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Desire for union as the criterion for spiritual love
The main difference between love and lust is that the latter is transient and can be associated with other issues in man’s heart, whereas true love is permanent and once settled in the heart, it will drive all others away from there.
Animal passion is just a whim, and after the sexual intercourse of the two bodies and their lustful satisfaction, the attraction usually subsides or dies out altogether. However, the world of love is different. Love and lust, like faith and disbelief, cannot come together in one heart; one cannot hit ‘the ball of love with the bat of lust’.
The lover has an excessive desire for union with the beloved. Evidently, the union of two bodies is impossible, and this is because of their material features. As we know, matter is the criterion for absence, disunion and separation rather than presence and union. Any kind of union ascribed to material bodies has no reality beyond nominalization; it is merely a kind of association, mixing, mating and contact. However, the lover really desires for union with the beloved, and this indicates that love is an attribute of the immaterial soul, and the body is the idea of neither the lover nor the beloved. The closer the lover comes to the beloved, the closer he still wishes to get, as if he wants to unite with it and be one soul. Evidently, the spear of such love is pointed at another world. Most often, love begins with the lover’s desire to be close to the beloved and be among her friends, but when he achieves his purpose, he will ask for more, that is, to be alone with the beloved. Later he will not even be satisfied with this and will ask for hugging and kissing her. His thirst will not be quenched with this either; his heat and the fire of his passion will rise higher, and he will long for the beloved with all his body, heart and soul, and the flame of the fire of his desire will still blaze more brightly. It has been narrated that Majnun was so much drowned in the love of Laila that one day when she, herself, came to him and announced her presence, he did not pay attention to her and said, "Your love has made me needless of you." Alluding to this story, Mulla Æadra states that the object of love is essentially the imaginal form of the beloved, and the lover comes into union with this imaginal form. This form becomes a part of his being, and he builds upon that form a world full of joy, warmth and drunkenness. This union is like the union of the 'intellect and the intelligible'. He quotes in al-Asfar some excellent verses that apparently belong to Ibn ‘Arabi:
I hug her, but the soul still desires more; is there any state closer than hugging one another?
And I kiss her lips to cool down my heat, but my excitement is increased even more.
It seems as if the fire of my heart will not extinguish, unless two souls unite with each other.
Mulla Æadra believes that the reason for such a burning and unquenchable thirst is the following: The reason is that the beloved is, in fact, other than flesh and body. And there is nothing in the corporeal body that the soul desires; rather, his beloved is a spiritual form existing in another world. [35]
Value and function of spiritual love
There is no philosopher who has voiced his approval or recommendation of the value of spiritual love and its function in absolute terms and unconditionally. As mentioned earlier, some philosophers have considered this kind of love a kind of disease and something worthless, and even those who have approved of it have conditioned it to certain factors.
According to Ibn Sina, Whenever man likes a beautiful countenance only because of animal pleasures, he deserves to be blamed and scolded. Adulterous and homosexual people are of this kind. If corrupt people love beautiful countenances on an intellectual basis [only for the sake of beauty rather than animal pleasures], this will help them as a means for advancing in benevolence and virtue, for this will, in fact, show their greed for the most effective thing to bring one close to the first source of influence and the absolute beloved and is the most similar to transcendent and noble issues. [36]
The bearer of animal love intends to possess the beloved, enjoy her being and satisfy his animal passion, whereas the bearer of transcendent love is ready to lay his existence at the feet of his beloved, sacrifice himself for her and disappear in her.
The noticeable point that Ibn Sina refers to is that man’s outward and inward depend and reflect on each other. He quotes a åadith from the Holy Prophet aelig;) in this regard: "Seek your needs from beautiful countenances," and concludes that the beauty of countenance is due to the beauty of behavior, and that upright posture and graceful external shape reflect excellence of internal constitution. It is the beautiful inward that creates a beautiful form, and they are beautiful attributes that create noble virtues in the person.
He usually thinks of people with beautiful faces as good people but admits, "There are those among people who are ugly in appearance but beautiful in attributes," and also, "There are those who are beautiful in appearance but ugly in attributes."
