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Summary : Emotion and spiritual insight {zevk) have become mixed in this Flash to an extent, and since their exuberance does not much heed the principles of the intellect and the scales of thought nor conform to them, it should not be weighed up on the balance of logic

The Third Flash
Transforming Transience into Immortality

 

[Emotion and spiritual insight {zevk) have become mixed in this Flash to an extent, and since their exuberance does not much heed the principles of the intellect and the scales of thought nor conform to them, it should not be weighed up on the balance of logic]

In the Name of God, the Merciful, the Compassionate.
Everything shall perish save His countenance; His is the command, and to Him shall you return.(1)

The two phrases, "The Eternal One (al-Baqi), He is the Eternal One! * The Eternal One, He is the Eternal One!" express the meaning of the above verse, and they state two important truths. It is because of this that some of the leading members of the Naqshbandi Order made themselves a special invocation with the repetition of them, a sort of concise Naqshi litany. Seeing that the two phrases express the verse's meaning, I shall explain a few points about the significant truth they state.
FIRST POINT
The first time "The Eternal One, He is the Eternal One!" is recited, like a surgical operation it severs and isolates the heart from everything other than God. It is as follows:
By virtue of his comprehensive nature, man is connected with virtually all beings. Also included in his nature is a boundless capacity to love. For these reasons he nurtures love towards all beings. He both loves the vast world as though it were his house, and he loves eternal Paradise as though it were his garden. However, the beings he loves do-not stop, they depart, and he constantly suffers the pain of separation. That boundless love of his becomes the means of boundless torment.
The fault in suffering such torment is his, for he was given a heart with an infinite capacity to love in order to direct it toward One possessing infinite undying beauty. By misusing it and spending it on transitory beings, he has done wrong and suffers the punishment for his fault due to the pain of separation.
Thus, the first time he utters: "The Eternal One.' He is the Eternal One!", it severs his attachment to transitory beings; he leaves those objects of love before they leave him and he is thus cleared of his fault. The phrase declares that love is restricted to the Eternal Beloved, and expresses this meaning: "You are the only Truly Enduring Being! Everything other than You is transient. My heart cannot become attached to anything transient, for it was created for everlasting love, to feel ardour from pre-eternity to post-eternity. Since those innumerable beloveds are transitory and they leave me and depart, I declare, 'The Eternal One, You are the Eternal One!" and leave them before they leave me. Only You are immortal, and I know and believe that beings can only be immortal by Your making them so. In which case, they should be loved with Your love. They are not otherwise worthy of the heart's attachment."
When in this state, the heart gives up innumerable things it loves; seeing that their beauty is stamped with transitoriness, it severs its attachment to them. Otherwise it will suffer wounds to the number of its beloveds. The second "The Eternal One, He is the Eternal One!" is both a salve and an antidote for those wounds. That is, "O You who is Eternal! Since You are thus, it is enough for me. You take the place of everything. Since You exist, everything exists."
Yes, the beauty, bounty, and perfection in beings which excite love, are generally signs of the Truly Enduring One's beauty and bounty and perfections, and passing through many veils, are pale shadows of them. Indeed, they are shadows of the shadows of the manifestations of His Most Beautiful Names.
SECOND POINT
Included in human nature is an intense love of immortality. Even, because of his power of imagination, man fancies a sort of immortality in everything he loves. Whenever he thinks of or sees their passing, he cries out from the depths of his being. All lamentations at separation are interpretations of the weeping caused by love of immortality. If there were no imagined immortality, there would be no love. It might even be said that a reason for the existence of the eternal realm and everlasting Paradise is the intense desire for immortality arising from that passionate love of immortality, and from the innate, general prayer for immortality. The Eternal One of Glory accepted transient man's intense, unshakea-ble, innate desire and his powerful, effective, general prayer, because He created an eternal realm for him.
Is it at all possible that the Munificent and Compassionate Creator would accept the insignificant wish of a tiny stomach and its supplication through the tongue of disposition for a temporary immortality by creating innumerable delicious foods, and not accept the intense desire of all humankind, which arises from an overpowering innate need, and its universal, constant, rightful, just prayer for immortality, offered through word and state? God forbid, a hundred thousand times! It is impossible that He would not accept it. Not to accept it would be in keeping with neither his wisdom, nor His justice, nor His mercy, nor His power.
Since man is most desirous of immortality, all his perfections and pleasures are dependent on it. And since immortality is particular to the Eternal One of Glory; and since the Eternal One's names are eternal; and since the Eternal One's mirrors take on His hue, and reflect His decree, and manifest a sort of immortality; for sure the matter most important for man, his most pressing duty, is to form a relation with that Eternal One and to adhere to His names. For everything expended on the way of the Eternal One receives a sort of immortality. The second "the Eternal One, He is the Eternal One!" expresses this truth. In addition to healing man's innumerable spiritual wounds, it satisfies the intense wish for immortality inherent in his nature.
