Chapter V: Part II: Greek Dualism (2)

But a more important and philosophically more significant aspect of the As̱ẖ‘arite Metaphysics, is their attitude towards the Law of Causation[72:1]. Just as they repudiated all the principles of optics[72:2] in order to show, in opposition to the Rationalists, that God could be visible in spite of His being unextended, so with a view to defend the possibility of miracles, they rejected the idea of causation altogether. The orthodox believed in miracles as well as in the Universal Law of Causation; but they maintained that, at the time of manifesting a miracle, God suspended the operation of this law. The As̱ẖ‘arite, however, starting with the supposition that cause and effect must be similar, could not share the orthodox view, and taught that the idea of power is meaningless, and that we know nothing but floating impressions, the phenomenal order of which is determined by God.

[72:1] S̱ẖiblī ‘Ilmal-Kalām pp. 64, 72.

[72:2] S̱ẖahrastānī, ed. Cureton, p. 82.

Any account of the As̱ẖ‘arite metaphysics would be incomplete without a notice of the work of Al-G̱ẖazālī (d. 1111 A.D.) who though misunderstood by many orthodox theologians, will always be looked upon as one of the greatest personalities of Islam. This sceptic of powerful ability anticipated Descartes[73:1] in his philosophical method; and, "seven hundred years before Hume cut the bond of causality with the edge of his dialectic"[73:2]. He was the first to write a systematic refutation of philosophy, and completely to annihilate that dread of intellectualism which had characterised the orthodox. It was chiefly his influence that made men study dogma and metaphysics together, and eventually led to a system of education which produced such men as S̱ẖahrastānī, Al-Rāzī and Al-Is̱ẖrāqī. The following passage indicates his attitude as a thinker:--

"From my childhood I was inclined to think out things for myself. The result of this attitude was that I revolted against authority; and all the beliefs that had fixed themselves in my mind from childhood lost their original importance. I thought that such beliefs based on mere authority were equally entertained by Jews, Christians, and followers of other religions. Real knowledge must eradicate all doubt. For instance, it is self-evident that ten is greater than three. If a person, however, endeavours to prove the contrary by an appeal to his power of turning a stick into a snake, the performance would indeed be wonderful, though it cannot touch the certainty of the proposition in question"[75:1]. He examined afterwards, all the various claimants of "Certain Knowledge" and finally found it in Ṣūfīism.

[73:1] "It (Al-Ghazālī's work on the Revivication of the
sciences of religion) has so remarkable a resemblance to the
_Discourse sur la methode_ of Descartes, that had any
translation of it existed in the days of Descartes everyone
would have cried against the plagiarism". (Lewes's History of
Philosophy: Vol. II. p. 50).

[73:2] Journal of the American Oriental Society, Vol. 20, p.
103.

[75:1] Al-Munqiḏẖ p. 3.

With their view of the nature of substance, the As̱ẖ‘arite, rigid monotheists as they were, could not safely discuss the nature of the human soul. Al-G̱ẖazālī alone seriously took up the problem, and to this day it is difficult to define, with accuracy, his view of the nature of God. In him, like Borger and Solger in Germany, Ṣūfī pantheism and the As̱ẖ‘arite dogma of personality appear to harmonise together, a reconciliation which makes it difficult to say whether he was a Pantheist, or a Personal Pantheist of the type of Lotze. The soul, according to Al-G̱ẖazālī, perceives things. But perception as an attribute can exist only in a substance or essence which is absolutely free from all the attributes of body. In his Al-Madnūn[75:2], he explains why the prophet declined to reveal the nature of the soul. There are, he says, two kinds of men; ordinary men and thinkers. The former who look upon materiality as a condition of existence, cannot conceive an immaterial substance. The latter are led, by their logic, to a conception of the soul which sweeps away all difference between God and the individual soul. Al-G̱ẖazālī, therefore, realised the Pantheistic drift of his own inquiry, and preferred silence as to the ultimate nature of the soul.

[75:2] See Sir Sayyid Aḥmad's criticism of Al-G̱ẖazālī's view
of the soul, Al-Nazrufī ba’di Masāili-l Imāmi-l humām Abū Ḥāmid
Al-G̱ẖazālī; No. 4, p. 3 sq. (ed. Agra).

He is generally included among the As̱ẖ‘arite. But strictly speaking he is not an As̱ẖ‘arite; though he admitted that the As̱ẖ‘arite mode of thought was excellent for the masses. "He held", says S̱ẖiblī (‘Ilmal-Kalām, p. 66.), "that the secret of faith could not be revealed; for this reason he encouraged exposition of the As̱ẖ‘arite theology, and took good care in persuading his immediate disciples not to publish the results of his private reflection". Such an attitude towards the As̱ẖ‘arite theology, combined with his constant use of philosophical language, could not but lead to suspicion. Ibn Jauzī, Qāḍī ‘Iyāḍ, and other famous theologians of the orthodox school, publicly denounced him as one of the "misguided"; and ‘Iyāḍ went even so far as to order the destruction of all his philosophical and theological writings that existed in Spain.

