVIsion of G~d, and he who has never learnt the~owledge WIll never have the Vision. This Vision~III not be: shared alike by all who know, but theirdlsce~nment of it will v~ry exactly as their knowledge.God IS. one, but He. wIl! be seen in many differentways., Just as o~e object IS.reflected in different waysby different mirrors, some showing it straight, andsome distorted, some clearly and some dimly. A mirror may be so. crooked as to make even a beautifulform appear misshapen, and a man may carry into thene~t wo~ld ~ heart so dark and distorted that the sightWhICh :'1111 be a source of peace and joy to others willbe to him a source of misery. He, in whose heart the .

4. Koran.

The Love of God 79

love of God has prevailed over all else, will derivemore joy from this vision than he in whose heart it hasnot so prevailed; JUSt as in the case of two men withequally powerful eyesight, gazing on a beautiful face,he who already loves the possessor of that face willrejoice in beholding it more than he who does not. Forperfect happiness mere knowledge is not enough, unaccompanied by love, and the love of God cannot takepossession of a man's heart till it be purified fromlove of the world, which purification can only be effected by abstinence and austerity. While he is in thisworld a man's condition with regard to the Vision' ofGod is like that of a lover who should see his Beloved's face in the twilight, while his clothes are infested with hornets and scorpions, which continuallytorment him. But should the sun arise and reveal his

. Beloved's face in all its beauty, and the noxious vermin leave off molesting him, then the lover's joy willbe like that of God's servant, who, released from thetwilight and the tormenting trials of this world,beholds Him without a veil. Abu Suleiman said, "Hewho is busy with himself now will be busy with himself then, and he who is occupied with God now willbe occupied. with Him then."

. Yahya Ibn Muaz relates,. "I watched Bayazid Bistami at prayer through one entire night, When he hadfinished he stood up and said, '0 Lord! some of Thyservants have asked and obtained of,Thee the power toperform miracles, to walk on the sea, and to fly intheir air, but this I do not ask; some have asked andobtained treasures, but these I do not ask.' Then he


ed, and seeing me, said, 'Are you there, Yahya?'I rep icd.Y es.' , He asked, 'Since when?' I answered, ,'For a long time.' I then asked him to reveal to mesome of his spiritual experiences. 'I will reveal,' heanswered, 'what is lawful to tell you. The Almightyshowed me His kingdom, from its loftiest to its lowest; He raised me above the throne and the seat and allthe seven heavens. Then He said "Ask of me whatsoever thing thou desirest." I answered, "Lord! I wishfor nothing beside Thee." "Verily," he said, "thou artMy servant."

On another occasion Bayazid said, "'Were God tooffer thee the intimacy with Himself of Abraham, thepower in prayer of Moses, the spirituality of Jesus,yet keep thy face directed to Him only, for He hastreasures surpassing even these." One day a friendsaid to him, "For thirty years r have fasted by day andprayed by.night and have found none of that spiritualJOY of which thou speakest." Bayazid answered, "Ifyou fasted and prayed for three hundred years, youwould never find it." "How is that?" asked the other."Becau~e," said Bayazid, "your selfishness is actingas a veil between you and God.'" "Tell me, then, 'thecure." "If is a cure which you cannot carry out."However, as his friend pressed him to, reveal itBayazid said, "Go to the nearest barber and have yourbeard shaved; strip yourself of your clothes, with theexception of a girdle round your loins. Take a horse's~osebag full of walnuts, hang it round your neck, go .Into the bazaar and cry out, 'Any boy who gives me a'slap on the nape of my neck shall have a walnut.'

The Love of God ~ i

Then. in this manner, go where the Cadi and th~ do~tors of the law are sitting." "Bless my soul! ' said hisfriend, "I really can't do that, do suggest s?me otherremedy." "This is the indispensable preltmmary to acure," answered Bayazid, "but, as I told you, you areincurable.

The reason Bayazid indicated this method of curefor want of relish in devotion was that his friend wasan ambitious seeker after place and honour. Ambitionand pride are diseases which can only be cured insome such way. God said unto Jesus, "0 Jesus! whenI see in My servants' hearts pure love for Myself unmixed with any selfish desire concerning this world orthe next. I act as guardian over that love." Again,when people asked Jesus "What is the highest work ofall?" he answered, "To love God and to be resigned toHis will." The saint Rabia was once asked whethershe loved the Prophet: "The love of the Creator, shesaid, "has prevented my loving the creature." IbrahimBen Adham, in his prayers, said, "0 God! in my eyesheaven itself is less than a gnat in comparison with thelove of Thee and the joy of Thy remembrance whichthou hast granted me."

He who supposes that it is possible to enjoy happiness in the next world apart from the love of God isfar gone in error. for the very essence ,of the futurelife is to arrive at God as .at an Object of desire longaimed at and attained through countless obstacles. Thisenjoyment of God is happiness. But if he had nodelight in God before, he will not delight in Him then,and if his joy in God was but slight before it will be

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slight then. I 1 brief, our future happiness will bein s ric proportion to the degree in which we have10 -ed God here.

