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Kashf (Arabic: كشف) "unveiling" is a Sufi concept dealing with knowledge of the heart rather than of the intellect. Kashf describes the state of experiencing a personal divine revelation after ascending through spiritual struggles, and uncovering the heart (a spiritual faculty) in order to allow divine truths to pour into it. Kashf is etymologically related to mukashafa “disclosure”/ “divine irradiation of the essence”,[1] which connotes "gain[ing] familiarity with things unseen behind the veils".[2] For those who have purified their hearts, and who come to know the Divine Names and Attributes to the fullest of their individual capacities, the veils in front of the purely spiritual realms are opened slightly, and they begin to gain familiarity with the unseen. In Sufism, an even further revelatory capacity exists by which the Divine mysteries become readily apparent to the seeker through the light of knowledge of God. This is called tajalli "manifestation".[3]

Veil References in Islamic Literature

Two passages in the Qur'an serve as the most solid basis for elaboration on the Sufi concept of kashf:

  • [50.22] ‘Thou wast heedless of this; therefore We have now removed from thee thy covering [veil], and so thy sight today is piercing.’
  • [53.57-58] The Immanent is immanent; apart from God none can disclose [remove] it.[4]

The verb “kashafa,” but never the noun “kashf” occurs in the Qur'an a variety of times in the sense of either “to uncover” (a part of the body) or “to take away” (misfortune, danger).[1]

Hadith of the Veils

One hadith holds particular significance for the concept of kashf:

إن بين الله عز وجل وبين الخلق سبعين ألف حجاب وأقرب الخلق إلى الله عز وجل جبريل وميكائيل ، وإسرافيل ، وإن بينهم وبينه أربع حجب : حجاب من نار ، وحجاب من ظلمة ، وحجاب من غمام ، وحجاب من الماء.

Between God, mighty and sublime, and creation are 70,000 veils. The nearest of creatures to God, mighty and sublime, are Gabriel, Michael, and Raphael, and between them and Him are four veils: a veil of fire, a veil of darkness, a veil of cloud, and a veil of water.[5]

This Hadith is quoted somewhat differently by Ibn Majah as follows:

God has seventy thousand veils of light and darkness; if He were to remove them, the radiant splendors of His Face would burn up whoever (or ‘whatever creature’) was reached by His Gaze.[6]

It is said that Ali ibn Abi Talib, cousin to the Prophet Muhammad, prayed a prayer that included this excerpt during the month of Sha'baan:

My Lord, grant me complete severance of my relations with everything else and total submission to You. Enlighten the eyes of our hearts with the light of their looking at You to the extent that they penetrate the veils of light and reach the Source of Grandeur, and let our souls get suspended by the glory of Your sanctity.[7]

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Hadith

Hadith

Ḥadīth or Athar refers to what most Muslims and the mainstream schools of Islamic thought, believe to be a record of the words, actions, and the silent approval of the Islamic prophet Muhammad as transmitted through chains of narrators. In other words, the ḥadīth are transmitted reports attributed to what Muhammad said and did.

Gabriel

Gabriel

In Abrahamic religions, Gabriel is an archangel with power to announce God's will to men. He is mentioned in the Hebrew Bible, the New Testament, and the Quran. Many Christian traditions — including Catholicism, Eastern Orthodoxy, and Anglicanism — revere Gabriel as a saint.

Michael (archangel)

Michael (archangel)

Michael, also called Saint Michael the Archangel, Saint Michael the Taxiarch in Orthodoxy and Archangel Michael is an archangel in Judaism, Christianity, Islam and the Baha'i faith. The earliest surviving mentions of his name are in 3rd- and 2nd-century BC Jewish works, often but not always apocalyptic, where he is the chief of the angels and archangels and he is the guardian prince of Israel and is responsible for the care of Israel. Christianity adopted nearly all the Jewish traditions concerning him, and he is mentioned explicitly in Revelation 12:7–12, where he does battle with Satan, and in the Epistle of Jude, where the author denounces heretics by contrasting them with Michael.

Raphael (archangel)

Raphael (archangel)

Raphael is an archangel first mentioned in the Book of Tobit and in 1 Enoch, both estimated to date from between the 3rd and 2nd century BCE. In later Jewish tradition, he became identified as one of the three heavenly visitors entertained by Abraham at the Oak of Mamre. He is not named in either the New Testament or the Quran, but later Christian tradition identified him with healing and as the angel who stirred waters in the Pool of Bethesda in John 5:2–4, and in Islam, where his name is Israfil, he is understood to be the unnamed angel of Quran 6:73, standing eternally with a trumpet to his lips, ready to announce the Day of Judgment. In Gnostic tradition, Raphael is represented on the Ophite Diagram.

