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CHAPTER SIX
Concluding Remarks
Sufism refers to the mystical tradition of Islam. It is the living Spirit
of the Islamic tradition. Sufism is built on Islam (Submission to Allah) and
Iman (faith). A Sufi is one who sets himself or herself on the path of selfpurification leading to enlightenment and union with God. He is a seeker in
search of his true identity.
The goal of Sufism was to promote love, understanding, affection
and seeking approaches of nearness to Allah through spiritual discipline. A
programme of stages was formulated for the realization of that goal.
The first stage was asceticism, including penitence for the past
mode of living, renunciation of worldly affairs and concerns and
mortification of flesh and appetites (which was not a way of moderation).
The Sufis relinquished their personal property, abstained from even lawful
pleasure and engaged in silent meditation.
The second stage was an effort to discover the esoteric knowledge,
which accompanies the direct personal mystical experience.
The third stage was the illumination, which was expected to
come. Sufi illumination was described in the term of light:
Allah is the light of Heaven and the Earth. The
similitude of His light is a niche wherein is a
lamp. The lamp is in a glass. The glass is as it
were a shining star. (This lamp is) kindled from
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a blessed tree an olive neither of the east nor of
the west, whose oil would almost glow forth (of
itself) though no fire touched it. Light upon
light, Allah guideth unto His light whom He
will And Allah speakth to mankind in
allegories, for Allah is knower of all things (this
lamp is found) in houses. Which Allah hath
allowed to be exalted and that His name shall be
remembered therein. Therein do offer praise to
Him at morning and evening.
(Al-Qur’an, 24:35, 36)
Therefore, in this third stage of Sufi idealism, the love of man and
God occupied its proper place. However, the Qur’an does not explicitly
state in so many words that Allah loves man, it does not state that:
Unto Allah (belongeth) whatsoever is in the
Heavens and whatsoever is in the earth and
whether ye make known what is in your mind
or hide it, Allah will bring you to account for it.
He will forgive whom He will and he will
punish whom He will. Allah is able to do all
things. (Al-Qur’an, 2:284).
Human love was a reflection of Divine Love. This stage led to the
God-intoxication of the Sufis. Which was reportedly manifested in trance
and ecstasy. For this, the Sufis were sometimes treated as near heretics due
to the subsequent innovations introduced in Islam. Such as veneration of
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saints, seeking, blessing from tombs, seeking the meditation of spiritual
leaders and excessive asceticism.
The Sufi leaders developed their thought content within the
framework of the traditions of their silsilas, but the original thinking of
many leading Sufis gave rise to the splintering of branches within the
silsilas themselves. The Sufis can broadly be classified into those who
claim to be inspired by God and those who assert to be in union with God.
However, owing to the difference in the methodology and customs adopted
by them they are divided into innumerable Orders, silsilas and sub-sects.
Here constraint of space does not permit to detail about every Order.
However, the four main and important Orders (silsilas) are as under:
1.
The Chishtitiyyah Order
2.
The Suhrawardiyyah Order
3.
The Qadriyyah, and
4.
Naqshbandiyyah Order
The Chishtitiyyah order, which even today exists in some parts of
India and Pakistan and has much follower-ship. The Suhrawardiyyah order,
which was founded in this period, differed from Chishtiyyah in laying
greater stress on the observance of religious law. It disapproved of the
particular type of music and dancing usually sanctioned by other Sufis.
Two other Orders (silsilas), the Qadriyyah and the Naqshbandiyyah,
also gained widespread influence in India in pre-Mughal times. These were
having large number of the followers during that era, but slowly they could
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not get much popularity because of various theological and economic
reasons.