But (and rna God preserve us from such adoom.) if in a man's heart there has been growing upa love of what is opposed to God, the conditions of thenext life will De altogether alien to him, and thatwhich will cause joy to others will to him causemisery.

This may be illustrated by the following anecdote:A certain scavenger went into the perfume-sellers' bazaar. and, smelling the sweet scents, fell down unconscious. People came round him and sprinkled rosewater upon him and held musk to his nose, but heonl became worse. At last one came who had been asca enger himself; he held a little filth under the'man's nose and he revived instantly, exclaiming, witha sigh of satisfaction. "Ah! this is perfume indeed!"Thus in the next life a worlding will no longer find thefilthy lucure and the filthy pleasures of the world; thespiritual joys of that world will be altogether alien tohim and but increase his wretchedness. For the nextworld is_a;world of Spirit and of the manifestation ofthe Beauty of God; happy is that man who has aimedat and acquired affinity with it. All austerities, devotions; studies have the acquirement of that affinity fortheir aim, and that affinity is love. This is the meaningof that saying of the Koran, "He who has purified hissoul is happy." Sins and lusts directly oppose the attainment of this affinity; therefore the Koran goes onto say, "and he who has corrupted his soul is miser-

The Love of God

able.,,5 Those who are gifted with spiritual insighthave really grasped this truth as ~ fact of. expenence,and not a merely traditional maxim. Their clear perception of it leads them to the conviction th~t he bywhom it was spoken was a prophet indeed, JUs~ as. aman who has studied medicine knows whe~ he IS 1.lstening to a physician. This i? a kind of certainty whichrequires no support from miracles ~uch as ~he conversion of a rod into a snake, the credit of .whlch may beshaken by apparently equally extraordmary miraclesperformed by magicians.

The Signs of the Love of God

Many claim to love God, but each should e~aminehimself as to the genuineness of the love which heprofesses. The first test is this: he should not disl~kethe thought of death, for no friend shrinks from gomgto see a friend. The Prophet said, "Whoever wishes tosee God, God wishes to see him." It is true a sincerelover of God may shrink from the thought of deathcoming before he has finished his preparation for thenext world but if he is sincere, he will be diligent inmaking such preparation.

, The second test of sincerity is that a man shouldbe willing to sacrifice his will to God's, should cleaveto what brings him nearer to God, and should shunwhat places him at a distance from God. The fact of aman's sinning is no proof that he does not love God atall, but it proves that he does not love Him with his

5 Koran. Chap. 91.

4 The Alchem y of Happiness

vhole hea l. The saint Fudhail said to a certain man"If a o~e asks you whether you love God, keep si~Ie t; for If you say, 'I do not love Him, 'you are an infidel:and if you say. ' I do, 'your deeds contradict you."

The third test is that the remembrance of Godshould always -rernai n fresh in a man's heart withouteffo~t, f?r what a man loves he constantly remembers,a.nd If hi s love is perfect he never forgets it. It is possible, however, that. while the love of God does nottake the fi rst place ina man's heart, the love of thelove of God may, for love is one thing and the love of10 e another.

The fourth test is that he will love the Koranwhich is the Word of God, and Muhammad, who isthe Prophet of God; if his love is really strong, he willlo~/e all men , for all are God's servants, nay, his loveswi ll embrace the whole creation, for he who lovesanyone loves the works he composes and his handwritmg.

The fifth test is, he will be covetous of retirementand privacy for p~rposes of devotion; he will long forthe approach of night, so that he may hold intercoursewith his~riend without let or hindrance. If he prefersconversation by day and sleep at night to such retirement, then his love is imperfect. God said to David"Be not too intimate with men: for two kinds of per:sons are excluded from My presence: those who are~arnest in seeking reward and slack when they obtainIt. and those who prefer their own thoughts to theremembrance of Me. The sign of My displeasure isthat I leave such to themselves."

The Love of God 85

In truth, if the love of God really takes possessionof the heart all other love is excluded. One of ·thechildren of Israel"was in the habit of praying at night,but, observing that a bird sang in a certain tree verysweetly, he began to pray under that tree, in order tohave the pleasure of listening to the bird. God toldDavid to go and say to him, "Thou hast mingled thelove of a melodious bird with the love of Me; thy rankamong the saints is lowered. " On the other hand,some have loved God with such intensity that, whilethey were engaged in devotion, their houses havecaught fire and they have not noticed it.

A sixth test that worship becomes easy. A certainsaint said, "During one space of thirty years I performed my night-devotions with great difficulty, butduring a second space of thirty years they became adel ight." When love to God is complete no joy isequal to the joy of worship.

The seventh test is that lovers of God will lovethose who obey Him and hate the infidels and thedisobedience, as the Koran says: "They are strenuousagainst the unbelievers and merciful to each other. "The Prophet once asked God and said. "0 Lord, whoare Thy lovers?" and the answer came, "Those whycleave to Me as a child to its' mother, take refuge inthe remembrance of Me as a bird seeks the shelter ofits nest, and are as angry at the sight of sin as anyangry lion who fears nothing. "

Imam Ghazali - The Alchemy of Happiness

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