Читать книгу The Kashf al-mahjúb: The oldest Persian treatise on Súfiism онлайн

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[The author then relates how, on Muḥammad’s decease, when `Umar threatened to decapitate anyone who asserted that the Prophet was dead, Abú Bakr stepped forth and cried with a loud voice: “Whoever worships Muḥammad, let him know that Muḥammad is dead; but whoever worships Muḥammad’s Lord, let him know that He is living and dieth not.” Those who regarded Muḥammad with the eye of mortality ceased to venerate him as soon as he departed from this world, but to those who regarded him with the eye of reality his presence and absence were alike, because they attributed both to God; and looked, not at the particular change which had come to pass, but at the Author of all change; and venerated Muḥammad only in proportion as God honoured him; and did not attach their hearts to anyone (except God); and did not open their eyes to gaze upon mankind, inasmuch as “he that beholdeth mankind waneth, but he that returneth unto God reigneth” (man naẕara ila ´l-khalq halak wa-man raja`a ila ´l-ḥaqq malak). And Abú Bakr showed that his heart was empty of this deceitful world, for he gave away all his wealth and his clients (mawálí), and clad himself in a woollen garment (gilím), and came to the Apostle, who asked him what he had left for his family. Abú Bakr replied: “Only God and His Apostle.” All this is characteristic of the sincere Ṣúfí.]