It is, therefore, clear that while the dialectic of Rationalism destroyed the personality of God, and reduced divinity to a bare indefinable universality, the antirationalist movement, though it preserved the dogma of personality, destroyed the external reality of nature. In spite of Nazzām's theory of "Atomic objectification"[77:1], the atom of the Rationalist possesses an independent objective reality; that of the As̱ẖ‘arite is a fleeting moment of Divine Will. The one saves nature, and tends to do away with the God of Theology; the other sacrifices nature to save God as conceived by the orthodox. The God-intoxicated Ṣūfī who stands aloof from the Theological controversies of the age, saves and spiritualises both the aspects of existence, and looks upon the whole Universe as the self-revelation of God--a higher notion which synthesises the opposite extremes of his predecessors. "Wooden-legged" Rationalism, as the Ṣūfī called it, speaks its last word in the sceptic Al-G̱ẖazālī, whose restless soul, after long and hopeless wanderings in the desolate sands of dry intellectualism, found its final halting place in the still deep of human emotion. His scepticism is directed more to substantiate the necessity of a higher source of knowledge than merely to defend the dogma of Islamic Theology, and, therefore, marks the quiet victory of Ṣūfīism over all the rival speculative tendencies of the time.

[77:1] Ibn Ḥazm, Vol. V, p. 63, 64, where the author states and
criticises this theory.

Al-G̱ẖazālī's positive contribution to the Philosophy of his country, however, is found in his little book--Mis̱ẖkātal-Anwār--where he starts with the Quranic verse, "God is the light of heavens and earth", and instinctively returns to the Iranian idea, which was soon to find a vigorous expounder in Al-Is̱ẖrāqī. Light, he teaches in this book, is the only real existence; and there is no darkness greater than non-existence. But the essence of Light is manifestation: "it is attributed to manifestation which is a relation"[78:1]. The Universe was created out of darkness on which God sprinkled[79:1] his own light, and made its different parts more or less visible according as they received more or less light. As bodies differ from one another in being dark, obscure, illuminated or illuminating, so men are differentiated from one another. There are some who illuminate other human beings; and, for this reason, the Prophet is named "The Burning Lamp" in the Qur’ān.

[78:1] Mis̱ẖkātal-Anwār, fol. 3a.

[79:1] In support of this view Al-G̱ẖazālī quotes a tradition
of the prophet. Mis̱ẖkātal-Anwār, fol. 10a.

The physical eye sees only the external manifestation of the Absolute or Real Light. There is an internal eye in the heart of man which, unlike the physical eye, sees itself as other things, an eye which goes beyond the finite, and pierces the veil of manifestation. These thoughts are merely germs, which developed and fructified in Al-Is̱ẖrāqī's "Philosophy of Illumination"--Ḥikmatal-Is̱ẖrāq.

Such is the As̱ẖ‘arite philosophy.

One great theological result of this reaction was that it checked the growth of freethought which tended to dissolve the solidarity of the Church. We are, however, concerned more with the purely intellectual results of the As̱ẖ‘arite mode of thought, and these are mainly two:--

(1). It led to an independent criticism of Greek philosophy as we shall see presently.

(2). In the beginning of the 10th century when the As̱ẖ‘arite had almost completely demolished the stronghold of Rationalism, we see a tendency towards what may be called Persian Positivism. Al-Birūnī[80:1] (d. 1048) and Ibn Haiṯẖam[80:2] (d. 1038) who anticipated modern empirical Psychology in recognising what is called reaction-time, gave up all inquiry concerning the nature of the supersensual, and maintained a prudent silence about religious matters. Such a state of things could have existed, but could not have been logically justified before Al-As̱ẖ‘arī.

[80:1] He (Al-Birūnī) quotes with approval the following, as the
teaching of the adherents of Aryabhatta: It is enough for us to
know that which is lighted up by the sun's rays. Whatever lies
beyond, though it should be of immeasurable extent, we cannot
make use of; for what the sunbeam does not reach, the senses do
not perceive, and what the senses do not perceive we cannot
know. From this we gather what Al-Birūnī's Philosophy was: only
sense-perceptions, knit together by a logical intelligence,
yield sure knowledge. (Boer's Philosophy in Islām, p. 146).

