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

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This is the distinction between Purity and Poverty in the spiritual sense. It is otherwise when Purity and Poverty are considered in their practical aspect, namely, the denuding one’s self of worldly things (tajríd) and the casting away of all one’s possessions. Here the real point is the difference between Poverty (faqr) and Lowliness (maskanat). Some Shaykhs assert that the Poor (faqír) are superior to the Lowly (miskín), because God has said, “the poor who are straitened in the way of Allah, unable to go to and fro on the earth” (Kor. ii, 274): the Lowly possess means of livelihood, which the Poor renounce: therefore Poverty is honour and Lowliness abasement, for, according to the rule of the Mystic Path, he who possesses the means of livelihood is base, as the Apostle said: “Woe befall those who worship the dínár and the dirhem, woe befall those who worship garments with a nap!” He who renounces the means of livelihood is honoured, inasmuch as he depends on God, while he who has means depends on them. Others, again, declare the Lowly to be superior, because the Apostle said: “Let me live lowly, and let me die lowly, and raise me from the dead among the lowly!” whereas, speaking of Poverty, he said, “Poverty is near to being unbelief.” On this account the Poor are dependent on a means, but the Lowly are independent. In the domain of Sacred Law, some divines hold that the Poor are those who have a sufficiency ([s.]áḥib bulgha), and the Lowly those who are free from worldly cares (mujarrad); but other divines hold the converse of this view. Hence the name “Ṣúfí” is given to the Lowly by followers of the Path (ahl-i maqámát) who adopt the former opinion: they prefer Purity (ṣafwat) to Poverty. Those Ṣúfís who accept the latter view prefer Poverty to Purity, for a similar reason.