Sufi Schemata for Tazkiyat an-Nafs
January 19, 2012 – 2:34 pm
Tazkiyat an-nafs (‘Purification’/’Augmenation’ of nafs) can be taken as the essence of the Sufi tariqat, and it has Koranic support:
“By the soul and That which shaped it, and inspired it to its depravity and its godwariness. Prosperous is he who purifies it, and failed has he who buries it”
(91:7-10, tr. W. Chittick Intro to Sufism, p. 41. Note the alternatives ‘corrupts’ or ‘stunts’ to Chittick’s ‘buries’)
On this small piece of worthy advice the Sufis have constructed a vast and elaborate schema of purification. The process has been regularized into sets of stages and stations that provided a usable guide to murshid/bureaucrats of the soul, and so standardised forms of the progress of the soul are described (with variations) in the charts that commonly appear in Sufi handbooks. The following example is given in Trimingham, J. The Sufi Orders in Islam (OUP, 1971) p.152-4. (Ref. to As-Sanusi, M. ibn ‘Ali, As-Salsabil al-ma’in fi ‘t-tara’iq al-arba’in p. 105, (section dealing with Khalwatiyya) on margin of his Al-masa’il al-‘ashar – or Bughyat al-maqasid fi khalasat al marasid – Cairo (1353/1935.)) Interestingly enough, this was apparently devised for philosophical reasons by Ibn Sina in Risalat at-Tair (L. Cheiko ed., in al-Mashriq, iv (1901), pp. 882-7) and adapted to Sufic purposes by (probably Ahmed) al-Ghazali in Risala at-Tair (L. Cheiko ed., op. cit., pp. 918-24.)
| Soul | Carnal (ammara) | Admonishing (lawwama) | Inspired (mulhama) | Tranquil (mutma’inna) | Contented (radiyya) | Approved (mardiyya) | Perfected (safiyya wa kamila) |
| Journey | To God | By God’s power | Upon God | With God | Within God | From God | Into God |
| World | Of Evidence (the senses) | Of the Isthmus [Purgatorial] | Of the Spirits | Of Reality | Of Principles | Of the Unseen | Of Plurality and Oneness |
| State | Inclination to Lusts | Love | Passion | Union | Passing Away | Bewilderment | Abiding in God |
| Abode | Breast | Heart | Spirit | The Mystery (of the Heart) | The Mystery of the Mystery | The Inmost | The Covert (‘Ground’) of the Mystery |
| Shari’a | Tariqa | Ma’rifa | Haqiqa | Wilaya | Dhat ash-Shari’a (Essence of the Revealed Law) | Dhat al-Kull | |
| Light | Blue | Yellow | Red | White | Green | Black | Colourless |
Only three of these forms of the nafs actually have Koranic support:
ammara: “Yet I claim not that my nafs was innocent: Verily the nafs of man incites to evil.”[12:53]
lawwama: ‘Self that blames (itself.)’ [75:2]
mutma’inna: ‘Self that is at peace (with God.)’ [89:27]
The rest are speculation.
Tags: Sufism
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