At-Tawhid in Essence, Attributes and Acts
Unity of Essence, Unity of Attributes and Unity of Acts are three terms used in special meanings by two groups of people: the philosophers and the theologians on the one hand, and the gnostics on the other. The meanings intended by these two groups are different. We begin first with these terms as used by the philosophers and the theologians, and later on we shall deal with the terms as used by the second group.
Unity of Essence in the View of the Theologians and the Philosophers
In the view of theologians and philosophers, the Unity of Essence means that the Essence of Allah is one and has no partner in His Being and there is no compound inside Him and no other god outside Him. He is simple in Essence, composed of no parts or organs. He is One and has no partner.
Unity of Attributes in the View of the Theologians and Philosophers
At-Tawhid in attributes means that the attributes which we ascribe to Allah are nothing but His very Essence they are not things other than Himself added to Him, such as the case with us, the human beings and our attributes. If a black object wanted to be white, a colour is to be added to it to make it white. Similar are the moral characteristics. A sad person may become happy by adding to him a mood of happiness. To the one who dislikes work we may add the required attribute to make one like it and want it.
So, there is a being who lacks the will, then the will can be added to him - an addition which suits the soul and abstract things, then it finds what it has not had before. Thus, it becomes clear that the soul itself is something and the will is something else. The soul was there, but the will was not there, then later there was the will added to the soul and the soul has acquired the will. So, the wanted attribute can be ascribed to the soul only when something other than the soul is added to it. All the attributes which we recognize in the substances and non-substances, such as the psychological attributes, are all of this type, that is, the attribute is something other than the essence. Is it the same with Allah, the Most High, too? Is this Essence something other than His knowledge? If so, does it mean that, if we disregard His knowledge, the Essence itself will lack knowledge? Is Allah's power something other than His Essence? Does it mean that His Essence, in itself, is lacking power which is added to it afterwards, and only then we say: Allah is powerful? Is it so? It is said that the Ash'aris (a Sunni sect) say that Allah's Attributes are other than His Essence, as Allah Himself is a truth that has eight Attributes, each one of them is self-existent, but they are not His very Essence, though they are old. That is why the Ash'aris were called "The Old Eights", one is Allah's Essence, and the others are the Attributes of His Essence.
On the opposite side of this opinion (which is untrue) stands the belief of the other intellectual Muslims, both the philosophers and the theologians, who say that Allah's Attributes are His very Essence, which is simple. Our minds derive different concepts from this Essence. The origin of all these concepts is the Essence itself, and it is the mind that derives these concepts through diverse view points concerning Allah, the Exalted. Such concepts have been formerly derived from another source, but they are concepts that speak of perfection.
Realizing that Allah is devoid of imperfection, the intellect says that He also has that perfection. But that perfection is nothing but His Essence. We first recognize the meaning of knowledge in ourselves. Is it possible that the one who has created this world is devoid of knowledge? It is impossible for the one who has no knowledge to create such a world so wisely. So, we say: "Allah is Knowing", or "Wise". These concepts are recognized first in ourselves, but we ascribe them to Allah, as we know that Allah possesses all perfections. So, the source from which these concepts are derived is the Sacred Divine Essence.
Knowledge is not a separate thing annexed, or added, to Allah, or united with Him. It is the Simple Divine Essence that causes the mind to ascribe these concepts to it. The expression that the Divine Attributes are nothing but the very Essence of Allah is called, in the terms of the philosophers and theologians, "at-Tawhid in Attributes" or the unity of Attributes. Maybe what has Imam 'Ali (A.S.) said in "Nahjul-Balaghah" was a reference to this. He said: "The perfect admission of His Oneness is to deny Him attribute." Oneness can be perfect only when we deny Him the attributes which are not His very Essence; not to ascribe to Him the knowledge which is outside Him or is contrary to His Essence, otherwise at-Tawhid will be imperfect, and we will be accepting a kind of multiplicity: there is Allah, and there is His Knowledge, His Power, His Existence or else. Therefore, Unity of Attributes, as believed in by the philosophers and the theologians, means that Allah has no separate Attributes added to His Essence.