[80:2] "Moreover truth for him (Ibn Haiṯẖam) was only that
which was presented as material for the faculties of
sense-perception, and which received it from the understanding,
being thus the logically elaborated perception". (Boer's
Philosophy in Islām, p. 150).

[80:2] "Moreover truth for him (Ibn Haiṯẖam) was only that
which was presented as material for the faculties of
sense-perception, and which received it from the understanding,
being thus the logically elaborated perception". (Boer's
Philosophy in Islām, p. 150).

CHAP. IV.

CONTROVERSY BETWEEN IDEALISM AND REALISM.

The As̱ẖ‘arite denial of Aristotle's Prima Materia, and their views concerning the nature of space, time and causation, awakened that irrepressible spirit of controversy which, for centuries, divided the camp of Muhammedan thinkers, and eventually exhausted its vigor in the merely verbal subtleties of schools. The publication of Najm al-Dīn Al-Kātibī's (a follower of Aristotle whose disciples were called Philosophers as distinguished from scholastic theologians) Ḥikmat al-‘Ain--"Philosophy of Essence", greatly intensified the intellectual conflict, and invoked keen criticism from a host of As̱ẖ‘arite as well as other idealist thinkers. I shall consider in order the principal points on which the two schools differed from each other.

A. _The Nature of the Essence._

We have seen that the As̱ẖ‘arite theory of knowledge drove them to hold that individual essences of various things are quite different from each other, and are determined in each case by the ultimate cause--God. They denied the existence of an everchanging primary stuff common to all things, and maintained against the Rationalists that existence constitutes the very being of the essence. To them, therefore, essence and existence are identical. They argued that the Judgment, "Man is animal", is possible only on the ground of a fundamental difference between the subject and the predicate; since their identity would make the Judgment nugatory, and complete difference would make the predication false. It is, therefore, necessary to postulate an external cause to determine the various forms of existence. Their opponents, however, admit the determination or limitation of existence, but they maintain that all the various forms of existence, in so far as their essence is concerned, are identical--all being limitations of one Primary substance. The followers of Aristotle met the difficulty suggested by the possibility of synthetic predication, by advocating the possibility of compound essences. Such a judgment as "Man is animal", they maintained, is true; because man is an essence composed of two essences, animality and humanity. This, retorted the As̱ẖ‘arite, cannot stand criticism. If you say that the essence of man and animal is the same, you in other words hold that the essence of the whole is the same as that of the part. But this proposition is absurd; since if the essence of the compound is the same as that of its constituents, the compound will have to be regarded as one being having two essences or existences.

It is obvious that the whole controversy turns on the question whether existence is a mere idea or something objectively real. When we say that a certain thing exists, do we mean that it exists only in relation to us (As̱ẖ‘arite position); or that it is an essence existing quite independently of us (Realist position)? We shall briefly indicate the arguments of either side. The Realist argued as follows:--

(1). The conception of my existence is something immediate or intuitive. The thought "I exist" is a "concept", and my body being an element of this "concept", it follows that my body is intuitively known as something real. If the knowledge of the existent is not immediate, the fact of its perception would require a process of thought which, as we know, it does not. The As̱ẖ‘arite Al-Rāzī admits that the concept of existence is immediate; but he regards the judgment--"The concept of existence is immediate"--as merely a matter of acquisition. Muḥammad ibn Mubārak Buḵẖārī, on the other hand, says that the whole argument of the realist proceeds on the assumption that the concept of my existence is something immediate--a position which can be controverted.[84:1] If, says he, we admit that the concept of my existence is immediate, abstract existence cannot be regarded as a constitutive element of this conception. And if the realist maintains that the perception of a particular object is immediate, we admit the truth of what he says; but it would not follow, as he is anxious to establish, that the so called underlying essence is immediately known as objectively real. The realist argument, moreover, demands that the mind ought not to be able to conceive the predication of qualities to things. We cannot conceive, "snow is white", because whiteness, being a part of this immediate judgment, must also be immediately known without any predication. Mulla Muḥammad Hās̱ẖim Ḥusainī remarks[85:1] that this reasoning is erroneous. The mind in the act of predicating whiteness of snow is working on a purely ideal existence--the quality of whiteness--and not on an objectively real essence of which the qualities are mere facets or aspects. Ḥusainī, moreover, anticipates Hamilton, and differs from other realists in holding that the so-called unknowable essence of the object is also immediately known. The object, he says, is immediately perceived as one.[85:2] We do not successively perceive the various aspects of what happens to be the objects of our perception.

[84:1] Muḥammad ibn Mubārak's commentary on Ḥikmat al-‘Ain,
fol. 5a.

