The Relationship Between Maʿrifa and ʿArafāt

🌼The Relationship Between Gnosis, Love and Martyrdom🌼

🌼Gnosis Is Love’s Wing🌼

🌸🔆🌿   “The Mystery of ʿArafāt”  “The رمز of Sacrifice” “Gnosis, Nearness and Sacrifice”

🔅🌹 A Summary, with an Addendum: “The Mystery of ʿArafāt” “ ”  “The رمز of Sacrifice” “Gnosis, Nearness and Sacrifice”  “ ”        1402.04.08   Ali Saʿi (Abdullah Meshkat 110.141(903)  🌹🔅

🌹🔅☘️ بِسْمِ اللَّهِ الرَّحْمنِ الرَّحيمِ ☘️🔅🌹

☘️ 🔅 🌸  Accept my sacrifice in the spirit of Abel, and my soul in the spirit of Abraham, O Near One, the One and Only. I would give my very self for You, and all You have given me—for You alone… «You»    🌸 🔅 ☘️

O Near One, the One and Only, my life and all the world are sacrificed for You

🌹🔅☘️ “May the Feast of Liberation from Estrangement and the Joy of a Nearness Dearer Than Life Be Blessed” ☘️🔅🌹

🔅 🌸  Remember! First sacrifice your lower self, and then offer your soul as a sacrifice to Him 🌸 🔅

🌸 🔅 Be God’s sacrificed one, so that you may become God’s servant; then become one sacrificed for God 🔅 🌸

🌹🔅☘️ اللَّهُمَّ هَذَا يَوْمٌ مُبَارَكٌ مَيْمُونٌ، وَ الْمُسْلِمُونَ فِيهِ‏ مُجْتَمِعُونَ‏ فِي أَقْطَارِ أَرْضِكَ، يَشْهَدُ السَّائِلُ مِنْهُمْ وَ الطَّالِبُ وَ الرَّاغِبُ وَ الرَّاهِبُ وَ أَنْتَ النَّاظِرُ فِي حَوَائِجِهِمْ، فَأَسْأَلُكَ بِجُودِكَ وَ كَرَمِكَ وَ هَوَانِ مَا سَأَلْتُكَ عَلَيْكَ أَنْ تُصَلِّيَ عَلَى مُحَمَّدٍ وَ آلِهِ ☘️🔅🌹

🌹🔅 How to Receive the Gifts of Eid al-Adha 🔅🌹

🌷 The Muslim community’s gathering on Eid al-Adha marks the completion of last year’s race and the beginning of the new year, with the receiving of special Merciful graces.

☘️On Eid al-Adha, the believers’ condition is like a display of fruit of varying quality: ripe, sweet and beautiful fruit, unripe fruit, and worm-eaten fruit. Which will the peerless Creator choose?

🌷 The believers’ state and desire may be driven by profit and commerce, by the pleasures of servitude, or by the joy of the free.

☘️Eid al-Adha is a day for presenting our needs—from those of the belly and the passions to needs of the hereafter and of the Lord!

🌷 Whoever makes God their need will have attained the highest rank in the contest of needs.

☘️God watches over us; we are the ones upon whom God gazes. What supreme good fortune! The question is: how do we present ourselves to Him?

🌷 Eid al-Adha is the day to sever every bond that is not with God, the day to break away from all but God.

☘️On Eid al-Adha, we must present the most beautiful image of servanthood to the One who beholds us, and offer Him the loveliest gift. Our greatest and highest gift is our greatest and most exalted need: the need of the noblest of creatures must itself be noble and exalted. The least of needs is unworthy of the greatest servant!

🌷 Our gift shows how deeply we understand our absolute need of Allah. And among all our needs, the one who meets them is itself our need: He Himself is what we need and desire.

☘️The breadth of one’s supplication reflects the expansiveness of one’s heart. The more a person possesses an open heart, the wider their needs become. For a heart overflowing with love of God, the Beloved Himself becomes the very essence of its need.

🌷 A base person’s needs never rise above the belly and the passions, whether in this world or the next. The needs of the hereafter should not resemble or be of the same kind as worldly needs. God’s servant is satisfied with nothing less than God Himself.

☘️Which of our needs does God look upon? Any need that is not for God reveals a desire to remain distant from Him.

