"The world was never wholly without philosophy, and without someone who cultivated it and was declared a philosopher by manifest proofs and facts. This man is the real Caliph or representative of God on earth, and his successors will be so, as long as heaven and earth shall endure. The difference between the old and new philosophers only consists in the variations of their phraseology and of their methods of exposition and proof. All in common acknowledge the three worlds (the earthly world, the spirit world, and the world of Deity); all alike are agreed in Monotheism and in their fundamental principles.
"As regards the first teacher, Aristotle, it is clear that he is of incomparable value, that his wisdom is great and his faculty of penetration profound; yet we should not so exaggerate our reverence for him as to undervalue his masters, among whom especially are to be counted the travelling and law-giving philosophers, such as Agathodæmon, Hermes, Æsculapius and others. The line of their succession is long; the chief classes into which they may be divided are as follows: (1) The Theosophist without philosophy; (2) the speculative philosopher without theosophy; (3) the philosopher who is equally strong in both; (4) the Theosophist who is strong in theosophy but mediocre or weak in philosophy; (5) the philosopher who is strong in philosophy but mediocre or weak in theosophy, etc. Now if the complete mastery of both philosophic and theosophic science is found in one man, this man is the representative of God on earth. Failing such a person, the title devolves on him who is complete in theosophy, though he may be mediocre in philosophy. Failing him, the representative of God is he who is complete in theosophy without possessing any philosophy at all. There never fails to be in the world one great theosophist.
"But the speculative philosopher, fully equipped in philosophy, has no claim to the rule in this earth. For there is always a theosophist on earth and he is better fitted for the post than the philosopher, as the place of God's Vicar on earth cannot remain unoccupied. By this 'rule,' however, I do not mean the possession of political power; only the Imam who is also a theosophist may take over the political power and exercise it publicly, or he may rule in secret. In the latter case he is termed the mystical pole ("qutb"); to him the rule belongs, even though he live in the deepest poverty. If the political power should really come into his hand, the age becomes illuminated; but if it lacks such divine guidance, it is overwhelmed by darkness.
"It is nobler to aim at a high attainment at theosophy and philosophy alike than to confine one's effort to one or the other. This book is intended for those who devote themselves to both, and not to the latter only; in it we address ourselves only to the untrammelled thinker in the reign of theosophy; the lowest step which the reader of it should have attained, if he would derive any benefit therefrom, is at any rate to have felt a flash of the divine light reach him, and in some measure to have made it his own. Whoever merely wishes to study philosophy, let him attend the school of the Peripatetics; for that purpose it is good and sufficient. Just as we form certain sense-perceptions and recognise their conditions with certainty, and base further scientific investigations upon them, so in the spiritual realm we form certain perceptions and build upon them; but he who does not adopt this method, understands nothing of philosophy."
Continuing, he assumes a peculiar theory of light, which betrays a really Persian origin. One special light he designates by the old Persian word "Isfahbad." The Godhead Itself he calls the "light of lights." In other places he borrows from Neo-Platonism. He assumes a region in the heavenly spheres where the ideal prototypes of existing things are found. The saints and devout ascetics, according to him, have the power to call those ideal prototypes into real existence, and these can produce at their wish, food, figures or melodies, etc.
Suhrawardy's optimistic way of conceiving the world is peculiar for a Moslem. While Islam regards the world as a vale of tears, and earthly life as a time of temptation, he finds the evil in this world much less than the good. The following sentences of his work are noteworthy: "Know that souls in whom the heavenly illuminations are lasting, reduce the material world to obedience. Their supplication is heard in the Upper World, and fate has already decreed that the supplication of such a person for such an object should be heard. The light which streams from the highest world is the Elixir of power and knowledge and the world obeys it. In the purified souls is reproduced a reflex of God's light, and a creative ray is focussed in them. The 'evil eye' is only a light-power, which influences objects and injures them." Soon after Suhrawardy had been put to death, nearly the whole of his books were committed to the flames by order to the Caliph Nasir.
[54] From Von Kremer.