And We gave David and Solomon knowledge. In this verse the Lord of the Worlds lays a favor on David and Solomon, for He taught them the knowledge of the religion. Religion is a comprehensive name that comprises submission, faith, the Sunnah and the congregation, performing obedient acts and worship, and avoiding unbelief and disobedience. This is the religion of the angels by which they worship and obey God, and it is the religion of the prophets and messengers from Adam to MuḤammad. The prophets and messengers invited their communities to it, as the Lord of the Worlds says: “He has set down for you as the religion that with which He counseled Noah, and what We have revealed to thee, and that with which We charged Abraham, Moses, and Jesus: Uphold the religion, and scatter not regarding it” [42:13]. This religion is extremely obvious and unveiled to the folk of felicity, but extremely hidden from the folk of wretchedness. The Real gives religion-recognizing eyesight only to the folk of felicity. Only the folk of this eyesight recognize the religion, as the Prophet said: “How is it that you are with your religion like the moon when it is full, but only the seeing see it?” It has also been narrated that he said, “I have brought you a white, immaculate splendor whose night is like its day. For those of you who live, a great diversity will be seen among you after me concerning my Sunnah and that of the rightly guided vicegerents, so hold fast to it.” The religion in its totality is built on two things: listening and following. Listening is that you accept with spirit and heart the revelation sent down on MuṣṬafā. Then you go straight by follow- ing him. That is His words, “Whatever the Messenger gives you, take” [59:7]. And We gave David and Solomon knowledge. In the tongue of the folk of recognition and the tasting of the lords of finding, this is the knowledge of understanding. The knowledge of under- standing is the knowledge of the Haqiqah. Junayd was asked, “What is the knowledge of the Haqiqah?” He said, “The God-given, lordly knowledge-the attributes gone, the Haqiqah staying.” The state of the recognizer is exactly this: the attributes gone, the Haqiqah staying. The com- mon people are in a station in which the attributes are apparent and the Haqiqah concealed.