🌹🔅☘️ هَا أَنَا أَتَوَسَّلُ إِلَيْكَ‏ بِفَقْرِي‏ إِلَيْكَ وَ كَيْفَ أَتَوَسَّلُ إِلَيْكَ بِمَا هُوَ مَحَالٌ أَنْ يَصِلَ إِلَيْك‏☘️🔅🌹

🔅🌹Aboard the Ship of Imam Husayn’s Words 🔅🌹

🌷 Imam Husayn, peace be upon him, teaches the world not merely the lesson of love and martyrdom, but the dawn of love and martyrdom.

Indeed, Imam Husayn, peace be upon him, cleaved open the breast of gnosis and offered love, together with the lover, as one sacrifice to the One and Only Beloved.

🌷 Poverty does not reach the threshold of God. If our poverty is the means by which we draw near to God, why do we seek Him through something that has no place in His presence? Imam Husayn, peace be upon him, teaches us to transcend it. Our very essence is nothing but poverty; unless we move beyond this poverty, we cannot reach Him. So long as we are nothing, we remain in nothingness. When we pass beyond it, we reach Him!

🌻🔆Fāṭir: 15   يا أَيُّهَا النَّاسُ أَنْتُمُ الْفُقَراءُ إِلَى اللَّهِ وَ اللَّهُ هُوَ الْغَنِيُّ الْحَميدُ

☘️Poverty may be our lack of knowledge of Him: whoever is without knowledge of Him is far from Him. God encompasses us with His knowledge, power, majesty, beauty and riches—so where is there any poverty in us? Our failure to understand this truth is our poverty.

🌷 In union, there is no poverty. I am not joined to God through my poverty; there is no veil between Him and us.

☘️Let us negate the nothingness that is not real, so that we may feel the presence of union.

🌷 To dispel poverty is to dispel nothingness, to pass beyond nonexistence. With nothingness and illusion, life becomes death.

🔅🌹The Ladder of Knowledge at ʿArafāt 🌹🔅

☘️The greater our need, the greater our knowledge.

🌷 The degree of our servitude is measured by the degree of our needs.

☘️The plain of ʿArafāt is a university of knowledge.

🌷 With Adam, the father of humankind, we fell from the garden of Paradise into the garden of ʿArafāt, to acquire knowledge—to learn the art of servitude at this university and come to know ourselves. Then, having graduated, we ascend once more and set foot and heart in the home of felicity.

☘️We have all fallen; otherwise, we would not be enduring the punishment of error in this valley. The kind and manner of our error differed from Adam’s. We too tasted a morsel from the forbidden tree—perhaps in the realm of pre-eternity, perhaps as cells, or in some other way. But in any case, we were tasters, for God does not punish us for the error of our first ancestor.

🌷 Confessing our error is a sign of our knowledge. To admit that we have erred is to know our error and acknowledge it; it is the beginning of passing beyond and arriving.

☘️Everyone complains about earthly life, and some even blame their parents’ desires for their own worldly existence. Yet they forget that we had no choice but to enter this world and learn the lesson of servitude. In one way or another, and under differing conditions, we had to be present in this world.

🌷 God seeks our knowledge of Him. What the All-Knowing God already knows, we must declare to Him ourselves.

☘️The ascent after the descent comes only through a sincere, knowing confession. Knowledge is the most shattering instrument in a human being’s hands: it breaks us, breaks our errors, and transforms our evil deeds into goodness and beauty. The Day of ʿArafah is such a day—a day of attaining this exalted station.

🌹🔅The Charter of Sacrifice 🔅🌹

🌷 First comes knowledge, which gives worship its form; then comes being sacrificed, receiving the grace of being God’s sacrifice, and attaining the rank of one offered to God.

☘️It is the one sacrificed for God who is God’s servant, and it is God’s servant who receives the grace of God’s sacrifice.

🌷 Only after being severed from everything, after every vein of attachment has been cut, does the reality of sacrifice become clear.

☘️«بنفسی انت و امّی و ابی و اخی و …» Truly, this means preferring God to everything: being content with God even when it brings the anger and displeasure of all others—whether our own selves, our parents, our loved ones, or anyone else. «بنفسی انت» is the sacrifice of every attachment.

