by William C. Chittick
Among the thousands of verses found in Ebno’l-’Arabi’s Fotuhat al-mak-kiya are the following. They describe some of his encounters with embodied spirits:
One embodied himself to me in the earth,
another in the air.
One embodied himself wherever I was,
another embodied himself in heaven.
They gave knowledge to me, and I to them,
though we were not equal,
For I was unchanging in my entity,
but they were not able to keep still.
They assume the form of every shape,
like water taking on the color of the cup.(Fotuhat I 755)
Spirits ‘embody’ themselves through imagination. To understand what this embodiment implies, we need to have a clear understanding of imagination’s characteristics, the most outstanding of which is ambiguity, the fact that it escapes the logic of either/or.
The universe has three fundamental worlds: The highest is the world of the simple (or ‘noncompound’) spirits, who are pure life, intelligence and luminosity. The lowest is that of bodies, which are inanimate and compound, or made of parts. The middle domain is the world of imagination, whose inhabitants are both simple and compound at the same time. Hence, they are not totally different from either spirits or bodies, and through them the two sides are able to interrelate.
Before we go further in this discussion, it is necessary to point out that we should not think of the basic characters in this drama spirit and body as discrete and autonomous things. Rather, the two terms designate configurations of certain tendencies found in existence, or certain divine qualities that are reflected in the created worlds. Both spirit and body are associated with a series of attributes, and no absolute can be drawn between the two sides. The discussion of imagination itself alerts us to the fact that the qualities of spirit and body which at first sight appear to be different interpenetrate and intermingle. There can be no absolute differences, except when God as the absolutely Real is contrasted with cosmos as nonexistence. Within the many worlds existentiated by the Breath of the All-merciful, things can be different only in a relative sense.
The World of Imagination allows spirits to become embodied and bodies to become spiritualized. On the micro-cosmic level, our minds spiritualize the objects of the outside world simply by perceiving them. The spiritualized nature of these objects becomes evident in the world of dreams, where we perceive sensory objects drawn from the outside world in a kind of never-never land between the inanimate matter of the corporeal world and the living and luminous substance of the spirit1. The five senses always remain operative in imagination. As the Shaykh remarks, “The reality of imagination is that it gives sensory form to everything that becomes actualized within it” (Fotuhat II 375.34). But the five senses that perceive imagination are not quite the same as the senses that function in the corporeal world. Hence, the Shaykh distinguishes between the ‘eye of sense perception’, which sees during wakefulness, and the ‘eye of imagination’, which sees during sleep. However, the eye of imagination may also see during wakefulness (Fotuhat I 305.3). The Shaykh frequently tells us that “The person who undergoes unveiling sees while he is awake what the dreamer sees while he is asleep” (Fotuhat I 305.1). In other words, both the dreamer and the ‘unveiler’ (mokashef) perceive imaginalized objects (motakhayyaldt), which are neither purely sensory nor purely spiritual.
Discerning Imaginal Realities
It is not always easy to tell the difference between an imaginal object and a sensory object. Although some people claim to experience the unveiling of luminous or fiery spirits that is, angels or jinn few of them know how they perceive what they perceive, nor do they know for certain the source of what they perceive. The Shaykh tells us that both the eye of imagination and the eye of sense perception function through the sense of sight, and the science of distinguishing between the perceptions of the two eyes is subtle (Fotuhat I 305.10). After all, Mohammad’s Companions, including ‘Omar, did not possess this science when Gabriel appeared in the form of a bedouin and asked several questions from the Prophet. And one of the most perfect of human beings, the Virgin Mary, did not possess it at the time of the Annunciation, when Gabriel “imaginalized himself to her as a man without fault” (Koran 19: 17). The Shaykh alludes to these two events while explaining the difficulty of discerning between the two kinds of perception:
Not all those who witness imaginalized bodies discern between these bodies and bodies that are ‘real’ in their view. That is why the Companions did not recognize Gabriel when he descended in the form of a bedouin. They did not know that the bedouin was an imaginalized body until the Prophet told them so when he said that it had been Gabriel. They had not doubted that he was a bedouin. The same was the situation with Mary when the angel “imaginalized himself to her as a man without fault,” because she had no mark by which to recognize spirits when they become embodied (Fotuhat II 333.27).
The Shaykh tells us that this ‘mark’ (‘aldma) plays a fundamental role in discerning the nature of an imaginal apparition. Without it, people cannot even distinguish between the imaginal manifestation of spirits and that of God Himself. As the Shaykh remarks, when people experience unveiling without possessing the mark, “The property of the divine and spiritual sides is exactly the same [in their eyes]” (Fotuhat II 333.31). Without the mark, they have no way of discerning among the three types of created spirits that can manifest themselves in imaginal formthose of angels, jinn and human beings2.