Ibn Majah

Ibn Majah

Abū ʿAbd Allāh Muḥammad ibn Yazīd Ibn Mājah al-Rabʿī al-Qazwīnī (Arabic: ابو عبد الله محمد بن يزيد بن ماجه الربعي القزويني; commonly known as Ibn Mājah, was a medieval scholar of hadith of Persian origin. He compiled the last of Sunni Islam's six canonical hadith collections, Sunan Ibn Mājah.

Muhammad

Muhammad

Muhammad was an Arab religious, social, and political leader and the founder of Islam. According to Islamic doctrine, he was a prophet divinely inspired to preach and confirm the monotheistic teachings of Adam, Abraham, Moses, Jesus, and other prophets. He is believed to be the Seal of the Prophets within Islam. Muhammad united Arabia into a single Muslim polity, with the Quran as well as his teachings and practices forming the basis of Islamic religious belief.

Sufi Scholars on Kashf

Al-Kushayri expands on al-Kalabadhi’s proposal that tajalli (manifestation) of “the essence” of the Divine is called mukashafa. He then illustrates three stages in progression towards understanding the Real:

  1. Muhadara—getting oneself into position vis-à-vis the objective sought. The objective remains veiled at this stage. This stage presupposes the presence of the heart, but relies on transmission of proof through the intellect (i.e. understanding God through his miraculous signs).
  2. Mukashafa—lifting of the veil. Here reasoning (of the intellect) gives way to evident proof (through intuition). One directly encounters the Attributes of God. Yet, this stage is still considered an intermediary stage.
  3. Mushahada—direct vision. This stage indicates an immediate encounter with The Real, without the intellect OR the intuition acting as an intermediary. This is direct experience of the Divine Essence.[1]

Al-Ghazali—This Sufi scholar discusses the concept of kashf, not purely in its mystical sense, but also with respect to theology in general. In conjunction with Al-Kushayri, Al-Ghazali links kashf with intuition. For Al-Ghazali, mukashafa has a dual sense:

  1. It indicates an inner state of purification, which is subjective and brought about by “unveiling” or kashf.
  2. It describes the objective truths that are revealed through the “unveiling”/kashf.

Since, for Al-Ghazali, kashf is linked to intuition, he describes mukashafa as the certain knowledge of the unseen discovered by the “science of the saints”.[1] Thus, kashf is considered “a light,” that is freely bestowed upon the purified worshipper through the grace of God, yet also yields sure intuitive knowledge for the worshipper upon whom it is bestowed.

Ibn Arabi—This Sufi mystic indicates the necessity for “divine unveiling” (kashf) as the means by which to understand the universality of the reality of realities (i.e. the universality of God's oneness). In fana (self-annihilation), the individual ego passes away and divine self-manifestation occurs. This self-manifestation is eternal (as it comes from God), but it must be continually reenacted by the human in time. Therefore, the human becomes a pure receptor required for pure consciousness to be realized. The human is a sort of barzakh or intermediary between divinity and elementality, between spirit and matter, and open to the experience of kashf.[8]

Ali Hujwiri—The author of the Persian Sufi text Kashf ul Mahjoob (Revelation of the Veiled) Hujwiri argues, along with Al-Kushayri that very few real Sufis exist anymore in his time; rather, there are a large number of “false pretenders” which he calls mustaswif—“the would-be Sufi”. In his text, Hujwiri describes the “veils which should be lifted” in order to purify one's heart and really pursue Sufism. Hujwiri argues for the importance of “morals” over “formal practice” in Sufism.[9] He was the first to directly address the problematic diversity in Muslim belief during his time. In Kashf ul Mahjoob, he describes various Sufi approaches to theoretical ideas, linking them to particular key Sufi figures.[10]

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Abu Bakr al-Kalabadhi

Abu Bakr al-Kalabadhi

Abu Bakr al-Kalabadhi, in full, Abu Bakr ibn Abi Ishaq Muhammad ibn Ibrahim ibn Ya'qub al-Bukhari al-Kalabadhi was a Persian Hanafi Maturidi Sufi scholar and the author of the Kitab at-ta'arruf, one of the most important works of Sufism composed during the first 300 years of Islam.