🌷 Let us offer our Ismāʿīls and all our desires as sacrifices, so that we may be beloved of God. Both the one who sacrifices and the one sacrificed are beloved of God.

☘️Blessed are the young people who offer their youth to God—the most precious Ismāʿīl of their lives. Let us sacrifice every desire we have, including the beasts within us.

🌷 Every kind of beast, livestock and predator within us must be sacrificed.

☘️How do we know that the very sheep, cow and camel we sacrifice are not part of the farm of our own being? They are an outward display of our inner farm. What beasts, birds, animals and delights lie within our hearts, awaiting sacrifice?

🌷 Let us cut the jugular of our lower desires, so that we may become sovereign in servitude to Him.

☘️ Let us sacrifice the biting and predatory beasts within us in His name.

🌷 Once all the beasts within us have been slaughtered, it is the turn of the single body of our being—but we can no longer slaughter it ourselves. God Himself must become our slaughterer. What a sublime sacrifice.

☘️ What do “slain for God” and “martyred for God” mean? What is the inner reality of martyrdom? Can anyone stand between Him and His martyr? Then who makes the martyr His martyr?!!!

🌷 In the highest station of martyrdom, there is no intermediary!

☘️ The final transaction is carried out by God, the Most High, the Exalted.

🌷 Woe to those who sacrifice all their values to their own lower desires—and even to the desires of others.

☘️ Every pleasure should be savoured with the intention of drawing near to His Essence of Majesty.

🌷 Every single moment is a moment of sacrifice. Let us offer ourselves to Him!

☘️ The finest human achievement is to acknowledge one’s utter poverty.

🌷 Knowledge stands above beauty: beauty takes shape through knowledge, which is the software of beauty and pleasure.

☘️ A chameleon makes itself the colour of its surroundings. This means that a particular knowledge has been planted within it: by absorbing information from its environment, it uses the hardware of its being to display a likeness of that environment on its body.  

🌷 Within the greater soul of the human being, the All-Knowing God has planted such knowledge that, by putting it into practice, a person can embody within their soul not only the colours of their surroundings, but the patterns, dimensions, quantities and qualities of all that exists. In a sense, they can scientifically remake themselves.

☘️ A human being can become like and equal to the sun, the moon and other celestial bodies and creatures—even angels, even the entire universe. Is the human being not the greater universe?!

🌷 How beautiful, then, to become worthy, to become like the friends of God, to become the whole universe and all that is beautiful—and to offer ourselves to Him.

☘️ May we be digested by, drawn to, swallowed up in, and touched by His knowledge, greatness, wisdom, majesty and beauty: by His immense power to digest, His supreme attraction, and His greatest act of swallowing and touching.

🌷 Human beings produce rubbish because they have made themselves distorted, becoming generators of filth and impurity. In other words, they have made themselves defective in the realm of their obligations and become sources of grime and foulness.

☘️ To reach the inner interpretation of our being, to return to the time before the forbidden tree and all prohibitions, is in truth to attain the most excellent form of being. We must bring ourselves into harmony with the most excellent order.

🌷 The secret of «عرفنی نفسک» is the longing to reach without intermediaries; it is the secret of casting off every attachment.

☘️ When all the veils are lifted, sacrifice happens of its own accord.

🌷 The secret of «عرفنی نبیک» is to seek the vision of the beauty of God’s Prophet, with no veil between. Through this supreme knowledge, this soul within me and within us, together with countless souls, gives itself as one to the Soul of the world.

☘️ May I hold the whole universe in my heart and give my soul to the Beloved.

🌷 From beginning to end, a human being must offer themselves as a sacrifice to their Beloved.

☘️ Every moment, Imam of the Age, may God hasten his return, is a sacrifice to God. Mahdi is God’s perpetual sacrifice; he is God’s sacrifice, ever-flowing and in motion.

O God, seek me out Yourself. O God, let me taste the love-filled state of Mahdi, my moon, in his love for You. O God, lift every veil between me and You. O God, adorn my eyes with the beauty of Your Prophet and Your friend, without any covering.

