The Pilgrimage of The Soul of The Nobles and The Righteous Ones - Chapter 1 of 7

 بِسْمِ اللَّهِ الرَّحْمَٰنِ الرَّحِيمِ

Chapter 1- The Soul of Shia Islam - Draft

Here, I use the word mind to designate the Arabic word of نفس pronounced "Nafs", which means our being in its individuality, the mindful, intelligent, curious, emotional, eager, imperious and the decision maker part of us, but the actual meaning of Nafs should be multilayer and dynamic, thus not limited to these latter.

Then, whatever Soul may be, it seems to play like it is the unnoticed, patient and tireless companion of mind; the companion which silently provides mind with the light (life) that it needs to dive into the matter and speak.

However our empirical science ignores Soul.

And our sacred traditions don’t tell that much about it, if not metaphorically.

"And they ask you about Soul, tell them  Soul is of my Lord’s matter and no science is given to you, except little." (Surat al-Asraa - Ayah 85)

 وَيَسْأَلُونَكَ عَنِ الرُّوحِ ۖ قُلِ الرُّوحُ مِنْ أَمْرِ رَبِّي وَمَا أُوتِيتُم مِّنَ الْعِلْمِ إِلَّا قَلِيلًا (سورة الاسراء - آیه ۸۵)

Abu Bassir asked Imam al-Sadegh, peace be upon him: "Does the soul leave the body during sleep?" Imam answered: "No, O Abu Bassir! If the soul leaves the body it will never return to it, but the soul is like the sun which sits in the middle of sky and its light covers everywhere.

عِندَ ما سَأَلَهُ عليه السلام أَبُوبَصيرٍ عَنِ الرُّوحِ عِندَ النَّومِ أخارِجٌ مِنَ البَدَنِ؟ قالَ عليه السلام: لا يا أبابَصيرُ، فَاِنَّ الرُّوحَ اِذا فارَقَتِ البَدَنَ لَمْ تَعُدْ اِلَيهِ، غَيْرَ أَنَّها عَينُ الشَّمسِ مَركُوزَةً فِى السَّماءِ فِى كَبِدِها وَ شعاعُها فِى الّدنيا.

[ميزان الحكمه ص 2158 ح 7505 به نقل از بحار ج 61 ص 43 ح 19]

So who can speak about Soul?

Perhaps the Gazan father who called his martyred daughter, soul of Soul (روح الروح)٫ while giving her a last hug?

Indeed our mind seems to make a sense of it, when Soul is taken away from the mind, ie the day when the mind lives his death.

Abde-Rahman says when he asked Imam Sadegh, peace be upon him: "I said for what reason when the soul departs from the body, we find out that the soul is touching the body, but when the soul is settled within the body, we don’t notice it and have no knowledge about it?" Imam said: "because the body grew on it (the soul)"

أَخْبَرَنِي عَلِيُّ بْنُ حَاتِمٍ قَالَ أَخْبَرَنَا اَلْقَاسِمُ بْنُ مُحَمَّدٍ قَالَ حَدَّثَنَا حَمْدَانُ بْنُ اَلْحُسَيْنِ عَنِ اَلْحُسَيْنِ بْنِ اَلْوَلِيدِ عَنْ عِمْرَانَ بْنِ اَلْحَجَّاجِ عَنْ عَبْدِ اَلرَّحْمَنِ عَنْ أَبِي عَبْدِ اَللَّهِ عَلَيْهِ السَّلاَمُ قَالَ: قُلْتُ لِأَيِّ عِلَّةٍ إِذَا خَرَجَ اَلرُّوحُ مِنَ اَلْجَسَدِ وَجَدَ لَهُ مَسّاً وَ حَيْثُ رُكِّبَتْ لَمْ يَعْلَمْ بِهِ قَالَ لِأَنَّهُ نَمَا عَلَيْهِ اَلْبَدَنُ .

The awareness about Soul could also be when mind losses all its means facing an impossible task, then it should take a seat with Soul and hear it speak. 