THIRD POINT
In this world, the effects of time on things, and on their transience and passing, differ greatly. Also, although beings are one within the other like concentric circles, they all differ as regards the speed of their passing.
Just as the hands of a clock counting the seconds, and those counting the minutes, hours, and days superficially resemble each other, but differ in respect to speed, so too the spheres of the body, soul, heart, and spirit in man differ from one another. For example, the body possesses an immortality, a life, and an existence in the present day, and even in the present hour while its past and future are dead and non-existent, yet the sphere of the heart's existence and life extends from many days previous to the present day and to many days in the future. Then the sphere of the spirit is vast; the sphere of its life and existence extends from years previous to the present day to years subsequent to it.
By virtue of this capacity, in respect of knowledge, love, and worship of God the Sustainer, and the pleasure of that Most Merciful One, from which spring the life of the heart and spirit, transient life in this world contains within it a perpetual life, and results in eternal life, and resembles everlasting life.
Yes, one second seeking the love, knowledge, and pleasure of the Truly Eternal One is like a year. While a year not spent on His way, is a second. A single second, even, on His way becomes immortal and the equivalent of many years. But for the people of neglect, a hundred years looking to this world are like a single second. There is a famous saying: "A moment's separation lasts a year, and a year's union passes in an instant." I say the complete opposite to this: a moment's union for God's sake within the bounds of the Eternal One of Glory's pleasure is a window of union, not of only a year; it is a permanent window. While hot one year, but perhaps a thousand spent in heedlessness and misguidance pass in an instant. There is a saying more famous than the previous one that corroborates this: "The broad earth with enemies resembles a cup, while the eye of a needle with friends is a broad arena."
A correct meaning of the first saying above is this: since, however long it is, union with transitory beings is transient, it seems brief. A year of such union passes in a second; it is an illusion, a dream, causing regret and sorrow. The human heart can only receive from it the tiniest pleasure within a fraction of a second, since it desires immortality. And one moment's separation seems like not one year, but many. For the arena of separation is broad. Even if only for a second, it inflicts years of destruction on the heart, which yearns for eternity. It bodes of innumerable separations. For physical and lowly loves, the past and future are filled with separations.
While oh the subject, we say this: O man! Don't you want to make your brief, futile life immortal, beneficial, and fruitful? Since humanity demands this, spend your life on the way of the Truly Eternal One. For everything turned to Him receives the manifestation of immortality.
Since everyone fervently desires long life and yearns for immortality; and since there is a way of transforming this fleeting life into perpetual life and it is possible to make it lengthy; for sure everyone who has not lost his humanity will seek out that way and try to convert the possibility into reality and will act accordingly. Yes, the way is this: work for God's sake, meet with others for God's sake, labour for God's sake; act within the sphere of "For God, for God's sake, on account of God." Then all the moments of your life will become years.
Alluding to this truth, verses of the Qur'an indicate that a single night such as the Night of Power is like a thousand months, that is, around eighty years. The expansion of time, a tried principle among the people of sainthood and reality, also alludes to it. Through this mystery, a few minutes' Ascension become like many years and prove the existence of this truth and demonstrate it in fact. The Ascension of the Prophet (PBUH), which lasted a few hours, had the length, breadth, and comprehensiveness of thousands of years, for by way of it he entered the world of eternity, and a few minutes of that world comprise thousands of years of this.
Besides this are the numerous instances of the expansion of time experienced by the saints, constructed on this truth. It is related that some of them did a day's work in a single minute, and others performed a year's duties in an hour, or recited the whole Qur'an in the space of a minute. Such veracious people of truth would never knowingly stoop to lying. There can be no doubt that they experienced this fact of the expansion of time,(2) which is thus numerously and unanimously reported.

One sort of it is experienced in dreams and is confirmed by everyone. Sometimes a day of the waking world, or many days, would be needed to experience all the happenings, words, pleasures, and pains experienced in a minute-long dream.
In Short: For sure man is transitory, but he was created for immortality and to be a mirror to the Eternal One. He is charged with duties which produce enduring fruits, and is given a form whereby he manifests the impresses of an Eternal One's eternal names. In which case, man's true duty and happiness lie in clinging with all his powers and faculties to the names of that Eternally Enduring One within the bounds of those things that please Him; it is to be turned towards Him, and to go to Him. As man's tongue utters "the Eternal One, You are the Eternal One!" so his heart, spirit, mind, and all his subtle faculties should declare:
"He is the Eternal One! He is Pre-Eternal and Post-Eternal! He is the Everlasting, the Perpetual One! He is the One who is Sought, Beloved, Wished For, and Worshipped!"
Glory be unto You! We have no knowledge save that which You have taught us; indeed, You are All-Knowing, All-Wise!(3)

O our Sustainer! Do not take us to task if we forget or do wrong.(4)