Poetry
I am Ahmad without the letter mim.
I am an Arab without the letter ‘ain.
Who Hath seen Me, the same hath seen the Truth.
Translation by Martin Lings.
The poetry is based from a hadith qudsi. The source is coming from Fusus al-Hikam or attributed to Ibn Arabi’s texts. Poem may also be attributed to Farid ad-Din al-Attar from the translation.
Note the hadith qudsi (God speaking in the first person through the Prophet) upon which is based the famous prayer of the mystics on the primordial love manifested in the personhood of the Prophet• laulaka ma khalagtu’1 aflaka= “if thou hadst not been (but for thee), I would not have created the heavens.” Ibn ‘Arabi is credited with developing this concept of the insan a1-kamil associated with the hadith qudsi that announces Muhammad as the Paraclete (61:6): ana Ahmad bila mim = “I am Ahmad (Muhammad) without the letter m [leaving ahad or ‘One’]” See Ibn ‘Arabi, The Wisdom of the Prophets, trans. Titus Burckhardt and Angela Culme-Seymour (Delhi: Taj Company, 1984).
Shaykh Muhiyuddin ibn al-‘Arabi believed that there is only one Dhat from the beginning, the Dhat of ‘abd is hypostatical or suppositional. Hypostatical distinction begins, as Herbert Spenser (Essay on Progress: its Law and Cause.) has put it, in the “appearance of differences in the parts of a like substance.” The Dhat of God expressing or as it were crystallizing itself in forms becomes the dhat of ‘abd. The moment, the unknown descended into its own knowledge, an aspect of its own, it showed itself to itself as ‘abd—and this was the stage of Haqiqat-i-Muhammadi. From the first to the last rung, the Dhat has manifested itself in knowledge; and it is therefore the Dhat that is manifest. God is thus sensed and the ‘abd is only inferred, (Al-haqqu mahsu sun wal ‘abd-u-ma’qulun). The Sifat (attributes) are thus hidden and inferred, and the Dhat is in the full blaze of evidence; just as the sun is in evidence and the dhat of the moon is inferred (Ash-Shums-u-mahsu sun wal Qamaru ma’qulun.) There are, however, others of Ibn ‘Arabi’s school, who hold that Sifat are in evidence, and the Dhat is hidden. Al-Ghazzali and Shaykh Ibrahim Gazur-i-Hahi belong to this school. There are evidences in Hadith to prove this. The prophet has said:
- I am Ahmad without min (Ana Ahmadun bila mim); without mim Ahmad becomes Ahad.
- I am Arab without ‘ayn (Ana Arabun bila ‘ayn; without the letter ‘ayn), Arab becomes Rabb. It may be observed that herein the Prophet first shows himself as ‘abd, and then says that when the letter ‘ayn disappears, he becomes Rabb in the state of self annihilation
- He who has seen me has seen God (man raani faqad ra-al-haqqa).Christ himself has also said “He that hath seen me hath seen the Father.” [St. John 14-9]
- He who knows his Nafs knows his rabb (Man ‘arafa nafsahu faqud ‘arafa rabbahu) i.e. He who knows his own Nafs, knows it as God.
- Some, however, interpret this, as meaning that he who understands his Nafs as “ignorant”, understands his rabb as “knowing”. He who understands his Nafs as “created” understands his Rabb as “Creator” and so on.
Sources https://sufi-horizon.blogspot.com/2008/02/thariqah-al-muhammadiyyah.html https://www.tajbaba.com/glimpse-of-tassawuf/48-the-one-in-many.html https://www.almirajsuficentre.org.au/qamus/app/single/132