[85:1] Ḥusainī's commentary on Ḥikmat al-‘Ain, fol. 13a.

[85:2] Ḥusainī's commentary on Ḥikmat al-‘Ain, fol. 14b.

(2) The idealist, says the realist, reduces all quality to mere subjective relations. His argument leads him to deny the underlying essence of things, and to look upon them as entirely heterogeneous collections of qualities, the essence of which consists merely in the phenomenal fact of their perception. In spite of his belief in the complete heterogeneity of things, he applies the word existence to all things--a tacit admission that there is some essence common to all the various forms of existence. Abu’l-Ḥasan al-As̱ẖ‘arī replies that this application is only a verbal convenience, and is not meant to indicate the so-called internal homogeneity of things. But the universal application of the word existence by the idealist, must mean, according to the realist, that the existence of a thing either constitutes its very essence, or it is something superadded to the underlying essence of the thing. The first supposition is a virtual admission as to the homogeneity of things; since we cannot maintain that existence peculiar to one thing is fundamentally different from existence peculiar to another. The supposition that existence is something superadded to the essence of a thing leads to an absurdity; since in this case the essence will have to be regarded as something distinct from existence; and the denial of essence (with the As̱ẖ‘arite) would blot out the distinction between existence and non-existence. Moreover, what was the essence before existence was superadded to it? We must not say that the essence was ready to receive existence before it actually did receive it; since this statement would imply that the essence was non-existence before it received existence. Likewise the statement that the essence has the power of receiving the quality of non-existence, implies the absurdity that it does already exist. Existence, therefore, must be regarded as forming a part of the essence. But if it forms a part of the essence, the latter will have to be regarded as a compound. If, on the other hand, existence is external to the essence, it must be something contingent because of its dependence on something other than itself. Now everything contingent must have a cause. If this cause is the essence itself, it would follow that the essence existed before it existed; since the cause must precede the effect in the fact of existence. If, however, the cause of existence is something other than the essence, it follows that the existence of God also must be explained by some cause other than the essence of God--an absurd conclusion which turns the necessary into the contingent.[88:1] This argument of the realist is based on a complete misunderstanding of the idealist position. He does not see that the idealist never regarded the fact of existence as something superadded to the essence of a thing; but always held it to be identical with the essence. The essence, says ibn Mubārak,[88:2] is the cause of existence without being chronologically before it. The existence of the essence constitutes its very being; it is not dependent for it on something other than itself.

[88:1] Ibn Mubārak's Commentary, fol. 8b.

[88:2] Ibn Mubārak's Commentary, fol. 9a.

The truth is that both sides are far from a true theory of knowledge. The agnostic realist who holds that behind the phenomenal qualities of a thing, there is an essence operating as their cause, is guilty of a glaring contradiction. He holds that underlying the thing there is an _unknowable_ essence or substratum which is _known_ to exist. The As̱ẖ‘arite idealist, on the other hand, misunderstands the process of knowledge. He ignores the mental activity involved in the act of knowledge; and looks upon perceptions as mere presentations which are determined, as he says, by God. But if the order of presentations requires a cause to account for it, why should not that cause be sought in the original constitution of matter as Locke did? Moreover, the theory that knowledge is a mere passive perception or awareness of what is presented, leads to certain inadmissible conclusions which the As̱ẖ‘arite never thought of:--

(a). They did not see that their purely subjective conception of knowledge swept away all possibility of error. If the existence of a thing is merely the fact of its being presented, there is no reason why it should be cognised as different from what it actually is.

(b). They did not see that on their theory of knowledge, our fellow-beings like other elements of the physical order, would have no higher reality than mere states of my consciousness.

(c). If knowledge is a mere receptivity of presentations, God who, as cause of presentations, is active in regard to the act of our knowledge, must not be aware of our presentations. From the As̱ẖ‘arite point of view this conclusion is fatal to their whole position. They cannot say that presentations on their ceasing to be my presentations, continue to be presentations to God's consciousness.

Another question connected with the nature of the essence is, whether it is caused or uncaused. The followers of Aristotle, or philosophers as they are generally called by their opponents, hold that the underlying essence of things is uncaused. The As̱ẖ‘arite hold the opposite view. Essence, says the Aristotelian, cannot be acted upon by any external agent.[90:1] Al-Kātibī argues that if, for instance, the essence of humanity had resulted from the operation of an external activity, doubt as to its being the real essence of humanity would have been possible. As a matter of fact we never entertain such a doubt; it follows, therefore, that the essence is not due to the activity of an agency external to itself. The idealist starts with the realist distinction of essence and existence, and argues that the realist line of argument would lead to the absurd proposition--that man is uncaused; since he must be regarded, according to the realist, as a combination of two uncaused essences--existence and humanity.