The Unity of Acts in the View of the Philosophers and Theologians
At-Tawhid in acts means to them that in performing His acts, Allah does not need any help or helper. He is independent and alone in doing. Some of the polytheists and deviators used to say that without there being other things or other persons, Allah is unable to carry out an act, and that when He wants to do anything He needs the help of others.
Here is, of course, a delicate point which must be mentioned. To say that Allah carries out an act by some means which He Himself has created is different from saying that He cannot do without the help of some means. These two expressions differ from each other. By Allah's Will, we shall expand on them in the coming pages, to explain the difference between saying Allah acts through means, and that He cannot act without means.
Thus, the meaning of Unity of Acts, in the terms of rationality and theology, is that Allah, in carrying out His acts, does not need any help and helper from outside Himself. Should he use any means for that purpose, the means itself is created by Him and used by Him. It is not that He needs some help from outside Himself and not connected to Him, and to be brought from somewhere else, or else Allah would not be able to do whatever He wants to. No, it is not like that, Allah's Acts need none but Himself. If the Act needs a means, He creates it and uses it.
Another Version of the Unity of Acts
Some Islamic philosophers use the term "Unity of Act" instead of "Unity of Acts". By this term they intend to say that all Allah's created beings are connected to one another with an existential tie which collects them in a single oneness, i.e. there is a sort of unity throughout the stages of existence.
Taking into consideration that the entire universe, from this point of view, is a single unit, the act which Allah achieves is the creation of this one universe, and thus, Allah has only one thing to do - the creation of this world with all its details and diverse dimensions, extended over the vast expanse of time. This, however, does not mean that Allah has created the world in a single moment, and then it goes on automatically for ever.
Actually, they mean that this world, besides having its dimensions of length, width and thickness, which are collected together, it also has its dimension of time, too. The world, with this dimension, which spreads in the expanse of time, is a single unit. Producing such a thing does not happen in the time, since time contains the world, not Allah. This world had been created with its time, but in what time is Allah? He has no time. The relation of the world, with all its phenomena along the time with Allah, is an existential one, yet it is not one of time nor of place. Can anybody tell where Allah had created the world? Such a place is a part of the world itself. The "where" appears with the world when it is created. So, it is impossible to tell where Allah had created the world.
The "place" is something which Allah had created first and then He created the world in it. One may ask: "Where did Allah created the 'where"'? If we suppose that a vacancy in the space had been created first by Allah, then the world was created in that vacancy, the same question rises again: "Where did He create that vacancy?" It goes on until it comes to where one can no more ask: "Where was that creation created?" "Where" belongs to the creation, and there was no "where" before creation. This is like length, width and thickness, which belong to the world. It is not that Allah had first created the world and then gave it its length.
Actually the world of matter means something which has length. We cannot say that Allah created the world, then gave it width or thickness. The world of matter cannot be without length, width and depth. Similarly, it cannot be without time.
Therefore, time and place, like volume and other dimensions, are characteristics of the world itself, not added from outside. The entire world, with its time and place dimensions are a single unit, which Allah had created. This they derived from the ayah: "And Our command is but one..."
and this one command is: "Be!" and it is there. This is regarded by some Islamic philosophers as a proof of the Unity of Acts, which can be regarded as Unity of Act, too. That is, there is only one act, no more, as, in fact, all of the Acts stem from a single one.
The real nature of these Acts is one, though they appear in different complexion and at different places and times. So, the different Acts are the manifestations and appearances of a single one.
At-Tawhid as Seen by the Gnostics
The gnostics are those who try, through training the soul, purifying the inside and polishing the spirit, to prepare themselves to receive the truths through their visions and tasting, not through studying and arguing. They are those who, through sufferings and laborious mortifications, can acquire visionary knowledge and see, not understand the facts. As to who the real gnostics are, is another topic- As a matter of course, many people allege to be of true gnosticism. The false ones are most probably, much more than the real ones.
