Ibn ‘Arabi on the impossibility of becoming nothing

I've read the Koran (in translation, naturally). It didn't resonate with me. Really tough to get through – but Muslims say that a lot, maybe everything, is lost in translation.

Somewhat strangely though, I went through a phase where I couldn't stop reading Rumi. He was a Sufi, the mystical side of Islam. My bookshelves are full of Rumi titles, including Nicholson's three volume translation of the Masnavi.

I rarely pick up a Sufi book any more. There's too much monotheism left over from Sufism's Islamic roots to appeal to me, now that I'm in a Taoist/Buddhist phase.

All this Rumi talk of "His ruby lips" and "kiss of the Beloved" …ugh.

But I just read an excerpt from Ibn 'Arabi's "Divine Governance of the Human Kingdom" that gave me a fresh outlook on Sufism and mystical Islam. It's included in One: Essential Writings on Nonduality, edited by Jerry Katz.

I liked these passages because the notion of becoming nothing is appealing only insofar as it is a metaphor, not reality.

During my deeply devoted Radha Soami Satsang Beas days, when I'd hear disciples say "The guru is everything, I am nothing," I liked the humble sentiment. But it never made sense to me.

After all, if someone is in love with the guru and wants to be just like him, and the guru is everything, then shouldn't that person want to be everything also, rather than nothing? Plus, if you're nothing, how can you love? Or be devoted? Or be anything?

Religions often preach the virtue of extinguishing individuality, ego, willfulness. Yet as Ibn 'Arabi (1165-1240) says below, this presumes that there is something to extinguish.

If reality is truly one at its foundation – a hypothesis that makes a lot of sense to me, both scientifically and spiritually – what's up with all this talk of nothingness and somethingness?

Here's how Ibn 'Arabi puts it, presenting Islam in a refreshing non-dualistic fashion.

You cannot know your Lord by making yourself nothing. Many a wise man claims that in order to know one's Lord one must denude oneself of the signs of one's existence, efface one's identity, finally rid oneself of one's self.

This is a mistake. How could a thing that does not exist try to get rid of its existence? For none of matter exists. How could a thing that is not, become nothing? A thing can only become nothing after it has been something.

Therefore, if you know yourself without being, not trying to become nothing, you will know your Lord. If you think that to know Allah depends on you ridding yourself of yourself, then you are guilty of attributing partners to Him – the only unforgivable sin – because you are claiming that there is another existence besides Him, the All-Existent: that there is a you and a He.

Our Master, the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him), said:

He who knows himself knows His Lord

He did not say:

He who eliminates himself knows his Lord!

…That which exists and is visible is He. There is nothing but He, so how could nothing cease to be?

…Therefore, do not think anymore that you need to become nothing, that you need to annihilate yourself in Him. If you thought so, then you would be His veil, while a veil over Allah is other than He. How could you be a veil that hides Him? What hides Him is His being the One Alone.

Well, I still don't like the "He's" and "Lord's" in reference to Allah. But these are just ways of speaking. I mentally translate them into "It" and "Reality," which seems to be the sense Ibn 'Arabi is intending.

There's only One Thing Going On. It's all around us, and indeed is us.

No need for religion when there's nowhere to go, nothing to do, no one to become.

Comments

[Tucson Bob]

When I write, I think I sometimes come off as some sort of arrogant know-it-all. It just comes off that way because I know what I write is true for me, but that's as far as it goes. Everyone finds their own truth. Sometimes this truth is similar to mine while others prefer VooDoo, Mormonism, or RSSB. Fine, just as long as you don't threaten in the name of your belief or try to force-feed it.

One commenter on this forum, assuming that I am claiming knowledge of enlightenment, objects to my using various personal pronouns, a name, and concepts which indicate that I couldn't possibly be in the absolute state since I am obviously functioning as an indentified individual with relative opinions and concepts. This is true. I get pissed off, have problems and fart 17 times a day. I watch TV and drive a fast car (that gets decent gas milage for all you green folks.)

By the way, did you know that someone with a white coat and clip-board actually did a study and found that people, on average, fart 17 times a day?. I have no reference, however. Sorry. Maybe I'm gullible. Google it and see. I choose to believe it judging by the distance people keep from me, except for the dog which will roll in deer shit given the chance.

Anyway, while I make no claim to anything other than ordinariness with all the usual faults and weaknesses (which should go without saying), I do at times perceive how things are. This is not a mental process, or anything I can teach, or anything special. I think many people enter this 'state' in quiet moments, or in an inspiring setting, but fail to recognise it because of our powerful conditioning of always looking in the wrong direction. It is a sort of seeing between the lines when time stands still.
*******

To identify with the body-mind is an obstacle because 'I', as the absolute, am devoid of any objectivity. I can only know what I am not. What I really am is unknowable because I am it, and if I could know it I would therefore be an object.