The Sufis under the influence of Ibn-Arabi’s philosophy had come to
believe in the doctrine of Wahdat al-Wujud (unity of Being), and where
prone to abolish all distinctions between God and man and consequently
were considered dangerous by the Muslim reformers like Sheikh Ahmed
Sirhindi, (lived during Emperor Akbar and Jahangirs time and waged war
against moral laxity, un-Islamic beliefs and practices) who clearly
perceived that all the commandments of religion are based on a distinction
between God and His creation. If creation were unreal and God only had
existence, as Ibn-Arabi maintained then the need for religion and law would
vanish, and what is more important, life and existence would become
matters of little moments. No wonder that the Sufis sought refuge in the
doctrine of annihilation in God, leaving mundane matters to be attended to
by worldly-minded men.
In view of the above, thus, Sheikh Ahmed Sirhindi set himself to
disprove the philosophy of Ibn-Arabi and put forward the contention that
the mystic experience of the unity of God and world is an illusion. He
affirmed the existence of the world as a separate entity, which is the
shadow of the Real Being. This philosophy was directed against the
pantheistic Ideas of the Sufis, which are influenced by Ibn-Arabi. Sirhindi
has come to be called the twelfth renovator on account of the prominent
part, he played in re-establishing Muslim orthodoxy and combating Sufi
deviations from Islam.
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Ibn-Arabi with his superhuman awareness of the mystic, argued that
one and the many were in fact two subjective aspects of One Reality. Thus,
the Muslim peripatetic analyzed the significance of wujud (Being),
metaphysically, while the Sufis approached the same problem mystically.
Accordingly, both the followers of wahdat-al-wujud and wahdat-al-shuhud
not only condemned the peripatetic philosophers and Mu‘tazilah, but were
also opposed to the scholastic reasoning of the Ash’arite Kalam.
The Shuhudiyyas could not outrightly reject the wujudiyyas, but
considered their vision of Reality as a preliminary experience in mystical
progress. They called upon their followers not to be content with attaining
the attractively easy level of the wujudiyyas experience, but to strive to
reach the higher stage of mystical development contained in the wahdat-alshuhud. Conversely the wujudiyyas who formed an overwhelming majority
amongst the Sufis, considered the Shuhudiyya a mystical vision as only a
very elementary stage of mystical development. They stressed the fact that
the Shuhudiyyas misunderstood the wujudiyyas concept of Being which
they used in the sense of Absolute and not in limited formal sense. In their
attempt to reconcile, the wahdat-al-wujud with the wahdat-al-shuhud
scholars such as shah Wali-Allah tended finally to accept the superiority of
wahdat-al-wujud arousing dissatisfaction among the leading exponents of
shuhudiyyah ideology. The effect of the wuyjudiyyah and the shuhudiyyah
conflicts were not only felt in ideological sphere, but had serious
repercussions on the ethico-social world-view of their followers as well.
Iqbal’s approach to genuine Sufism is very much in keeping with his
own philosophy of self and bold action. Thus, he does not discriminate
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between a Muslim and non-Muslim. For him, acceptance of the will of
God, coupled with bold action is the essence of Sufism. Islam brought a
great message of action in west Asia, believing that ego or self worth is a
self-created quality, and can be immortalized through action.
There was a time when Persian poets saw pantheism, as a part of
Islamic thought. Iqbal went along with this philosophy to some extent, but
in his later years, he wrote about removing humankind from the state of
wretchedness and to lead it towards a state of blessedness. He claims that
human being is the noblest of all the creation of Almighty Allah and his
greatness lies in respecting his fellow beings and in love of mankind.
Along with Iqbal’s message of love and brotherhood, his poetry is
infused with patriotism on broader perspective. He has also hit hard against
western imperialism. He wants human beings especially Muslims in Indian
sub-continent, to break shackles of slavery, mindless imitation of the West,
and to crave out their destiny, following their own path, and be free of all
bonds.
