On the Angel Named the Spirit (al-Rūḥ)

Know that this angel is the one named, in the terminology of the Sufis, "the Real by whom [creation is made]" (al-ḥaqq al-makhlūq bihi) and the Muhammadan Reality. God (exalted is He) looked upon this angel with that by which He looks upon Himself.

So He created it from His light, created the world from it, and made it the locus of His regard within the world.

Among its names is "the Command of God" (Amr Allāh). It is the noblest of the existents, the highest of them in station and the most exalted in rank; there is no angel above it. It is the master of the brought-near ones and the most excellent of the ennobled.

God set turning upon it the millstone of the existents and made it the Pole (qutb) of the sphere of created things. With everything God (exalted is He) created, it has a special aspect by which it adjoins that thing, and in the rank in which God (exalted is He) brought that thing into being, it preserves it.

It has eight forms, which are the Bearers of the Throne; from it were created all the angels, their higher and their elemental; so the relation of the angels to it is the relation of the droplets to the sea.

And the relation of the eight who bear the Throne, [drawn] from it, is the relation of the eight by which human existence subsists, [drawn] from the spirit of the human.

And they are: the intellect (al-ʿaql), the estimation (al-wahm), the cogitation (al-fikr), the imagination (al-khayāl), the form-giving faculty, the retentive faculty, the apprehending faculty, and the soul (al-nafs).

And this angel has, in the horizonal world, the world of Omnipotence (al-jabarūt), the high world, and the world of Sovereignty (al-malakūt), a divine dominion that God created within this angel.

And it appeared in its perfection in the Muhammadan Reality; therefore the most excellent of mankind bore it, and by it God (exalted is He) bestowed favor upon him and reinforced him -- among the greatest of the blessings that God (exalted is He) conferred upon him.

So He (exalted is He) said: "And thus We revealed to you a spirit from Our Command. You did not know what the Book was, nor faith; but We made it a light by which We guide whom We will of Our servants. And truly you guide to a straight path" (42:52, al-Shūrā).

Meaning: We made for your spirit a perfect aspect of the aspects of this angel, which is Our Command -- for this angel, its name is the Command of God -- and to it is the pointing in His saying:

"from the Command of my Lord" (17:85) -- that is, an aspect of its aspects.

And the subtle point is that, when the mention of the spirit was left unqualified in their questioning about it, in His saying: "They ask you about the spirit" (17:85, al-Isrāʾ),

He left it unqualified in the answer, saying: "Say: the spirit is from the Command of my Lord" (17:85, al-Isrāʾ).

That is, an aspect of the aspects of the Command -- unlike the spirit of Muhammad (upon him be peace), concerning whom He said: "Thus We revealed to you a spirit from Our Command" (42:52, al-Shūrā),

His mentioning it [in the masculine] was out of concern for it, and His making it indefinite was for the majesty of that aspect -- as an alerting to the immensity of the worth of Muhammad (upon him be peace) -- just as in His saying (exalted is He): "That is a Day for which mankind shall be gathered" (11:103, Hūd), where the indefinite construction conveyed the immensity of that Day.

Then He said: "a spirit from Our Command," and did not say: "We revealed to you from Our Command" -- because it is the intended purpose of existence, for the spirit is the intended purpose of the human frame. Then He brought the nūn of annexation in the saying "from Our Command" -- all of that as emphasis and as an alerting to the immensity of the worth of Muhammad (may God bless him and grant him peace).

Then know that, since God created this angel as a mirror for His Essence, God (exalted is He) does not appear by His Essence except in this angel; and His appearing in all the [other] creatures is only by His Attributes.

So it is the Pole of the worldly world and the otherworldly, the Pole of the people of the Garden and the Fire, and the people of the Dune (al-kathīb) and the people of the Heights (al-aʿrāf).

The divine Reality, in the knowledge of God (glory be to Him), required that He create nothing without this angel's having in it an aspect upon which the sphere of that created thing turns -- so it is its Pole.