It is sometimes possible to find some ugly people with good attributes and some beautiful people with bad attributes, but these are only exceptions. He believes that people with hideous faces but glamorous attributes did not originally possess such an appearance but became so due to some accidents. Their ugliness is not genuine, constitutional or rooted in their primary creation; rather, it is accidental, and their good temper has been the result of habit and mixing with good people. On the other hand, there are some people with a beautiful face but despicable behavior, and this could be possibly the effect of two factors: either their bad conduct has nothing to do with their essence, and they were essentially good and virtuous at the beginning, and then, because of some accidents, they became vicious or ill-natured, or perhaps mixing with evil characters has influenced them in the wrong direction and created a number of secondary bad habits in them.[37]
Therefore, according to Ibn Sina, if the aim of the lover in the process of love is not the satisfaction of his instinctive and passionate desires; if he is only in love with the beauty of her countenance, erect posture, and virtuous attributes; and if his affection is roused by the beloved’s beauties rather than his longing for satisfying his passion, his love is admirable and rational. And since form and conduct are compatible with each other, the lover is, in fact, in love with virtuous behavior, though he is looking at it through the mirror of appearance. Man’s disposition for falling in love with beauties and good things is a blessed opportunity; it grants subtlety, enthusiasm, ecstasy and sadness to the soul, makes it cry and causes tenderness of heart and thoughtfulness of mind. It also gives delicacy and liveliness to man’s emotions and feelings. It is as if the lover is seeking for an inward and hidden aspect in the senses, and, consequently, he is liberated from worldly concerns and turns away from whatever other than the beloved. In this case, too, his purpose will be one and limited to the beloved; he starts his mystic journey from the world of multiplicity to the world of unity, and, thus, the process of his reaching the real beloved will become much easier. This is because he does not need to cut off from multiple things for joining his true beloved who is the origin of all perfection, virtues and beauty; rather, it suffices for him to turn away from one and join the other.
Concerning the effect of this love, Mulla Æadra writes, By my life, this love frees the soul free from all worldly concerns, except for one: the desire to see human beauty in which many traces of the Beauty and Glory of Allah could be seen, as God has referred to this in His Words, ''We have indeed created man in the best shape" (Qur’an, chapter al-Tin, 95: 4), and "… and then produced it as another creation. So blessed be Allah, the Best of creators!'' (Qur’an, chapter al-Mu’minun, 23: verse 14). It makes no difference whether what is intended by another creation is the apparent perfect form or the rational soul, for outward is only another label for the inward, and form is the image of reality, and the body and all its components correspond to the soul and its attributes, and the metaphor is the passage to reality". [38]
One of the major obstacles to man’s spiritual and intellectual perfection is his diverse concerns and dispersed motifs and tendencies. Most people’s faculty of imagination, like a wondering bird, sits on a different branch at every moment and wastes all their power and energy on such useless diversities. Having a single concern is a privilege enjoyed by wayfarers, thinkers and all those who have been successful in their field and profession. In some prayers we read: "Oh, God! Make our concerns only one." The gracious Prophet aelig;) said in a tradition to his people: If it were not for your excessive talking and the confusion within your heart, you would see what I see and would hear what I hear.
When man has only one concern, all his energy and power will be concentrated on one direction and lead him to his goal. This great art only lies in love. It is the Elixir unifying man's being and his diverse imaginations with each other and bringing all of them to a point of focus. Thus it is a very powerful factor for motion and search. It fills its owner with courage and dares him to step in fields which reason will never have the courage to enter.
All kinds of loves are one in nature, and their difference lies in their object. Whatever its kind, one of the precious functions of love is to provoke the motion from multiplicity to unity, which provides a very good context for wayfaring and cutting oneself off from natural multiplicity. Love is, indeed, the very excessive desire and zeal of the lover for union with the beloved.
In the ninth Namaì (section) of al-Isharat, where Ibn Sina speaks of the mystical and ascetic practices, he refers to softening of the inward as one of the aims of mystical practices and struggles. An issue that he considers as beneficial and helpful in this regard is having ‘subtle thought and chaste love.’[39] He believes that a kind of love involving chastity and purity is very beneficial in this process. Khwajah Naæir al-Din Ìusi in his commentary on al-Isharat explains Ibn Sina’s remarks as follows: In his speech on chaste love Ibn Sina refers to the first of the two metaphors … and, on the contrary, the first makes the soul delicate and enthusiastic, marks it with ecstasy and tenderness, brings it into opposition with worldly concerns, makes it reject whatever other than its beloved, and transforms all concerns only into a single one. Thus turning to the real beloved will be easier for the lover than to others, because he does not need to reject many things, and one who has said, ' whosoever falls in love, remains chaste, keeps his love secret, and then dies has died a martyr,' has certainly referred to the same point.