[90:1] Ibn Mubārak's Commentary, fol. 20a.

B. _The Nature of Knowledge._

The followers of Aristotle, true to their position as to the independent objective reality of the essence, define knowledge as "receiving images of external things".[91:1] It is possible to conceive, they argue, an object which is externally unreal, and to which other qualities can be attributed. But when we attribute to it the quality of existence, actual existence is necessitated; since the affirmation of the quality of a thing is a part of the affirmation of that thing. If, therefore, the predication of existence does not necessitate actual objective existence of the thing, we are driven to deny externality altogether, and to hold that the thing exists in the mind as a mere idea. But the affirmation of a thing, says Ibn Mubārak, constitutes the very existence of the thing. The idealist makes no such distinction as affirmation and existence. To infer from the above argument that the thing must be regarded as existing in the mind, is unjustifiable. "Ideal" existence follows only from the denial of externality which the As̱ẖ‘arite do not deny; since they hold that knowledge is a relation between the knower and the known which is known as external. Al-Kātibī's proposition that if the thing does not exist as external existence, it must exist as ideal or mental existence, is self-contradictory; since, on his principles, everything that exists in idea exists in externality.[92:1]

[91:1] Ibn Mubārak, fol. 11a.

[92:1] Ibn Mubārak, fol. 11b.

C. _The Nature of Non-existence._

Al-Kātibī explains and criticises the proposition, maintained by contemporary philosophers generally--"That the existent is good, and the non-existent is evil".[92:2] The fact of murder, he says, is not evil because the murderer had the power of committing such a thing; or because the instrument of murder had the power of cutting; or because the neck of the murdered had the capacity of being cut asunder. It is evil because it signifies the negation of life--a condition which is non-existential, and not existential like the conditions indicated above. But in order to show that evil is non-existence, we should make an inductive inquiry, and examine all the various cases of evil. A perfect induction, however, is impossible, and an incomplete induction cannot prove the point. Al-Kātibī, therefore, rejects this proposition, and holds that "non-existence is absolute nothing".[93:1] The possible '_essences_', according to him, are not lying fixed in space waiting for the attribute of existence; otherwise fixity in space would have to be regarded as possessing no existence. But his critics hold that this argument is true only on the supposition that fixity in space and existence are identical. Fixity in externality, says Ibn Mubārak, is a conception wider than existence. All existence is external, but all that is external is not necessarily existent.

[92:2] Ibn Mubārak, fol. 14a.

[93:1] Ibn Mubārak's Commentary, fol. 14b.

The interest of the As̱ẖ‘arite in the dogma of the Resurrection--the possibility of the reappearance of the non-existent as existent--led them to advocate the apparently absurd proposition that "non-existence or nothing _is_ something". They argued that, since we make judgments about the non-existent, it is, therefore, known; and the fact of its knowability indicates that "the nothing" is not absolutely nothing. The knowable is a case of affirmation and the non-existent being knowable, is a case of affirmation.[94:1] Al-Kātibī denies the truth of the Major. Impossible things, he says, are known, yet they do not externally exist. Al-Rāzī criticises this argument accusing Al-Kātibī of the ignorance of the fact that the '_essence_' exists in the mind, and yet is known as external. Al-Kātibī supposes that the knowledge of a thing necessitates its existence as an independent objective reality. Moreover it should be remembered that the As̱ẖ‘arite discriminate between positive and existent on the one hand, and non-existent and negative on the other. They say that all existent is positive, but the converse of this proposition is not true. There is certainly a relation between the existent and the non-existent, but there is absolutely no relation between the positive and the negative. We do not say, as Al-Kātibī holds, that the impossible is non-existent; we say that the impossible is only negative. Substances which do exist are something positive. As regards the attribute which cannot be conceived as existing apart from the substance, it is neither existent nor non-existent, but something between the two. Briefly the As̱ẖ‘arite position is as follows:--

"A thing has a proof of its existence or not. If not, it is called negative. If it has a proof of its existence, it is either substance or attribute. If it is substance and has the attribute of existence or non-existence, (i.e. it is perceived or not) it is existent or non-existent accordingly. If it is attribute, it is neither existent nor non-existent".[95:1]

[94:1] Ibn Mubārak's Commentary, fol. 15a.

[95:1] Ibn Mubārak's Commentary, fol. 15b.

CHAP. V.

ṢŪFĪISM.

§ I.

The origin and Qurānic Justification of Ṣūfīism.

