Shariah, Tariqah and Haqiqah

Hz Mawlana Jalaluddin Rumi (r.a.) explains the relationship between the Shariah (law), the Tariqah (way) and the Haqiqah (Truth/Reality) thus:

The Law is like a lamp: It shows the way. Without a lamp you will not be able to go forward. When you enter the path your going is the Way. And when you reach the goal, that is the Truth.

The Law may be compared to learning the theory of medicine. The Way involves avoiding certain foods and consuming certain remedies on the basis of this theory. Then the Truth is to find everlasting health and to have no need for theory or practice.

When man dies to the life of this world, the Law and the Way will be cut off from him and only the Truth will remain………The law is knowledge, theWay is works and the Truth is attainment to God.

Masnavi BK 5 (Intro)

 

Afternoon Tea with Shaykh Abdal-Hakim Murad

Bismillah-The Journey Of the Soul (the following are some notes I took-I have a feeling this will be long one)Shaykh Abdul Hakim began by speaking about the year coming to its end, with the Hajj having just taken place and reminding us that all ibadaat are forms of dhikr; our days are punctuated with the five daily prayers, we have Jummah once a week, Ramadhan once every year and Hajj once in our lifetime. He mentioned how Hajj is the last pillar of Islam and how this practice is symbolic of the returning journey of the soul from whence it came. (It wasn’t until the end of his talk that I understood and appreciated the link between Hajj and the title of the talk).

We begin from the beginning, from even before we were manifest in our mother’s wombs; before we were given our bodily forms comprised of flesh and bones:

‘When your Lord brought forth from the Children of Adam , from their reins, their seed, and made them testify of themselves, He said: ‘Am I not your Lord?’ They said, ‘Yea! We testify!’ That was lest you should say on the Day of Arising: ‘Of this we were unaware.’’ (7:171)
This is an excerpt from an excellent talk by Shaykh Abdal Hakim Murad which I found transcribed on Usma’s Just Another Blog. Read it in full here.

 

Eid Mubarak!

Its Eid-ul-Adha here today commemorating the great Abrahamic sacrifice. Its message  can be summed up in the words of one contemporary sufi : “God refuses to be anything but our number one priority”. Eid mubarak to you all.

 

Comparison of Christian and Platonic Doctrine

I talked briefly about Causality and Necessity a while ago. That was in respect of the impact of Platonic and Neo-Platonic teachings on Islamic philosophy and mysticism. The following article by Phillip Sherrard looks at the same theory of emanation from a comparative approach which is very instructive for us as Muslims. It also tackles the problem of evil and though rather difficult in style is well worth reading in full. Part 1 is here and part 2 here.

I have taken this article from a new website of the traditonalist journal called Studies in Comparative Religion which contains a full archive of the journal dating back to 1963. Lots of interesting material.

 

Metaphysics and Virtue in Sufism

Titus Burckhardt an eminent traditionalist author writes:

Sufi doctrine possesses several branches, the two most important of which are the domain of Universal Truths (Haqâ’iq) and the domain relating to the human or individual stages of the spiritual way (daqâ’iq); in other words, metaphysics (the science of principles, or of the Principle) and virtue (the “science of the soul”). Needless to say, these two domains are not in watertight compartments. Metaphysics by definition includes everything, but in Sufism it is always linked to spiritual realization. Cosmology, which is derived from metaphysics, applies to both macrocosm and microcosm. Thus, there is a psychology which has a cosmic application and a psychology which, by analogy, applies to the soul or the inward constitution of man.

The rest of the article is here.

 

Adamic Knowledge

When Adam became the theater of Divine inspiration and love,
his rational soul revealed to him the knowledge of the Names.*
His tongue, reading from the page of his heart,
recited the name of everything that is.
Through his inward vision his tongue divulged the qualities of each;
for each it bestowed an appropriate name.
Nine hundred Noah walked in the straight way,
and everyday he preached a new sermon.
His ruby lip drew its eloquence from the precious jewel
that is within the hearts of prophets:
he had not read Qushayrî’s Risâlah or the Qût al-Qulûb of Abû Tâlib.
He had not learned to preach from poring over commentaries;
no, he learned from the fountain of revelations and the spirit–
from the wine that is so potent that when it is quaffed
the water of speech gushes from the mouth of the dumb,
and the new-born child becomes an eloquent divine
and, like the Messiah, recites words of ripened wisdom.

Mathnawi Bk 6

* ref to Qur’an 1: 29

 

An Interesting Quote

I chanced upon this just now and as it kind of relates to what I’ve been saying previously I thought I should share it.

Truly we cannot limit reality to something whose existence even the    dullest and most superficial person has neither the desire nor the possibility of denying. Surely there is more. Just as there are scientific instruments to establish a “more” in reality in the sphere of the material world, so too without instruments, but not without the higher development of spirit, there are experiences which grasp . . .eternity.

                                                                                               Karl Rahner