(5). The gradual softening of religious fervency due to the rationalistic tendency of the early ‘Abbāsid period, and the rapid growth of wealth which tended to produce moral laxity and indifference to religious life in the upper circles of Islam.
(6). The presence of Christianity as a working ideal of life. It was, however, principally the actual life of the Christian hermit rather than his religious ideas, that exercised the greatest fascination over the minds of early Islamic Saints whose complete unworldliness, though extremely charming in itself, is, I believe, quite contrary to the spirit of Islam.
Such was principally the environment of Ṣūfīism, and it is to the combined action of the above conditions that we should look for the origin and development of Ṣūfīistic ideas. Given these conditions and the Persian mind with an almost innate tendency towards monism, the whole phenomenon of the birth and growth of Ṣūfīism is explained. If we now study the principal pre-existing conditions of Neo-Platonism, we find that similar conditions produced similar results. The barbarian raids which were soon to reduce Emperors of the Palace to Emperors of the Camp, assumed a more serious aspect about the middle of the third century. Plotinus himself speaks of the political unrest of his time in one of his letters to Flaccus.[102:1] When he looked round himself in Alexandria, his birth place, he noticed signs of growing toleration and indifferentism towards religious life. Later on in Rome which had become, so to say, a pantheon of different nations, he found a similar want of seriousness in life, a similar laxity of character in the upper classes of society. In more learned circles philosophy was studied as a branch of literature rather than for its own sake; and Sextus Empiricus, provoked by Antiochus's tendency to fuse scepticism and Stoicism was teaching the old unmixed scepticism of Pyrrho—that intellectual despair which drove Plotinus to find truth in a revelation above thought itself. Above all, the hard unsentimental character of Stoic morality, and the loving piety of the followers of Christ who, undaunted by long and fierce persecutions, were preaching the message of peace and love to the whole Roman world, necessitated a restatement of Pagan thought in a way that might revivify the older ideals of life, and suit the new spiritual requirements of the people. But the ethical force of Christianity was too great for Neo-Platonism which, on account of its more metaphysical[103:1] character, had no message for the people at large, and was consequently inaccessible to the rude barbarian who, being influenced by the actual life of the persecuted Christian adopted Christianity, and settled down to construct new empires out of the ruins of the old. In Persia the influence of culture-contacts and cross-fertilisation of ideas created in certain minds a vague desire to realise a similar restatement of Islam, which gradually assimilated Christian ideals as well as Christian Gnostic speculation, and found a firm foundation in the Qur’ān. The flower of Greek Thought faded away before the breath of Christianity; but the burning simoon of Ibn Taimiyya's invective could not touch the freshness of the Persian rose. The one was completely swept away by the flood of barbarian invasions; the other, unaffected by the Tartar revolution, still holds its own.
This extraordinary vitality of the Ṣūfī restatement of Islam, however, is explained when we reflect on the all-embracing structure of Ṣūfīism. The semitic formula of salvation can be briefly stated in the words, "Transform your will",—which signifies that the Semite looks upon will as the essence of the human soul. The Indian Vedantist, on the other hand, teaches that all pain is due to our mistaken attitude towards the Universe. He, therefore, commands us to transform our understanding—implying thereby that the essential nature of man consists in thought, not activity or will. But the Ṣūfī holds that the mere transformation of will or understanding will not bring peace; we should bring about the transformation of both by a complete transformation of feeling, of which will and understanding are only specialised forms. His message to the individual is—"Love all, and forget your own individuality in doing good to others." Says Rūmī:—"To win other people's hearts is the greatest pilgrimage; and one heart is worth more than a thousand Ka‘bahs. Ka‘bah is a mere cottage of Abraham; but the heart is the very home of God." But this formula demands a why and a how—a metaphysical justification of the ideal in order to satisfy the understanding; and rules of action in order to guide the will. Ṣūfīism furnishes both. Semitic religion is a code of strict rules of conduct; the Indian Vedanta, on the other hand, is a cold system of thought. Ṣūfīism avoids their incomplete Psychology, and attempts to synthesise both the Semitic and the Aryan formulas in the higher category of Love. On the one hand it assimilates the Buddhistic idea of Nirwāna (Fanā-Annihilation), and seeks to build a metaphysical system in the light of this idea; on the other hand it does not disconnect itself from Islam, and finds the justification of its view of the Universe in the Qur’ān. Like the geographical position of its home, it stands midway between the Semitic and the Aryan, assimilating ideas from both sides, and giving them the stamp of its own individuality which, on the whole, is more Aryan than Semitic in character. It would, therefore, be evident that the secret of the vitality of Ṣūfīism is the complete view of human nature upon which it is based. It has survived orthodox persecutions and political revolutions, because it appeals to human nature in its entirety; and, while it concentrates its interest chiefly in a life of self-denial, it allows free play to the speculative tendency as well.
I will now briefly indicate how Ṣūfī writers justify their views from the Quranic standpoint. There is no historical evidence to show that the Prophet of Arabia actually communicated certain esoteric doctrines to ‘Alī or Abū Bakr. The Ṣūfī, however, contends that the Prophet had an esoteric teaching—"wisdom"—as distinguished from the teaching contained in the Book, and he brings forward the following verse to substantiate his case:—"As we have sent a prophet to you from among yourselves who reads our verses to you, purifies you, teaches you the Book and the Wisdom, and teaches you what you did not know before."[107:1] He holds that "the wisdom" spoken of in the verse, is something not incorporated in the teaching of the Book which, as the Prophet repeatedly declared, had been taught by several prophets before him. If, he says, the wisdom is included in the Book, the word "Wisdom" in the verse would be redundant. It can, I think, be easily shown that in the Qur’ān as well as in the authenticated traditions, there are germs of Ṣūfī doctrine which, owing to the thoroughly practical genius of the Arabs, could not develop and fructify in Arabia, but which grew up into a distinct doctrine when they found favourable circumstances in alien soils. The Qur’ān thus defines the Muslims:—"Those who believe in the Unseen, establish daily prayer, and spend out of what We have given them."[108:1] But the question arises as to the what and the where of the Unseen. The Qur’ān replies that the Unseen is in your own soul—"And in the earth there are signs to those who believe, and in yourself,—what! do you not then see!"[108:2] And again—"We are nigher to him (man) than his own jugular vein."[108:3] Similarly the Holy Book teaches that the essential nature of the Unseen is pure light—"God is the light of heavens and earth."[108:4] As regards the question whether this Primal Light is personal, the Qur’ān, in spite of many expressions signifying personality, declares in a few words—"There is nothing like him."[108:5]
These are some of the chief verses out of which the various Ṣūfī commentators develop pantheistic views of the Universe. They enumerate the following four stages of spiritual training through which the soul—the order or reason of the Primal Light—("Say that the soul is the order or reason of God.")[109:1] has to pass, if it desires to rise above the common herd, and realise its union or identity with the ultimate source of all things:—
(1). Belief in the Unseen.
(2). Search after the Unseen. The spirit of inquiry leaves its slumber by observing the marvellous phenomena of nature. "Look at the camel how it is created; the skies how they are exalted; the mountains how they are unshakeably fixed."[109:2]
(3). The knowledge of the Unseen. This comes, as we have indicated above, by looking into the depths of our own soul.