Mushahada

Mushahada

Mushahada or Mushahida, derived from shuhud to witness, is a concept in Sufism. It is the vision 'of' or 'by' God so that the seeker of God may acquire yaqeen which can neither be inherited nor can it be gained through the intellect. The life of a Sufi or a seeker of God is meaningless without Mushahada because his goal is to remain ever-present in the vision of God. The inverse of Mushahada is Hijab i.e. when the Divine Face is veiled which is considered a punishment for a Sufi. "Divine Love leads to Mushahida and possesses the Essence of the true mystic knowledge but the intellect has superficial knowledge only".

Al-Ghazali

Al-Ghazali

Al-Ghazali, full name Abū Ḥāmid Muḥammad ibn Muḥammad aṭ-Ṭūsiyy al-Ġazzālīy, and known in Persian-speaking countries as Imam Muhammad-i Ghazali or in Medieval Europe by the Latinized as Algazelus or Algazel, was a Sunni Muslim Persian polymath. He is known as one of the most prominent and influential jurisconsults, legal theorists, muftis, philosophers, theologians, logicians and mystics of the Islamic Golden Age.

Theology

Theology

Theology is the systematic study of the nature of the divine and, more broadly, of religious belief. It is taught as an academic discipline, typically in universities and seminaries. It occupies itself with the unique content of analyzing the supernatural, but also deals with religious epistemology, asks and seeks to answer the question of revelation. Revelation pertains to the acceptance of God, gods, or deities, as not only transcendent or above the natural world, but also willing and able to interact with the natural world and, in particular, to reveal themselves to humankind. While theology has turned into a secular field, religious adherents still consider theology to be a discipline that helps them live and understand concepts such as life and love and that helps them lead lives of obedience to the deities they follow or worship.

Ibn Arabi

Ibn Arabi

Ibn ʿArabī, nicknamed al-Qushayrī and Sulṭān al-ʿĀrifīn, was an Arab Andalusian Muslim scholar, mystic, poet, and philosopher, extremely influential within Islamic thought. Out of the 850 works attributed to him, some 700 are authentic while over 400 are still extant. His cosmological teachings became the dominant worldview in many parts of the Muslim world.

Fana (Sufism)

Fana (Sufism)

Fanaa in Sufism is the "passing away" or "annihilation". Fana means "to die before one dies", a concept highlighted by famous notable Persian mystics such as Rumi and later by Sultan Bahoo. There is controversy around what Fana exactly is, with some Sufis defining it as the annihilation of the human ego before God, whereby the self becomes an instrument of God's plan in the world (Baqaa). Other Sufis interpret it as breaking down of the individual ego and a recognition of the fundamental unity of God, creation, and the individual self. Persons having entered this enlightened state are said to obtain awareness of an intrinsic unity (Tawhid) between Allah and all that exists, including the individual's mind. This second interpretation is condemned as heretical by orthodox Islam.

Barzakh

Barzakh

Barzakh is an Arabic word meaning "obstacle", "hindrance", "separation", or "barrier". In Islam, it denotes a place separating the living from the hereafter or a phase/"stage" between an individual's death and their resurrection in "the Hereafter".

Islam

Islam

Islam is an Abrahamic monotheistic religion centered around the Quran and the teachings of Muhammad. Adherents of Islam, called Muslims, number approximately 1.9 billion globally and are the world's second-largest religious population after Christians.

Kashf and Shi’ism

In Shi’ism, the spiritual experience of kashf is treated as a theological rather than purely mystical dimension.

ImamisSayyid Haydar Amuli distinguishes three kinds of knowledge: 1) by the intellect, 2) by transmission, 3) by kashf—this is the only form of knowledge that leads to true understanding of Reality
Amuli additionally distinguishes between two kinds of kashf:
  1. kashf suwari—divine manifestations reach the senses of sight and hearing
  2. 'kashf ma’nawi—spiritual encounter, such as the disclosure indicated by mukashafa
Ismalis—these followers of Shi’ism put emphasis on kashf in a double sense as both a Gnostic and cosmic “state.” The Ismalis define “cycles of metahistory”[1] which alternate between phases of “unveiling” (dawr-al-kashf) and “occultation” (dawr-al-satr).