It has become quite a fashion with modern oriental scholarship to trace the chain of influences. Such a procedure has certainly great historical value, provided it does not make us ignore the fundamental fact, that the human mind possesses an independent individuality, and, acting on its own initiative, can gradually evolve out of itself, truths which may have been anticipated by other minds ages ago. No idea can seize a people's soul unless, in some sense, it is the people's own. External influences may wake it up from its deep unconscious slumber; but they cannot, so to speak, create it out of nothing.

Much has been written about the origin of Persian Ṣūfīism; and, in almost all cases, explorers of this most interesting field of research have exercised their ingenuity in discovering the various channels through which the basic ideas of Ṣūfīism might have travelled from one place to another. They seem completely to have ignored the principle, that the full significance of a phenomenon in the intellectual evolution of a people, can only be comprehended in the light of those pre-existing intellectual, political, and social conditions which alone make its existence inevitable. Von Kremer and Dozy derive Persian Ṣūfīism from the Indian Vedanta; Merx and Mr. Nicholson derive it from Neo-Platonism; while Professor Browne once regarded it as Aryan reaction against an unemotional semitic religion. It appears to me, however, that these theories have been worked out under the influence of a notion of causation which is essentially false. That a fixed quantity A is the cause of, or produces another fixed quantity B, is a proposition which, though convenient for scientific purposes, is apt to damage all inquiry, in so far as it leads us completely to ignore the innumerable conditions lying at the back of a phenomenon. It would, for instance, be an historical error to say that the dissolution of the Roman Empire was due to the barbarian invasions. The statement completely ignores other forces of a different character that tended to split up the political unity of the Empire. To describe the advent of barbarian invasions as the cause of the dissolution of the Roman Empire which could have assimilated, as it actually did to a certain extent, the so-called cause, is a procedure that no logic would justify. Let us, therefore, in the light of a truer theory of causation, enumerate the principal political, social, and intellectual conditions of Islamic life about the end of the 8{th} and the first half of the 9{th} century when, properly speaking, the Ṣūfī ideal of life came into existence, to be soon followed by a philosophical justification of that ideal.--

(1). When we study the history of the time, we find it to be a time of more or less political unrest. The latter half of the 8{th} century presents, besides the political revolution which resulted in the overthrow of the Umayyads (749 A.D.), persecutions of Zendīks, and revolts of Persian heretics (Sindbāh 755–6; Ustādhīs 766–8; the veiled prophet of Ḵẖurāsān 777–80) who, working on the credulity of the people, cloaked, like Lamennais in our own times, political projects under the guise of religious ideas. Later on in the beginning of the 9{th} century we find the sons of Hārūn (Ma’mūn and Amīn) engaged in a terrible conflict for political supremacy; and still later, we see the Golden Age of Islamic literature seriously disturbed by the persistent revolt of the Mazdakite Bābak (816–838). The early years of Ma’mun's reign present another social phenomenon of great political significance--the S̱ẖu‘ūbiyya controversy (815), which progresses with the rise and establishment of independent Persian families, the Tāhirīd (820), the Ṣaffārīd (868), and the Sāmānīd Dynasty (874). It is, therefore, the combined force of these and other conditions of a similar nature that contributed to drive away spirits of devotional character from the scene of continual unrest to the blissful peace of an ever-deepening contemplative life. The semitic character of the life and thought of these early Muhammadan ascetics is gradually followed by a large hearted pantheism of a more or less Aryan stamp, the development of which, in fact, runs parallel to the slowly progressing political independence of Persia.

(2). _The Sceptical tendencies of Islamic Rationalism_ which found an early expression in the poems of Bas̱ẖs̱ẖār ibn Burd--the blind Persian Sceptic who deified fire, and scoffed at all non-Persian modes of thought. The germs of Scepticism latent in Rationalism ultimately necessitated an appeal to a super-intellectual source of knowledge which asserted itself in the Risāla of Al-Qus̱ẖairī (986). In our own times the negative results of Kant's Critique of Pure Reason drove Jacobi and Schleiermacher to base faith on the feeling of the reality of the ideal; and to the 19{th} century sceptic Wordsworth uncovered that mysterious state of mind "in which we grow all spirit and see into the life of things".

(3). The unemotional piety of the various schools of Islam--the Ḥanafite (Abu Ḥanīfa d. 767), the S̱ẖāfiite (Al-S̱ẖāfi‘ī d. 820), the Mālikite (Al-Mālik d. 795), and the anthropomorphic Ḥambalite (Ibn Ḥambal d. 855)--the bitterest enemy of independent thought--which ruled the masses after the death of Al-Ma’mūn.

(4). The religious discussions among the representatives of various creeds encouraged by Al-Ma’mūn, and especially the bitter theological controversy between the As̱ẖ‘arites, and the advocates of Rationalism which tended not only to confine religion within the narrow limits of schools, but also stirred up the spirit to rise above all petty sectarian wrangling.

