al-Insān al-Kāmil, Bāb 61 -- The Portents of the Hour (Ashrāṭ al-Sāʿa)
full parallel manuscript · complete bitext
الإنسان الكامل · في أشراط الساعة
The chapter on the Portents of the Hour, rendered as a full parallel manuscript: every segment, aligned line by line. Where Bāb 58 mapped the structure of the Garden and the Fire, this maps the process of the end: death, the Barzakh, the Resurrection, the Reckoning, the Balance, the Path, and the Heights and the Dune. al-Jīlī’s governing method is to pair each portent of the “Greater Hour” (al-sāʿa al-kubrā, the cosmic end) with its inner counterpart in the individual’s “Lesser Hour” (al-sāʿa al-ṣughrā): the slave-girl who bears her mistress, Gog and Magog, the Beast of the Earth, the Dajjāl (read as the deceiving soul), the Mahdī (the Muhammadan station of equilibrium), and the sun rising from the west (the unveiling of the inner sun). He then turns to a quasi-medical theory of death (the cooling of the “innate heat” through the four elemental degrees), the famous sunlight-through-colored-glass model of the spirit-body relation, the two modes of dealing with souls in the Barzakh (by Wisdom and by Power), and a developed account of the Aʿrāf (the Heights, read as the station of the gnostics) and the Kathīb (the Dune).
Editorial note. This chapter carries the book’s waḥdat al-wujūd in a notably guarded form. Its unitive claims — “all the worlds are a single substance (jawhar fard),” “each comes to Him alone,” the one sun shining in many colored glasses — are recorded in al-Jīlī’s voice and framed against the mainstream. But the chapter is also threaded with his own guardrails, surfaced here: the divine presence in the human is “without indwelling” (§30), the sun “has not descended into the house nor indwelt in it” (§143) — an explicit anti-incarnationist (anti-ḥulūl) model; the wayfarer travels “by the lights of the sacred Law” even at the summit (§80); dominion in the Hereafter is earned by submission to God’s judgment in this life (§230); and al-Jīlī expressly affirms the bodily resurrection against fellow Sufis who denied it (§139). His distinctive reading of the People of the Heights as the gnostics, and the comparative-religion remarks on the “purified” Brahmins and philosophers, are recorded and framed. A second-reader pass is advisable.
الباب الحادي والستون في أشراط الساعة وذكر الموت والبرزخ والحساب والقيامة والميزان والصراط والجنة والنار والأعراف والكثيب الذي يخرج أهل الجنة إليه
Chapter Sixty-One: On the Portents of the Hour (Ashrāṭ al-Sāʿa), and the mention of Death, the Barzakh, the Reckoning, the Resurrection, the Balance, the Path (al-Ṣirāṭ), the Garden, the Fire, the Heights (al-Aʿrāf), and the Dune (al-Kathīb) to which the people of the Garden go forth
اعلم أن العالم الدنيوي الذي نحن فيه الآن له انتهاء يئول إليه؛ لأنه محدث وضرورة حكم المحدث أن ينقضي.
Know that the worldly world in which we now are has an end to which it comes, because it is originated (muḥdath), and it is a necessity of the ruling of the originated that it pass away.
ولا بد من ظهور هذا الحكم، فانقضاؤه وفناؤه تحت سلطان الحقيقة الإلهية الظاهرة في لباس أفراد هذا العالم الدنيوي هو موته، وظهور الحقيقة الإلهية الظاهرة عندنا بالأحكام التي ذكرها سبحانه في كتابه هو الساعة الكبرى لهذا الوجود.
And the appearing of this ruling is inevitable. So its passing-away and annihilation, beneath the sovereignty of the divine Reality appearing in the garb of the individuals of this worldly world, is its death; and the appearing of the divine Reality -- which appears to us by the rulings He (glory be to Him) mentioned in His Book -- is the Greater Hour (al-sāʿa al-kubrā) for this existence.
ثم إن كلا من أفراد العالم له ساعة خاصة، يجتمع الجميع في الساعة العامة، لأن كل فرد لا بد أن يحصل في الساعة المختصة به.
Then each of the individuals of the world has a particular Hour; all are gathered in the general Hour, because each individual must come to be in the Hour particular to it.
ويعم هذا الحكم جميع الأفراد الموجودة في هذا العالم، وذلك العموم هو الساعة الكبرى التي وعد الله بها.
And this ruling becomes general over all the individuals existing in this world; and that generality is the Greater Hour that God has promised.
فلما علمت هذا وتحققته وعرفت أن العالم بأجمعه أعلاه وأسفله له أجل معلوم، لأن كل واحد من أفراده له أجل معلوم، وبنظر الجملة، فعموم الحكم هو أجل العالم بأجمعه، وما ثم إلا هذا.
So when you have known this and realized it, and known that the world in its entirety, its highest and its lowest, has an appointed term -- because each one of its individuals has an appointed term, and, by the consideration of the whole, the generality of the ruling is the term of the entire world -- there is nothing there but this.
فلا أدري هل تفهم هذه النكتة على ما نص الكتاب عليه أم فهمك منه على غير مرادي. وأما على مفهوم العوام من ظاهره فسأنبهك عليه بعبارة أخرى.
So I do not know whether you understand this subtle point according to what the Book stipulates, or your understanding of it is other than my intent. As for [understanding it] according to the common folk's understanding of its outward, I shall alert you to it with another expression.
اعلم أن الحق تعالى له عوالم كثيرة.
Know that the Real (exalted is He) has many worlds.
فكل عالم ينظر الله إليه بواسطة الإنسان يسمى شهادة وجودية.
Every world that God looks upon by means of the human is called an existential witnessing (shahāda wujūdiyya).
وكل عالم ينظر إليه من غير واسطة الإنسان يسمى غيبا.
And every world that He looks upon without the means of the human is called an unseen (ghayb).
ثم إنه جعل ذلك الغيب نوعين: فغيب جعله مفصلا في عالم الإنسان: فالغيب المفصل في عالم الإنسان يسمى غيبا وجوديا، وهو كعالم الملكوت.
Then He made that unseen two kinds: an unseen He made detailed in the world of the human -- so the unseen detailed in the world of the human is called an existential unseen (ghayb wujūdī), and it is like the world of the Malakūt;
glossary: mulk-malakut-jabarut
وغيب جعله مجملا في قابلية الإنسان:
and an unseen He made summary in the receptivity of the human:
والغيب المجمل في القابلية يسمى غيبا عدميا، وهو كالعوالم التي يعلمها الله تعالى ولا نعلمها، فهي عندنا بمثابة العدم، فذلك معنى الغيب العدمي. ثم إن هذا العالم الدنيوي الذي ينظر الله إليه بواسطة هذا الإنسان لا يزال شهادة وجودية ما دام الإنسان واسطة نظر الحق فيها.
and the unseen summary in the receptivity is called a privative unseen (ghayb ʿadamī), and it is like the worlds that God (exalted is He) knows and we do not know -- so they are, for us, in the position of non-existence; and that is the meaning of the privative unseen. Then this worldly world, which God looks upon by means of this human, continues to be an existential witnessing as long as the human is the means of the Real's regard in it.
فإذا انتقل الإنسان منها نظر الله إلى العالم الذي انتقل إليه الإنسان بواسطة الإنسان، فصار ذلك العالم شهادة وجودية، وصار العالم الدنيوي غيبا عدميا.
So when the human moves on from it, God looks upon the world to which the human has moved, by means of the human; so that world becomes an existential witnessing, and the worldly world becomes a privative unseen.
ويكون وجود العالم الدنياوي حينئذ في العالم الإلهي كوجود الجنة والنار اليوم في علمه سبحانه وتعالى.
And the existence of the worldly world, then, in the divine world, is like the existence of the Garden and the Fire today in His knowledge (glory be to Him, exalted is He).
فهذا هو عين فناء العالم الدنياوي، وعين القيامة الكبرى وهي الساعة.
So this is the very annihilation of the worldly world, and the very Greater Resurrection, which is the Hour.
ولسنا بصدد ذكرها، بل غرضنا أن نشرح الساعة الخاصة بكل فرد من أفراد هذا العالم.
And we are not engaged in mentioning it; rather, our aim is to expound the Hour particular to each individual of the individuals of this world.
ونتحدث عن ذلك في الإنسان؛ لأنه أكمل أفراد الوجود، فلنقس الباقين عليه، ونحيل فهم علم الساعة العامة على فهمك من كتاب الله تعالى.
And we speak of that in [the case of] the human, because he is the most perfect of the individuals of existence; so let us measure the rest upon him, and refer the understanding of the knowledge of the general Hour to your understanding from the Book of God (exalted is He) --
glossary: insan-al-kamil
خشية على إيمانك أن يسلبه شيطان الشك إن ذكرنا لك عجائب الساعة الكبرى، فلنقتصر من ذلك على ذكر الساعة الصغرى التي هي قبل الساعة الكبرى.
out of fear for your faith, lest the devil of doubt despoil it if we mention to you the marvels of the Greater Hour. So let us restrict ourselves, of that, to the mention of the Lesser Hour (al-sāʿa al-ṣughrā), which is before the Greater Hour.
ثم لا تظن بأنهما ساعتان، بل هي ساعة واحدة.
Then do not suppose that they are two Hours; rather, it is a single Hour.
فمثل هذا مثل الكلي الواقع على كل واحد من جزئياته.
For the like of this is like the universal that applies to each one of its particulars.
مثلا كما تقول: مطلق الحيوان واقع على كل أنواع الخيل والأنعام والإنسان وغير ذلك.
For example, as you say: the absolute [concept] "animal" applies to all the species of horses, livestock, the human, and other than that.
ثم إن نفس لفظ الحيوان واقع على كل فرد من أفراد كل نوع.
Then the very word "animal" applies to each individual of the individuals of each species,
ولا تتعدد الحيوانية في نفسها لأنها كلية تامة، والكلية تقع على جزئياتها من غير تعدد.
and "animality" is not made multiple in itself, because it is a complete universal, and the universal applies to its particulars without [being] multiplied.
فكذلك الساعة الكبرى واقعة على كل من الساعة الصغرى من غير تعدد؛ فأول ما نذكر علامة الساعة وأشراطها، ثم نذكرها.
Likewise the Greater Hour applies to each [instance] of the Lesser Hour without [being] multiplied. So first we mention the sign of the Hour and its portents, then we mention it.
اعلم أن للساعة الصغرى علامات وأشرطة مناسبة لعلامات الساعة الكبرى وأشراطها.
Know that the Lesser Hour has signs and portents corresponding to the signs of the Greater Hour and its portents.
فكما أن من أمارات الساعة الكبرى أن تلد الأمة ربتها، وأن ترى الحفاة العراة رعاء الشاء يتطاولون في البنيان.
So, just as among the tokens of the Greater Hour is that the slave-girl shall give birth to her mistress, and that you shall see the barefoot, the naked, the shepherds of sheep vying in [tall] building --
From the Ḥadīth Jibrīl (sound, Muslim); invoked, not graded here.
فكذلك الإنسان من علامة قيام ساعته الخاصة به ظهور ربوبيته سبحانه وتعالى في ذاته، فذات الإنسان هي الأمة.
likewise, of the human: a sign of the rising of his particular Hour is the appearing of His lordship (glory be to Him, exalted is He) in his essence -- so the essence of the human is the slave-girl,
والولادة هي ظهور الأمر الخفي من باطنه إلى ظاهره، لأن الولد محله البطن، والولادة بروز إلى ظاهر الحمل.
and the giving-birth is the appearing of the hidden matter from his inward to his outward -- because the child's place is the womb, and giving-birth is a coming-forth to the outward of what was carried.
فكذلك الحق سبحانه وتعالى موجود في الإنسان بغير حلول، وهذا الوجود باطن، فإذا ظهر بأحكامه وتحقق العبد بحقيقة: وكنت سمعه الذي يسمع به، وبصره الذي يبصر به، ويده التي يبطش بها، ورجله التي يمشي بها.
