what they said.” Its cause: “Lend to God” [al-Muzzammil 73:20]. Its purity: “a good loan.” Its explanation and proof: “Excellence is to worship God as though you see Him.” Its recompense: “Whatever good they do, they shall not be denied it” [Al ʿImran 3:115].
(Poverty’s Generality and Reality)
There is no crowding at poverty’s gate because of its breadth and the generality of its ruling. Poverty is a forsaken attribute, although none is without it. In every poor one it accords with what his reality gives. It is the most pleasurable thing the knower attains: it brings him into the Real’s presence, and the Real receives him because he called Him through it. Calling is asking. Its sister, lowliness, is close to it.
Abu Yazid said: The Real told me, “Draw near to Me through what I do not possess: lowliness and need.” He thus directed him and veiled him.
In language these two attributes describe possible things. The Necessary Existent has neither as a description in language. Exalted is God! A lowered veil and a locked door, its key hanging upon it: the seeing person sees it, while the blind person does not sense it. “Say: Are those who know and those who do not know equal? Only possessors of understanding remember” [al-Zumar 39:9].
In this verse—I mean His saying, “You are the poor toward God” [Fatir 35:15]—the Real names Himself for us by the name of everything needed, out of His jealousy lest another be needed. The poor one needs everything and is needed by nothing. This is the pure servant among the realizers.
His state in the thingness of his existence is thus like his state in the thingness of his nonexistence. A beneficial medicine for an intractable ailment is His saying, “I created you
Anmerkungen
Translator’s note TN4383-1: The pronouns in ‘because he called Him through it’ are read as the knower calling upon the Real through poverty. They could also refer to the Real calling the knower by this attribute. The subsequent statement that He ‘directed him and veiled him’ is retained without removing its second term.
