In the name of God, the All-Merciful, the Most Merciful.
The Forty-Third Question
What is primordial nature?
The answer: The light through which the darkness of possible things is split and forms are distinguished, so that one says, “This is not this,” although one may say, “This is the very same as this,” in respect of what they share.
“Praise belongs to God, Originator of the heavens and the earth” [Fatir 35:1] is His saying, “God is the light of the heavens and the earth” [al-Nur 24:35]. The whole cosmos is heaven and earth, nothing else, and through light they appear. His saying, “With the Real We sent it down, and with the Real it descended” [al-Israʾ 17:105]. God makes (the heavens and the earth) manifest, so He is their light. The manifestation of the loci of manifestation is God, who is thus “Originator of the heavens and the earth” [al-Anʿam 6:14]. He originated heaven and earth through Him, so He is their primordial nature and the primordial nature upon which He originated people.
Every newborn is therefore born upon primordial nature: “Am I not your Lord? They said: Yes” [al-Aʿraf 7:172]. He originated them only upon Him and originated them only through Him.
Through Him things are distinguished, separated, and determined. In their divine manifestation, things are nothing. Existence is His existence, and the servants are His servants. They are servants in respect of their entities and the Real in respect of their existence. Their existence is distinguished from their entities only through primordial nature, which separates the entity from its existence. This is among the most subtle matters to which
Notes
Translator’s note TN3569-1: Fiṭrah, “primordial nature,” continues the preceding discussion of faṭr, splitting or originating. Here the light both makes forms appear and distinguishes the entity from the existence manifested in it. The repeated “through Him” and “upon Him” retain the author’s formulation.