That angel makes itself known to no one of God's creation (exalted is He) except to the Perfect Human; so when the friend of God (al-walī) comes to know it, it teaches him things.

And when he realizes them, he becomes a pole upon which the millstone of all existence turns, by way of vicegerency and as a loan. So know it.

For it is the Spirit mentioned in the Book of God (exalted is He), where He said: "On the Day when the Spirit and the angels stand in ranks, they do not speak, except him whom the All-Merciful permits and who says what is right" (78:38, al-Nabaʾ).

That true Day is the day when this angel stands in the divine dominion, with the angels before it, standing in ranks in its service; while it stands in servanthood to the Real, acting freely in that divine Presence by what God (exalted is He) has commanded it.

And His saying "they do not speak" refers to the angels, not to it; for it is permitted to speak without restriction in the divine Presence, because it is its most complete locus of manifestation and its most excellent disclosure-site. And the angels, even though they are permitted to speak in the divine Presence, no angel speaks but a single word -- nothing more than that is within its capacity, so it cannot at all, at all, expand in speech.

So the angel does not speak in the Presence but a single word. And the first to receive the Command from the Real is this angel; then it directs it to the others of the angels.

For they are the army. So when it is commanded that a command take effect in the world, God creates from it an angel suited to that command, and the Spirit sends it; so the angel does what the Spirit commands it. And all the brought-near angels are created from it -- like Isrāfīl, Jibrīl, Mīkāʾīl, and ʿAzrāʾīl.

And those who are above them -- like the angel named the Nūn, which is the angel standing beneath the Preserved Tablet; and like the angel named the Pen (al-Qalam), whose exposition will come following this chapter.

And the angel named the Disposer (al-Mudabbir), which is the angel standing beneath the Footstool (al-Kursī).

And the angel named the Detailer (al-Mufaṣṣil), which is the one standing beneath the Manifest Record (al-Imām al-Mubīn).

And these are the High Ones (al-ʿālūn) who were not commanded to prostrate to Adam -- a divine wisdom; for had they been commanded to prostrate to Adam, every one of his progeny would have known them.

Do you not see the angels [who were commanded]: when they were commanded to prostrate to Adam, how they became manifest to every one of the Children of Adam, taking form for them in sleep through the divine similitudes by which the Real appears to the sleeper?

So all those forms are angels of God; they descend according to what the angel charged with the striking of similitudes commands them, and they take on every form for the sleeper.

And for this reason the sleeper sees an inanimate object speaking to him; and were it not a spirit taking form in the inanimate shape, it would not speak. For this reason he (upon him be blessing and peace) said: "The truthful dream is a revelation from God" -- and that is because the angel descends with it.

And he said: "The truthful dream is one part of forty-six parts of prophethood" -- the hadith.

And since Iblīs (upon him be the curse) was among those commanded to prostrate to Adam and did not prostrate, he commands the devils -- who are his product and his progeny -- to take form for the sleeper with that by which the angels take form.

So the false dream came about. And the upshot of all this discourse is that the High Ones were not commanded to prostrate to Adam.

And for this reason none attains to knowing them except the divine ones among the Children of Adam -- a divine gift -- after deliverance from the Adamic rulings, which are the human meanings.

Do you not see His saying (glory be to Him, exalted is He) to Iblīs: "What prevented you from prostrating to what I created with My two hands? Did you wax proud, or are you among the High Ones?" (38:75, Ṣād) -- meaning that the High Ones have no prostration incumbent upon them.

The Imām Muḥyī al-Dīn Ibn al-ʿArabī mentioned this meaning in the Meccan Openings (al-Futūḥāt al-Makkiyya), but he did not specify of anyone that he is among the High Ones; then he adduced this verse as proof.

And know that it is not sound to construe the questioning from the Real (exalted is He) as [literal] interrogation; rather, where it occurs, it is either in the sense of negation, or of affirmation, or of putting-at-ease (īnās), or of putting-in-dread (īḥāsh).