The prophet Mohammadﷺ said: "the apostles asked Jesus Christ, peace be upon him: O Soul of Allah, with whom should we have a seat? Jesus said: the One whose contemplation reminds you Allah, and whose reasoning rises your Science (علم), and whose action makes you desire Salvation."

رسولُ اللّه صلی‏ الله ‏علیه و ‏آله :

قالُوا [الحَوارِیّونَ لعیسی علیه السلام] : یا رُوحَ اللّه، فمَن نُجالِسُ إذا؟ قالَ: مَن یُذَکِّرُکُمُ اللّه‏َ رُؤیَتُهُ(۱)، و یَزیدُ فی عِلْمِکُم منطِقُهُ (۲) و یُرَغِّبُکُم فی الآخِرَةِ عَمَلُهُ (۳).

When the mind takes a seat and lessons, another Mind will be heard through Soul.

Imam al-Bagher, peace be upon him, said: "The Guardians tell, what the Holy Soul tells them, and they don’t see it. And Ali, peace be upon him, used to address to the Holy Soul what he was asked about, so he was finding out within his Mind that he got the right answer (form the Holy Soul) then he was informing those who asked him, with what he was told."

قَالَ أَبُو جَعْفَرٍ اَلْبَاقِرُ عَلَيْهِ اَلسَّلاَمُ : إِنَّ اَلْأَوْصِيَاءَ مُحَدَّثُونَ يُحَدِّثُهُمْ رُوحُ اَلْقُدُسِ وَ لاَ يَرَوْنَهُ وَ كَانَ عَلِيٌّ عَلَيْهِ اَلسَّلاَمُ يَعْرِضُ عَلَى رُوحِ اَلْقُدُسِ مَا يُسْأَلُ عَنْهُ فَيُوجَسُ فِي نَفْسِهِ أَنْ قَدْ أَصَبْتَ بِالْجَوَابِ فَيُخْبِرُ فَيَكُونُ كَمَا قَالَ .

بصائر الدرجات في فضائل آل محمد ﷺ جلد۱ صفحه ۴۵۳

So should the Mind of the Guardians and the Righteous Ones verify and attest what they were told by Soul.

In his interpretation of the Surat al-Ghadr of Quran, Imam al-Sadegh, peace be upon him, said: " … and in His Words: "When descend archangels and Soul in it (the al-Ghadr Night)…" archangels here stand for the faithfuls (Muslim) who possess the Science (علم) of the Family of Mohammadﷺ and Soul is the Holy Soul, and She is Fatima, peace be upon Her, … " 

الصّادق (علیه السلام)- عَنْ حُمْرَانَ قَالَ: سَأَلْتُ أَبَاعَبْدِ‌اللَّهِ (علیه السلام) ... وَ قَوْلُهُ تَنَزَّلُ الْمَلائِکَةُ وَ الرُّوحُ فِیها وَ الْمَلَائِکَهًُْ فِی هَذَا الْمَوْضِعِ الْمُؤْمِنُونَ الَّذِینَ یَمْلِکُونَ عِلْمَ آلِ مُحَمَّدٍ (علیهم السلام) وَ الرُّوحُ رُوحُ الْقُدُسِ وَ هُوَ فِی فَاطِمَهًَْ (سلام الله علیها) مِنْ کُلِّ أَمْرٍ سَلامٌ یَقُولُ مِنْ کُلِّ أَمْرٍ مُسَلَّمَهًْ.

The Christian dogma designates the third principle of "the trinitarian God", the Holy Spirit. However from the prospective of Shia Islam, first this is not God who is trinitarian, but the process of becoming and being the divine Human, as he/she is the entanglement point of Mind (نفس), Soul (روح) and the Purpose or Imam (امام) or the Reference to become. All these are within Allah and Allah is One.