Controversy in the Muslim World

The concept of kashf remains controversial in the Muslim world because it indicates the ability to “know” the unknowable. According to the Qur'an, Muslims are required to believe in the unseen (namely Allah), but knowledge of the unseen is a power that should belong solely to God. But it does not contradict the Qur'an because only God has knowledge of the unseen and if someone else other than God has that knowledge, then it's only because it was given to them by God.

Sufis further would argue that “the only guide to God is God Himself”.[11] They do believe that every genuine worshipper has the capability to experience unveiling (personal revelation), but that this personal revelation occurs by the grace of God. Some say, if a worshipper fails to experience unveiling, "it indicates that that person is pursuing Sufism for a reason other than the love of God alone." Ibn ‘Arabi calls this "inner receptivity"[12] to the manifestation (tajalli) of the divine mysteries, the essence of which is mukashafa.

Peripatetic Scholars vs. Sufis

Peripatetic scholars such as Avicenna, al-Kindi, and al-Farabi argue that the intellect unaided by divine unveiling (kashf) is sufficient in order for man to attain ultimate truth.

Sufis such as Bayazid Bastami, Rumi, and Ibn al-Arabi, contrarily argue that the limited human intellect is insufficient and misleading as a means of understanding ultimate truth. This kind of understanding requires intimate, personal, direct knowledge resulting from the removal of the veils separating man from God as given to man by God himself. This is kashf.[13]

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Avicenna

Avicenna

Ibn Sina, commonly known in the West as Avicenna, was a Persian polymath who is regarded as one of the most significant physicians, astronomers, philosophers, and writers of the Islamic Golden Age, and the father of early modern medicine. Sajjad H. Rizvi has called Avicenna "arguably the most influential philosopher of the pre-modern era". He was a Muslim Peripatetic philosopher influenced by Greek Aristotelian philosophy. Of the 450 works he is believed to have written, around 240 have survived, including 150 on philosophy and 40 on medicine.

Al-Kindi

Al-Kindi

Abū Yūsuf Yaʻqūb ibn ʼIsḥāq aṣ-Ṣabbāḥ al-Kindī was an Arab Muslim philosopher, polymath, mathematician, physician and music theorist. Al-Kindi was the first of the Islamic peripatetic philosophers, and is hailed as the "father of Arab philosophy".

Al-Farabi

Al-Farabi

Abu Nasr Muhammad al-Farabi. ,born either in Faryab in Khorasan or Farab in Transoxania, c. 870— died in Damascus between 14 December 950 and 12 January 951), known in the Latin West as Alpharabius. He was an impeccable early Islamic philosopher and music theorist, and has been designated the Father of Islamic Neoplatonism, and Founder of Islamic Political Philosophy.

Bayazid Bastami

Bayazid Bastami

Abū Yazīd Ṭayfūr bin ʿĪsā bin Surūshān al-Bisṭāmī (al-Basṭāmī), commonly known in the Iranian world as Bāyazīd Bisṭāmī, was a Persian Sufi from north-central Iran. Known to future Sufis as Sultān-ul-Ārifīn, Bisṭāmī is considered to be one of the expositors of the state of fanā, the notion of dying in mystical union with Allah. Bastami was famous for "the boldness of his expression of the mystic’s complete absorption into the mysticism." Many "ecstatic utterances" have been attributed to Bisṭāmī, which lead to him being known as the "drunken" or "ecstatic" school of Islamic mysticism. Such utterance may be argued as, Bisṭāmī died with mystical union and the deity is speaking through his tongue. Bisṭāmī also claimed to have ascended through the seven heavens in his dream. His journey, known as the Mi'raj of Bisṭāmī, is clearly patterned on the Mi'raj of the Islamic prophet Muhammad. Bisṭāmī is characterized in three different ways: a free thinking radical, a pious Sufi who is deeply concerned with following the sha'ria and engaging in "devotions beyond the obligatory," and a pious individual who is presented as having a dream similar to the Mi'raj of Muhammed. The Mi'raj of Bisṭāmī seems as if Bisṭāmī is going through a self journey; as he ascends through each heaven, Bisṭāmī is gaining knowledge in how he communicates with the angels and the number of angels he encounters increases.