Likewise the Real (glory be to Him, exalted is He) is present in the human without indwelling (ḥulūl); and this presence is inward. So when it appears by its rulings, and the servant is realized in the reality of [the hadith]: "and I become his hearing by which he hears, his sight by which he sees, his hand by which he grasps, and his foot by which he walks" --
The ḥadīth al-nawāfil (sound, Bukhārī 6502). Note al-Jīlī's own explicit guardrail here: the divine presence is 'without indwelling (ḥulūl)' -- guarding the unitive reading against incarnationism.
ظهر الحق تعالى في وجود هذا الإنسان، فتمكن من التصرف في عالم الأكوان، فذاته بمثابة الأمة، وآثار ربوبية الحق بمثابة الربة، وظهورها بمثابة الولادة.
the Real (exalted is He) appears in the existence of this human, so that he gains the capacity for free disposal in the world of beings; so his essence is in the position of the slave-girl, the traces of the Real's lordship are in the position of the mistress, and their appearing is in the position of the giving-birth.
ثم تجرد العارف عن الأسماء بمثابة التحفي عن النعل، لأن الأسماء مراكب العارفين، وتجرده عن الصفات بمثابة حال العراة.
Then the gnostic's stripping-bare of the Names is in the position of going barefoot from the sandal -- because the Names are the mounts of the gnostics; and his stripping-bare of the Attributes is in the position of the state of the naked.
glossary: asma, sifat
وكونه دائم الملاحظة للأنوار الأزلية بمثابة رعاء الشاء.
And his being a perpetual observer of the beginningless lights is in the position of the shepherds of sheep.
وكون المجذوب يأخذ في الترقي من المعارف الإلهية هو بمثابة تطاول البنيان.
And the [divinely] drawn one's taking to ascent in the divine gnoses is in the position of the vying in [tall] building.
فكما أن ظاهر هذا الحديث من أمارات الساعة الكبرى العامة في الوجود، كذلك باطنه الذي تكلمنا عليه هو من علامات الساعة الصغرى الخاصة بكل فرد من أفراد الإنسان.
So, just as the outward of this hadith is among the tokens of the Greater Hour, general in existence, likewise its inward, upon which we have spoken, is among the signs of the Lesser Hour particular to each individual of the human.
ومن علامات الساعة الكبرى: ظهور يأجوج ومأجوج في الأرض حتى يملكوها، فيأكلون الثمار ويشربون البحار، ثم يرسل الله عليهم في ليلة واحدة النغف فيموتون عن آخرهم، فحينئذ يكثر الزرع، وينصع الأصل والفرع، وتطيب الثمار، ويحمد الملك الجبار.
And among the signs of the Greater Hour: the appearing of Gog and Magog (Yaʾjūj and Maʾjūj) in the earth, until they possess it, eating the fruits and drinking the seas; then God sends upon them, in a single night, the worm (al-naghaf), so that they die to the last of them. Then the crop becomes abundant, the root and the branch grow pure, the fruits become wholesome, and the Compelling Sovereign is praised.
فكذلك الساعة الصغرى من علامات قيامها في الإنسان: ثوران النفس بثوران الخواطر الفاسدة والوساوس المعاندة قبل تمكنه من نفسه.
Likewise the Lesser Hour: among the signs of its rising in the human is the raging of the soul, by the raging of the corrupt thoughts and the obstinate whisperings, before his gaining mastery over his soul.
glossary: nafs
فيملكون أرض قلبه، ويأكلون ثمار لبه، ويشربون بحار سره، حتى لا يظهر لمعارفه وأحواله فيهم أثر، فيرجع عن سكره إلى حقيقة الصحو.
So they possess the land of his heart, eat the fruits of his kernel, and drink the seas of his secret, until no trace of his gnoses and states appears among them; so he returns from his intoxication to the reality of sobriety.
ثم تأتيه العناية الربانية بالنفحات الرحمانية بتحف: ألا إن حزب الله هم الغالبون، ألا إن حزب الله هم المفلحون.
Then the lordly solicitude comes to him, with the All-Merciful breezes, with the gifts of "truly the party of God -- they are the victorious" (5:56) [and] "truly the party of God -- they are the successful" (58:22).
Qurʾān 5:56: al-Māʾida 5:56, the clause 'fa-inna ḥizba llāhi humu l-ghālibūn'Qurʾān 58:22: al-Mujādila 58:22, the clause 'alā inna ḥizba llāhi humu l-mufliḥūn'
فتكحل عين هدايته بإثمد: الله يصطفي من يشاء من عباده. فحينئذ تفنى الخواطر النفسانية، وتذهب تلك الوساوس الشيطانية.
And the eye of his guidance is anointed with the collyrium of "God chooses whom He wills of His servants." Then the egotistical thoughts pass away, and those satanic whisperings depart,
'God chooses whom He wills of His servants' is al-Jīlī's paraphrase (echoing al-Ḥajj 22:75 and al-Shūrā 42:13), not a verbatim Qurʾānic verse.
وترد محلها ملائكة الله بالعلوم اللدنية والنفثات الروحية في الكمالات الروعية.
and the angels of God come in their place, with the God-given sciences (al-ʿulūm al-laduniyya) and the spiritual breathings, in the awe-inspiring perfections.
وهو بمثابة تكثر الزرع واخضرار الأصل والفرع، ثم تحققه في مقام القرب وتلذذه بمشاهدة الرب هو بمثابة طيب الثمار وحمد الملك الجبار.
And that is in the position of the abundance of the crop and the greening of the root and the branch. Then his realization in the station of nearness and his delight in the witnessing of the Lord is in the position of the wholesomeness of the fruits and the praise of the Compelling Sovereign.
glossary: mushahada
فكما أن ظاهره من أمارات الساعة الكبرى، كذلك ما أشرنا إليه وهو باطنه من أمارات الساعة الصغرى الخاصة بكل فرد من أفراد الإنسان.
So, just as its outward is among the tokens of the Greater Hour, likewise what we have pointed to -- which is its inward -- is among the tokens of the Lesser Hour particular to each individual of the human.
ومن أمارات الساعة الكبرى: خروج دابة الأرض، قال الله تعالى: وإذا وقع القول عليهم أخرجنا لهم دابة من الأرض تكلمهم.
And among the tokens of the Greater Hour: the coming-forth of the Beast of the Earth (dābbat al-arḍ). God (exalted is He) said: "And when the word falls upon them, We shall bring forth for them a beast from the earth that speaks to them" (27:82, al-Naml),
Qurʾān 27:82: al-Naml 27:82, verbatim
يعني إذا وقع القول وهو الأمر الإلهي برجوع هذا العالم إليه، وذلك انصرام أمر عالم الدنيا إلى الآخرة.
meaning, when the word falls -- which is the divine command for the return of this world to Him, that being the cutting-off of the affair of the world of this life unto the Hereafter.
أخرجنا لهم دابة من الأرض تكلمهم، يعني تنبئهم بحقيقة ما وعدناهم به من البعث والنشور والجنة والنار وأمثال ذلك.
"We shall bring forth for them a beast from the earth that speaks to them" -- meaning, it informs them of the reality of what We promised them, of the raising, the resurrection, the Garden, the Fire, and the like.
لأن الناس كانوا بآياتنا، يعني الأمور التي أخبرناهم بها في كلامنا، لا يوقنون، فلأجل ذلك أخرجنا لهم تلك الدابة ليعلموا أنا قادرون على كل شيء، فيوقنون بما بعدها وما تخبرهم به تلك الدابة.
"Because the people were, of Our signs" -- meaning, the matters of which We informed them in Our speech -- "not certain"; so for that reason We brought forth for them that beast, that they might know that We are powerful over everything, and so be certain of what comes after it, and of what that beast informs them.
فيرجع من يرجع إلى الحق، ويوقن بما أخبر به تعالى.
So whoever returns, returns to the Real, and is certain of what He (exalted is He) has informed.
فكذلك الساعة الصغرى من أمارات قيامها في الإنسان بروز روحه الأمينة في حضرة القدس بخروجها من أرض الطبيعة البشرية لترك الأمور العادية.
Likewise the Lesser Hour: among the tokens of its rising in the human is the coming-forth of his trustworthy spirit in the Presence of Holiness, by its emergence from the land of human nature, through the abandonment of the customary matters
وعدم إتيان الاقتضاءات السفلية، فحينئذ يتحقق له الكشف الكبير، وينبئه روح القدس بالنقير والقطمير، فيكلمه بجميع تلك الأخبار، ويظهر له بواطن الأستار، فيعلمه بكتمان الأسرار، ليرتفع حينئذ من مقام التصديق إلى مقام القرب في الرفيق الأعلى ونعم الرفيق.
and the non-doing of the lower requisites. Then the great unveiling (al-kashf al-kabīr) is realized for him, and the Holy Spirit informs him of the date-stone's notch and its skin [every least thing], speaking to him of all those tidings, and disclosing to him the inward-realities of the veils, and teaching him the concealment of the secrets -- that he may then rise from the station of affirmation to the station of nearness, in "the highest companion, and how excellent the companion."
glossary: kashf
وذلك منة من الله وفضل واعتناء بعبده، لئلا تنهزم جيوش إيمانه بعساكر دوام الحجاب، فيرجع إلى الخطأ عن حقيقة الصواب.
And that is a favor from God, a bounty, and a care for His servant -- lest the armies of his faith be routed by the hosts of the perpetuity of the veil, and he return to error, away from the reality of what is right.
لأن مكتمات الربوبية ومقتضيات المرتبة الإلهية، عزيزة المرام عالية المقام، لا تكاد القلوب لشدة عزتها أن توقن بحصولها إلا بعد الكشف.
Because the concealed things of lordship and the requisites of the divine rank are of mighty aim and lofty station; the hearts can scarcely, for the intensity of their mightiness, be certain of their attainment except after the unveiling.
glossary: kashf
لأن الخلق في نفسه ليس له وسع قبول تلك الأشياء، فلا يوقن بها إلا بعد الكشف الإلهي.
Because the creature, in itself, has no capacity to accept those things; so it is not certain of them except after the divine unveiling.
The witness reads 'al-ḥaqq' here; context (the limited self's incapacity) indicates 'al-khalq' (the creature); rendered accordingly.
فكما أن الناس لا يتحققون وقوع الأمر إلا بخروج الدابة، كذلك العارف لا يتحقق بقبول تلك المقتضيات الإلهية إلا بعد خروج الروح من أرض الطبائع وخلاصها من القواطع والموانع فافهم.
So, just as the people do not become certain of the occurrence of the matter except by the coming-forth of the Beast, likewise the gnostic does not become realized in the acceptance of those divine requisites except after the coming-forth of the spirit from the land of the natures and its deliverance from the severers and the impediments. So understand.
ومن أمارات الساعة الكبرى: خروج الدجال، وأن تكون له جنة عن يساره ونار عن يمينه، وأنه مكتوب بين عينيه كافر بالله.
And among the tokens of the Greater Hour: the coming-forth of the Dajjāl, and that he shall have a garden on his left and a fire on his right, and that there shall be written between his eyes "unbeliever in God."
وأنه يعطش الناس ويجوعون حتى لا يجدوا مأكلا ولا مشربا إلا عند هذا الملعون.
And that he shall make the people thirst and hunger, until they find no food and no drink except with this accursed one;
وإن كل من آمن به فإنه يسقيه من مائه ويطعمه من طعامه، ومن أكل من ذلك أو شرب منه لا يفلح أبدا.
and that everyone who believes in him, he gives him to drink of his water and feeds him of his food -- and whoever eats of that or drinks of it never prospers.
وأنه يدخل المؤمن به جنته، ومن دخل جنته قلبها الله عليه نارا، وإنه يدخل من لا يؤمن به ناره، ومن دخل ناره قلبها الله عليه جنة.
And that he admits the one who believes in him into his garden -- and whoever enters his garden, God turns it for him into a fire; and he admits the one who does not believe in him into his fire -- and whoever enters his fire, God turns it for him into a garden.
وإن من الناس من يأكل من حشيش الجزر إلى أن يرفع الله عنه هذا الضرر.
And that among the people is one who eats of the grass of the wild herbage until God lifts this harm from him.