There actually is no Reality, God, Self, Mind, Truth, etc. or any other concept of 'I' because 'I' am not at all in any form, attribute or quality.

But to say 'I am not' is misleading as well. There is no thing present or absent, positive or negative. However, Objects are 'I'. The entire perceived Universe is 'I'. But 'I'..'God' am not the Universe, the Universe is 'I'..'God'. The last statement is significant because the difference is between subject and object. The Creation is not God's subject.

What 'I' am is not any thing at all. God is a conceptual object just as everyone is as long as there is a 'me'. Yet everyone can say that the Universe is 'I' including animals and bugs because what else could they be? There is only 'I', and 'I' am not.

We may perceive that we, as creatures, are different as one another's objects, but as what we really are, we are not. We cannot say we are anything because that is what we are not. So, we can't know ourselves because we aren't anything that can be known. We can only BE as we are.

This is not something to be done or accomplished as a goal via a process. It is simply an intuitive perception of looking in the right direction which is no direction at all, where there is nothing to be seen and no one to see it. There has never been anyone who was "enlightened". Who could it have been? Certainly not the Buddha. I love the expression, "If you see a Buddha by the road, strike him with a stick!" Anyone claiming to be a master is not a master.

When this 'truth' is perceived you may laugh and, free of the burden of youself and responsiblity for you actions, you may feel a relief which could be interpreted as bliss. Ultimately you feel a kinship and kindness for all.

[william]

"Plus, if you're nothing, how can you love? Or be devoted? Or be anything?"
ask tucson bob that one.

from my point of view at this time we are that that is expressing itself in more ways than one.

pun intended.

the problem is as soon as i say itself the advaita type folks come out of the woodwork.

[Tucson Bob]

William wrote: "Plus, if you're nothing, how can you love? Or be devoted? Or be anything?"
ask tucson bob that one.

TB answers: You just do. It happens of it's own accord. No effort required. No admission fee. In being nothing, everything is what you are.

The problem is trying to make it complicated, to understand via thinking. Fuck thinking. Words are just words, not what is between the lines.

"There has never been a hen who laid an egg, but vast numbers of eggs have been laid by hens.

There has never been a man who wrote a book, but vast numbers of books have been written by men.

Nobody has ever done anything, but innumerable actions have been performed."

by Chinese philosopher, ah so!!

[tao]

One of my all time favorites:

Whoso Knoweth Himself -- by Ibn al' Arabi

[The following is a small portion of "Whoso Knoweth Himself" (now out of print), which is a part of the larger "Treatise on Being", by Ibn al' Arabi.]

"In the name of God, the Merciful, the Compassionate, and Him we ask for aid: Praise be to God before whose oneness there was not a before, unless the Before were He, and after whose singleness there is not an after, except the After be He. He is, and there is with Him no after nor before, nor above nor below, nor far nor near, nor union nor division, nor how nor where nor when, nor times nor moment nor age, nor being nor place. And He is now as He was. He is the One without oneness, and the Single without singleness. He is not composed of name and named, for His name is He and His named is He. So there is no name other than He, nor named. And so He is the Name and the Named. He is the First without firstness, and the Last without lastness. He is the Outward without outwardness, and the Inward without inwardness. I mean that He is the very existence of the First and the very existence of the Last, and the very existence of the Outward and the very existence of the Inward. So that there is no first nor last, nor outward nor inward, except Him, without these becoming Him or His becoming them.

Understand, therefore, in order that thou mayest not fall into the error of the Hululis (see Note 1): -- He is not in a thing nor a thing in Him, whether entering in or proceeding forth. It is necessary that thou know Him after this fashion, not by knowledge, nor by intellect, nor by understanding, nor by imagination, nor by sense, nor by the outward eye, nor by the inward eye, nor by perception. There does not see Him, save Himself; nor perceive Him, save Himself. By Himself He sees Himself, and by Himself He knows Himself. None sees Him other than He, and none perceives Him other than He. His Veil is [only a part of] His oneness; nothing veils other than He. His veil (See Note 2) is [only] the concealment of His existence in His oneness, without any quality. None sees Him other than He -- no sent prophet, nor saint made perfect, nor angel brought nigh (See Note 3) knows Him. His Prophet is He, and His sending is He, and His word is He. He sent Himself with Himself to Himself. There was no mediator nor any means other than He. There is no difference between the Sender and the thing sent, and the person sent and the person to whom he is sent. The very existence of the prophetic message is His existence. There is no other, and there is no existence to other, than He, nor to its ceasing to be, nor to its name, nor to its named.