Regarding the possible consequences of the love for the beautiful, Ibn Sina writes, "Loving a beautiful form entails three things: firstly, the desire for hugging it; secondly, the desire for kissing it, and thirdly, the desire for becoming one flesh with it. It is the third desire that marks the borderline between spiritual love and animal love. If the lover hopes to do this with his beautiful beloved, his love will be of the kind of animal love, though it can dispense with its beastly aspect through sharing with the rational soul and come of value by intending to survive and reproduce. The first and second desires, that is, the desires for hugging and kissing, are considered vicious, provided that the motif behind them is passion and lust. However, they are not so if the intention behind is to come closer to the beloved or unite with it, and if they are void of lustful purposes. [40]
Metaphor as the passage to reality
There is hardly any difference between metaphorical (spiritual) love and real love. In both of them, the beloved is a being endowed with perfections, virtues, beauties and absolute attributes that strike the eyes and the imagination of the lover. The major difference here is related to their extension; in the former, what the lover accepts as absolute are pure imagination and a metaphor for reality. This is because a being with such absolute and unlimited attributes cannot be found in this earthly world. In this state, if the lover is directed by an experienced and successful wayfarer, he has found access to an immensely valuable means for his attaining the reality. The journey from metaphorical to real love had been discussed in the works of ancient Greeks, especially in those of Plato. Nevertheless, closer inspection of Muslim scholars’ works reveals that mystics, philosophers and scholars of ethics have been inspired by the holy Qur’an in their turning to love as a method, and it was only after this that they began to devise the principles of this method. And, naturally, through internal reflections and deliberations, they learnt about some of the divisions and characteristics of each kind of love and their principles. [41]
Nowadays, scholars of ethics propose two ways for purifying the soul: the way of the intellect and the way of love. The way of the intellect is very long and time consuming and comes to fruition very late, thus it is not the way chosen by sagacious topers. It is on the route of love that one can reach his final destination just by one song, and thus its effect is extremely remarkable.
Do not find fault with me, if from the mosque I go to the tavern, The preaching session is so long, and time is passing. [42]
On the way of love, it is recommended to the wayfarer to tie the leash of his affection and love to a perfect man, and since the first fruit of love is the similitude and sameness of the lover and the beloved, the beloved's attributes, like a generator, will be transferred through the cable of love to the lover. It is from here that the rules of finding friends and winning the love of the people of the house of piety comes of undeniable value. [43]
Mulla Æadra does not recommend spiritual love in absolute terms and on unconditional grounds. He claims that the merit of this kind of love depends on the time and conditions of individuals and believes that it would be useful only in the middle of the process of mystical journey for softening the soul and awakening the wayfarer from the sleep of ignorance and saving him from the sea of animal lusts. However, when the soul is perfected through gaining divine knowledge and the privilege of connecting to the holy realm, one should not continue his spiritual love, since such a person has found access to the truth. Undoubtedly, abandoning the truth and that high rank for attaining a metaphorical and lower rank is condemned and despised by the wise: "When passing through the archway to the world of reality has been completed, turning once again to the beginning of the journey is abominable and deemed contemptuous." [44] He does not reject the possibility that one of the reasons for philosophers’ disagreements in this regard might be staying at the state of metaphorical love or turning one’s back to the truth after reaching it.
It is said that the beginning of the experience of love in the life of most mystics has been with metaphorical love. Such stories have been told about Ibn ‘Arabi, Rumi, Åafiî, and, among the contemporaries, Shahriyar. In the school of love, the toddler has to be taught by childish games initially, so that later, after developing the necessary skills, he could be connected to the truth.
The warrior puts a wooden sword in the hands of his son, So that when he becomes skilful in using it, he would carry a sword in war.
The love that man has is that wooden sword, At the final trial, it will turns into love of the Merciful. [45]
Alas! This desert is extremely dangerous, and it is impossible to pass through it without having Khizr (the Green) as your companion. No one recommends taking such a risk; however, if, by destiny, such a thing happens to the wayfarer, his chastity, shrewdness and patience will be greatly effective in dealing with it and rubbing out the rusts and impurities from the metal of his existence. Nothing could do this other than love; it breaks the walls of egotism and selfishness in him and increase his thirst for moving towards perfection and beauty. It will also bring his potentialities into actuality, grant him a sharp mind, an enlightened heart, a tender spirit, and delicate feelings, and draw his attention to the perception of subtle points and spiritual and transcendental issues.
