A Muslim Convert Once Before

Imam Abu al-Mughits al-Husayn ibn Manswur al-Hallaj wrote: “The long-awaited revealing of a well-kept secret, Is becoming clear to you. A dawn is breaking on your darkness. Your own heart is the veil covering the Secret. If you had kept yourself, He would not have been Revealed to you. But when you destroy your own heart, He Enters it and Discloses His Divine Revelation. So, guarded by this Revelation, An ever-nourishing dialogue will follow; Its verse and prose delicious to Us both.” al-Hallaj is not describing a nice feeling on a Friday afternoon.  He is describing the annihilation of the self — fana’ — as the precondition for direct Divine disclosure.  The heart he means is not the pump in your chest.  It is the ego's fortress: the accumulated self-regard, the inherited assumptions, the comfortable identity you have spent a lifetime defending.  He is telling you that a fortress is the thing standing between you and the Secret, not the thing protecting it. al-Hall...

بِسۡمِ ٱللهِ ٱلرَّحۡمَـٰنِ ٱلرَّحِيمِ This is the story of Imam al-Mugits Husayn ibn Manswur al-Hallaj ( q.s. ), who was born in Madina al-Bayda, a little village in the ancient province of Fars, in southern Persia, in the year 224 A.H./857 CE, two years before his shaykh, Imam Abu al-Qasim al-Junayd ibn Muhammad al-Baghdadi ( q.s. ).   He grew up in Wasith and in Tustar, where the cultivation of cotton was the main occupation of most of the people.   His father was a cotton-carder from which he gained his name of “ al-hallaj ” - one who cards cotton.   Even when he was a young child, Imam al-Hallaj ( q.s. ) felt drawn towards a spiritual life, and at the age of sixteen he attached himself to Imam Abu Muhammad Sahl ibn ‘Abdullah at-Tustari ( q.s. ), whom he accompanied when he moved from Tustar to Baswra, in ‘Iraq.   He served this shaykh for two years and then, when he was eighteen years old, he left him, and went to Baghdad.   The young Imam al-Hallaj (...

بِسۡمِ ٱللهِ ٱلرَّحۡمَـٰنِ ٱلرَّحِيمِ It is said Imam al-Mugits Husayn ibn Manswur al-Hallaj ( q.s. ) said:   “The hearts of the gnostics have eyes which see What is not seen by those who look. The sunnah is intimate conversation of secrets, Unseen by the noble scribes. Wings fly without feathers, To the Malakut of the Lord of the Worlds. I added two verses to it: Hearts are frantic with the passion of ecstasy, yearning, For the Jabarut of the One with certain truth. If you want to set out early for the one with meanings, Then expend your spirit and have little of us.”

‎ بِسۡمِ ٱللهِ ٱلرَّحۡمَـٰنِ ٱلرَّحِيمِ Dr. Alan A. Godlas wrote that the Shafi’i jurist, and qadhi of Shiraz, Imam Abu al-‘Abbas Ahmad ibn ‘Umar ibn Surayj al-Baghdadi’s ( q.s. ) fatwa prohibiting takfir of Sufi expressions had saved Imam al-Mugits Husayn ibn Manswur al-Hallaj ( q.s. ), in 301 AH.   His death opened the way for Imam al-Hallaj ( q.s. ) to be condemned on political charges.   Imam ibn Surayj al-Baghdadi ( q.s. ) was asked, “What do you say about a man who enters a desert without provisions?”   He replied, “This is among the acts of the men of God.”   Then he was asked, “So, if he dies?”   He replied, “The blood money is the responsibility of the slayer.”    And he said, “Your anxiety about sustenance causes you to cease being aware of God, the Real and impoverishes you, making you dependent on people.”   Once, he was asked about knowledge of the Divine Qualities.   In response, Imam ibn Surayj al-Baghdadi ( q.s....

بِسۡمِ ٱللهِ ٱلرَّحۡمَـٰنِ ٱلرَّحِيمِ   Attributed to Imam al-Mugits Husayn ibn Manswur al-Hallaj ( q.s. ):   “Your Image is constantly before my eyes, Your remembrance always upon my lips; The thought of you forever in my heart. Where can You hide from me?”

بِسۡمِ ٱللهِ ٱلرَّحۡمَـٰنِ ٱلرَّحِيمِ Imam al-Mugits Husayn ibn Manswur al-Hallaj ( q.s. ) said:   “Stillness, then silence, then random speech; Then knowledge, intoxication, annihilation; Earth, then fire, then light; Coldness, then shade, then sunlight. Thorny road, then a path, then the wilderness; River, then ocean, then the shore; Contentment, desire, then love Closeness, union, intimacy. Closing, then opening, then obliteration; Separation, togetherness, then longing; Signs for those of real understanding, Who find this world of little value.”