And for this the Prophet (upon whom be peace) said: "Whoso knoweth himself knoweth his Lord". And he said (upon him be peace): "I know my Lord by my Lord". The Prophet (upon whom be peace) points out by that, that thou art not thou: thou art He, without thou; not He entering into thee, nor thou entering into Him, nor He proceeding forth from thee, nor thou proceeding forth from Him. And it is not meant by that, that thou art aught that exists or thine attributes aught that exists, but it is meant by it that thou never wast nor wilt be, whether by thyself or through Him or in Him or along with Him. Thou art neither ceasing to be nor still existing. Thou art He, without one of these limitations. Then if thou know thine existence thus, then thou knowest God; and if not, then not.

And most of "those who know God" make a ceasing of existence and the ceasing of that ceasing a condition of attaining the knowledge of God, and that is an error and a clear oversight. For the knowledge of God does not presuppose the ceasing of existence nor the ceasing of that ceasing. For things have no existence, and what does not exist cannot cease to exist. For the ceasing to be implies the positing of existence, and that is polytheism. Then if thou know thyself without existence or ceasing to be, then thou knowest God; and if not, then not.

And in making the knowledge of God conditional upon the ceasing of existence and the ceasing of that ceasing, there is involved an assertion of polytheism. For the Prophet (upon whom be peace) said, "Whoso knoweth himself," and did not say, "Whoso maketh himself to cease to be". For the affirmation of the other makes its extinction impossible, and [on the other hand] that of which the affirmation is not allowable its extinction is not allowable. Thine existence is nothing, and nothing cannot be added to something, whether it be perishing or unperishing, or existent or non-existent. The Prophet points to the fact that thou art non-existent now as thou wast non-existent before the Creation. For now is past eternity and now is future eternity, and now is past time. And God (whose name be exalted) is the existence of past eternity and the existence of future eternity and the existence of past time, yet without past eternity or future eternity or past time ever existing. For if it were not so He would not be by Himself without any partner, and it is indispensable that He should be by Himself without any partner. For His "partner" would be he whose existence was in his own essence, not in the existence of God, and whoever should be in that position would not be dependent upon Him. Then, in that case, there would be a second Lord, which is absurd: God (whose name be exalted) can have no partner nor like nor equal. And whoever looks upon anything as being along with God or apart from God or in God, but subject to Him in respect of His divinity, makes this thing also a partner, [only] subject to God in respect of divinity. And whoever allows that anything exists side by side with God, whether self-subsisting or subsisting in Him or capable of ceasing to exist or of ceasing to cease to exist, he is far from what smells of a breath of the knowledge of the soul."

[Tucson Bob]

Tao,

Whoso Knoweth Himself -- by Ibn al' Arabi.

I can see why that is one of your favorites. Really a good piece. Timeless wisdom expressed in a unique way (for me). I assume the writer was a Sufi and Mohammed is the Prophet spoken of here? Then it was written after the Koran? I appologise for my ignorance regarding this. I imagine if one could read it in Arabic it would shine all the brighter.

[william]

"I appologise for my ignorance regarding this."

No need to apologize for your ignorance although we all do because we take responsibility for our ignorance because we think/feel/act/believe that we are a person/self/individual and that we are indeed responsible for our not knowing.

The reality is that without our ignorance/not knowing/unawareness there is no expression of that that is, which is everything. Pure awareness is without ignorance whereas any conscious “thoughts” less than pure awareness must have some level of not knowing.

The origin of that not knowing/ignorance/ unawareness is innocence.

There lies the great mystery the ability of pure awareness to “veil” its own pure awareness to manifest a magnificent drama so real that most of our greatest scientists in the world cannot fathom or even appreciate their true reality.

[Cyfer]

"Round and round you (all) go, where it ends nobody knows"

Brain,

If your in a Tao/Buddaism phase, please study the work of Allen Watts. I know your going to say you have but, from all your endless wondering it appears you may need a good strong refresher. All these questions have been answered to best of Mans ability and nobody presents it better than Watts. I know the intellect can never be satisfied for long but this crap, ancient text and all that, is just flat boring. When one of those guys does make a good point, it's just a redux and poorly lucidated point that Watts make 20, 30 or 40 years ago.

Luie

[Tucson Bob]

Luie Cyfer,

I agree. Watts is great. "The Book" was a great catalyst for me back in the 60's, along with a tab of Sandoz and some gnarly tubes off the O.B. jetty on a McTavish twin fin.

[tao]

Tucson Bob wrote: "I assume the writer was a Sufi and Mohammed is the Prophet spoken of here?"

Yes Bob, Ibn al‘Arabi, a twelfth-century Spanish sufi mystic, is considered by many scholars to be the greatest master of Sufism.

"Then it was written after the Koran?"

Yes definitely.

"I imagine if one could read it in Arabic it would shine all the brighter."