وإن اللعين لا يزال يدور في أقطار الأرض إلا مكة والمدينة، فإنه لا يدخلها، وإنه يتوجه إلى بيت المقدس، فإذا بلغ رملة لد -- وهي قرية قريبة من بيت المقدس بينهما مسيرة يوم وليلة --
And that the accursed one continues to circle through the regions of the earth -- except Mecca and Medina, for he does not enter them -- and that he heads toward Jerusalem (Bayt al-Maqdis); so when he reaches the sands of Ludd -- which is a village near Jerusalem, between them a journey of a day and a night --
أنزل الله عيسى عليه السلام على منارة هناك وفي يده الحربة.
God shall send down Jesus (upon him be peace) upon a minaret there, with the spear in his hand.
فإذا رآه اللعين ذاب كما يذوب الملح في الماء فيضربه بالحربة فيقتله. وكذلك الساعة الصغرى من علامات قيامها في الإنسان خروج الدجال من حقيقته وهي النفس الدجالة.
So when the accursed one sees him, he melts as salt melts in water; then he strikes him with the spear and kills him. Likewise the Lesser Hour: among the signs of its rising in the human is the coming-forth of the Dajjāl from his reality, which is the deceiving soul (al-nafs al-dajjāla),
glossary: nafs
يعني أنها تخلط عليه الباطل وتبرزه له في معرض الحق.
meaning, it confounds falsehood upon him and brings it forth to him in the guise of the truth.
ويقال دجل فلان على فلان: يعني لبس عليه الأمر واستغلطه، وهذه النفس الدجالة هي المسماة من بعض وجوهها بشيطان الإنس وهي محل الشياطين والوسواس وموضع المردة والخناس، وتسمى أيضا من بعض وجوهها بالنفس الأمارة بالسوء.
And it is said, "So-and-so dajjala upon so-and-so," meaning, he confounded the matter upon him and led him into error. And this deceiving soul is the one named, from some of its aspects, "the devil of mankind" (shayṭān al-ins); it is the locus of the devils and the whisperings, the place of the rebellious ones and the slinking [whisperer]; and it is also named, from some of its aspects, "the soul commanding to evil" (al-nafs al-ammāra bi-l-sūʾ).
glossary: nafs
ومطلق لفظ النفس فهو اسمها في اصطلاح الصوفية؛ فمهما ذكروا النفس فإنهم يريدون الأوصاف المعلومة من العبد.
And the unqualified word "soul" (al-nafs) is its name in the terminology of the Sufis; so whenever they mention "the soul," they intend the known [blameworthy] attributes of the servant.
glossary: nafs
فهي بمثابة الدجال، ومقتضياتها الشهوانية هي بمثابة الجنة التي هي عن يساره لأنها طريق أهل الشقاوة.
So it is in the position of the Dajjāl, and its appetitive requisites are in the position of the garden that is on his left -- because it is the path of the people of wretchedness;
ومخالفتها بترك الطبائع والعوائد وحسم العلائق والقواطع هي بمثابة النار التي عن يمين الدجال.
and the opposing of it -- by abandoning the natures and the habits and severing the attachments and the severers -- is in the position of the fire that is on the Dajjāl's right;
إذ اليمين طريق أهل السعادة، وما تقتضيه الأمور النفسانية من تكثيف الحجب الظلمانية هو بمثابة
since the right is the path of the people of felicity. And what the egotistical matters require, of the thickening of the dark veils, is in the position of
الكتابة التي على جبين الدجال، هذا هو الكافر بالله.
the writing that is on the forehead of the Dajjāl -- this "unbeliever in God."
وصيرورة العارف في أسرها حتى يعدم عليه الصواب، فلا يكاد عند غلبتها أن يفهم معنى الخطاب.
And the gnostic's becoming in its captivity, until what is right is lost to him, so that he can scarcely, at its predominance, understand the meaning of the address --
هو بمثابة الجوع والعطش للناس في زمان الدجال، وقهرها باللذات بالخاصة، حتى لا يكاد يجد العارف بدا من مرافقتها، هو بمثابة أن لا يجد الناس مأكلا ولا مشربا إلا عند الدجال اللعين.
this is in the position of the hunger and thirst for the people in the time of the Dajjāl. And its subduing [him] by the pleasures, in particular, until the gnostic can scarcely find any escape from accompanying it, is in the position of the people's finding no food and no drink except with the accursed Dajjāl.
وقد قال النبي صلى الله عليه وسلم يشير إلى هذا المعنى:
And the Prophet (may God bless him and grant him peace) said, pointing to this meaning:
سيأتي على الناس زمان يكون القابض فيه على دينه كالقابض على الجمر.
"A time will come upon the people in which the one who holds to his religion is like one who holds to a live coal."
Tirmidhī 2260, Aḥmad, and al-Silsila al-Ṣaḥīḥa 957 (per the witness citation); invoked, not graded here.
فمن رجع في تلك المدة عن المجاهدة -- ونعوذ بالله من ذلك -- إلى المقتضيات النفسية وركن إلى الأمور الطبيعية،
So whoever, in that period, turns back from the [spiritual] struggle -- and we seek refuge in God from that -- to the egotistical requisites, and reclines upon the natural matters,
واستعمل الملذوذات الشهوانية، وأخذ في الأفعال العادية، هو بمثابة من أخذ من الدجال.
and employs the appetitive pleasures, and takes to the customary deeds -- he is in the position of one who took from the Dajjāl.
فأخذ الركون إلى المباحات التي هي عند العارف كالخمر الحرام،
So the taking-up of the reclining upon the permitted things -- which, for the gnostic, are like the forbidden wine --
هو بمثابة من أطعمه الدجال من ذلك الطعام، وانهماك من رجع إلى النفس والغفلات والأماني التي هي كالشراب بمثابة من سقاه اللعين مما عنده من الشراب.
is in the position of one whom the Dajjāl fed of that food. And the immersion of the one who returned to the soul, the heedlessnesses, and the [vain] hopes -- which are like the drink -- is in the position of one whom the accursed one gave to drink of what he had of the drink.
ومن رجع من العارفين قبل بلوغه إلى هذه الأشياء فهو بمثابة من لا يفلح أبدا.
And whoever of the gnostics turns back before reaching these things is in the position of one who never prospers.
ثم الاغترار بزخارف الدار التي بقاؤها محال ولذاتها خيال، هو بمثابة من دخل جنة الدجال، فيقلبها الحق عليه نارا ويصير قراره فيها بوارا.
Then the being deluded by the embellishments of the abode -- whose remaining is impossible and whose pleasures are imagination -- is in the position of one who entered the garden of the Dajjāl; so the Real turns it for him into a fire, and his settling in it becomes ruin.
glossary: khayal
ومن أسعده التوفيق وثبته الحق في جادة الطريق، سلك بأنوار الشريعة في ليل التحقيق راكبا على متون المخالفات والمجاهدات والرياضات، وأكل من حشيش الأكوان جزر ظهور الرحمن.
And whoever [divine] success makes felicitous, and the Real makes firm on the highway of the path -- he travels by the lights of the sacred Law (al-sharīʿa) in the night of [esoteric] realization, riding upon the backs of the oppositions [to the ego], the struggles, and the disciplines, and eats, of the herbage of the [created] beings, the roots of the appearing of the All-Merciful.
A pointed guardrail: even at the summit, the wayfarer travels 'by the lights of the sacred Law' -- the esoteric never abrogates the Law.
فهو بمثابة من دخل نار الدجال فقلبها له نعيما لا يزول وملكا لا يحول.
So he is in the position of one who entered the fire of the Dajjāl, and [the Real] turned it for him into a bliss that does not pass away and a kingdom that does not shift.
وأما إنه لا يزال يدور في أقطار الأرض إلى أن يحل الأمر الفرض، ما خلا مكة الزهراء والمدينة ذات الروضة الخضراء.
As for his continuing to circle through the regions of the earth until the imposed command falls due -- excepting radiant Mecca and Medina, possessor of the green garden --
فهو بمثابة ما تلبس به النفس على العبد في جميع المقامات، ما خلا مقامين: أحدهما مقام الاصطلام الذاتي: وهو غيبوبة العبد عن وجوده بجانب الحضرة الإلهية الذاتية، فيذهب عن حسه ويفنى عن نفسه، وهذا هو مقام السكر. والمقام الثاني هو المقام المحمدي: المعبر عنه في اصطلاح القوم بالصحو الثاني، فهذان المقامان ليس للنفس فيهما مجال، لأنهما مصونان عن طوارق العلل، محفوظان في غيب الأزل.
this is in the position of what the soul confounds upon the servant in all the stations -- excepting two stations: one of them, the station of essential overwhelming (al-iṣṭilām al-dhātī), which is the servant's absence from his [own] existence at the side of the divine essential Presence, so that he passes away from his sense-perception and is annihilated from his [own] self -- and this is the station of intoxication (al-sukr); and the second station is the Muhammadan station, expressed in the terminology of the [Sufi] folk as "the second sobriety" (al-ṣaḥw al-thānī). So in these two stations the soul has no field, because they are guarded against the accidents of defects, preserved in the unseen of pre-eternity.
glossary: nafs
فهما في ذلك المجال بمثابة البلدتين اللتين لا يدخلهما الدجال.
So the two of them, in that field, are in the position of the two cities that the Dajjāl does not enter [Mecca and Medina].
وما يلتبس على العبد من الكشوفات الإلهية فيغلط بها عن المحجة الصوابية، هو بمثابة توجه هذا اللعين الأنجس إلى قطر البيت الأقدس، ثم وقوفه دون تلك المحجة بالأرض المسماة بالرملة.
And what becomes confounded upon the servant, of the divine unveilings, so that he errs by them away from the right highway, is in the position of this most-filthy accursed one's heading toward the region of the most-holy House [Jerusalem], then his halting short of that highway, at the land named al-Ramla [Ludd].
هو لأن دجال النفوس عند ظهوره على العارف في كل لبوس، قد يظهر في مقابلة المقام الأنفس.
That is because the Dajjāl of the souls, at its appearing upon the gnostic in every garb, may appear opposite the most-precious station;
فيتوهم من لا معرفة له بالبلوغ من الوادي الأقدس، فليس له إلى ذلك المقام من إلمام، ولكنه يقف عند حده دون الحجاب.
so the one who has no knowledge imagines [he has] reached [it] from the most-holy valley -- though he has no [real] acquaintance with that station; rather, he halts at his [own] limit, short of the veil,
إذ الرملة من طينة التراب، فينزل عيسى الروح وفي يده حربة الفتوح فيقتله هنالك، لأن عيسى هو روح الله المالك.
since al-Ramla is of the clay of dust. So Jesus the Spirit descends, with the spear of [spiritual] openings in his hand, and kills it there -- because Jesus is the Spirit of God, the Possessing.
وإذا جاء الحق زهق الباطل وانقطع حكم الملابس والمداجل.
And when the truth comes, falsehood vanishes, and the rule of the confounders and the deceivers is cut off.
Echoes al-Isrāʾ 17:81, 'and say: the truth has come and falsehood has vanished.'
فكما أن هذه الآيات للساعة الكبرى من الشروط والعلامات، فكذلك باطنها وهي الأشياء التي ذكرناها والأمور التي شرحناها في علامات الساعة الصغرى المختصة بالإنسان دون سائر الأكوان.
So, just as these signs are, for the Greater Hour, among the conditions and tokens, likewise their inward -- which are the things we have mentioned and the matters we have expounded -- are among the signs of the Lesser Hour particular to the human, to the exclusion of the rest of the beings.
ومن أشراط الساعة خروج المهدي عليه السلام، وأن يعدل أربعين سنة في الأنام، وأن تكون أيامه خضراء ولياليه زهراء، يخصب فيها الزرع ويكثر فيها در الضرع.
And among the portents of the Hour: the coming-forth of the Mahdī (upon him be peace), and that he shall rule justly forty years among mankind, and that his days shall be green and his nights radiant, the crop made fertile in them and the milk of the udder made abundant;
ويكون الناس في أمان مشتغلين بعبادة الرحمن.
and the people shall be in security, occupied with the worship of the All-Merciful.
فكذلك الساعة الصغرى من شروط قيامها في الإنسان خروج المهدي.