🌹🔅 إِلَهِي تَرَدُّدِي‏ فِي‏ الْآثَارِ يُوجِبُ بُعْدَ الْمَزَارِ فَاجْمَعْنِي عَلَيْكَ بِخِدْمَةٍ تُوصِلُنِي إِلَيْك‏

🌹🔅 كَيْفَ‏ يُسْتَدَلُّ عَلَيْكَ بِمَا هُوَ فِي‏ وُجُودِهِ‏ مُفْتَقِرٌ إِلَيْك‏

🌹🔅 عَمِيَتْ عَيْنٌ لَا تَزَالُ [تَرَاكَ‏] عَلَيْهَا رَقِيباً وَ حَسَرَتْ صَفْقَةُ عَبْدٍ لَمْ تَجْعَلْ لَهُ مِنْ حُبِّكَ نَصِيباً إِلَهِي أَمَرْتَ بِالرُّجُوعِ إِلَى الْآثَارِ فَأَرْجِعْنِي إِلَيْكَ بِكِسْوَةِ الْأَنْوَارِ وَ هِدَايَةِ الِاسْتِبْصَارِ حَتَّى أَرْجِعَ إِلَيْكَ مِنْهَا كَمَا دَخَلْتُ إِلَيْك‏

🌹🔅 إِلَهِي حَقِّقْنِي بِحَقَائِقِ أَهْلِ الْقُرْبِ وَ اسْلُكْ بِي مَسْلَكَ أَهْلِ الْجَذْب‏

🌹🔅 يَا مَنْ أَذَاقَ أَحِبَّاءَهُ حَلَاوَةَ الْمُؤَانَسَةِ فَقَامُوا بَيْنَ يَدَيْهِ‏ مُتَمَلِّقِينَ‏ وَ يَا مَنْ أَلْبَسَ أَوْلِيَاءَهُ مَلَابِسَ هَيْبَتِهِ فَقَامُوا بَيْنَ يَدَيْهِ مُسْتَغْفِرِين‏

🌹🔅 وَ أَنْتَ الْوَهَّابُ ثُمَّ لِمَا وَهَبْتَ لَنَا مِنَ‏ الْمُسْتَقْرِضِينَ‏ إِلَهِي اطْلُبْنِي بِرَحْمَتِكَ حَتَّى أَصِلَ إِلَيْك‏

🌹🔅 إِلَهِي اطْلُبْنِي بِرَحْمَتِكَ حَتَّى أَصِلَ إِلَيْكَ وَ اجْذِبْنِي‏ بِمَنِّكَ‏ حَتَّى أُقْبِلَ عَلَيْك‏[1]

🌻🔆المائدة : 27   وَ اتْلُ عَلَيْهِمْ نَبَأَ ابْنَيْ آدَمَ بِالْحَقِّ إِذْ قَرَّبا قُرْباناً فَتُقُبِّلَ مِنْ أَحَدِهِما وَ لَمْ يُتَقَبَّلْ مِنَ الْآخَرِ قالَ لَأَقْتُلَنَّكَ قالَ إِنَّما يَتَقَبَّلُ اللَّهُ مِنَ الْمُتَّقينَ

🌻🔆الصافات : 102   فَلَمَّا بَلَغَ مَعَهُ السَّعْيَ قالَ يا بُنَيَّ إِنِّي أَرى‏ فِي الْمَنامِ أَنِّي أَذْبَحُكَ فَانْظُرْ What تَرى‏ قالَ يا أَبَتِ افْعَلْ ما تُؤْمَرُ سَتَجِدُني‏ إِنْ شاءَ اللَّهُ مِنَ الصَّابِرينَ

🌹🔅 وَ اعْتَرِفْ بِالْخَطَإِ بِالْعَرَفَاتِ وَ حَدِّدْ عَهْدَكَ عِنْدَ اللَّهِ تَعَالَى بِوَحْدَانِيَّتِهِ وَ تَقَرَّبْ إِلَيْهِ وَ اتَّقِهِ بِمُزْدَلِفَةَ وَ اصْعَدْ بِرُوحِكَ‏ إِلَى الْمَلَإِ الْأَعْلَى بِصُعُودِكَ إِلَى الْجَبَلِ وَ اذْبَحْ‏ حَنْجَرَةَ الْهَوَى وَ الطَّمَعِ عِنْدَ الذَّبِيحَةِ وَ ارْمِ الشَّهَوَاتِ وَ الخَسَاسَةَ وَ الدَّنَاءَةَ وَ الْأَفْعَالَ الذَّمِيمَةَ عِنْدَ رَمْيِ الْجَمَرَاتِ وَ احْلِقِ الْعُيُوبَ الظَّاهِرَةَ وَ الْبَاطِنَةَ بِحَلْقِ شَعْرِك‏[2]