So this questioning from the Real to Iblīs, in His saying "What prevented you from prostrating," is a threat and a putting-in-dread; and the interrogative alif in "or did you wax proud" is in the sense of affirmation -- meaning: you waxed proud,

by your saying: "I am better than he." And the "or" (am) in His saying "or are you among the High Ones" is in the sense of negation -- meaning: you are not among the High Ones who were not commanded to prostrate.

And the interrogation that is in the sense of putting-at-ease and expansion is His saying: "And what is that in your right hand, O Moses?" (20:17, Ṭā Hā),

and for this reason Moses answered with his saying: "It is my staff; I lean upon it, and I beat down leaves with it for my sheep, and I have in it other uses" (20:18, Ṭā Hā) --

because he knew of Him that He desired that of him; otherwise the answer would have been [merely] "my staff." This is the courtesy (adab) of the People of God with God in His Presence -- God has brought it forth for you in [this book,] the Perfect Human, that you may read it and act by its requirement, and so be inscribed among the felicitous. So take it as your courtesy.

The vessel of exposition has coursed with us upon the sea of clarification until it has brought us in sight of the shore; so let us return to the sea of realities in giving expression to the angel named the Spirit.

Know that the Spirit has many names, according to the number of its aspects: it is named the Highest Pen, the spirit of Muhammad (may God bless him and grant him peace), the First Intellect, and the divine Spirit -- by the naming of the root after the branch.

Otherwise, it has in the Presence only a single name, which is the Spirit; and for this reason we singled it out in framing the chapter upon it. Were we to undertake to expound what this angel contains of marvels and wonders, we would need many books and volumes. And I did indeed meet with it in one of the divine Presences: it made itself known to me and greeted me with peace, and I returned to it the greeting -- after I had nearly dissolved from its awe and been annihilated by the beauty of its splendor.

When it put me at ease with speech, after it had greeted [me], and the cup of [wine-like] intimacy had gone round by its companioning, I asked it about its station and its origin, its presence and its support; about its root and its branch; about its configuration and its kind; about its attribute and its name; and about its adornment and its description.

It said: The matter you have sought and the secret you have requested is of lofty aim and immense station; its composition is not fit to be made by plain declaration, nor is it well-nigh understood by allusion and intimation.

I said to it: Come, then, with intimation and allusion -- perhaps I shall understand it, if divine solicitude has gone before me to it.

It said: I am the child whose father is his son, and the wine whose vine is its jar. I am the branch that produced its root, and the arrow whose bow is its blade. I joined the mothers who bore me, and I betrothed her to wed her, and she wedded me. When I coursed through the outward of the roots, I knit the form of the harvest; then I bent back upon myself, revolving within my sense-perception, having borne the trusts of prime-matter (al-hayūlā) and made firm the Presence described as the First. I found myself the father of all and the mother of the great and the suckling. This is the Presence, and the trust.

As for the origin and the station: know that I was a witnessed entity; I had, in the Unseen, an existent ruling. When I desired the knowledge of that decreed ruling and the witnessing of it on the side of the matter ruled upon,

I worshipped God (exalted is He) by that Name for such-and-such years, while I was, with respect to wakefulness, in a slumber. Then the Real (glory be to Him, exalted is He) roused me, and He swore by His Name and pointed to [the truth that]: "He has prospered who purifies it, and he has failed who corrupts it" (91:9-10, al-Shams).

So when the apportionment came and I secured what the Name gave me -- I mean, by His Name -- the Muhammadan Reality purified me, by the tongue of the Presence of the Messenger.

He (upon him be blessing and peace) said: "God created Adam upon His form." And there is no doubt in this, nor any dispute.

And Adam was nothing but a locus of manifestation among my loci of manifestation, set up as a vicegerent over my outward; so I knew that the Real had made me the intended and the purposed one of [all] the servants.

Then suddenly came the most noble address, from the greatest station: You are the Pole upon which the spheres of beauty revolve, and the sun by whose light the full moon of perfection was completed.

You are the one for whom We set up the paradigm, and for whose sake We made firm the scriptures; so the intended one was crowned with that which is alluded to as "Hind" and "Salmā," or hinted at as "ʿIzza" and "Asmā."