Likewise the Lesser Hour: among the conditions of its rising in the human is the coming-forth of the Mahdī --
وهو صاحب المقام المحمدي ذو الاعتدال في أوج كل كمال.
and he is the possessor of the Muhammadan station, of [perfect] equilibrium at the apogee of every perfection.
وأن تكون دولته أربعين عاما بغير جحود، وهي عدد مراتب الوجود، وقد شرحناها في كتابنا المسمى بـ الكهف والرقيم في شرح بسم الله الرحمن الرحيم، فمن أراد معرفة ذلك فليطالع هنالك.
And that his rule shall be forty years, without denial -- which is the number of the ranks of existence; and we have expounded them in our book named al-Kahf wa-l-Raqīm fī Sharḥ Bism Allāh al-Raḥmān al-Raḥīm. So whoever desires the knowledge of that, let him consult there.
A cross-reference to al-Jīlī's own work al-Kahf wa-l-Raqīm, his commentary on the Basmala.
وكون لياليه زهراء وأيامه خضراء هو بمثابة ما يتقلب فيه العارف بين السكر المرقي والصحو المبقي.
And his nights being radiant and his days green is in the position of what the gnostic turns about in, between the ascending intoxication (al-sukr al-murqī) and the abiding sobriety (al-ṣaḥw al-mubqī).
وتكثير الزرع وتدرير الضرع بمثابة تواتر الإنعامات وترادف الكرامات، والأمان بمثابة دخول العارف مقام الخلة ونزوله في تلك الحلة، فإنه القائل سبحانه عن مقام إبراهيم: ومن دخله كان آمنا.
And the multiplying of the crop and the flowing of the udder is in the position of the succession of the bestowals and the following-on of the marvels. And the security is in the position of the gnostic's entering the station of [intimate] friendship (al-khulla) and his alighting in that abode -- for He (glory be to Him) is the One who says, concerning the station of Abraham: "and whoever enters it is secure" (3:97, Āl ʿImrān),
Qurʾān 3:97: Āl ʿImrān 3:97, the clause 'wa-man dakhalahu kāna āminā'
يعني من العذاب الأليم، فإذا كان المقام الصوري يحصل به الأمان من الإحراق بالنيران.
meaning, from the painful torment. So if the formal station yields by it security from being burned by the fires,
فبالأولى والأحرى أن المقام المعنوي يحصل به الأمان من مكر الرحمن.
then all the more fitting and worthy that the meaning-station yields by it security from the stratagem (makr) of the All-Merciful.
وهذا هو المقام الذي لما نزله الشيخ عبد القادر الجيلاني قال: إن الحق تعالى عاهده سبعين عهدا أن لا يمكر به، فما بعد ذلك إلا عبادة الرحمن وثناء الملك الديان.
And this is the station which, when the Shaykh ʿAbd al-Qādir al-Jīlānī alighted in it, he said: the Real (exalted is He) made with him seventy covenants that He would not employ stratagem against him; so after that there is nothing but the worship of the All-Merciful and the praise of the Requiting Sovereign.
فانظر إلى هذه الإشارات كيف ناسبت تلك العبارات، فكما أن تلك من أشراط الساعة الكبرى، كذلك هذه من أشراط الساعة الصغرى.
So look at these allusions -- how they corresponded to those [outward] expressions; for just as those are among the portents of the Greater Hour, likewise these are among the portents of the Lesser Hour.
ومن أشراط الساعة الكبرى: طلوع الشمس من مغربها، وأن يغلق بها باب التوبة في مغربها، وأن لا ينفع نفسا إيمانها لم تكن آمنت من قبل.
And among the portents of the Greater Hour: the rising of the sun from its place of setting, and that by it the door of repentance shall be shut at its setting, and that the faith of a soul that had not believed before shall not profit it.
Alludes to al-Anʿām 6:158.
إذ قد طوى يومئذ بساط الوصل، فحينئذ لا تقبل توبة ولا تغفر حوبة، فكذلك الساعة الصغرى من شروط قيامها في الإنسان: طلوع شمس شهوده من مغرب وجوده، وذلك عبارة عن الباطن الكشفي، وهو تحقق اطلاعه على السر الكتمي.
since on that day the carpet of union is rolled up; then no repentance is accepted and no sin is forgiven. Likewise the Lesser Hour: among the conditions of its rising in the human is the rising of the sun of his witnessing from the place-of-setting of his existence -- and that is an expression for the unveiled inward, which is the realization of his looking upon the concealed secret.
glossary: kashf, mushahada
فيعلم حينئذ ما هو ومن هو، ويتحقق بأوصافه، ويتمتع في جنة أعرافه.
So he knows then what he is and who he is, and is realized in His attributes, and takes enjoyment in the garden of his Heights (aʿrāf).
فيحل الرموز ويستخرج منها الكنوز، ويعرف الألغاز ويفوز بالله مع من فاز.
So he unties the symbols and draws forth from them the treasures, and knows the riddles, and wins God, with whoever has won.
فحينئذ طوى عنه بساط الوصل والفصل، وليس للإيمان هناك نفع، إذ حكمه من قبل، لأن الإيمان لا يكون إلا فيما غاب، ويرتفع حكمه برفع الحجاب.
Then the carpet of union and separation is rolled up from him, and faith has no profit there -- since its ruling [belonged to] before; because faith is only in what is unseen, and its ruling is lifted by the lifting of the veil.
فلا يقبل توبة ولا تغفر حوبة، لأن الذنب والغفران مقام محله الاثنين.
So no repentance is accepted and no sin is forgiven, because sin and forgiveness are a station whose locus is the two [the duality of servant and Lord].
والأحد في أحديته منزه عن الذنب وغفريته.
And the One (al-Aḥad), in His oneness, is transcendent above sin and the forgiving of it.
فهذه شروط الساعة الصغرى مقابلة لشروط الساعة الكبرى.
So these are the conditions of the Lesser Hour, corresponding to the conditions of the Greater Hour.
وقد عبر الإمام محيي الدين ابن عربي عن تلك العبارات وقابلها بما يقابلها من باب الإشارات.
And the Imām Muḥyī al-Dīn Ibn ʿArabī gave expression to those [outward] expressions and paired them with what corresponds to them, in the manner of allusions.
فجعل مقابلة طلوع الشمس من المغرب رجوع الروح إلى المركز الأول والمنصب، وذلك عبارة عن الممات وانتقال الأمر إلى الآخرة بحكم الوفاة، وجعل مقابلة إغلاق باب التوبة هو أن المغرغر لا تقبل له توبة ولا تغفر له حوبة.
So he made the counterpart of the rising of the sun from the west the return of the spirit to the first center and station -- and that is an expression for death and the transfer of the affair to the Hereafter by [the rule of] decease; and he made the counterpart of the shutting of the door of repentance [the fact] that the death-rattling one (al-mugharghir) -- his repentance is not accepted and his sin is not forgiven.
وأيد ذلك بما قيل أن بين البابين تسعين عاما، وأنها تقابل الأعمار قياسا ونظاما، وما ذكره هذا الإمام فمقبول، وعلى أحسن وجوهه فمحمول.
And he supported that with what is said -- that between the two doors are ninety years, and that they correspond to the lifespans by analogy and arrangement. And what this Imām mentioned is acceptable, and is to be construed in its best aspect.
ولكنا لما كنا بصدد بيان أشراط الساعة الصغرى المختصة بالإنسان في أيام بقائه في هذه الدار، لم نذهب إلى ذكر غيره خوفا من هتك الأستار.
But since we were engaged in the exposition of the portents of the Lesser Hour particular to the human during the days of his remaining in this abode, we did not go to the mention of other than it, out of fear of rending the veils.
على أنا قد رمزنا في ذلك جميع الأسرار، ولم نترك أمرا لم ننبه عليه في هذا الكتاب. والله يقول الحق وهو يهدي الصواب.
Granted that we have intimated in that all the secrets, and have left no matter without alerting to it in this book. And God speaks the truth, and He guides to what is right.
فصل نذكر فيه طرفا من ذكر الموت، إذ قد سبق بيانه في الباب الرابع والخمسين من هذا الكتاب فيطالع فيه.
Section: in which we mention a part of the discourse on death -- since its exposition has already passed in the fifty-fourth chapter of this book; let it be consulted there.
اعلم أن الموت عبارة عن خمود النار الغريزية التي يكون بها سبب الحياة في دار الدنيا.
Know that death is an expression for the dying-down of the innate fire (al-nār al-gharīziyya) by which is the cause of life in the abode of this world.
وتلك الحياة عبارة عن نظر الأرواح إلى نفسها في الهياكل الصورية، والمناسب لذلك النظر في هذه الهياكل الصورية هي الحرارة الغريزية ما دامت على حكم الاعتدال الطبيعي.
And that life is an expression for the regard of the spirits toward themselves in the formal frames; and what corresponds to that regard in these formal frames is the innate heat (al-ḥarāra al-gharīziyya), as long as it remains under the rule of natural equilibrium.
وهو -- أعني اعتدال الحرارة -- كونها مستوية في الدرجة الرابعة، لأن انصرافها في الدرجة الأولى هو قوة الحرارة العنصرية، هي تلك الدرجة لا تقبل المزاج بركن آخر من أركان العناصر.
And it -- I mean the equilibrium of the heat -- is its being level in the fourth degree; because its disposition in the first degree is the strength of the elemental heat -- it is that degree [which] does not accept mixing with another element of the pillars of the elements.
فهي هناك آخذة في حدها من الانتهاء، وأشباهها في الدرجة الثانية هي الحرارة النارية القابلة للامتزاج، ولولا امتزاجها ببقية الأركان لم يكن للنار وجود.
So it is there taking to its limit, of extremity; and its like in the second degree is the fiery heat (al-ḥarāra al-nāriyya) that accepts blending -- and were it not for its blending with the rest of the pillars, fire would have no existence.
لأن كل واحد من النار والماء والهواء والتراب مركب من العناصر الأربعة التي هي الحرارة والبرودة واليبوسة والرطوبة، ولكن كل ما غلب فيه ركن الحرارة حتى اضمحل الباقي سمي بالطبيعة النارية.
Because each one of fire, water, air, and earth is composed of the four elements -- which are heat, cold, dryness, and moisture; but whatever the pillar of heat predominates in, until the rest vanishes, is named "the fiery nature."
وكل ما غلب ركن البرودة فيه حتى اضمحلت البواقي سمي بالطبيعة المائية.
And whatever the pillar of cold predominates in, until the remainder vanishes, is named "the watery nature."
وكل ما غلب فيه حكم ركن الرطوبة على البواقي سمي بالطبيعة الهوائية.
And whatever the rule of the pillar of moisture predominates in, over the remainder, is named "the airy nature."
وكل ما غلب فيه حكم اليبوسة على البواقي حتى اضمحلت البواقي سمي بالطبيعة الترابية.
And whatever the rule of dryness predominates in, over the remainder, until the remainder vanishes, is named "the earthy nature."
لا يسمى في هذه الدرجة نارية ولا مائية ولا هوائية ولا ترابية إلا إذا نزل إلى الدرجة الثالثة فامتزج بالأركان، فأي شيء استوت الحرارة واليبوسة منه في الدرجة الثالثة واستتر فيه الركنان الآخران لضعفهما عن هذه الدرجة سمي ذلك الشيء نارا.
It is not named, in this degree, fiery, watery, airy, or earthy -- except when it descends to the third degree and blends with the pillars. So whatever the heat and the dryness in it become level in the third degree, and the other two pillars are hidden in it, by reason of their weakness [relative] to this degree -- that thing is named "fire."
وأي شيء استوت البرودة واليبوسة منه في الدرجة الثالثة حتى استتر الركنان الآخران منه لضعفهما عن هذه الدرجة سمي ذلك الشيء ترابا.
And whatever the cold and the dryness in it become level in the third degree, until the other two pillars are hidden in it, by reason of their weakness [relative] to this degree -- that thing is named "earth."
وأي شيء استوت الحرارة والرطوبة منه في الدرجة الثالثة حتى استتر الركنان الآخران منه لضعفهما عن هذه الدرجة سمي ذلك الشيء هواء.
And whatever the heat and the moisture in it become level in the third degree, until the other two pillars are hidden in it, by reason of their weakness [relative] to this degree -- that thing is named "air."
