5. Abú Sa`íd Faḍlalláh b. Muḥammad al-Mayhaní.
He was the sultan of his age and the ornament of the Mystic Path. All his contemporaries were subject to him, some through their sound perception, and some through their excellent belief, and some through the strong influence of their spiritual feelings. He was versed in the different branches of science. He had a wonderful religious experience and an extraordinary power of reading men’s secret thoughts. Besides this he had many remarkable powers and evidences, of which the effects are manifest at the present day. In early life he left Mihna (Mayhana) and came to Sarakhs in order to study. He attached himself to Abú `Alí Záhir, from whom he learned in one day as much as is contained in three lectures, and he used to spend in devotion the three days that he had saved in this manner. The saint of Sarakhs at that time was Abu ´l-Faḍl Ḥasan. One day, when Abú Sa`íd was walking by the river of Sarakhs, Abu ´l-Faḍl met him and said: “Your way is not that which you are taking: take your own way.” The Shaykh did not attach himself to him, but returned to his native town and engaged in asceticism and austerities until God opened to him the door of guidance and raised him to the highest rank. I heard the following story from Shaykh Abú Muslim Fárisí: “I had always,” he said, “been on unfriendly terms with the Shaykh. Once I set out to pay him a visit. My patched frock was so dirty that it had become like leather. When I entered his presence, I found him sitting on a couch, dressed in a robe of Egyptian linen. I said to myself: ‘This man claims to be a dervish (faqír) with all these worldly encumbrances (`alá´iq), while I claim to be a dervish with all this detachment from the world (tajríd). How can I agree with this man?’ He read my thoughts, and raising his head cried: ‘O Abú Muslim, in what díwán have you found that the name of dervish is applied to anyone whose heart subsists in the contemplation of God?’ i.e. those who contemplate God are rich in God, whereas dervishes (fuqará) are occupied with self-mortification. I repented of my conceit and asked God to pardon me for such an unseemly thought.”
And it is related that he said: “Ṣúfiism is the subsistence of the heart with God without any mediation.” This alludes to contemplation (musháhadat), which is violence of love, and absorption of human attributes in realizing the vision of God, and their annihilation by the everlastingness of God. I will discuss the nature of contemplation in the chapter which treats of the Pilgrimage.
On one occasion Abú Sa`íd set out from Níshápúr towards Ṭús. While he was passing through a mountainous ravine his feet felt cold in his boots. A dervish who was then with him says: “I thought of tearing my waist-cloth (fúṭa) into two halves and wrapping them round his feet; but I could not bring myself to do it, as my fúṭa was a very fine one. When we arrived at Ṭús I attended his meeting and asked him to tell me the difference between suggestions of the Devil (waswás) and Divine inspiration (ilhám). He answered: ‘It was a Divine inspiration that urged you to tear your fúṭa into two pieces for the sake of warming my feet; and it was a diabolic suggestion that hindered you from doing so.’” He performed a whole series of miracles of this kind which are wrought by spiritual adepts.