75:1 No! I swear by the Day of Resurrection.
The Lord of the Worlds swears an oath by the Day of Resurrection. That is the day when the pavilions of the rightful due of Lordhood will be opened, the carpet of majesty and tremendousness spread, and the banner of all-compellingness brought out to the desert of all-subjugatingness. The portico of magnificence will be raised, the scales of justice will be hung, and the harshness of the exalted all-compellingness will make everyone confounded and senseless.
The prophets will come in their perfection and put away talk of their knowledge: “We have no knowledge” [5:109]. The angels of the Dominion will come and strike fire to the monasteries of their worship: “We have not worshiped You with the rightful due of Your worship.” The recognizers and tawḥīd-voicers will come and disown their own recognition: “We have not recognized You with the rightful due of Your recognition.”
What great remorse—if on that day His bounty does not take your hand! What tremendous affliction—if in that assembly His generosity does not come to your aid! If His solicitude does not take your hand, what good will obedience have done? If He shows the face of His justice, that will be your destruction.
“O God, You know that I do not have these days by myself. I do not light the candle of guidance with my sufficiency. What comes from me? What opens up from my doing? My obedience is through Your success-giving, my service through Your guidance, My repentance through Your kind favor, my gratitude through Your beneficence, my remembrance through Your inspiration. All is You! Who am I? If not for Your bounty, what do I have?”
75:2 No! I swear by the blaming soul.
Among the words of the commentators is that the blaming soul is the soul of the person of faith which is always in remorse for its own days and blaming itself for its own shortcomings. It strikes fear and dread into itself and looks upon itself with the eyes of disdain and abasement and says, O soul mean in aspiration and deluded, on whatever stone I strike you, you come up false. O you who fell short in the road of seeking the Real at the first step! O you who were cut off in the desert of the Law’s prescription despite a thousand steeds! O you who have never seen the tip of the hair of good fortune despite a thousand candles and lamps! O you who fell into the treasury of Tibet but did not catch the scent of musk! O you who dove into the ocean with all the divers without finding anything at all but losing your own self! O you who came late and went back early! O you who bought the mirage of delusion in place of the wine of joy and sold your heart and religion for a price! They deemed the life of this world more worthy of love than the next world [16:107].
A great man was asked, “Where does the road begin?” He said, “Not with you. When you go off to the side, the road begins everywhere.” There is never a day when this call does not come from the World of Infinity: “O you whom We called but you turned away from Us! O you whom We called, morning and night, to the good fortune of companionship, but you pulled your feet back from Our street! It is We whom you cannot avoid. If you show Us disdain, with whom will you get along? If you cannot be an elephant, at least be no less than a gnat, which has the form of an elephant and says, ‘Though I don’t have an elephant’s strength to carry a load, at least I will have the form of an elephant and will not throw my load on someone else.’”
When the faithful servant pulls the blaming soul into discipline and gives it its rightful due of rebuke and advice, and when success-giving helps him, then the blaming soul will soon turn into the serene soul. The Lord will address it and welcome it with the attribute of ennobling and exalting: “O serene soul, return to thy Lord [89:27-28]: O serene soul at rest and at ease with Our companionship, until today you came by the road of the soul. Now come by the road of the heart so that you may reach Us. The heart is given access to Our threshold, but nothing else is ever given access.
75:22-23 Faces that day will be radiant, gazing upon their Lord.
The servant with faith is like a falcon. When they catch a falcon and want to make it worthy for the hand of the king, they sew its eyes shut for a while. They put a tie on its foot and keep it in a dark house, separate from its mate. For a time they afflict it with hunger so that it becomes weak and emaciated. It forgets its homeland and gains the nature of being left aside. Finally, they open up their eyes. They light a candle and beat a drum for it. They put a piece of meat in front of it and they make the hand of the king its resting place. The falcon says to itself, “In the whole world, who has this honor that I have? A candle before my eyes, the beating of a drum my tune, bird meat my food, the king’s hand my place!”
In a similar way, when they want to clothe the faithful servant in the robe of bosom friendship and let him drink the wine of love, they do so with the same practice. For a time they keep him within the four walls of the grave. They take away his hands’ holding and his feet’s walking. They remove the sight from his eyes and leave him in this state for some time. Then all of a sudden they beat the drum of the resurrection. The servant lifts his head from the dust of the grave, opens his eyes, and sees the light of paradise: Their light running before them [57:12]. He forgets this world, drinks the wine of union, and sits at the table of everlastingness. Just as the falcon opened its eyes and saw itself on the hand of the king, the faithful servant opens his eyes and sees himself in the seat of truthfulness [54:55]. He hears the greeting of the King and sees the vision of the King. The servant is happy and joyful in the midst of blessedness, nearness, and the most beautiful, gazing on the beauty and majesty of the Real. This is why the Lord of the Worlds says, “Faces on that day will be radiant, gazing upon their Lord.” The faces of the faithful and the obedient, the faces of the sincerely truthful and the witnesses, the faces of the passionate and the yearners, will be shining like the moon and sparkling like the sun. They will gaze happily and joyfully on the Lord of the world’s folk, the Caresser of the friends, the Heart-opener of the yearners. What a sweet day is the day of union! The happiness of that day is never-ending, the good fortune of that day is boundless—the day of kindness and bounteousness, the day of giving and bestowal, the day of the gaze of the Possessor of Majesty, the day of happiness and victory, the servant subsisting and the Patron bearing the cup. From the side of generosity goes forth the call, “The house is your house, and I am your neighbor.”
The recognizer’s portion in paradise is three things: listening, drinking, and seeing. Concerning the listening, He says, ‘They will be made happy in a garden’ [30:15]. Concerning the drinking He says, ‘And their Lord will pour for them a pure wine’ [76:21]. Concerning the seeing He says, ‘Faces on that day will be radiant, gazing upon their Lord.’ Hearing is the portion of the ears, drinking the portion of the lips, and seeing the portion of the eyes. Hearing is for the finders, drinking for the passionate, and seeing for the lovers. Hearing increases revelry, drinking opens up the tongue and seeing snatches away attributes. Hearing turns the object of seeking into hard cash, drinking discloses the mystery, seeing makes the recognizer solitary. Hearing reaches the servant’s seven bodily parts: the ears are like his cupbearer, drinking is all-hearing, and vision sees His face beneath every hair.”
