is also the very reality of the opposites, for he is his own entity in his relation to the two contradictories. “He is the First” through his body, “the Last” through his spirit, “the Manifest” through his form, and “the Hidden” through what requires his rulings. The entity is one: it is Zayd’s entity, and it is the very reality of the opposites. Zayd is the very reality of the four opposed and differing humors, no other, and possesses the psychic spirit and natural composite.
Here al-Kharraz said, “I knew God through His gathering opposites.” When our companion Taj al-Din al-Akhlati heard this from us, he said, “No: rather, He is the very reality of the opposites,” and spoke correctly. Al-Kharraz’s statement suggests that there is an entity other than the opposites’ very reality, receiving both opposites together. The affair in itself is not so: He is the very reality of the opposites, since there is no additional entity. The Manifest is the very reality of the Hidden, the First, and the Last; the First is the very reality of the Last, the Manifest, and the Hidden. There is nothing but this.
I have made known to you that the human constitution is upon the divine form. Discussion of the human being’s creation in respect of the totality through which he is human will come in Chapter Three Hundred and Sixty-One, in the section on abodes, in the abode of sharing with the Real in determination.
Section
(The Divine Oath and Relieving the Addressee)
The divine oaths from the Breath of the All-Merciful occurring in the Qurʾan
Notes
Translator’s note TN5236-1: The source distinguishes a gathering of opposites in an additional bearer from their being the entity itself. The unvocalized nafsī in ‘psychic spirit’ can also evoke a relation to breath (nafas); the human constitution and the four humors form its immediate context.
