The faithful indeed are siblings. O You who make every existent thing appear! O You who accept every burning sigh! O You whose generosity assures the daily provision of the servants! O You whose kingship is secure from annihilation and disappearance! No one debases the one You have exalted. No one throws down the one You have pulled up. No one can covet the one with Your brand. The faithful have all been branded by You. They have been pulled up by Your compassion and caressed by Your gentleness. In the alternations of created nature and the states of mortal nature, they keep their feet within the circle of duty on the center point of approval. Sometimes like a cypress they are in the station of seclusion in the meadow, sometimes like a polo mallet they are in the station of service. It is they who were caressed by the Lord of the Worlds in the Beginningless, when brother- hood was established among them, for the faithful indeed are siblings. This is a brotherhood that will never be cut off, a kinship that will never be broken, a lineage that will be joined with the End- less. It is to this that the report refers, “Every tie and lineage will be cut on the Day of Resurrection, save my tie and my lineage.” What is meant by this is the lineage of the religion and godwariness, not the lineage of water and clay. If it were the lineage of water and clay, Abū Lahab and Abū Jahl would have a portion of it. It is this to which He alludes with the words, “Surely the noblest of you with God is the most godwary” [49:13]. O chevalier! You know that all the faithful are your brothers and kinsmen in the lineage of faith and godwariness. Attend to the rightful due of brotherhood and the stipulations of kinship. Live in agreeableness with them, choose the road of preferring others and chivalry, and serve them without recompense. If they sin, excuse them. If they are ill, visit them. Put your own portion totally off to the side and increase their portion. This is the rightful due of brotherhood. If you have the head for it, then enter. Otherwise, emigrate. Dhu'l-Nūn was asked, “With whom should we be companions and with whom should we come and go?” He said, “With him who does not own, who does not censure any state of yours, and who does not change when you change.