(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 condition that we should look for the origin and development of Ṣūfīistic ideas. Given these condition 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.

[102:1] "Tidings have reached us that Valerian has been
defeated, and is now in the hands of Sapor. The threats of
Franks and Allemanni, of Goths and Persians, are alike terrible
by turns to our _degenerate_ Rome." (Plotinus to Flaccus; quoted
by Vaughan in his Half hours with Mystics, p. 63.)

[103:1] The element of ecstacy which could have appealed to some
minds was thrown into the background by the later teachers of
Neo-Platonism, so that it became a mere system of thought having
no human interest. Says Whittaker:--"The mystical ecstacy was
not found by the later teachers of the school easier to attain,
but more difficult; and the tendency became more and more to
regard it as all but unattainable on earth." Neo-Platonism, p.
101.

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]

[107:1] Sura 2, v. 146.

[108:1] Sura 2, v. 2.

[108:2] Sura 51, v. 20, 21.

[108:3] Sura 50, v. 15.

[108:4] Sura 24, v. 35.

[108:5] Sura 42, v. 9.

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.

(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]

[109:1] Sura 17; v. 87.

[109:2] Sura 88; v. 20.

[110:1] Sura 16; v. 92.

It must, however, be remembered that some later Ṣūfī fraternities (e.g. Naqs̱ẖbandī) 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.

[110:2] Weber makes the following statement on the authority of
Lassen:--"Al-Birūnī translated Patañjalī's work into Arabic at
the beginning of the 11th century, and also, it would appear,
the Sānkhya sūtra, though the information we have as to the
contents of these works does not harmonise with the Sanskrit
originals." History of Indian Literature, p. 239.

§ 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 S̱ẖaqīq Balḵẖī, 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 9{th} century Ma‘rūf Karḵẖī 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-Qus̱ẖairī about the end of the 10{th} 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 S̱ẖarīf, 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]

[113:1] Mr. Nicholson has collected the various definitions of
Ṣūfīism. See J. R. A. S. April, 1906.

[114:1] Maṯẖnawī, Jalāl al Dīn Rūmī, with Baḥral ‘ulūm's
Commentary. Lucknow (India), 1877, p. 9.

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.

[114:2] As regards the progress of Buddhism Geiger says:--"We
know that in the period after Alexander, Buddhism was powerful
in Eastern Iran, and that it counted its confessors as far as
Tabaristan. It is especially certain that many Buddhistic
priests were found in Bactria. This state of things, which began
perhaps in the first century before Christ, lasted till the
7{th} century A.D., when the appearance of Islamism alone cut
short the development of Buddhism in Kabul and Bactria, and it
is in that period that we will have to place the rise of the
Zarathushtra legend in the form in which it is presented to us
by Daqīqī."

Civilisation of Eastern Iranians
Vol. II, p. 170.

The ultimate Reality or Eternal Beauty, according to the Ṣūfīs of this school, is infinite in the sense that "it is absolutely free from the limitations of beginning, end, right, left, above, and below."[115:1] The distinction of essence and attribute does not exist in the Infinite--"Substance and quality are really identical."[115:2] We have indicated above that nature is the mirror of the Absolute Existence. But according to Nasafī, there are two kinds of mirrors[115:3]--

(a). That which shows merely a reflected image--this is external nature.

(b). That which shows the real Essence--this is man who is a limitation of the Absolute, and erroneously thinks himself to be an independent entity.

[115:1] Nasafī's Maqṣadi Aqṣā: fol. 8b.

[115:2] Nasafī's Maqṣadi Aqṣā: fol. 10b.

[115:3] Nasafī's Maqṣadi Aqṣā: fol. 23b.

"O Derwish!" says Nasafī "dost thou think that thy existence is independent of God? This is a great error."[116:1] Nasafī explains his meaning by a beautiful parable.[116:2] The fishes in a certain tank realised that they lived, moved, and had their being in water, but felt that they were quite ignorant of the real nature of what constituted the very source of their life. They resorted to a wiser fish in a great river, and the Philosopher-fish addressed them thus:--

"O you who endeavour to untie the knot (of being)! You are born in union, yet die in the thought of an unreal separation. Thirsty on the sea-shore! Dying penniless while master of the treasure!"

[116:1] Nasafī's Maqṣadi Aqṣā: fol. 3b.

[116:2] Nasafī's Maqṣadi Aqṣā: fol. 15b.

