“In every atom, in every molecule, I see the face of Beloved.“- Attar
“To God belong all that is in the East and in the West. God is the place of sun rising and the place of sun setting, so whatever way you turn there is His face.
His core being. He wraps around you. He knows.” —Quran al-Baqarah (2:115)
THE Face of God refers to His Names and Qualities in as much as they are reflected upon the myriads of mirrors of existence. This Face is also none other than the Face, which the spiritual man turns towards God. Man returns to God by turning his face toward God’s Face and by finally realizing that he is himself the mirror, in which God contemplates His Holy Face. The goal of human life is to realize this Face, while man resides in the human state as the being whom God created in ‘His image.’ On the highest level, the realization of this Face through ‘self-effacement’ or annihilation (fana) as the Sufis have called it—means to be resurrected in God while in this life and to see God wherever one turns.”
“Those who have died to their ego have gained thereby the right to assert, with such saints as Hallaj and Bastami their ‘union’ with the Divine and to express through their ecstatic utterances such sayings as ‘I am the Truth’ or ‘Glory be unto me.’ It was not the individual Sufi, but God in them who uttered such ecstatic sayings. Through this self-effacement or annihilation, which represents the highest possibility of the human state, the spiritual masters of Islam came to realize the ultimate meaning of the Shahadah, which is not only that God is One, but also that He is the only Reality in the absolute sense. Whether called the “Transcendent unity of being” (wadat al-wujud) or “Unity of consciousness” (wadat al-shuhud) and despite varying metaphysical expositions and interpretations given to these terms over the centuries by mystics and Gnostics, this doctrine represents the highest fruit of spiritual realization, which is to know God and to see Him as He is.”
“The fruit of the spiritual path of Islam for the mystic is the plenary knowledge of the Divine, experience God as Transcendent and Immanent, as before and after all things, as both Inward and Outward. He sees God everywhere as the Qur’an asserts:-“Whithersoever ye turn, there is Face of God.” Such a person is already dead to the world even if he continues to live actively in it. His gaze is fixed upon God, and his tongue and heart never cease repeating His Name, before the profane world, which understands him not, he simply repeats the Qura’nic injunction:- “Say Allah, and then leave them to plunge themselves in vain and trifle discourse.”(VI, 92).
“He already lives in Allah’s Sacred Name, having died to his passionate self. Through this death he has gained access to the world of the spirit and has come to know His Lord, thereby fulfilling the goal of creation and the purpose of the Qura’nic Revelation, which is none other than to enable man to know and love God and to obey His Will during this earthly journey,” writes Hossen Nasr. Quran says, “Everything that dwells upon the earth is perishing, yet still abides the Face of your Lord, Majestic,Splendid.” (Sura Ar-Rahman 55:26-27)
It tells us about the transience and the impermanence of all created things in contrast to the eternal and unchanging nature of Allah’s existence. The cosmos is the locus of God’s self-disclosure or manifestation. This means that the universe and and everything within it, are not separate from God but rather a reflection or manifestation of His attributes and essence. In other words, God is present in the world.
“And turn away not those who invoke their Lord morning and afternoon seeking His Face. (Qur’an Sura-al-Anam (6:52) Closely connected to the face is the veil (hijab) which keeps the face hidden. The face symbolizes Allah’s essence and presence, emphasizing Allah’s grandeur, majesty and splendor, highlighting Allah’s beauty, generosity and kindness. “Can we set our hearts on that which is everlasting and not on, which is perishing is the question,” which the Sufi mystics asks?
“Rose and mirror, sun and moon—what are they? Wherever we looked, there was always Thy face.” – Mir Dard God says concerning the folks of felicity and wretchedness:- “Faces on that day shall be radiant, gazing upon their Lord.”(Quran 75:22-23). “Faces on that day shall be scowling, thinking that a calamity will be worked upon them. (Quran 75:24-25) God created everything of the cosmos in perfection. This perfection is its face. ‘He clarified the affair to His servants in the perfect of its faces, according to both reason and the Shariah. He was not obscure, nor did He employ tokens or riddles.’ “It is only a remembrance and a clear Qur’an (36:69) that thou mayest make dear to the people, what was sent down to them (Qur’an 16:44).
In the context of wujud, the most important Qur’anic verse concerning the face is (28:88) which Ibn-Arabi reads in two basic ways, depending on the lesson, he wishes to draw. If he understands the word face, to mean God’s face, then he reads it as:- “Each thing is perishing except His face, which is to say that God alone has wujud and all other things dwell in non-existence, or that wujud’s self-disclosure never ceases and every existent entity constantly perishes, only to be given wujud in the next instant, through the next self-disclosure.
The Prophet (PBUH) said, ”Worship God as if you see Him.” The human being configures a form within himself that he worships. He is the form-giver and he is the created, configured thing that God configured as a servant, who worships what he configures. (IV 212.29). “Sunlight fell upon the earth, The wall received a borrowed splendor. Why set your heart on a piece of earth. O simple one, seek out the source Which shines forever.” Rumi
In another place, Rumi says, “Keep your heart awake, don’t be deceived by the intoxication of the ego. Don’t think all ecstasies are the same. Jesus was drunk with love for God; his donkey was drunk with barley.”
—The writer is author of six books including “Islamic Spirituality and Mysticism, the Path and destination’ & ‘The Philosophy of Rumi and its relevance in the Present Times.
(muhammadtahir50@hotmail.com)