There was a great uproar when Iqbal wrote his Mathnavis, Asrar-iKhudi and Rumuz-i-Bekhudi. He was accused of being anti-Sufism. In these
books, he has lashed out an attack on Hafiz Shirazi for his preaching of
passiveness and inaction. His main objection was to a particular brand of
Sufism prevalent in Persia, which despite producing poets of great merit
advocated pessimism, and had a depressing and degenerating effect on the
reader. According to Iqbal, Sufism gives strength and vitality to the heart
and soul, and invigorates the mind. His concept of Sufism is that it should
function as a fountainhead of courage, heroism, and self-sacrifice and not as
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a source of resignation and inactivity. He draws a line between genuine and
artificial Sufism. According to him, genuine Sufism helps in shaping and
directing the evolution of religious experience in Islam while artificial
Sufism is incapable of receiving any fresh inspiration from thought and
experience. He refuses to accept that Sufis orders should only be ascetic,
world-neglecting and life-destroying. According to him, they should be
dynamic, inspired by spiritual vision and should aim at evolving a
civilization, which is socially just, aesthetically beautiful and spiritually
integrated.
Iqbal, while criticizing Persian fatalistic thought and passive
resignation to God’s Will, advocates the combination of bold action and
acceptance of the will of God. He talks of the difference between the
prophetic and mystic type of experience. A mystic when he returns from his
experience does not do much for humankind. Where as the prophet’s
awakening creates earth-shaking psychological force within him calculated
to transform the world creating a fresh world of ideas.
The impression that Iqbal is opposed to Sufism is not true. Iqbal’s
wrath is directed against religious formalism and its dogmas. He raises his
voice against an attitude of surrender, inactivity and blind acceptance of the
doctrine of destiny and against inaction.
Iqbal’s thought is based on the Holy Qur’an and the explanatory
dimension of his thought covers our future. Iqbal was keenly interested in
the Holy Qur’an because he thought that the true personality of his Ideal
Man or Mard-i-Momin is possible only through the teaching of the Holy
Qur‘an and practices of the Prophet’s Sunnah.
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Iqbal drew his inspiration from the Holy Qur‘an, the fountainhead of
Islamic philosophy and he interpreted it in his own way which will serve as
a guiding light for generations to come. To a Muslim he was a source of
great inspiration. The educated admired his poetry and philosophy but both
the literate and illiterate loved and respect him as a leader and patriot.
Iqbal is an Islamic thinker in every respect. He has elucidated his
views on man, universe and God in his prose and poetry. Iqbal adopts the
approach of synthesis theological issues. Reconstruction and constant
striving are important aspects of Iqbal’s philosophy of Islam and he
honestly tries to resolve all those difficulties and challenges in Islamic
framework that are faced by the modern man.
To sum up the entire discussion of Iqbal on the Sufi-tradition of
Islām, we can, on the bases of his poetic art and religious thought, say that
Iqbal’s approach to Sufism is holistic and integral. He does not reject
Sufism. However, he does not accept the institutionalised speculative
Sufism. The factual position of Iqbal is that he is neither a fundamentalist
nor anti-liberalist. Again, he is not a literalist as well. He is a genuine
philosopher and a sensitive poet of spiritual-humanist pursuits. However,
he is profoundly and authentically committed to Islamic world-view and
value-system. To the best of his knowledge, wisdom and conscience, he
tries to preserve Islamic beliefs and values in their letter and spirit. In his
struggle for preserving authentic Islamic weltanschauung, he criticizes the
assumptions of speculative and pantheistic Sufism by questioning their
Integrability with the vision and mission of Islām. Especially, he questions
the validity and viability of pantheistic interpretation of Islamic beliefs and
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values on ethical grounds. He might have erred here and there in outliving
the essence of Sufism or committed inadvertently to some hermeneutical
oversight or lapse. However, he was fundamentally both a Sufi and a Sufi
philosopher. His critique of Sufism was, in the final analysis, a
chastisement of fellow Sufis. Presently we need to revisit Iqbal in the light
of contemporary methodology with a view to appropriating, so far as
possible, an authentic interpretation of Islām, which must be aim of a true
faithful Islamic philosopher in the twenty-first century human world.
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