(4). The Realisation—This results, according to the higher Ṣūfīism from the constant practice of Justice and Charity—"Verily God bids you do justice and good, and give to kindred (their due), and He forbids you to sin, and do wrong, and oppress".[110:1]
It must, however, be remembered that some later Ṣūfī fraternities (e.g. Naqshbandī) devised, or rather borrowed[110:2] from the Indian Vedantist, other means of bringing about this Realisation. They taught, imitating the Hindu doctrine of Kundalīnī, that there are six great centres of light of various colours in the body of man. It is the object of the Ṣūfī to make them move, or to use the technical word, "current" by certain methods of meditation, and eventually to realise, amidst the apparent diversity of colours, the fundamental colourless light which makes everything visible, and is itself invisible. The continual movement of these centres of light through the body, and the final realisation of their identity, which results from putting the atoms of the body into definite courses of motion by slow repetition of the various names of God and other mysterious expressions, illuminates the whole body of the Ṣūfī; and the perception of the same illumination in the external world completely extinguishes the sense of "otherness." The fact that these methods were known to the Persian Ṣūfīs misled Von Kremer who ascribed the whole phenomenon of Ṣūfīism to the influence of Vedantic ideas. Such methods of contemplation are quite unislamic in character, and the higher Ṣūfīs do not attach any importance to them.
§ II.
Aspects of Ṣūfī-Metaphysics.
Let us now return to the various schools or rather the various aspects of Ṣūfī Metaphysics. A careful investigation of Ṣūfī literature shows that Ṣūfīism has looked at the Ultimate Reality from three standpoints which, in fact, do not exclude but complement each other. Some Ṣūfīs conceive the essential nature of reality as self-conscious will, others beauty; others again hold that Reality is essentially Thought, Light or Knowledge. There are, therefore, three aspects of Ṣūfī thought:—
A. Reality as Self-conscious Will.
The first in historical order is that represented by Shaqīq Balkhī, Ibrāhim Adham, Rābi‘a, and others. This school conceives the ultimate reality as "Will", and the Universe a finite activity of that will. It is essentially monotheistic and consequently more semitic in character. It is not the desire of Knowledge which dominates the ideal of the Ṣūfīs of this school, but the characteristic features of their life are piety, unworldliness, and an intense longing for God due to the consciousness of sin. Their object is not to philosophise, but principally to work out a certain ideal of life. From our standpoint, therefore, they are not of much importance.
B. Reality as Beauty.
In the beginning of the 9th century Ma‘rūf Karkhī defined Ṣūfīism as "Apprehension of Divine realities"[113:1]—a definition which marks the movement from Faith to Knowledge. But the method of apprehending the ultimate reality was formally stated by Al-Qushairī about the end of the 10th century. The teachers of this school adopted the Neo-Platonic idea of creation by intermediary agencies; and though this idea lingered in the minds of Ṣūfī writers for a long time, yet their Pantheism led them to abandon the Emanation theory altogether. Like Avicenna they looked upon the ultimate Reality as "Eternal Beauty" whose very nature consists in seeing its own "face" reflected in the Universe-mirror. The Universe, therefore, became to them a reflected image of the "Eternal Beauty", and not an emanation as the Neo-Platonists had taught. The cause of creation, says Mīr Sayyid Sharīf, is the manifestation of Beauty, and the first creation is Love. The realisation of this Beauty, is brought about by universal love, which the innate Zoroastrian instinct of the Persian Ṣūfī loved to define as "the Sacred Fire which burns up everything other than God." Says Rūmī:—
"O thou pleasant madness, Love!
Thou Physician of all our ills!
Thou healer of pride,
Thou Plato and Galen of our souls!"[114:1]
As a direct consequence of such a view of the Universe, we have the idea of impersonal absorption which first appears in Bāyazīd of Bistām, and which constitutes the characteristic feature of the later development of this school. The growth of this idea may have been influenced by Hindu pilgrims travelling through Persia to the Buddhistic temple still existing at Bāku.[114:2] The school became wildly pantheistic in Ḥusain Manṣūr who, in the true spirit of the Indian Vedantist, cried out, "I am God"—Aham Brahma asmi.