🌹🔅 عَنْهُ ص أَنَّهُ قَالَ: سَمِعْتُ رَسُولَ اللَّهِ ص يَخْطُبُ يَوْمَ النَّحْرِ وَ هُوَ يَقُولُ هَذَا يَوْمُ الثَّجِ‏ وَ الْعَجِ‏ وَ الثَّجُّ مَا تُهَرِيقُونَ فِيهِ مِنَ الدِّمَاءِ فَمَنْ صَدَقَتْ نِيَّتُهُ كَانَتْ أَوَّلُ قَطْرَةٍ لَهُ‏  كَفَّارَةً لِكُلِّ ذَنْبٍ وَ الْعَجُّ الدُّعَاءُ فَعِجُّوا إِلَى اللَّهِ فَوَ الَّذِي نَفْسُ مُحَمَّدٍ بِيَدِهِ لَا يَنْصَرِفُ مِنْ هَذَا الْمَوْضِعِ أَحَدٌ إِلَّا مَغْفُوراً لَهُ‏  إِلَّا صَاحِبَ كَبِيرَةٍ مُصِرّاً عَلَيْهَا لَا يُحَدِّثُ نَفْسَهُ بِالْإِقْلَاعِ عَنْهَا.[3]

🌹🔅 On this day, these are the very blood-offerings you sacrifice, and whoever’s intention is pure, all his sins are forgiven with the flowing of the first drop of the sacrificial blood. And the “عجّ” is itself supplication, so on this day call upon God abundantly. ثجّ و عجّ است. ثجّ 🌹🔅

« قَالَ أَبُو عَبْدِ اللَّهِ ع‏ إِذَا اشْتَرَيْتَ هَدْيَكَ فَاسْتَقْبِلْ بِهِ الْقِبْلَةَ وَ انْحَرْهُ أَوِ اذْبَحْهُ‏ وَ قُلْ‏

»وَجَّهْتُ‏ وَجْهِيَ‏ لِلَّذِي‏ فَطَرَ السَّماواتِ وَ الْأَرْضَ حَنِيفاً وَ ما أَنَا مِنَ الْمُشْرِكِينَ‏ إِنَّ صَلاتِي وَ نُسُكِي وَ مَحْيايَ وَ مَماتِي لِلَّهِ رَبِّ الْعالَمِينَ لا شَرِيكَ لَهُ وَ بِذلِكَ أُمِرْتُ وَ أَنَا مِنَ‏ الْمُسْلِمِينَ‏ اللَّهُمَّ مِنْكَ وَ لَكَ بِسْمِ اللَّهِ وَ اللَّهُ أَكْبَرُ اللَّهُمَّ تَقَبَّلْ مِنِّي 

[4]ثُمَّ أَمِرَّ السِّكِّينَ وَ لَا تَنْخَعْهَا- حَتَّى تَمُوت‏🌹🔅 With sincere, pure-hearted devotion I have turned my face toward the One who created the heavens and the earth, and I am not of the polytheists. Indeed, my prayer and my worship, my life and my death are for God, the Lord of the worlds. He has no partner, and with this I have been commanded, and I am the first of those who submit. O Lord, it is from You and it is for You. بسم الله و الله اکبر. O Lord, accept it from me.

🌼 Ali Saei (Abdullah Meshkat) 110.141(903)  🌼

[1] A passage from the supplication of ʿArafah by His Eminence Sayyid al-Shuhadāʾ (peace be upon him)

[2] Miṣbāḥ al-Sharīʿa; vol. 1, p. 48  Aʿlamī, Beirut, first edition, 1400 AH.

[3] Daʿāʾim al-Islām; vol. 1, p. 184  Ahl al-Bayt Foundation (peace be upon them), Qom, second edition, 1385 AH.

[4] Al-Kāfī (Islamic edition); vol. 4, p. 498  Fourth edition, 1407 AH.