For all are [veiled] except you, O possessor of the resplendent qualities and the pure attributes: beauty does not bewilder you, majesty does not make you tremble, and you do not deem far-fetched the encompassing of perfection.

You are the point, and it is the circle; you are the wearer, and it is the magnificent garments.

[Thus] spoke the Spirit. [Here its account of the divine address closes.]

So I said: O great master, O all-knowing and well-informed one -- we ask you, by [divine] support and preservation: inform me concerning the pearls of wisdom and the sea of mercy, since their shell was made other than me, while they congealed from nothing but my water,

and why was my bird marked with the name of another than me, and this matter concealed its head, so that no harm was known to its iron edge?

It said: Know that the Real (exalted is He) willed that His Names and Attributes be disclosed, that the creation might know His Essence; so He brought them forth in the distinguished loci of manifestation and the localized inward-realities -- which are the essential existents, disclosed in the divine ranks.

And had the matter been released face-to-face, and had this servant been set free [unrestricted], the ranks would have been unknown, and the relations and connections lost.

For when the human is made to witness another than himself, he has comprehended its good, following becomes easy for him, and he takes therein what he is able.

For this reason God sent the noble messengers (upon them be blessing and peace) with His manifest Book and His firm address, interpreting His lofty Attributes and His Beautiful Names, that it might be known that His Essence has the transcendence above apprehension -- so that none knows it but it, with no associating.

And for this the deeply-sighing Master commanded us, saying: "Take on the character-traits of God (takhallaqū bi-akhlāq Allāh),"

that His secrets deposited in the human frames might come forth, and thereby the bond of lordly might appear, and the truth of the All-Merciful rank be known; and there is no way to knowing Him in the measure of His delimitation, since He is the One who says of Himself: "And they did not measure God with the measure due to Him" (6:91, al-Anʿām).

This is the pearl of wisdom and the sea of mercy.

And the being of the shell as other than you, while its pearls congealed from nothing but your water -- that is the husk over the kernel, lest any ascend to wisdom and the decisive word save him who is fit for that in the Mother of the Book.

As for the marking of your bird with the name of another than you -- that is for the comprehending of your good.

And as for the concealing of the matter -- that is for the lack of capacity to plunge into the sea; for the intellects fall short of apprehension, and there is no escape for them from their fetter, nor any disjunction.

And this whole [discourse] is the husks of expressions and the graves of allusions; we have made it a veil over the face,

to veil it, with a veiling, from him who is not of its people. So understand, if you are one who apprehends an address. The faces that came forth in the outward [appearances] are the virgins that hid themselves in the inward-realities -- veils upon those faces; and at the concealment of this inverted matter the thoughts are bewildered.

The narrator said: I did not cease drinking of what the most-exalted Spirit gave me to drink; and for all the slaking by it, I remained as I was, or [even] thirstier -- until the sun of power rose and the dawn of the Name broke like the day.

And lo, the turtledove had sung upon my nest; so it interpreted the state, then recited concerning the angel named the Spirit, saying:

A tender maiden -- in her beauty are risings; / the whole is the meaning of the attribute, and she is the Essence.

She is the spirit of the phantasms of beauty, and truly she / is a negation -- yet after her comes the affirmation.

She is the form of beauty which I have hinted at, / and which I have alluded to [under the names] of the Hinds.

And she is, in truth, the inward meanings / of your beauty -- yet she has outward appearings.

All the worlds are beneath the center of her pole; / she is their gathering, and they, for her, are scattered [particulars].

I have alluded truly: she is indeed the Reality / of God's creating, and she is the Words.

She was lost in eternity-past, then He originated her -- the One who / carries out and does what the attributes require.

But she, when her essence became determined, / appeared with rulings that have [their own] tongues.

So she came forth, having donned the garments of her beauty, / glorying in a loveliness beneath which [all other] beauties fall.

And she says that her existence is not preceded / by non-existence, nor are there for her any successors.

And you witness her description in its perfection, / as an essence; and the truth of the Essence is [a matter of] realizations.