All feeling of separation, therefore, is ignorance; and all "otherness" is a mere appearance, a dream, a shadow--a differentiation born of relation essential to the self-recognition of the Absolute. The great prophet of this school is "The excellent Rūmī" as Hegel calls him. He took up the old Neo-Platonic idea of the Universal soul working through the various spheres of being, and expressed it in a way so modern in spirit that Clodd introduces the passage in his "Story of Creation". I venture to quote this famous passage in order to show how successfully the poet anticipates the modern concept of evolution, which he regarded as the realistic side of his Idealism.

First man appeared in the clan of inorganic things,
Next he passed therefrom into that of plants.
For years he lived as one of the plants,
Remembering nought of his inorganic state so different;
And when he passed from the vegetive to the animal state,
He had no remembrance of his state as a plant,
Except the inclination he felt to the world of plants,
Especially at the time of spring and sweet flowers;
Like the inclination of infants towards their mothers,
Which know not the cause of their inclination to the breast.
Again the great creator as you know,
Drew man out of the animal into the human state.
Thus man passed from one order of nature to another,
Till he became wise and knowing and strong as he is now.
Of his first soul he has now no remembrance,
And he will be again changed from his present soul.

(Maṯẖnawī Book IV).

It would now be instructive if we compare this aspect of Ṣūfī thought with the fundamental ideas of Neo-Platonism. The God of Neo-Platonism is immanent as well as transcendant. "As being the cause of all things, it is everywhere. As being other than all things, it is nowhere. If it were only "everywhere", and not also "nowhere", it would _be_ all things."[118:1] The Ṣūfī, however, tersely says that God _is_ all things. The Neo-Platonist allows a certain permanence or fixity to matter;[118:2] but the Ṣūfīs of the school in question, regard all empirical experience as a kind of dreaming. Life in limitation, they say, is sleep; death brings the awakening. It is, however, the doctrine of Impersonal immortality--"genuinely eastern in spirit"--which distinguishes this school from Neo-Platonism. "Its (Arabian Philosophy) distinctive doctrine", says Whittaker, "of an Impersonal immortality of the general human intellect is, however, as contrasted with Aristotelianism and Neo-Platonism, essentially original."

[118:1] Whittaker's Neo-Platonism, p. 58.

[118:2] Whittaker's Neo-Platonism, p. 57.

The above brief exposition shows that there are three basic ideas of this mode of thought:--

(a). That the ultimate Reality is knowable through a supersensual state of consciousness.

(b). That the ultimate Reality is impersonal.

(c). That the ultimate Reality is one.

Corresponding to these ideas we have:

(I). The Agnostic reaction as manifested in the Poet ‘Umar Ḵẖayyām (12{th} century) who cried out in his intellectual despair:--

The joyous souls who quaff potations deep,
And saints who in the mosque sad vigils keep,
Are lost at sea alike, and find no shore,
One only wakes, all others are asleep.

(II). The monotheistic reaction of Ibn Taimiyya and his followers in the 13{th} century.

(III). The Pluralistic reaction of Wāḥid Maḥmūd[119:1] in the 13{th} century.

[119:1] Dabistān, Chap: 8.

Speaking from a purely philosophical standpoint, the last movement is most interesting. The history of Thought illustrates the operation of certain general laws of progress which are true of the intellectual annals of different peoples. The German systems of monistic thought invoked the pluralism of Herbart; while the pantheism of Spinoza called forth the monadism of Leibniz. The operation of the same law led Wāḥid Maḥmūd to deny the truth of contemporary monism, and declare that Reality is not one but many. Long before Leibniz he taught that the Universe is a combination of what he called "Afrād"--essential units, or simple atoms which have existed from all eternity, and are endowed with life. The law of the Universe is an ascending perfection of elemental matter, continually passing from lower to higher forms determined by the kind of food which the fundamental units assimilate. Each period of his cosmogony comprises 8,000 years, and after eight such periods the world is decomposed, and the units re-combine to construct a new universe. Wāḥid Maḥmūd succeeded in founding a sect which was cruelly persecuted, and finally stamped out of existence by S̱ẖāh ‘Abbās. It is said that the poet Ḥāfiz of S̱ẖīrāz believed in the tenets of this sect.

C. _Reality as Light or Thought._

The third great school of Ṣūfīism conceives Reality as essentially Light or Thought, the very nature of which demands something to be thought or illuminated. While the preceding school abandoned Neo-Platonism, this school transformed it into new systems. There are, however, two aspects of the metaphysics of this school. The one is genuinely Persian in spirit, the other is chiefly influenced by Christian modes of thought. Both agree in holding that the fact of empirical diversity necessitates a principle of difference in the nature of the ultimate Reality. I now proceed to consider them in their historical order.

I. Reality as Light--Al-Is̱ẖrāqī.

Return to Persian Dualism.