At any rate, when some people, because of their pure hearts, are capable of discerning the facts, their such a faculty is called. gnosticism, visionary or intuitive knowledge. Those people have a lot to say concerning what they find. The nature of gnosticism is what the heart finds and recognizes. As to what is being said, their words are merely moulds for what they find, or signs of what they taste, but these words can never convey what the gnostics receive into their hearts, since what they receive is from beyond this limited, small and emulative world. So, when they want to pour their findings into the mould of words, they use certain terms.
We must remember that the discussion is not about who the true gnostic is, and whether every body who uses gnostical terms is a real or a false gnostic, i.e. whether he has picked up some gnostical terms and ascribed them to himself, as is the habit of most of those who claim gnosticism. They themselves actually found nothing, but have heard some information from others, they liked and adopted it, using the relevant gnostical terms. It is even vagine whether they understood and tasted them, or they were mere words they picked up from here and there. To us, the real gnostics are the prophets, the pure Imams (may Allah bless them all) and those whom they personally educated. Whether there are others who have attained real gnosticism is not easy for us to know, unless those who have some degrees of gnosticism show certain signs, or can be known through spiritual intuition.
Ordinary people cannot recognize whether those who speak like the gnostics have really found something, or theirs is just a borrowed language. The real gnostics use, like the theologians and the philosophers, the three special terms: at-Tawhid in Acts, at-Tawhid in Attributes and at-Tawhid in Essence, to demonstrate their findings.
At-Tawhid in Acts as Seen by the Gnostics
In manifesting these terms, the philosophers begin with the Unity of Essence. They say that we must first believe in the fact that there are no attributes added to the Essence, then we may realize that in His Acts Allah is in no need of help and helper. But the gnostic, explaining these subjects on the basis of the human procession, starts with the Unity of Acts, i.e. '!man's procession and advance towards Allah." The first thing uncovered to him is the Unity of Acts, then, when he reaches a more perfect stage, he deserves to understand the Unity of Attributes. The last stage to which a gnostic arrives is the Unity of Essence, though not as the philosopher explains it.
At-Tawhid in Acts means, to them, that when a person gets his soul purified, he will see every act to be Allah's, and the others are merely means and instruments. The hand which, from behind the curtain of causes, directs the world, creates everything in time and puts everything in place, is the powerful hand of Allah - a hand which is present everywhere and in all times. The tiniest phenomenon that happens in the world is created by Allah. So, what is the role of the material causes? They are no more than instruments, such as the incomplete simile of a pen in the hand of a writer.
The writer writes with the pen, but the basic role is played by the writer himself. The gnostic believes that, having believed in Allah and made it his profession to obey and worship Him, man would receive such a light from Allah that, he would be able to see and find the world's phenomena as they are, not just to understand them. But the Unity of Acts is one of at-Tawhid's degrees which man can attain first. We can also, more or less, attain them, through the philosophical studies, and by means of knowledge. But they (gnostics) see (witness) and find the facts without need of learning them. There is a famous story which clearly shows this fact but, we don't know to what extent it is right.
It is related that there was a meeting between Avicenna, (Ibn Sina), a philosopher, and Abu Sa'id Abul-Khayr, a gnostic. "How did you find Abu Sa'id Abul-Khayr?" the students of Avicenna asked him. "He sees whatever I know", was his reply. Asked by his students about Avicenna, Abu Sa'id Abul-Khayr said: "He knows whatever I see". Now, suppose that this story is untrue, but it quite clearly shows the basic difference between philosophy and gnosticism as an important one. The object of philosophy is to know, and the result of gnosticism is seeing and finding - that is, the real perfect gnosticism. So, this is the first stage which man reaches on his procession towards the stages of at-Tawhid. Having passed the stage of knowing himself, and stepped onto the valley of at-Tawhid, the first stage of at-Tawhid which man attains to and sees, is at-Tawhid in Acts (Unity of Acts).
