The work is the work of the purifiers, the good fortune of the truthful, the conduct of the pure, and the hard cash in their purse. Today they are on the carpet of service with the light of recognition, tomorrow on the carpet of companionship with the joy of union. Surely We purified them with that which is pure [38:46]. He is saying, “We made them pure and brought them forth pure from the crucible of testing so that they would be worthy for the Presence,” for the Pure Presence gives access only to the pure. “Surely God is goodly and accepts only the goodly.” Nothing is of any use with the Pure Presence save pure activity and pure speech. Then you must become so purified of that pure activity that you do not seek it out in this world or the afterworld. Then you may reach God purely. Surely he shall have nearness to Us, and a beautiful return [38:40].
2:112 No, whosoever submits his face to God, doing the beautiful, shall have his wage with his Lord, and no fear shall be upon them, neither shall they grieve.
The secret of this talk is what was said by Abū Bakr Zaqqāq: “The defect in the purity of every purifier is to see his purity. If God desires to purify his self-purification, He will eliminate the seeing of his self-purification from his purification. Then he will be ‘purified’ [mukhlaṣ], not ‘purifying’ [mukhliṣ].” He is saying that your self-purification will be pure when it is pure of your seeing it.
Know also that this self-purification is not in your hands, nor in your capacity or possession. Rather, it is a secret of the Lord placed there by the Glorified. No one is aware of it, and no one else has any access to it. The Unity says, “It is one of My secrets that I deposit in the hearts of those whom I love among My creations.” He is saying, “I choose a servant and approve him for My love, then I place my deposit in the core of his heart. Satan has no access to it so as to destroy it, nor does the soul’s caprice see it so as to change it, nor does the angel reach it so as to write it down.”
This is why Junayd said, “Self-purification is a secret between God and the servant. No angel knows it that he might write it down, no satan that he might corrupt it, and no caprice that it might make it deviate.” Dhu’l-Nūn Miṣrī said, “When this deposit is placed within someone, his mark is that people’s praise and censure have the same value. He sees their applause and their curses in one color. He does not become happy from the former, nor does he shrivel from the latter.”
Thus on the night of proximity and generosity, all creatures were reciting the edict of Muṣṭafā’s ruling authority, but he did not look at anything from the corner of his eye. He was saying, “You who are the proximate of the Presence are saying, ‘Peace be upon the wholesome Prophet, who is the best of those in heaven and earth.’ But I am waiting to be taken back to the doorstep of the cruelty of Abū Jahl so that he may say, ‘O sorcerer! O liar!’ Just as I strike the ‘best of those in the heaven and earth’ against the touchstone, so also I strike it against ‘sorcerer, liar.’ If the two do not have the same value, I will take off the hat of my claims.”
Go, you’re still in bond to attributes, still in love with yourself, if you find the pulpit’s exaltation sweeter than the gallows’ abasement. (DS 210) Someone like this is called “purified,” not “purifier,” as Abū Bakr Zaqqāq said: “Then he will be purified, not a purifier.” The purifier is someone in a whirlpool in the middle of the perilous ocean. The life-snatching sharks come to him from the right and left. He cuts through the water and he is fearful about how and when he will reach the shore of security. This is why the great ones of the past have said, “The purifier is in great peril.”
The purified is he who has reached the shore of security. The Lord of the Worlds has shown that Moses had both states. He says, “Surely he was ‘purifier/purified’ and he was a messenger, and prophet” [19:51]. This has been read as both mukhliṣ and mukhlaṣ.” If you read it as a purifier, then it is the beginning of his work. If you read it as purified, then it is the end of his work. He was a purifier when the work of prophethood joined with him and the caress of Unity showed its face to him. He became purified when the work of prophethood took flight and he became bold toward the Exalted Presence.
This is indeed the state of someone who first had traveling and then reached the pull of the Real. What a difference there is between him and our The Last Prophet Muḥammad! The difference between Muḥammad (PBUH) and Moses (PBUH) is such that he was protected by the lasso of the Real’s pull before the era of Adam’s clay, as he said: “I was a Prophet when Adam was molded of clay.” This is why Shiblī said, “Everyone will have an antagonist at the resurrection, and I will be Adam’s antagonist, for he made my road steep because I was stuck in his mire.”
Concerning this Shaykh al-Islām Anṣārī said, “Do you know when the realizer reaches the Real? When the flood of Lordhood arrives and the dust of mortal nature disappears when the Haqiqah increases and the pretext decreases. The body does not remain, nor heart, nor spirit. He stays limpid, released from water and clay. Light is not mixed with dust, nor dust with light—dust is with dust, and light with light. The tongue is lost in remembrance, remembrance in the Remembered. The heart is lost in love, love in the Light. The spirit is lost in face-to-face vision, and face-to-face vision is far from explication.”
If you want this day, come out of yourself like a snake from its skin. Abandon yourself, for it is not beautiful for you to be ascribed to yourself. This is exactly what that chevalier said.
“Endless passion has nothing to do with a heart
that stays firm in its own attributes.
No friend in passion’s road has ever embraced
the realm of meaning along with the realm of form.” [DS 209-10]