Rumi

Rumi

Jalāl al-Dīn Muḥammad Rūmī, also known as Jalāl al-Dīn Muḥammad Balkhī, Mevlânâ/Mawlānā and Mevlevî/Mawlawī, but more popularly known simply as Rumi, was a 13th-century Persian poet, Hanafi faqih, Islamic scholar, Maturidi theologian and Sufi mystic originally from Greater Khorasan in Greater Iran. Rumi's influence transcends national borders and ethnic divisions: Iranians, Kurds, Tajiks, Turks, Greeks, Pashtuns, other Central Asian Muslims, as well as Muslims of the Indian subcontinent have greatly appreciated his spiritual legacy for the past seven centuries. His poems have been widely translated into many of the world's languages and transposed into various formats. Rumi has been described as the "most popular poet" and the "best selling poet" in the United States.

Ibn Arabi

Ibn Arabi

Ibn ʿArabī, nicknamed al-Qushayrī and Sulṭān al-ʿĀrifīn, was an Arab Andalusian Muslim scholar, mystic, poet, and philosopher, extremely influential within Islamic thought. Out of the 850 works attributed to him, some 700 are authentic while over 400 are still extant. His cosmological teachings became the dominant worldview in many parts of the Muslim world.

Other Types of Kashf

The 18th century mystic Khwaja Mir Dard (d. 1785) (, relying upon the traditional terminology, classified the revelations as follows in his `Ilm al-Kitab:

  • Kashf kaunī, revelation on the plane of the created things, is a result of pious actions and purifications of the lower soul; it becomes manifest in dreams and clairvoyance.
  • Kashf ilāhī, divine revelation, is a fruit of constant worship and polishing of the heart; it results in the knowledge of the world of spirits and in cardiognosis ["soul-reading"] so that the mystic sees hidden things and reads hidden thoughts.
  • Kashf aqlī, revelation by reason, is essentially the lowest grade of intuitive knowledge; it can be attained by polishing the moral faculties, and can be experienced by the philosophers as well.
  • Kashf īmānī, revelation through faith, is the fruit of perfect faith after man has acquired proximity to the perfections of prophethood. He will be blessed by direct divine addresses — he talks with the angels, meets the spirits of the prophets, and sees the Night of Might and the blessings of the month of Ramaḍan in human form in the ālam almithāl.[14]

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Source: "Kashf", Wikipedia, Wikimedia Foundation, (2023, February 9th), https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kashf.

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References
  1. ^ a b c d e Gardet, L. (24 April 2012). "Encyclopedia of Islam, Second Edition". Kashf. Retrieved 27 September 2013.
  2. ^ Gulen, M. Fethullah (2004). Key Concepts in the Practice of Sufism: Emerald Hills of the Heart, Vol. 2. Somerset: The Light, Inc. p. 108.
  3. ^ Gulen, M. Fethullah (2004). Key Concepts in the Practice of Sufism: Emerald Hills of the Heart, Vol. 2. Somerset: The Light, Inc. p. 115.
  4. ^ Trans. A.J., Arberry (1996). The Koran Interpreted. New York: Touchstone.
  5. ^ Ibn al-Jawzi, Mawdu'at. Narrator Sahl ibn Sa'd al-Sa'id. Translated by Cyrus Ali Zargar. 1/166.
  6. ^ Morris, James Winston (2005). The Reflective Heart: Discovering Spiritual Intelligence in 'Ibn Arabi's Meccan Illuminations. Louisville: Fons Vitae. p. 115.
  7. ^ "The Invocation (Munajat) of Shabaniyah".
  8. ^ Sells, Michael (1998). "Ibn Arabi's Polished Mirror: Perspective Shift and Meaning Event". Studia Islamica. 67 (67): 121–149. JSTOR 1595976.
  9. ^ Karamustafa, Ahmet T. (2007). Sufism: The Formative Period. Berkeley: University of California Press. p. 101.
  10. ^ Karamustafa, Ahmet T. (2007). Sufism: The Formative Period. Berkeley: University of California Press. p. 103.
  11. ^ Hoffman, Valerie (1995). Sufism, Mystics, and Saints in Modern Egypt. Columbia: University of South Carolina Press. p. 218.
  12. ^ Morris, James Winston (2005). The Reflective Heart: Discovering Spiritual Intelligence in 'Ibn Arabi's Meccan Illuminations. Louisville: Fons Vitae. p. 61.
  13. ^ Chittick, William C. (1981). "Mysticism versus Philosophy in Earlier Islamic History: The Al-Tusi, Al-Qunawi Correspondence". Religious Studies. 17 (1): 87–104. doi:10.1017/S0034412500012804.
  14. ^ Annemarie Schimmel, Mystical dimensions of Islam (1975), pg192

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