Gardens of Eden, which the Compassionate One has promised to His servants in the unseen…This means the ‘visual’ beholding (muʿāyana) of God, in the sense of nearness which He appointed between Him and them, so that the servant sees his heart in the proximity of God, witnessed (mashhūd) in the unseen of the unseen (ghayb al-ghayb). The unseen of the unseen is the spiritual self (nafs al-rūḥ), the understanding of the intellect (fahm al-ʿaql), and the discernmentof meaning by the heart (fiṭnat al-murād bi’l-qalb). The spiritual self is the seat of the intellect (ʿaql), which is the seat of the Holy (al-Quds). This Holy is linked with the Throne (ʿarsh), and is one of the names of the Throne. God, Exalted is He, apportioned for the self one part in a thousand parts [i.e. one thousandth] of the spirit (rūḥ) — or rather, even less than that. When the will (irāda) of the spirit becomes the will of the self (nafs) [as in the spiritual self], they are given between them discernment (fiṭna) and intuition (dhihn). Discernment is the guide (imām) of understanding (fahm), and understanding is the guide of intuition (dhihn). Discernment (fiṭna) is life (ḥayāt) and understanding (fahm) is livelihood (ʿaysh).There are but two [kinds of] men who understand the Word [of God]: the first wants to understand so he can speak about it from a position [of authority] and his lot is nothing but that; the other hears it and is occupied with acting upon it to the exclusion of all else. This person is rarer than red sulphur (al-kibrīt al-aḥmar) and more precious than all that is dear. He is among those who love one another for God’s sake (al-mutaḥābbūn fī’Lllāh). Trying to understand (tafahhum) is an exertion of effort (takalluf), yet discernment (fiṭna) cannot be attained through effort, but rather by acting in sincerity (al-ʿamal bi’l-ikhlāṣ) for Him. Truly God, Exalted is He, has servants in Paradise who, if they were veiled from the encounter (liqāʾ) [with their Lord] for a blinking of the eye, would cry out for help against it, just as the inhabitants of the Hellfire plead for help against the Hellfire. This is because they have come to know Him (ʿarafūhu). See how God’s Interlocutor [Moses] http://www.aalalbayt.org) ® All Rights Reserved. Apart from any fair dealing for the purposes of research or private study, or criticism or review, this work may not be reproduced, stored or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior permission in writing of the Great Tafsirs Project, Royal Aal al-Bayt Institute for Islamic Thought (aalalbayt@aalalbayt.org)