وأي شيء استوت البرودة والرطوبة منه في الدرجة الثالثة حتى استتر الركنان الآخران منه لضعفهما عن هذه الدرجة سمي ذلك الشيء ماء.
And whatever the cold and the moisture in it become level in the third degree, until the other two pillars are hidden in it, by reason of their weakness [relative] to this degree -- that thing is named "water."
ألا ترى إلى فلك العناصر كيف هو من فوق فلك الطبائع، وفلك الطبائع من فوق فلك الاستقصات، وهي أفلاك النار والهواء والماء والتراب.
Do you not see the sphere of the elements -- how it is above the sphere of the natures, and the sphere of the natures above the sphere of the elemental-roots (al-isṭiqsāt), which are the spheres of fire, air, water, and earth?
ثم بعد هذا إذا نزلت الحرارة الطبيعية درجة واستوت في الدرجة الرابعة،
Then, after this, when the natural heat descends a degree and becomes level in the fourth degree,
وجدت في هيكل من هياكل الصور ممتزجة بقية الأركان امتزاجا جسمانيا حيوانيا، كان ذلك الهيكل حيوانيا.
and is found in a frame of the formal frames, the rest of the pillars being blended [with it] in a corporeal, animal blending -- that frame is animal.
ولا يزال موجودا ما دامت هذه الحرارة الغريزية في هذه الدرجة، فإنها في الدرجة الرابعة تسمى غريزية.
And it continues to exist as long as this innate heat is in this degree, for in the fourth degree it is named "innate" (gharīziyya),
كما أنها في الدرجة الثالثة تسمى حرارة نارية.
just as in the third degree it is named "fiery heat,"
وكما أنها في الدرجة الثانية تسمى حرارة طبيعية.
and just as in the second degree it is named "natural heat,"
وكما أنها في الدرجة الأولى تسمى حرارة عنصرية.
and just as in the first degree it is named "elemental heat."
وكذلك باقي الأركان فإنها بهذه المثابة في التسمية، فالموت هو ذهاب هذه الحرارة الغريزية من الهيكل الحيواني، ما يضادها من البرودة الغريزية، هذا الأمر يصيب الجسم.
And likewise the rest of the pillars, for they are in this same position in [the matter of] naming. So death is the going of this innate heat from the animal frame -- [by] what opposes it of innate cold; this matter befalls the body.
وأما نصيب الروح فإن حياة هيكلها هو مدة نظرها إلى الهيكل بعين الاتحاد، وموته هو ارتفاع ذلك النظر من الهيكل إلى نفسها.
As for the share of the spirit: the life of its frame is the duration of its regard toward the frame with the eye of union (ittiḥād), and its death is the lifting of that regard from the frame [back] to itself.
فتبقى بكليتها في عالمها لكن على هيئة الهيكل الذي كان لها، تتجسد على شكله في عالم الروح.
So it remains, in its entirety, in its [own] world -- but in the configuration of the frame that was its [own]; it embodies itself in its shape in the world of the spirit.
فيحكم لها بالوجود معها لذلك التجسد، لأن أحكامه ظاهرة في ذلك المحل على تجسدها.
So existence is adjudged to it, along with it [the frame], by reason of that embodiment, because its rulings are manifest in that locus upon its embodiment.
ومن هنا أخطأ كثير من أهل الكشف النوراني وحكموا أن الأجسام لا حشر لها. وأما نحن فقد علمنا بالاطلاع الإلهي حشر الأجسام مع الأرواح.
And from here many of the people of luminous unveiling erred, and judged that the bodies have no resurrection (ḥashr). But as for us, we have known, by the divine looking-upon, the resurrection of the bodies along with the spirits.
Notably, al-Jīlī here corrects fellow Sufis who denied bodily resurrection, affirming the resurrection of the bodies -- a point aligned with the mainstream against a Sufi/philosophical denial.
لأن موت الأرواح هو انفكاكها عن نفس الجسد الهيكلي، لأن ذلك مما يقضي بانعدامها، فتكون كأنها بسيطة في الوجود مدة معلومة.
Because the death of the spirits is their disjunction from the very body of the frame -- because that is of what decrees their [seeming] non-existence; so it is as though it [the spirit] were simple [/bare] in existence for a known period,
ومثلها كالنائم الذي لا يرى في نومه شيئا، فهو كالمعدوم في تلك الساعة.
and its likeness is like the sleeper who sees nothing in his sleep, so that he is like the non-existent in that hour;
لأنه لا هو في عالم الشهادة فيقظان، ولا في عالم الغيب فيكون يتراءى شيئا يدل على وجوده، فهو موجود معدوم.
because he is neither in the world of witnessing, so as to be awake, nor in the world of the unseen, so as to behold something indicating his existence; so he is [at once] existent and non-existent.
ويضرب عنه المثل بالشمس، فإن الشمس إذا أشرقت من طاقة البيت كان البيت مضيئا بضوء الشمس، ولم تنزل إليه ولا حلت فيه.
And the similitude for it is struck by the sun: for the sun, when it shines through the window-opening of the house, the house is illumined by the light of the sun -- while it [the sun] has not descended into it nor indwelt in it.
The sunlight-through-the-window image is al-Jīlī's anti-incarnationist (anti-ḥulūl) model of the spirit-body and the Real-creature relation: presence without descent or indwelling. A key guardrail for reading the whole edition's metaphysics.
فكذلك الضياء بمثابة نظر الروح في الجسم المخصوص من أجسام الحيوانات.
Likewise the radiance is in the position of the spirit's regard within the particular body of the bodies of animals.
ثم كذلك إذا كانت الطاقة من زجاج أخضر كانت شعلة الشمس في البيت خضراء، أو حمراء إذا كانت الطاقة حمراء.
Then likewise, when the window is of green glass, the flame of the sun in the house is green; or red, when the window is red;
وكذلك على أي لون كانت زجاجة الطاقة كانت الشعلة في البيت على هيئتها وصورتها.
and likewise, whatever color the glass of the window is, the flame in the house is in its configuration and its form.
والروح كذلك إذا نظرت إلى الهيكل الإنساني أو إلى غيره كانت على صورته لا تتغير عن ذلك.
And the spirit is likewise: when it regards the human frame or another, it is [conformed] to its form, not changing from that.
ثم زوال الشمس عن البيت هو بمثابة ارتفاع نظر الروح من الجسد.
Then the departure of the sun from the house is in the position of the lifting of the spirit's regard from the body.
والموت هو بمثابة خفاء تلك الشعلة في نفس شعاع الشمس، فلا يزال الشخص ميتا ونسبته نسبة اختفاء تلك الشعلة في نفس شعاع الشمس في العالم. ثم البرزخ فإنه وجود ولكن غير تام ولا مستقل، ولو كان تاما أو مستقلا لكان دار إقامة مثل دار الدنيا والآخرة.
And death is in the position of the hiding of that flame within the very ray of the sun; so the person remains dead, his relation being the relation of the hiding of that flame within the very ray of the sun in the world. Then the Barzakh: it is an existence, but not complete nor independent; and were it complete or independent, it would be an abode of residence like the abode of this world and the Hereafter.
glossary: barzakh
فهو في المثال كما نتصور نحن تلك الشعلة واخضرارها بخضرة الزجاجة، فتشكل لنا كما هي عليه، ولكن في عالم الخيال، لأن عالم الخيال لأهل الدنيا غير تام.
So it is, in the similitude, as we imagine that flame and its greening by the greenness of the glass, so that it takes shape for us as it is -- but in the world of imagination (ʿālam al-khayāl); because the world of imagination, for the people of this world, is not complete.
glossary: khayal
فليس لخيال أهل الدنيا استقلال بنفسه، على أن عالم الخيال في نفسه عالم تام.
So the imagination of the people of this world has no independence in itself -- granted that the world of imagination, in itself, is a complete world;
ولكن بالنظر إليه في عينه، وهو بالنظر إلى عالم الحس والمعاني غير تام.
but [that is] by the consideration of it in its [own] essence; whereas, by the consideration of [it relative to] the world of sense and of meanings, it is not complete.
بخلاف خيال أهل الله فإنه
Unlike the imagination of the People of God, for it is
كامل ومستقل وتام بنفسه، فهو بمثابة آخرة غيرهم من أهل الدنيا.
complete, independent, and entire in itself; so it is in the position of the Hereafter of others, of the people of this world.
وخيال من تصفى من البراهمة والكفرة والمشركين وأمثالهم بالمجاهدات والرياضات وأمثالهما، فإنه يكون بمثابة نوم أهل الدنيا، وخيال أهل الدنيا لا اعتبار به.
And the imagination of those who have become purified -- of the Brahmins, the unbelievers, the associators, and their like -- by struggles, disciplines, and the like, is in the position of the sleep of the people of this world; and the imagination of the people of this world is of no account.
A comparative-religion observation: even purified non-Muslim contemplatives (Brahmins, philosophers) attain a refined imagination, though al-Jīlī ranks it below that of 'the People of God'; recorded in his voice and framed.
ولو كان محتد الخيال واحدا في نفسه للجميع.
even though the origin of the imagination is one in itself for all.
ولكنه لما فسدت خزانة خيالهم بالأمور العادية والمطلوبات الجسدية انقطعت عن حكم الصفاء الروحي. ولما كان المتصفون من البراهمة والفلاسفة متخلصين من هذا، ولكن قد سكنت الأمور العقليات والأحكام الطبيعيات في خزانة خيالهم، فانقطعوا بذلك عن الترقي إلى المعاني الإلهية.
But since the storehouse of their imagination has been corrupted by the customary matters and the bodily desiderata, it has been cut off from the rule of spiritual purity. And since the purified ones of the Brahmins and the philosophers were delivered from this -- yet the intellectual matters and the natural rulings had settled in the storehouse of their imagination -- they were thereby cut off from ascent to the divine meanings.
بخلاف خيال أهل الله فإنه مصون عن طوارق العلل ومحفوظ بالله في غير الأزل، فليس لعالم البرزخ وجود تام ولهذا يسمى برزخا.
Unlike the imagination of the People of God, for it is guarded against the accidents of defects and preserved by God in [what is] other than pre-eternity. So the world of the Barzakh has no complete existence, and for this reason it is named "Barzakh" [isthmus].
glossary: barzakh
وكذلك خيال أهل الدنيا برزخ بين العالم الوجودي وبين العالم العدمي، ثم نسبة القيامة نسبة رجوع الشمس في طاقتها التي كان الإشراق منها، ولا مزيد على هذا في البيان.
And likewise the imagination of the people of this world is a barzakh between the existential world and the privative world. Then the relation of the Resurrection is the relation of the return of the sun into its window, from which the shining had been; and there is no increase upon this in the exposition.
glossary: khayal, barzakh
لأن الروح ما دامت غير متجسدة في الهياكل تلحق بالبساطة وهو حقيقة الموت.
Because the spirit, as long as it is not embodied in the frames, is joined to simplicity [bareness] -- and that is the reality of death.
فإذا تجسدت كان ذلك التجسد لها وجودا، ولكن ما دامت في ذلك التجسد مقيدة بلوازم الجسد فهي في البرزخ.
So when it is embodied, that embodiment is, for it, an existence; but as long as it is in that embodiment, restricted by the concomitants of the body, it is in the Barzakh,
glossary: barzakh
لأنها قاصرة عن جميع ما تقتضيه الروح في الإطلاق الروحاني.
because it falls short of all that the spirit requires in the spiritual absoluteness.
فإذا أراد الله بعثها إلى القيامة أطلقها عن مقتضيات الجسد فصارت في أرض المحشر. ثم الإطلاق إنما كان على حسب ما كانت عليه في الدنيا: فإذا كانت في الدنيا على الخير كانت مطلقة على الخير.
So when God wills to raise it to the Resurrection, He releases it from the requisites of the body, so that it comes to be in the land of the Gathering. Then the release is only in accordance with what it was upon in this world: so if it was in this world upon good, it is released upon good,
وإن كانت في الدنيا على الشر كانت مطلقة في الشر.
and if it was in this world upon evil, it is released in evil --
لأنها لا تطلب بإطلاقها إلا ما كانت عليه في دار الدنيا، وهو قوله تعالى: وأن ليس للإنسان إلا ما سعى.
because it seeks, by its release, only what it was upon in the abode of this world; and that is His saying (exalted is He): "And that the human has nothing but what he strove for" (53:39, al-Najm).