The Shaykh often employs the term ‘mark’ in relation to a hadith that describes God’s ’self-transmutation’ (tahawwol) at the Resurrection3. God reveals Himself to each group of people, but they keep on denying Him until He transmutes Himself into a form that has the mark which they recognize. In one place, the Shaykh defines the mark as “the form of their belief concerning God” (Fotuhat I 266.18). In the context of the unveiling of imaginal realities, he apparently has something similar in view. He does not tell us what the mark is, because it is established between God and His servant and differs in each case. But he does tell us something about the circumstances of marks. For example, he says that God in His jealousy (ghayra) may decide that one of His lovers should love Him alone, even though the lover is still dominated by the natural world and has not yet escaped the constraints of imagination.
God desires to deliver the soul from everything but Himself, so that it will love nothing else. Hence, He discloses Himself to it in a natural form and gives it a mark that it is not able to deny. This mark is what is called ‘incontrovertible knowledge’. The soul comes to know that God is this form. Hence, it inclines toward this form in spirit and bodily nature. When God comes to own the soul and teaches it that secondary causes4 must have an effect upon it in respect of its nature. He gives it a mark whereby it will recognize Him. He discloses Himself to it through that mark in all secondary causes without exception. The soul recognizes Him and loves the secondary causes for His sake, not for their sake. (Fotuhat II 331.12)
Unless God has revealed the mark to spiritual seekers, they can always be deceived by visionary experiences. This is not only the case for beginners, but even for advanced adepts. Thus, for example, the Shaykh explains that a person can be deluded (talbis) by the satans and evil jinn (marada) even during a spiritual ascent or me’rdj, during which the traveler passes through the invisible worlds following the example of the Prophet. He writes that many Sufis have been mistaken on this point. Even Ghazali was of the opinion that a person can be deluded only in the world of the elements; once the adept ascends beyond this world, and the doors of heaven are opened for him, he will be protected from being deluded by the satans. The Shaykh, however, does not agree. He writes:
Let us explain to you the truth in that: some of the Sufis hold the view that [during a me'rdj] all delusion in what is seen will be eliminated, because the travelers ascend into places where the satans cannot enter, places that are holy and pure, as described by God. This is true. The situation is as they suppose. However, this is so only when the me’rdj takes place in both body and spirit, as was the me’rdj of the Messenger of God. Another person will ascend through his mind or spiritual reality without the separation that occurs through death, but rather through an annihilation (fana’) or a faculty of vision that has been given to him, while his body stays in his room. He may be absent from his body through annihilation, or present with it through a power he possesses. In this case, there must be delusion if this person does not possess the divine mark between him and God. Through that mark he stands “upon a clear sign from his Lord” (Koran 11: 17) in what he sees and witnesses and in everything that is addressed to him. Hence, if he has a mark, he will stand “upon a clear sign from his Lord.” Otherwise, delusion will occur for him, and there will be a lack of certain knowledge in that, if he is just. (Fotuhat II 622.22)
For his part, the Shaykh makes it clear that he possessed the mark that allows the gnostic to distinguish among the various kinds of imaginalized beings. He always knew if his imaginal eye was observing God, an angel, a jinn, or another human being. He writes:
Some people see the spiritual reality that becomes embodied in the outside world and are able to distinguish between it and a human being or any form in which it manifests itself. They also distinguish between an embodied, supra-formal, spiritual form and an imaginal form from within, by means of various marks that they know. I have come to know and realize these marks, for I discern between the spirit when it becomes embodied in the outside or inside world and a true corporeal form. But the common people do not discern that. (Fotuhat III 44.12)
Note that by ‘common people’ (al-’dmma) the Shaykh does not mean the man in the street, but rather the vast majority of Sufi adepts, the spiritual travelers who have experienced the unveilings of the imaginal world (see Chittick 1989, p. 387, no. 17).
It is perhaps worth remarking here that unveiling is absolutely unreliable as a source of knowledge so long as people are unable to perceive the ‘marks’ and thereby discern the true nature of the experience. As the Shaykh tells us, “Any unveiling that is not unmixed, completely untainted by anything of the bodily constitution, cannot be relied upon, unless the person already possesses the knowledge of the thing that takes form” (Resold, p. 18). No one but the prophets and the greatest friends of God can know who or what becomes embodied to them in imaginal form during a visionary encounter.
The Shaykh reminds his readers that Satan and his followers among the jinn have a vested interest in leading people astray. This is their cosmic function, after all, just as the cosmic function of the prophets is to guide. The result of being led astray is to fall into ‘distance from God’, which is the most concise definition of hell. In contrast, to follow guidance is to be brought near to God, that is, to end up in paradise.
This is not the place to go into detail concerning the Shaykh’s views of the imaginal activity of satans, even though nowadays this is a topic that seems to have special relevance. It is worth noting, ho
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