If this human love does not originate from excessive animal passion, but from the admiration of the features of the beloved and her excellent shape, well-combined features, good temper, harmonious movements and actions, and coquetry and flirtation, it will be considered a virtue. It will bring tenderness to the heart, and sharpness to the mind and draws the attention of the soul to the perception of noble issues. And that is why masters have ordered their disciples to begin with love. As the hadiths go, "Allah is Beautiful and loves beauty," and also "whosoever falls in love, remains chaste, keeps his love secret, and then dies has died a martyr." [46]
In Mystic terms, the true beloved of all people, at whatever level they are, is God. However, such a love and affection for this Beloved is manifested in the love for others. Ibn ‘Arabi’s approves of this idea by saying, "Nobody has ever loved anyone other than his creator, but He is hidden from him by Zaynab, Suad, and Hind." [After stating in his Risalat al-‘ishq (Treatise on Love) that the first cause and the Necessary Being is pure Good, Ibn Sina adds that the real beloved of human, angelic and divine souls is the very Pure Good and the Absolute Perfection. Every soul is in love with itself and its own perfection, and since all perfection and good are emanated from the first cause, and the perfection of souls lies in knowing it and coming close to it, all souls, indeed, love and desire the first cause and the Pure Good. He also writes in Ilahiyyat Shifa, "The Necessary is intelligible, whether it is understood through the mediation of other than Him or not, as He is the Beloved, whether other than Him love Him or not." [49]
The heart that loves beautiful and virtuous ladies, Whether it knows this or not, loves Him.
In his al-Shawahid al-rububiyyah, under the heading ‘Qur'anic wisdom’, Mulla Æadra writes, All worshipers are monotheists at the level of conception and polytheists at the level of judgment. Since they worship and love the origin of good and the absolute perfection… Even idolaters think of their idols as divinity, and, thus, they are no different from most Muslims, and the holy verse, "Thy Lord hath decreed, that ye worship none save Him …" (chapter Bani Israel, 17: 23), could signify this divine command, universal nature and intrinsic religion in all beings. [50]
Regarding the point that all loves and affections, whether conscious or unconscious, lead to the love of God, Ibn ‘Arabi in his Futuåat-i makkiyyah says, We usually love God in His manifestations and under particular names, such as Laila, Lubna and the like, and we do not know that the object of love is the very Truth. We love a name and we are unaware of the fact that it is the very Truth…. Some will recognize their beloved in this world, and some will not until after death; however, when the veils are removed, they will learn that they have not loved anyone other than God, but it has always been the name of the creature that had veiled Him.
Concerning idolaters, he states, "And he has not loved other than God without knowing it and has named his object of worship Manat, ‘Uzza, and Lat, and when he dies and the veil is drawn aside, he will recognize that he has not worshipped other than God".[51]
Rumi also believes that the earthly beloved is loved because a ray of the real beloved exists in her, and a drop of that secret goblet has been poured over her, and, in fact, the spear of worldly lovers is always pointed at the origin and source of those beauties and perfections.
You have spilt a drop from that hidden goblet over the land of my earth, the goblet of the honored.
There is a trace of that drop on the tresses and the visage, and because of that the kings are licking the earth.
There is a drop of beauty on that humiliated earth, which you kiss with a hundred hearts day and night.
A muddy drop of it creates a Majnun; think what a pure drop will do to you.
Every man is tearing his clothes in front of a stone, for that stone of beauty has received a drop.
A drop over the moon, and the sun and the ram; a drop over the throne, the chair and Saturn; A drop over gold, garnet and pearl; a drop over wine, sweets and fruits; A drop over delicate virtuous ladies; then how is that pure and unmixed wine. [52]
Conclusion
The final conclusion that can be drawn from the remarks of great philosophers and mystics is that all beings are in love with existence and perfection, and love is intertwined with existence, though it is realized in different forms at different levels of existence. Since man is endowed with the power of intellect and will, and his motion is not forced by nature or instincts, his love appears in a certain form. He chooses different objects in the light of his intellect and falls in love with them. Such intellection, imagination and selection are absent in other beings, and their love is simply limited to instinctive and natural attraction.
The writer believes that it would be worthwhile to bring this paper to an end with some of Mulla Æadra’s beautiful words in this regard: Beware that the final ends and highest purposes behind the existence of love in the souls of the witty, behind their affection for the beauty of bodies, and behind their adornment of forms are to awaken the souls from the sleep of negligence and ignorance, to train them for a while and bring them from potentiality to actuality, to make them advance from corporeal things to spiritual ones and from there to the best of the permanent universal issues, and to provoke in them the desire for seeing Allah and experiencing the pleasures of the Hereafter.[53]
Notes
[1]. Ibn ‘Arabi, Futuåat al-makkiyyah, vol. 2, p. 111 (4 vols. edition). Beirut: Dar Ihya al-Turath al-Arabi.