Second, Holy Soul reflects better the meaning of the Soul who accompanies Jesus Christ, peace be upon him. The spirit is just the mind, or Nafs, without his body. You provide the spirit with a body and a soul, then he becomes a human being, or انسان in Arabic, pronounced "Ensan". 

But Soul is something or someone different, she is entangled with mind, grants him light and life to live in the matter state inside a body, but from the prospective of Shia Islam, Soul is not mind, Soul is not spirit neither.

But the human being may be able to lower the reasoning of the mind and higher the vibration of the soul, giving up almost entirely the matterish thoughts and memories, in order to emit and "broadcast" some resonance of the soul, in a way that the human being impersonates and even becomes the soul.

So should the mind show off the soul to find out his way in the darkness.

Hossein ibn Ali, peace be upon him, is deemed to be the mindful experience of Soul, as per at least two reported Hadiths :

• Regarding the significance of his Day of living the death of Mind, the killing, piece by piece, of his mind tied to his loved ones, and the revelation and contemplation of his Soul, at least partially. The second Imam, Hassan ibn Ali, peace be upon him, told his brother: "There is no day like thy Day, O Aba Abd-Allah" (لَا یَوْمَ کَیَوْمِکَ یَا اَبا عَبْدِاللهِ).

• Regarding the light which Soul provides to the mind, prophet Mohammadﷺ said: "Hossein is definitely the Lantern of Guidance and the Vessel of Salvation" (اِنَّ الْحُسين مِصباحُ الْهُدي وَ سَفينَهُ الْنِّجاه). So the Soul who saves the mind from the darkness, which elevates the mind, is, in Shia faith, Fatima peace be upon her, and her Lantern is Imam Hossein, peace be upon him.

Of corse the above testimonies are backed by the empirical evidence of how Hossein is beating in the heart of Shia Muslims and how he is reviving them in their incessant struggles and suffering during the past 14 centuries.

The pilgrimage of the Ashura event (زیارت عاشورا) in his Shrine in Karbala/Iraq, is the pilgrimage of the Soul of Shia Islam. And according to the Shia dogma, the current Imam, or Imam of Time, or the Twelfth Imam, may Allan hasten the coming of His Dawn, is actively pursuing this pilgrimage every year.

I therefore pose here the Axiom of the Twelver Shia faith:

• the Mind of Islam is the Twelfth Imam بقیة الله (عجل الله تعالی فرجه الشریف).
• the Hidden and Sanctum Soul of Islam, its Holiest Soul, is Fatima al-Zahra, فاطمه الزهرا (سلام الله علیها)

• the Manifest and Ostentatious pedestal where the Soul of Islam stands is Hossein ibn Ali (علیه السلام), the Third Imam, ثار الله and his fellow witness martyries, peace be upon them. 

Bearing in mind that both three may be trinitarian too, they have their own Mind, Soul and Purpose (امام), Imam for them being directly Allah.

Thus they are not Allah, but can be Soul at will. They are what they have the Science (علم) of.

Science or علم (Eilm) here cannot be translated. In a limiting attempt, it may stand for a kind of knowledge which is ontologically a state of being, resonating, achieved, if not by Allah's direct creation, through an "empirical" process of becoming or maturing.

Thus, this kind of knowledge, should we better call it Science, is not a state of awareness.

The state of awareness is achieved through a process of observation, thinking, learning and memorising. This state of awareness is designated in Arabic by the verb "Arafa" (عرف) which means getting familiar, close and aware through observation, thinking, learning, debating, pilgrimage etc. I hope this is what we are doing here.

Therefore, there is distance between عرف (arafa) and علم (alama), with a stepped journey for ascending from the first to the last, from the meaning to the being, should it be the purpose of our earthly life.

In other words, first one needs to be familiar and aware in order to appeal for and be engaged in the process of empirical becoming, the Science, Eilm, علم. This Science is a kind of Light, or can be described by analogy with light, with layered spectrum, which could be named by attributes that are those of the Soul. These attributes incarnated by humans, have infinite divin archetypes, that are called Names of Allah in Quran. 