Qurʾān 53:39: al-Najm 53:39, verbatim
واعلم أن نسبة كون الأرواح المتعددة مخلوقة من نور الحق هو نسبة الشعاعات المختلفة المضيئة من شعاع الشمس.
And know that the relation of the multiple spirits being created from the light of the Real is the relation of the various rays shining from the ray of the sun.
ونسبة ما يدعيه المحققون من واحدية العالم نسبة إلى واحدية الشمس، ولو ظهرت في تلك الزجاجات على اختلافها، فهي واحدة لم تتعدد ولم تتنوع في نفسها، ولو تنوعت المظاهر. ويكفي هذا القدر من التنبيه على هذا الأمر، لأنا قد بينا كيفية قبض الأرواح وكيفية إتيان عزرائيل للقبض في بابه مما سبق من الكتاب.
And the relation of what the verifiers (al-muḥaqqiqūn) claim, of the oneness of the world, is a relation to the oneness of the sun -- which, even though it appears in those glasses in their diversity, is one, not multiplied nor varied in itself, even if the loci of manifestation are varied. And this measure of alerting to this matter suffices, for we have already explained the manner of the taking of the spirits and the manner of ʿAzrāʾīl's coming for the taking, in its chapter, in what has preceded of the book.
'the oneness of the world' (the one sun in many glasses) is the chapter's image of waḥdat al-wujūd; recorded in al-Jīlī's voice and framed against the mainstream -- noting that the sun-image is itself his guard against indwelling/incarnation.
واعلم أن أحوال الناس في البرزخ مختلفة، فمنهم من يعامل فيه بالحكمة ومنهم من يعامل فيه بالقدرة. فمن يعامل فيها بالحكمة: ومن يعامل بالحكمة فإنه ينقلب في البرزخ في حقيقة عمله في الدنيا، فإذا كان مثلا مطيعا في الدنيا فإن الحق تعالى يخلق له في البرزخ معاني الطاعة صورة.
And know that the states of people in the Barzakh differ: among them is one who is dealt with in it by Wisdom (ḥikma), and among them one who is dealt with in it by Power (qudra). As for the one dealt with by Wisdom: he is turned about, in the Barzakh, in the reality of his deed in this world; so if he was, for example, obedient in this world, the Real (exalted is He) creates for him, in the Barzakh, the meanings of the obedience [given] form.
glossary: barzakh
فينتقل من صورة طاعة يقيمها الله تعالى -- إما صلاة وإما صوما وإما صدقة وإما غير ذلك -- إلى صورة أخرى من الطاعات. ولا يزال ينتقل من عمل حسن إلى عمل آخر إما مثله وإما أحسن منه كما كان في الدنيا، إلى أن تبدو عليه حقائق الأمور فتقوم قيامته. ثم إن حسن تلك الصورة وبهجتها وضيائها على حسب قدر طاعته واجتماع خاطره فيها وحسن مقصده في ذلك العمل.
So he moves from a form of obedience that God (exalted is He) sets up -- whether a prayer, a fast, an alms, or other than that -- to another form of the acts of obedience; and he continues to move from a good deed to another, either its like or better than it, as he was in this world, until the realities of things dawn upon him, and his resurrection arises. Then the beauty of that form, its splendor, and its radiance is in accordance with the measure of his obedience, the gathering of his attention in it, and the goodness of his intention in that deed,
وقبح الصورة على قدر قبح ذلك العمل، فلو كان مثلا ممن يزني أو يسرق أو يشرب الخمر فإن الحق تعالى يقيم له معاني تلك الأفعال صورة ينتقل فيها، فيختلق للزاني فرجا من نار يلج فيه ذكره، وحرارة ناره ونتانة ريحه على قدر قوة انهماكه في تلك المعصية.
and the ugliness of the form is in accordance with the ugliness of that deed. So if he were, for example, of those who fornicate, steal, or drink wine, the Real (exalted is He) sets up for him the meanings of those deeds [given] form, in which he is turned about: He fashions for the fornicator a pudendum of fire into which his member enters, the heat of its fire and the foulness of its smell being in accordance with the strength of his immersion in that disobedience.
وكذلك يقيم للشارب كأسا من نار فيه خمر من نار فيشربه، وينتقل منه إلى مثل ما كان ينتقل إليه في دار الدنيا.
And likewise He sets up for the [wine-]drinker a cup of fire, in which is wine of fire, and he drinks it, and moves from it to the like of what he used to move to in the abode of this world.
ومن كان بين طاعة ومعصية فإنه ينتقل بينهما، أعني من صورة تلك المعاني التي خلقها الله تعالى إما من نور كما يخلق الطاعات،
And whoever was between obedience and disobedience moves between the two -- I mean, [between] the form of those meanings that God (exalted is He) created, whether from light, as He creates the [forms of] acts of obedience,
وإما من نار كما يخلق صور المعاصي، فلا يزالون ينتقلون فيه، وتبدو لهم بتوالي الانتقال حقائق الأمر شيئا فشيئا، إلى أن يتم عليهم أحد الحكمين فتقوم عليهم القيامة. فمن يعامل فيها بالقدرة:
or from fire, as He creates the forms of the disobediences; so they continue to move about in it, and the realities of the matter dawn upon them, by the succession of the moving, little by little, until one of the two rulings is completed upon them, and the Resurrection arises upon them. As for the one dealt with by Power:
وأما من عومل بالقدرة فإنه لا يقع في معاني أعماله، ولكن يقع في معاني صورتها بالقدرة.
as for the one dealt with by Power, he does not fall into the meanings of his [own] deeds, but rather falls into the meanings of their forms by [sheer] Power.
فإن كان عاصيا وقد غفر الله تعالى له، انتقل إلى صورة تشبه الطاعات، يقيمها الله تعالى له هيئة إلهية.
So if he was disobedient and God (exalted is He) has forgiven him, he moves to a form resembling the acts of obedience, which God (exalted is He) sets up for him [as] a divine configuration.
The witness carries an intrusive negation ('fa-lā yantaqil'); the sense required by the context (a forgiven sinner moved to a good form) is 'he moves to a form resembling the acts of obedience'; rendered to that sense.
فلا يزال ينتقل من صورة حسنة إلى أحسن منها إلى أن تقوم قيامته بظهور الحقائق على ساق.
So he continues to move from a beautiful form to one more beautiful than it, until his resurrection arises by the appearing of the realities "upon a shank" [in earnest].
فإن كان مطيعا مثلا وقد أحبط الله عمله، فإن الحق تعالى يقيم صورة ما كتبه في الأزل من الشقاوة، فيجليها عليه وينوعها له.
And if he was, for example, obedient, and God has nullified his deed, then the Real (exalted is He) sets up the form of what He wrote for him in pre-eternity, of wretchedness, and discloses it upon him and varies it for him;
فلا يزال يتقلب فيها إلى أن تقوم قيامته على قدر طبقته من النار فيعذب في جهنم.
so he continues to turn about in it, until his resurrection arises, in accordance with his layer of the Fire, and he is tormented in Jahannam.
ثم إن البرزخ خلق الله تعالى له قوما يسكنون فيه ويعمرونه، وليسوا من أهل الدنيا ولا من أهل القيامة، ولكنهم ملحقون بأهل الآخرة لاتحاد المحتد الذي خلقوا منه.
Then the Barzakh: God (exalted is He) created for it a folk who dwell in it and inhabit it, who are not of the people of this world nor of the people of the Resurrection -- but they are joined to the people of the Hereafter, by the union of the origin from which they were created.
glossary: barzakh
فمن جانسهم في الروحية بعد موته أنس منهم.
So whoever is congeneric with them in spirituality, after his death, finds intimacy from them,
كمن يصل إلى قوم يعرفهم ويعرفونه فيستأنس بهم ويتروح من همه معهم.
like one who arrives at a people whom he knows and who know him, so that he finds intimacy with them and is relieved of his care among them.
ومن لم يجالسهم فإنه يراهم غيظا له، فلا يتألفون به ولا يتألف بهم.
And whoever does not consort with them sees them as a vexation to him, so that they do not grow familiar with him nor he with them.
ثم ينبعث منهم من جعله الله سببا لعذابه، فيكون على أقبح صورة كان يكرهها في الدنيا فتأتيه.
Then there is sent forth from them one whom God has made a cause of his torment, who is in the ugliest form that he used to detest in this world, and it comes to him --
وهي صورة عمله، فيتلقى بها من الوحشة والنفور ما لا يقاس بغيره.
and it is the form of his [own] deed; so he meets, by it, of desolation and recoiling, what cannot be measured against anything else.
ومنهم من تأتيه على أحسن صورة جميلة وهي صورة عمله، فيلقى بها من الألفة والعطف والحنان، فتؤنسه تلك الصورة إلى أن تقوم قيامته.
And among them is one to whom it comes in the most beautiful, fair form -- and it is the form of his [own] deed; so he meets, by it, of familiarity, affection, and tenderness, [and] that form gives him intimacy until his resurrection arises.
ثم اعلم أن القيامة والبرزخ والدار الدنيا وجود واحد.
Then know that the Resurrection, the Barzakh, and the abode of this world are a single existence.
glossary: barzakh
فمثاله مثال دائرة فرض نصفها دنيا ونصفها أخرى، وفرض البرزخ بينهما.
Its likeness is the likeness of a circle, half of which is posited as this world and half as the Hereafter, and the Barzakh is posited between the two.
وكل ذلك على سبيل الفرض، فإن هويتك التي أنت بها موجود، هي بعينها التي تكون بها في البرزخ، وهي بعينها التي تكون بها في القيامة.
And all of that is by way of positing; for your ipseity (huwiyya) by which you exist is the very one by which you are in the Barzakh, and the very one by which you are in the Resurrection.
فأنت في الدنيا وفي البرزخ وفي الآخرة بهذه الإنية، لكن التفاوت بينهما أن أمور البرزخ ضرورية لأنها مبنية على الدنيا، وأمور القيامة أيضا ضرورية لأنها مبنية على البرزخ، وأمور الدنيا اختيارية.
So you, in this world, in the Barzakh, and in the Hereafter, are by this I-ness -- but the difference between them is that the affairs of the Barzakh are necessary, because they are built upon this world; and the affairs of the Resurrection, too, are necessary, because they are built upon the Barzakh; and the affairs of this world are chosen [voluntary].
ثم اعلم أن الله تعالى إذا أراد أن تقوم القيامة، أمر إسرافيل عليه السلام أن ينفخ النفخة الثانية في الصور، لأن النفخة الأولى للإماتة، والصور هو عالم الصور الروحية، ينفخ فيه النفخة الأولى من حيث اسمه المفني والمميت.
Then know that God (exalted is He), when He wills the Resurrection to arise, commands Isrāfīl (upon him be peace) to blow the second blast in the Trumpet (al-ṣūr) -- because the first blast is for the causing-of-death; and the Trumpet (al-ṣūr) is the world of the spiritual forms (al-ṣuwar), in which He blows the first blast by way of His Name the Annihilator and the Death-Giver.
فتنعدم الصور وتنحل عقد هياكلها كما تنعدم الصور المرئية في النوم بالانتباه، فترجع إلى محلها الذي خلقت منه.
So the forms become non-existent, and the knots of their frames are loosed, as the seen forms become non-existent in sleep by [the act of] waking; so they return to their locus, from which they were created.
ثم ينفخ النفخة الثانية في الصور فترجع كما كانت في عالم الأرواح فتدخل في قوالب الأشباح، كما ذكرنا لك من عود إشراق الشمس في زجاجتها.
Then He blows the second blast in the Trumpet [/forms], so they return as they were in the world of the spirits, and enter into the molds of the phantasms -- as we mentioned to you, of the return of the shining of the sun into its glass.
وكل هذا باعتبارها في وجودها.
And all of this is with respect to them [the forms] in their existence.