Not necessarily. The small excerpt which I shared was a portion of a small booklet I own titled "Whoso Knoweth Himself", which was derived from a larger volume of Ibn al'Arabi writings titled "Treatise on Being". "Whoso Knoweth Himself" was translated by a scholar T.H. Weir, so it is as good as it gets.

For the small booklet "Whoso Knoweth Himself" and other Ibn al'Arabi writings that are available from Behara Publications, go here:

http://www.besharapublications.org.uk/titles/WhosoKnowethHimself.html

http://www.besharapublications.org.uk/authors/IbnArabi.html

http://www.besharapublications.org.uk/authors.html

http://www.besharapublications.org.uk/index.html

[william]

"Therefore, do not think anymore that you need to become nothing, that you need to annihilate yourself in Him. If you thought so, then you would be His veil, while a veil over Allah is other than He. How could you be a veil that hides Him? What hides Him is His being the One Alone."

These are profound words but the last sentence is stated the very best. "What hides him is his being the one alone". Words to ponder but then I have found the mystics have many words to ponder but the mystics are seldom taught in religious circles. My own small research data has shown that less than one per cent of Catholics (but not priests) have any idea who master (Meister) Eckhart was nor anything about his teachings. Why is that? How popular would religion be if god was not made in man’s image?

During the early nineties when I was doing research into the teachings of the mystics what grabbed my attention was that all the mystics whether from Buddhism, catholic, Sufi, or Hindu are pretty much all stating the same thing “we are that that is” and anytime we try to define ourselves or that that is we create a mental paradox.

“When this 'truth' is perceived you may laugh and, free of the burden of yourself and responsibility for you actions, you may feel a relief which could be interpreted as bliss. Ultimately you feel a kinship and kindness for all.”

One of the best kept “secrets” in the world is that our ignorance has its home in innocence. As Emmanuel would state something to the effect: if we do something not based in love and intelligence that action was needed to learn love and intelligence.

The last sentence (ultimately you feel a kinship and kindness for all) in this paragraph is a nice description of compassion. It was of interest to me to see that Tucson bob used the word you. Sorry Tucson bob that statement was straight from the ego but a kinship and kindness for all is much more than sympathy or empathy commonly used synonyms for compassion.

We Americans exhibiting the human behavior that we humans usually do, sought revenge after 9/11 and now how many have died seeking that revenge. Some people state that god works in mysterious ways. Maybe they are not so mysterious they just look mysterious to us in our ignorance but in realty these “universal laws or reality” are perfection is action called karma.

[Tucson Bob]

William wrote:"The last sentence (ultimately you feel a kinship and kindness for all) in this paragraph is a nice description of compassion. It was of interest to me to see that Tucson bob used the word you. Sorry Tucson bob that statement was straight from the ego but a kinship and kindness for all is much more than sympathy or empathy commonly used synonyms for compassion.

TB responds: Why are you so hell-bent on finding evidence of my ego? OK, here it is right in your face... Lighten-up and quit nit-picking with verbal details you pompous, vain, posturing, little snot. You and your "research" are full of shit. You are missing the forest for the trees, and as long as you remain on your high-horse of intellectual one-upmanship and condescending attitude, you will have a tough time getting a glimpse of that which you seek.

You make the assumption that it is impossible to know 'truth' in the human condition, yet you expect your readers to accept as truth your lame theories about 'ignorance and 'innocence', etc. WTF? If we can't know anything, how can you?

[tao]

Ditto to Tucson Bob's last comment (directly above).

[william]

Well if there was any doubt about you two possessing a very strong and defensive ego that has been laid to rest. Defensive behavior and hostility are based in ego ideation.

Not that you never nit picked my words and statements. God you two live in a glass house and you throw stones at me.

When the shoe was on the other foot wow what a difference it makes.

Hey I admitted it was my ego. Actually I gave you a complement but it was worded wrong on my part.

Here is what I meant to say kinship and kindness is another term for compassion and much easier to comprehend for most readers.

Surely by now you get my point about intellectualism being grounded in our egos and defensive behaviors being doubt revealing itself to the world as anger and especially towards those that disagree with our beliefs.

Actually advaita type responses are valid but at this point of our evolution of consciousness we can only intellectualize about them but because we identify with a personal self we often respond when someone we think is threatening that personal identity we attack to protect that cherished ego of ours.

The ego feels in constant danger of losing its identity and tries to protect its perceived self at all costs. Down deep very deep at the heart of our soul (spirit) the ego must know it is an illusion and impermanent.

Sorry to have upset you but inside that anger I suspect is room for growth. If you now feel embarrassed that you made those remarks don’t sweat it, embarrassment offers us great opportunity for growth but only opportunity.

Thanks for the dialog it is much more appreciated than you can imagine for my own potential growth in conscious awareness of reality.

[Tucson Bob]

Oh, come on. Get off it.

[william]

ok