[2]. Mathnawi, 3rh Book, verse 4668.
[3]. Ghazaliyyat Shams, 2/ 215.
[4]. Diwan Mutannabi, Edited by Barquti, vols. 3and4, and the second sec., p. 85, Beirut: Dar Al-Kitab Al-Arabi.
[5]. Ghazaliyyat, 2/ 171.
[6]. Cf. Dr Sayyed Hussein Fatimi, Imagery in Ghazaliyyat Shams, Amir Kabir, 1364 A.S., pp. 87-90.
[7]. Ghazaliyyat Shams, 2/299.
[8]. Ibid., 4/202.
[9]. Dehkhoda Dictionary, Tehran University Press, vol. 10, p 14024.
[10]. Muåyaddin Mahdi Ilahi Qumsha’i, Divine Philosophy, Islamic Publications Office, 1363 A.S , pp. 140-146.
[11]. Mulla Sadra, al-Asfar, Qum: Manshurat Mustafawi Publications, vol. 7, p. 15.
[12]. Ibid., p. 176.
[13]. Ibid., p. 152, footnote.
[14]. Cf. al-Shawahid al-rububiyyah, Edited by Sayyed Jalal al-Din Ashtiyani,, University Publication Center, and T‘aliqat section, p. 597, and Rasa’il Ibn Sina, Risalat al-‘ishq, p. 396.
[15]. Cf. al-Asfar, vol. 7, p. 148.
[16]. Ibid., p. 150.
[17]. Cf. Rasa’il Ibn Sina, Qum: Bidar Publications, p. 381.
[18]. Ibid., pp. 371, 381.
[19]. al-Asfar, vol. 7, p. 153.
[20]. Ibid., p. 153, footnote.
[21]. Ibid., p. 160, title of chapter 17.
[22]. Ibid., p. 149.
[23]. Cf. Rasa’il Ibn Sina, p. 377.
[24]. Ibid., p. 393.
[25]. Cf. al-Asfar, vol. 7, pp. 164, 174.
[26]. Ibid., pp. 165-167.
[27]. Muìahhari, Murtaèa, Fiìrat, p. 91.
[28]. Cf. al-Asfar, vol. 7, p. 91.
[29]. Cf. Fiìrat, p. 95.
[30]. al-Asfar, vol. 7, p. 172.
[31]. Ibid., p. 175.
[32]. Ibn Sina, al-Isharat wal tanbihat, vol. 3, Book Publication Center, 1403 A.H. p. 383.
[33]. Cf. Rasa’il Ibn Sina, p. 386.
[34]. Sorush, Abdul Karim, Story of Masters of Knowledge, Sirat Publications, p. 277.
[35]. al-Asfar, vol. 7, p. 179.
[36]. Rasa’il Ibn Sina, p. 387.
[37]. Rasa’il Ibn Sina, p. 388.
[38]. Cf. al-Asfar, vol. 7, p. 174.
[39]. Ibn Sina, al-Isharat wal tanbihat, vol. 3, Book Publication Center, p. 383. 1403 A.H.
[40]. Rasa’il Ibn Sina, p. 388.
[41]. Cf. Saeed Rahimiyan, Real Love and Metaphorical Love, Kayhan Andishe, No. 37.
[42]. Diwan Åafiî.
[43]. For more information refer to Murtaèa Muìahhari, Imam ‘Ali's Attraction and Repulsion.
[44]. al-Asfar, vol. 7, p. 175.
[45]. Ghazaliyyat Shams, 1/22.
[46]. al-Asfar, vol. 7, p. 174.
[47]. Muìahhari Murtaèa, Fiìrat, p. 120.
[48]. Rasa’il Ibn Sina, p. 393.
[49]. Ibn Sina, Ilahiyyat shifa, Tehran: Nasir Khusro Publications, p. 370.
[50]. Mulla Sadra, al-Shawahid al-rububiyyah, edited by Ashtiyani, p. 144.
[51]. Ibn ‘Arabi, al-Futuåat al-makkiyyah, vol. 4, Beirut: Dar Sadir, p. 259.
[52]. Mathnawi, 5th Book, 372.
[53]. al-Asfar, vol. 7, p. 186.
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