فإن العالم الأخروي هو عالم الأرواح، وجميع عالم الأرواح عبارة عن مطلق الروح الموجودة في الإنسان، فلا يخرج الإنسان عن نفسه.
For the otherworldly world is the world of the spirits, and the whole world of the spirits is an expression for the absolute spirit existing in the human; so the human does not go forth from his [own] self.
لأن الآخرة عبارة عن عالم الأرواح، وعالم الأرواح قد يجمعه مطلق روحه، لما سبق مما ذكرنا أن العالم جميعه كمرائي متقابلات توجد كل واحدة منهن في الأخرى على حكم الأحدية لا على حكم المماثلة والمشابهة.
Because the Hereafter is an expression for the world of the spirits, and the world of the spirits may be gathered by the absolute [reality] of his spirit -- according to what has preceded, of what we mentioned: that the world, all of it, is like mirrors set facing [each other], each one of which is found in the other by the rule of oneness (aḥadiyya), not by the rule of likeness and resemblance.
فجميع العوالم جوهر فرد غير منقسم في نفسه على الحقيقة.
So all the worlds are a single substance (jawhar fard), undivided in itself in reality.
The 'single substance' / one-existence doctrine is the chapter's metaphysical core (waḥdat al-wujūd cast in the atomist vocabulary of the jawhar fard); recorded in al-Jīlī's voice and framed against the mainstream.
وما تراه من التعداد والانقسام فهو خيال، بمثابة ما لو فرضنا الانقسام في الجوهر الفرد. وهذا معنى قوله تعالى: وكلهم آتيه يوم القيامة فردا.
And what you see of multiplicity and division is imagination -- in the position of what [would obtain] if we posited division in the single substance. And this is the meaning of His saying (exalted is He): "And each of them comes to Him on the Day of Resurrection, alone" (19:95, Maryam).
Qurʾān 19:95: Maryam 19:95, verbatim glossary: khayal
فإذا فهمت هذه النكتة علمت سر أحدية الحق تعالى في الوجود.
So when you have understood this subtle point, you have known the secret of the oneness (aḥadiyya) of the Real (exalted is He) in existence,
وشهدت ما وعد الله تعالى به وأوعد من الجنة والنار ومن أهوال الآخرة يقينا كشفا عيانا، فصار إيمانك إيمان حارثة رضي الله عنه، حيث قال للنبي صلى الله عليه وسلم: أصبحت مؤمنا حقا، فقال: ما حقيقة إيمانك؟ فقال: أرى كأن القيامة قد قامت، وعرش ربي بارز، أو كما ذكر في الحديث.
and witnessed what God (exalted is He) has promised and threatened, of the Garden, the Fire, and the terrors of the Hereafter, with certitude, unveiling, [and] direct vision -- so that your faith becomes the faith of Ḥāritha (may God be pleased with him), when he said to the Prophet (may God bless him and grant him peace): "I have become a true believer"; and he said: "What is the reality of your faith?"; and he said: "It is as though I see the Resurrection [already] arisen, and the Throne of my Lord brought forth" -- or as it is mentioned in the hadith.
The 'reality of faith' (ḥaqīqat al-īmān) report (Ibn Abī Shayba, al-Ṭabarānī, Majmaʿ al-Zawāʾid); the report is from Ḥāritha ibn Mālik (al-Nuʿmān). The witness names 'Zayd ibn Ḥāritha', a likely error; rendered as 'Ḥāritha'. Invoked, not graded here.
وأما القيامة الصغرى المخصوصة بكل فرد من أفراد الإنسان، فإنه متى انتصب ميزان عقله الأول في قبة عدله الأكمل، وأتت المقتضيات الحقائقية تحاسبه بما تقتضيه كل حقيقة من حقائقه، أو ضرب له صراط الأحدية يمشي على متن جهنم الطبيعية أدق من الشعر لغموضه،
As for the Lesser Resurrection particular to each individual of the human: when the Balance of his first intellect is set up in the dome of his most-perfect justice, and the requisites of the realities come to bring him to account by what each reality of his realities requires; or the Path (ṣirāṭ) of oneness is laid down for him, [and] he walks upon the back of the natural Jahannam, finer than a hair for its subtlety,
وأحد من السيف لبعده، فإما مسرع في سيره كالبرق الخاطف لقوة مركبه السائر في المعارف،
and sharper than the sword for its remoteness -- then either [he is] swift in his journeying, like the snatching lightning, by the strength of his mount coursing in the gnoses,
وإما كالجبل في ثقله لتعلقه بسفليته.
or [he is] like the mountain in his heaviness, by his attachment to his lowliness.
فإذا جاز الصراط وقام ناموس القسطاس دخل جنة الذات ورتع في ميادين الصفات، ممحوقا عن إنيته، مسحوقا عن هويته، لا يرى لنفسه أثرا ولا يعرف له خبرا.
So when he has crossed the Path, and the law of the Balance (al-qisṭās) has stood, he enters the Garden of the Essence (jannat al-dhāt) and pastures in the fields of the Attributes -- effaced from his I-ness, crushed from his ipseity, seeing for himself no trace and knowing of himself no report.
glossary: dhat, sifat
قد نادى في ناديه منادي الجبار فقال: لمن الملك اليوم.
The herald of the Compeller has called in his assembly, saying: "Whose is the dominion this Day?" (40:16, Ghāfir).
Qurʾān 40:16: Ghāfir 40:16, the clause 'li-mani l-mulku l-yawm'
فلما لم يجد سواه قال: لله الواحد القهار. فليس له بعدها غفلة ولا حضور، ولا يرجى له بعد ذلك موت ولا نشور، قد قامت قيامته على ساق، وعدمت علانيته، فهذه هي الساعة الصغرى.
So when he found none but Him, he said: "To God, the One, the Subduer" (40:16). So after it there is for him no heedlessness and no presence, and no death and no resurrection are awaited for him after that. His resurrection has arisen "upon a shank" [in earnest], and his outwardness has become non-existent. So this is the Lesser Hour.
Qurʾān 40:16: Ghāfir 40:16, the clause 'li-llāhi l-wāḥidi l-qahhār'
وقس عليها أحوال الساعة الكبرى، وخذ معرفة الحساب والميزان والصراط مما دللناك عليه بالإشارة لا بالتصريح.
And measure upon it the states of the Greater Hour, and take the knowledge of the Reckoning, the Balance, and the Path from what we have indicated to you by allusion, not by plain declaration.
ويكفي العاقل هذا القدر من التلويح، وقد ذكرنا الجنة والنار في بابهما، وهو الباب الثامن والخمسون من هذا الكتاب.
And this measure of intimation suffices the intelligent one. And we have [already] mentioned the Garden and the Fire in their chapter, which is the fifty-eighth chapter of this book.
وسنومئ إلى سرهما بطريق الإشارة، فإن كنت ذا فهم علي وعزم قوي أدركت ما نشير إليه، وإلا فلا تبرح كغيرك واقفا مع ظاهره ولديه.
And we shall gesture toward their secret by way of allusion; so if you are a possessor of lofty understanding and strong resolve, you will grasp what we point to; otherwise, do not cease, like others, standing with its outward and [staying] beside it.
اعلم أن الله تعالى خلق الدار الآخرة بجميع ما فيها نسخة من دار الدنيا.
Know that God (exalted is He) created the abode of the Hereafter, with all that is in it, [as] a copy of the abode of this world,
وخلق الدنيا نسخة من الحق، فالدنيا هي أصل والآخرة فرع عليها.
and created this world [as] a copy of the Real. So this world is a root, and the Hereafter is a branch upon it.
وقد ورد: الدنيا مزرعة الآخرة.
And it has come [in report]: "This world is the tillage of the Hereafter."
A popular saying widely cited, not established as a sound hadith; invoked, not graded here.
وقال تعالى: فمن يعمل مثقال ذرة خيرا يره * ومن يعمل مثقال ذرة شرا يره.
And He (exalted is He) said: "So whoever does an atom's weight of good shall see it * and whoever does an atom's weight of evil shall see it" (99:7-8, al-Zalzala).
Qurʾān 99:7: al-Zalzala 99:7, verbatimQurʾān 99:8: al-Zalzala 99:8, verbatim
نعلم أن الأصل هو العمل الصادق في الدنيا، والفرع هو الأمر الذي تراه في الآخرة.
We know that the root is the truthful deed in this world, and the branch is the matter that you see in the Hereafter.
وليست آخرة كل إلا ما سيكون فيه يوم القيامة، وهو لا يكون إلا في نتيجة عمله، والنتيجة فرع على المقدمة، والمقدمة هي العمل الدنيوي.
And the Hereafter of each is nothing but what he shall be in on the Day of Resurrection, and that is only in the result of his deed; and the result is a branch upon the premise, and the premise is the worldly deed.
ولهذا تقدمت الدنيا في الإيجاد على الآخرة، وسميت بالأولى، لأنها الأصل، وتأخرت الآخرة وسميت بالأخرى لأنها الفرع.
And for this reason this world (al-dunyā) preceded the Hereafter in being-brought-into-existence, and was named "the First" (al-ūlā), because it is the root; and the Hereafter came later and was named "the Last" (al-ākhira), because it is the branch.
فلو لم تكن الآخرة فرعا على الدنيا لكان تأخيرها نقصا في الحكمة، إذ تأخير المقدم وتقديم المؤخر من الأمور الطاعنة في الحكمة.
So had the Hereafter not been a branch upon this world, its [coming] later would have been a deficiency in [divine] Wisdom -- since the delaying of the prior and the advancing of the posterior are among the matters that impugn Wisdom.
ثم اعلم أن محسوس الآخرة أقوى من محسوس الدنيا، وملذوذها أعظم لذة من لذة الدنيا، ومكروهها أعظم كراهة من كراهة الدنيا.
Then know that the sensible of the Hereafter is stronger than the sensible of this world, and its pleasurable is greater in pleasure than the pleasure of this world, and its detestable is greater in detestableness than the detestable of this world.
وسبب ذلك أن الروح في الآخرة متفرغة لقبول ما يرد عليها من المحبوب والمكروه، بخلاف دار الدنيا فإن الجسم لكثافته يمنع الروح من قوة التفرغ للملائم.
And the cause of that is that the spirit, in the Hereafter, is free [/unoccupied] for the acceptance of what comes upon it, of the beloved and the detested -- unlike the abode of this world, for the body, by its density, prevents the spirit from the strength of being-free for the agreeable.
فلا تجد منه إلا طرفة، كما لو أكل الشخص طعاما ملذوذا وهو غير متفرغ البال بل مشغول بأمر أهمه، فإنه لا يجد لذلك الطعام ما يجده غيره من اللذة.
So it finds of it only a glimpse -- as when a person eats pleasurable food while he is not free of mind, but occupied with a matter that concerns him: he does not find, of that food, what another finds of pleasure.
وسبب ذلك الاهتمام المانع له من التفرغ لقبول الواردة. فلهذا كانت الدار الآخرة أشرف من دار الدنيا ولو كانت أمها.
And the cause of that is the preoccupation that prevents him from being free for the acceptance of the incoming. For this reason the abode of the Hereafter is nobler than the abode of this world, even though it [this world] is its mother.
ولا تعجب من هذا، فإن كثيرا من الأولاد يكون أشرف من والده، والدنيا ولو كانت أصلا
And do not marvel at this, for many of children are nobler than their father; and this world, even though it is a root
للآخرة، فإن الآخرة أفضل منها وأشرف عند الله تعالى،
for the Hereafter, [yet] the Hereafter is more excellent than it and nobler with God (exalted is He),
لما تقتضيه حقيقة الآخرة في نفسها، ألا ترى إلى اللفظ مثلا كيف كان المعنى المفهوم منه أشرف وأعلى قدرا من اللفظ بما لا يتناهى.
for what the reality of the Hereafter requires in itself. Do you not see the word, for example -- how the meaning understood from it is nobler and higher in worth than the word by [a measure] without end?
على أن المعنى نتيجة اللفظ وفرعه، ولولاه لم تفهم حقيقة المعنى.
Granted that the meaning is the result of the word and its branch, and were it not for it [the word], the reality of the meaning would not be understood.
