After Alá-eddin Muhammed, it was Rukn-eddin Khúrshah who became king in Almút. He put to death Hassan Mazinderání with his family, and burnt their corpses.[668]
Holagú khan[669] overcame Rocn-eddin: the latter demanded to be sent to the court of Maikú khán, which demand was granted; on the journey he attained the extremity of his life; his reign did not last one year.
In Almút had been dug several reservoirs which were filled with vinegar, honey, and wine; these things and all stores, which had been deposited in the time of our Sáíd, that is, of Hassan Śabáh, were found without any alteration: all were astonished, and the Ismâílíah thought this event to be one of the miracles of their Said.
AN ACCOUNT OF THE ALI ILAHÍAN.
In the east of Kohistan, not far from Bakhtá, is a place called Arníl,[670] and also Armal; the king is there entitled Abáb. They say: as it is evident to the swimmer in the sea of the realities of events, that the door of intercourse is closed between the beings below and those above, and no intercourse is opened between the elemental and the heavenly beings, so are the temporal beings and those of eternity destitute of the bonds of relationship, and no connexion exists between those confined, and those unconfined, by space; therefore they are ordered to know God by investigation of wisdom and of the divine law, and to worship the divinity. The angels on high and the prophets below have the faculty of knowing the substance of the blessed verses, but not the divine Being itself:
“We do not know thee as thou shouldst be known.”
This is what the crier proclaims. On that account it is necessary to the Almighty God and eternal Lord that he should descend from the dignity of purity and from the station of unity and absoluteness, and that, according to the abundance of his clemency, he should, in every period and revolution of time, unite his spirit with a bodily frame, in order that his creatures may behold this holy and exalted Lord, and, in whatever manner he ordains, acknowledge and reverence him; the precepts and traditions of history are published to that effect. As the manifestation of a spirit in a bodily form is a possible fact, and the learned agree upon it, and as it is stated in the account of the travellers upon the road of salvation to the city of the true faith, so is it determined that a pure spirit may assume a bodily likeness; thus is the appearance of Jabrîl in the form of an ape-dog[671] an instance of it, and thus, on the occasions of wickedness, is the appearance of Satan, or a demon in a human form. Besides, it is in the power of the Almighty to manifest himself in the best, the most perfect body.
The individuals among men are, during the business of life, formed dependent on their mutual wants. To this sect it is an indispensable rule to associate all together, in order that no oppression may take place towards each other in their communities, and that the order of the world may remain upheld. It is indispensable that this great rule be derived from God, the Lord of glory, in order that all men may adopt it. On that account, the government of the supreme Judge has found necessary that, by power of his perfection, a canon, having been revealed among the different classes of mankind, should be agreed upon for the regulation of the creatures, in consequence of which the purpose of the conditions in the affairs of the world might be settled. Further, by the assistance of reason and instruction, there is in this age no other moon or sun in the sphere of perfection but ALI MURTAZA, “the chosen.” Truly, the illiterate prophet[672] (Muhammed) esteemed this blessed personage equal to several learned apostles, and saw praiseworthy qualities of a prophet united in that virtuous existence. Hence it follows, that men possessed of sight behold him sometimes come down from heaven in the shape of the father of mankind (Adam), and reckon his time to be that of one who inhabited the floating ship of Noah, and place him as far back as that age when a martyr, in the garment of Ibrahim, he was playing with the fire into which Nimrod had thrown him; another time they find him in the dress of the speaker with God, Moses, and the words of that Lord:
“He who knows himself, certainly knows God,”