Unity of Attributes, the Gnostic's Second Stage
The gnostic says: Having passed through the first stage, become firm in it and continued his advance, man will reach the stage of the Unity of Attributes. This Unity of Attributes is different from the philosophic version. It means that man in this stage regards every attribute of perfection as to originally belong to Allah. That is, he sees that, except Allah, no one really has knowledge, and that the knowledge of the others is a manifestation and shadow of the Divine Knowledge, since the real knowledge is Allah's. Similarly, the other powers of the world are originally Allah's, but we fictitiously ascribe them to things or people. In reality they are manifestation of Allah's power which appears in His creatures, otherwise, they are originally His.
Thus, at-Tawhid in the Attributes means that the gnostic sees that all the attributes of perfection originally belong to Allah, while what is seen of them in man is but a shadow, a reflection, or a manifestation of the Divine Attributes. We cannot, however, have an agreeable and delightful impression of understanding and comprehending what they claim. Much as we press our minds to get the belief that our knowledge is that of Allah, we fail in getting it in. They themselves admit that such things cannot be understood by reasoning. One must have a pure soul to do so.
They say: It is to be tasted, not heard of. Of course, those who are endowed with sufficient mental powers, philosophic brilliant intellects and gnostical tastes can present those gnostical topics in delicate philosophic terms. Such people are not many. In the philosophical terms, the Unity of Attributes means that the Divine Attributes are not additions to His Essence. But they do not say that every attribute of perfection, wherever it is, is an attribute of Allah.
The gnostic sees that Allah's Attributes are not additions to His Essence, and that every attribute, wherever it is, originally belongs to Allah. It is a ghost of Him ascribed to others. An Arabic poem which refers to this gnostical concept, reads:
The glass is so sheer, and the wine is sheer, too As though there is wine but no glass, Or as though there is a glass but no wine.
The gnostic claims that such vocabularies are symbolic, according to the terms of the gnostical poets, with special meaning for every word. The poem says that the glass, full of wine, was so transparent and so clear and it added nothing of itself to the wine, that one could only see the wine, not the glass. But the wine was also so clear and transparent that one would think it to be just a red glass with no wine, as if there was a glass with no wine, or wine with no glass. By this they mean to say that when the Attributes of Allah are manifested in His creation they appear as if they were the Attributes of the creation and not of Allah.
Here we think that there is a glass with no wine. But if somebody's attention is drawn to the fact that the colour belongs to the wine, it appears as if he sees only the wine with no glass. The gnostic reaches a stage when he sees the attributes of perfection in the world like this. Wherever he sees knowledge, it is the knowledge of Allah poured into a certain container, manifested in this way. Its original reality is Allah. Wherever he sees a power, he believes it to be Allah's. Likewise the other attributes of perfection. He claims that finding these facts is so much pleasing that one is thrown into ecstasy and rapture.
Naturally we accept whatever had reached us through the prophets and the infallible Imams (A.S.) as to be true. But as to others, we can neither take whatever they claim to be right, nor deny them, since we know nothing of what is there in their minds. It may be possible to guess their credibility by their acts and conduct.
For example, if the one who claims to have such intuitive visions, is seen in his daily life resorting to flattery even for trivial gains, or extending his hand begging, can we believe in his unity of acts and that he knows some divine secrets? The one who, for his daily bread, extends his hand to the courts of the sultans, praises them and flatters this and that, can we believe him that he takes Allah as the manager of the world? We do accept such claims from somebody who says (like late Imam Khumayni): "By Allah, I feared no one in my whole life except Allah". In his practical life he proves that he fears no one except Allah. On mentioning Allah's Name his eyes are filled with tears, but before the greatest world powers he seems as if talking with a child. "For so-and-so President is to go!" thus he fears nobody. When he stands for worshipping Allah he trembles, but in facing grave dangers that threaten his life, wealth and existence, he does not turn a hair, and so steadfast he is that he astonishes the entire world. If such a person claims that he has realized that all powers are Allah's, and that the others are no more than means, we are apt to believe him.