And when your Lord told the angels that "I’m appointing a Caliph on Earth", they said: "Are You appointing  someone who will commit corruption in there and shed blood, while we glorify You with Your praise and extol Your holiness?" Allah answered, "I certainly know what you do not know." ["knowing" by using the verb "Alama" علم and not "Arafa" عرف see above] (Surat al-Bagharat - Ayah 30)

وَإِذْ قَالَ رَبُّكَ لِلْمَلَائِكَةِ إِنِّي جَاعِلٌ فِي الْأَرْضِ خَلِيفَةً ۖ قَالُوا أَتَجْعَلُ فِيهَا مَن يُفْسِدُ فِيهَا وَيَسْفِكُ الدِّمَاءَ وَنَحْنُ نُسَبِّحُ بِحَمْدِكَ وَنُقَدِّسُ لَكَ ۖ قَالَ إِنِّي أَعْلَمُ مَا لَا تَعْلَمُونَ (سورة البقره - آیه ۳۰)

And Allah "taught" Adam all the Names and presented them to the angels then said: "talk to me about the Names of these if you tell the truth (and stand for Truth)." (Surat al-Baghara - Ayah 31)

وَعَلَّمَ آدَمَ الْأَسْمَاءَ كُلَّهَا ثُمَّ عَرَضَهُمْ عَلَى الْمَلَائِكَةِ فَقَالَ أَنبِئُونِي بِأَسْمَاءِ هَٰؤُلَاءِ إِن كُنتُمْ صَادِقِينَ (سورة البقره - آیه ۳۱)‏

 

They (the angels) said: "Glory is Yours. We have no "knowledge/science" except what You have "taught" us, You are certainly Omniscient and Wise." (Surat al-Baghara - Ayah 32)

قَالُوا سُبْحَانَكَ لَا عِلْمَ لَنَا إِلَّا مَا عَلَّمْتَنَا ۖ إِنَّكَ أَنتَ الْعَلِيمُ الْحَكِيمُ (سورة البقره - آیه ۳۲) 

Allah said: "O Adam, inform them of their Names. When he informed them about their Names, Allah said: “Did I not tell you that I ‘know’ the secrets of the Heavens and the Earth, and I ‘know’ what you reveal and what you conceal?” (Surat al-Baghara - Ayah 33)

قَالَ يَا آدَمُ أَنبِئْهُم بِأَسْمَائِهِمْ ۖ فَلَمَّا أَنبَأَهُم بِأَسْمَائِهِمْ قَالَ أَلَمْ أَقُل لَّكُمْ إِنِّي أَعْلَمُ غَيْبَ السَّمَاوَاتِ وَالْأَرْضِ وَأَعْلَمُ مَا تُبْدُونَ وَمَا كُنتُمْ تَكْتُمُونَ (سورة البقره - آیه ۳۳)

Imam al-Sadegh, peace be upon him said: "There are three kinds of people:

• the scientists العُلَماءُ (the one who possess and incarnate Eilm),
• the students  المُتَعلمونَ (the one who "experience" the earning an embodying of Eilm),
• the scum.

Then, We* are the scientists, our followers are the students and the other people are scum**"

امام صادق(علیه السلام): اِنَّ النّاسَ یَغدونَ عَلَی ثَلاثَهٍ: عالمٍ و مُتَعَلِّمٍ و غُثَاءٍ، (مصداق:) فَنَحنُ العُلَماءُ، وَ شِیعتنا المُتَعلمونَ، و سائر الناسِ غُثاءٌ

Of course my translation is weak and should be perfected.

* Every time an Imam say We, he refers to prophet Mohammadﷺ, Fatima and the Twelve Imams, including him, peace be upon them.

** Here I would interpret "scum" as the distressed and disoriented minds, distancing themselves with their Soul, who can’t dive deep and float on the surface of the matterly life, like dead fishes. 

Source: The link of this photo

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