فكذلك الدار الآخرة ولو كانت نتيجة الدنيا فإنها أفضل وأوسع وأشرف منها، وسبب ذلك أنها مخلوقة من الأرواح، والأرواح لطائف نورانية؛ والدنيا مخلوقة من الأجسام، والأجسام كثائف ظلمانية؛ ولا شك أن اللطائف أفضل من الكثائف. ثم إن الآخرة دار العز والقدرة، يفعل فيها من سلم من الموانع ما يشاء كأهل الجنة، والدنيا دار الذل والعجز، لا يقدر ملوكها على دفع أذى نملة منها.
Likewise the abode of the Hereafter: even though it is the result of this world, [yet] it is more excellent, more spacious, and nobler than it. And the cause of that is that it is created from the spirits -- and the spirits are luminous subtleties; while this world is created from bodies -- and bodies are dark densities; and there is no doubt that the subtleties are more excellent than the densities. Moreover, the Hereafter is the abode of might and power: whoever is delivered from the impediments does in it what he wills, like the people of the Garden; while this world is the abode of lowliness and incapacity, [where] its kings are not able to repel the harm of an ant from it.
ومع هذا فيحاسبون على نعيمها وهو نعيم زائل.
And, along with this, they are brought to account for its bliss -- and it is a passing bliss;
وأهل الآخرة يعقبهم على نعيم أفضل مما كانوا فيه، فإن عطاء الله في الآخرة بغير حساب، وعطاؤه في الدنيا بحساب لترتيب الحكمة الإلهية، فإذا فهمت هذا وتحققته بلغت المراد.
while the people of the Hereafter -- He follows up [their bliss] with a bliss more excellent than what they were in; for God's giving in the Hereafter is without reckoning, and His giving in this world is by reckoning, by reason of the arrangement of the divine Wisdom. So when you have understood this and realized it, you have attained the aim.
واعلم أن الآخرة بجملتها، أعني الجنة والنار والأعراف والكثيب، كلها دار واحدة غير منقسمة ولا متعددة.
And know that the Hereafter, in its totality -- I mean the Garden, the Fire, the Heights (al-Aʿrāf), and the Dune (al-Kathīb) -- all of it is a single abode, undivided and not multiple.
فمن حكمت عليه حقائق تلك الدار كان في النار؛ لأن أهل النار محكوم عليهم تحت ذل الانقهار.
So whoever the realities of that abode rule over is in the Fire -- because the people of the Fire are ruled over, under the lowliness of being-subdued;
ومن لم تحكم عليه حقائق تلك الدار كان في الجنة، فمن احتكم في هذه الدار لله تعالى وأطاعه فإن الله تعالى يجعله حاكما في حقائق تلك الدار يفعل فيها ما يشاء.
and whoever the realities of that abode do not rule over is in the Garden. So whoever submits to the judgment of God (exalted is He) in this abode and obeys Him -- God (exalted is He) makes him a ruler over the realities of that abode, doing in it what he wills;
A pointed ethical hinge: dominion in the Hereafter is earned by submission to the divine judgment (and the Law) in this life -- the reverse of any antinomian reading.
ومن لم يحتكم لله تعالى وعصاه في هذه الدار فإنه يكون محكوما عليه.
and whoever does not submit to the judgment of God (exalted is He) and disobeys Him in this abode -- he is ruled over,
هناك تحكم عليه حقائق تلك الدار بما لا يسعه أن يخالف فيها، كما أن أهل النار تحت حكم الزبانية بخلاف أهل الجنة.
there the realities of that abode rule over him by what he cannot oppose in it -- just as the people of the Fire are under the rule of the Zabāniya [the fire-angels], unlike the people of the Garden.
ألا ترى أن أهل الجنة يفعل الواحد منهم ما يشاء ولا يحكم عليه أحد بشيء، ومن تحقق بعلم أمر تلك الدار وتمكن من التصرف بما تحقق بعلمه كان في الأعراف، والأعراف محل القرب الإلهي، المعبر عنه في القرآن بقوله تعالى: عند مليك مقتدر. ويسمى هذا المنظر بهذا الاسم للمعرفة، وهو تحقق العلم الذي ذكرته لك، وأهل الأعراف هم العارفون بالله، لأن من عرف الله تعالى تحقق بعلم أمر الآخرة، ومن لم يعرفه لم يتحقق بعلمه. ألا ترى قوله عز وجل: وعلى الأعراف رجال يعرفون كلا بسيماهم. يعني وعلى مقام المعرفة بالله رجال نكرهم لجلالة شأنهم، ولأنهم مجهولون عند غيرهم، يعرفون كلا بسيماهم.
Do you not see that the people of the Garden -- each one of them does what he wills, and no one rules over him in anything? And whoever is realized in the knowledge of the affair of that abode, and gains the capacity for free disposal by what he has been realized in of its knowledge, is in the Heights (al-Aʿrāf); and the Heights is the locus of divine nearness, expressed in the Qurʾān by His saying (exalted is He): "with a Sovereign Omnipotent" (54:55, al-Qamar). And this vista is named by this name ["the Heights"] for [its] gnosis -- which is the realization of the knowledge I have mentioned to you. And the people of the Heights are the gnostics of God (al-ʿārifūn bi-llāh), because whoever knows God (exalted is He) is realized in the knowledge of the affair of the Hereafter, and whoever does not know Him is not realized in its knowledge. Do you not see His saying (mighty and majestic is He): "And upon the Heights are men who know each by their mark" (7:46, al-Aʿrāf)? -- meaning, and upon the station of the gnosis of God are men [whom] He left indefinite, for the majesty of their affair, and because they are unknown to others; [yet] "they know each by their mark,"
Qurʾān 54:55: al-Qamar 54:55, the clause 'ʿinda malīkin muqtadir'Qurʾān 7:46: al-Aʿrāf 7:46, the clause 'wa-ʿalā l-aʿrāfi rijālun yaʿrifūna kullan bi-sīmāhum' al-Jīlī's distinctive reading: the 'People of the Heights' (aṣḥāb al-aʿrāf) are the gnostics (al-ʿārifūn bi-llāh), not the in-between/equal-balance people of much mainstream tafsīr. Recorded in his voice and framed.
لأنهم عرفوا الله تعالى، ومن عرف الله تعالى فلا يخفى عليه شيء. والكثيب مقام دون الأعراف وفوق جنات النعيم، فكما يقع لأهل الجنة من زيادة المعرفة بالله تعلو درجاتهم في الكثيب.
because they knew God (exalted is He), and whoever knows God (exalted is He) -- nothing is hidden from him. And the Dune (al-Kathīb) is a station below the Heights and above the Gardens of Bliss; so, in accordance with what comes to the people of the Garden of increase in the gnosis of God, their degrees are exalted in the Dune.
والفرق بين أهل الكثيب وأهل الأعراف أن أهل الكثيب خرجوا من دار الدنيا قبل أن يتجلى عليهم الحق فيها.
And the difference between the people of the Dune and the people of the Heights is that the people of the Dune departed from the abode of this world before the Real disclosed Himself to them in it;
فلما انتقلوا إلى الآخرة كان محلهم في الجنة، ويتفضل الحق عليهم بأن يخرجهم إلى الكثيب فيتجلى عليهم.
so when they moved to the Hereafter, their locus was in the Garden, and the Real bestows favor upon them by bringing them out to the Dune and disclosing Himself to them.
glossary: tajalli
هنالك يتجلى على كل شيء بقدر إيمانه بالله تعالى في الدنيا، وبمعرفته بقدره سبحانه وتعالى.
There He discloses Himself to each one in accordance with his faith in God (exalted is He) in this world, and his gnosis of His worth (glory be to Him, exalted is He).
glossary: tajalli
وأهل الأعراف قوم لم يخرجوا من الدنيا إلا وقد تجلى الله سبحانه وتعالى عليهم وعرفوه فيها.
And the people of the Heights are a folk who did not depart from this world except [after] God (glory be to Him, exalted is He) had disclosed Himself to them, and they had known Him in it.
glossary: tajalli
فلما خرجوا منها إلى الآخرة لم يكن لهم محل إلا عنده، لأن من دخل بلادا وله فيها صاحب يعرفه لا ينزل إلا عنده.
So when they departed from it to the Hereafter, they had no locus but with Him -- because whoever enters lands, and has in them a companion who knows him, alights only with him;
بل ويجب على ذلك الصاحب أن لا ينزله إلا عنده، فإذا كان هذا يفعله المخلوق فمن أولى به من الخالق تعالى.
indeed, it is incumbent upon that companion that he lodge him only with himself. So if the created one does this, then who is worthier of it than the Creator (exalted is He)?
ألا تراه قد صرح سبحانه وتعالى أن ثمة قوما هم عند مليك مقتدر، وهنا عجائب وغرائب لا يسع الوجود بأسره أن نذكرها على سبيل التصريح.
Do you not see that He (glory be to Him, exalted is He) has plainly declared that there is a folk who are "with a Sovereign Omnipotent" (54:55)? And here are marvels and wonders that the whole of existence does not have room for us to mention by way of plain declaration;
Qurʾān 54:55: al-Qamar 54:55, the clause 'ʿinda malīkin muqtadir'
بل هي لدقتها وغموضها لا تفهم إلا بالإشارة والتلويح.
rather, for their fineness and obscurity, they are not understood except by allusion and intimation --
اللهم إلا إذا كان الناظر في الكتاب قد بلغ تلك المرتبة وعاين تلك الأمور العجيبة بما ليس يدري.
unless, that is, the one looking into the book has reached that rank and has beheld those wondrous matters by [a means] he does not [himself fully] know.
وأما العالم فليس لذكرنا هذه العجائب عنده فائدة إلا لازم الخبر.
As for the [merely] learned one, there is no benefit, with him, in our mentioning these marvels -- except the necessary concomitant of the report:
وهو أن يعلم أنا علمنا ما علم وليس لنا في ذلك قصد.
namely, that he know that we have known what is to be known, and that we have, in that, no [self-seeking] intent.
فلنقبض العنان، والله المستعان وعليه التكلان.
So let us draw in the rein. And God is the One whose help is sought, and upon Him is reliance.
The chapter's closing formula (a variant of the standard chapter-close).
Collation. Two-witness collated as the eschatological-process chapter (companion to Bāb 58's eschatological structure), staged 2026-06-03. Witness-2 clean of navigation chrome. No embedded poems. The chapter's method is consistent: each portent of the Greater Hour (al-sāʿa al-kubrā) is paired with its inner counterpart in the individual's Lesser Hour (al-sāʿa al-ṣughrā). Several OCR garbles restored to sense and noted. No lossy drop of authorial text. The title-line is truncated in the witness ('...to which the people of the Garden go forth'); completed sensibly.
Qurʾān. Ten loci verified verbatim, all tags correct (no mis-tags in this chapter): al-Māʾida 5:56 and al-Mujādila 58:22 ('the party of God', §39); al-Naml 27:82 (the Beast of the Earth, §44); Āl ʿImrān 3:97 ('whoever enters it is secure', §97); al-Najm 53:39 (§165); Maryam 19:95 ('each of them comes to Him on the Day of Resurrection, alone', §197); Ghāfir 40:16 ('whose is the dominion this Day... God, the One, the Subduer', §204-§205); al-Zalzala 99:7-8 (§212); al-Qamar 54:55 ('with a Sovereign Omnipotent', the Aʿrāf, §233, §241); al-Aʿrāf 7:46 ('upon the Heights are men', §233). One paraphrase noted (§40, 'God chooses whom He wills of His servants', echoing al-Ḥajj 22:75 / al-Shūrā 42:13, not a verbatim verse). Sayings flagged: the ḥadīth al-nawāfil ('I become his hearing...', §30, sound, Bukhārī 6502); the slave-girl/shepherds tokens from Ḥadīth Jibrīl (§27, sound, Muslim); 'a time will come when the one holding to his religion...' (§73, Tirmidhī); 'this world is the tillage of the Hereafter' (§211, a popular saying, not a sound hadith); the ḥaqīqat-al-īmān report of Ḥāritha (§199 -- the witness names 'Zayd ibn Ḥāritha', likely an error for Ḥāritha ibn Mālik). Closing formula (§246) is 'and God is the One whose help is sought, and upon Him is reliance.'