The Gnostic and the Last Stage of At-Tawhid
To the gnostic, the last stage of at-Tawhid is the Unity of Essence. He says that man, in his march to perfection, reaches a stage in which he believes that the real existence is confined to Allah. There, in the world of existence, he sees that the whole world is the manifestations and the reflexions of His Existence. In fact, "reflexion" is an inapt expression, yet it is used for a better approach to the subject. The gnostic believes that when man reaches the highest degree of at-Tawhid, he sees everything as a reflexion in a mirror showing the existence of Allah, the Exalted. The multiplicities which he witnesses in the world are but multiplicity of mirrors. The light which illuminates these mirrors is one and same, and it does not belong to them, it is only reflected in them:
"Allah is the light of the heavens and the earth, the likeness of His light is as a niche in which is a lamp..."
So, he regards the world to be a mirror, in which he sees that what is manifested is the Divine Essence of Allah. This is the same subject referred to by the Persian poet, Sa'di:
Man reaches where he sees nothing but Allah Look! To what extent man's position can rise
This is the highest position in at-Tawhid to which man can ascend. As it has been said, comprehending what those notables had said, cast into the moulds of common vocabulary, is no easy task. Yet, those who have explained their beliefs, their behaviour, and morals and showed conformity with the religious regulations, can have our good opinion of them that they would not claim groundless achievements. They must have found something which they tried to contain into their utterances, though somewhat vague. Those who have written in their books that Allah is immaterial; Allah does not transmigrate; Allah is not the very creation; and when they have said they see nothing but Allah, they do not mean that whatever they have seen is Allah. They actually mean that in these mirrors they discern the beauty of their own beloved. If those who have spent their whole lives obeying Allah and worshipping Him claim such allegations we shall have the right to have a good opinion of them and say that their utterances bear high meanings which we cannot understand well. But if a careless, wine drinker and unrestrained person alleges gnosticism, we cannot have a good opinion of him. Gnostical intuition is not such a gem to be offered to every rascal.
Acquiring such a knowledge requires decades of toil, or, as that great man said: "It needs digging the mountain with one's eyelashes." Treading the road of gnosticism is not an easy job, it is like rubbing off a mountain with one's eyelashes. Those who had endeavoured so hard for the sake of knowledge and servitude to Allah, might have been blessed by Him and they must have been guided to uncover certain realities that our minds are incapable of understanding.
This is quite possible, as it had been referred to in some narratives, which assure that among the companions of the Prophet (S.A.) and the pure Imams (A.S.) there were some who could not tell their closest friends about the things they could understand. Such traditional narratives are seen in Usulul-Kafi, as: "Had Abudharr known what was there in Salman's heart, he would have accused him of infidelity (or: he would have killed him), whereas the Prophet (S.A.) proclaimed them as brothers." We do know that Abudharr and Salman were the Prophet's most favoured companions. Their faith made them so close to one another that the Prophet (S.A.), on the day of announcing brotherhood among the believers, proclaimed them to be brothers.
Yet, Salman had attained such a knowledge that could not be understood by Abudharr, and thus, on hearing it, he would either accuse Salman of infidelity or kill him. Salman's knowledge, apparently, was so deep and profound that if he had tried to tell Abudharr about it, the latter could not have understood it correctly, and would have thought him to have turned back to infidelity. Amirul-Mu'minin, 'Ali (A.S.) could understand facts which he could not disclose to Salman either. They could not be explained. Poured into the moulds of words, would have caused them to be wrongly understood and get incorrect meanings. As a matter of fact, some great personalities were actually misunderstood and badly accused of groundless accusations, whereas they were quite innocent.
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Author: Ayatullah Muhammad Taqi Misbah Yazdi
