The Essence of Islam – Volume III — Page 91
Faith, Certainty and Insight 91 reflected in it; similarly, a believer who completely dis- cards his ego so that no part of his own being survives, becomes like a mirror and all the features and qualities of the Divine are reflected in him. It can be said that the mirror, which reflects all the features of the one standing before it, becomes his vicegerent; in the same way a be- liever, by reflecting Divine qualities, becomes a vicege- rent of God and reflects Divine features. As God is Hidden beyond hidden and is transcendent in His Being, in the same way, a perfect believer becomes hidden and transcendent in his being. The world cannot appreciate his reality as he is placed far away from the sphere of the world. It is a wonderful thing that after this holy change in the perfect believer, when he loses his self altogether for the sake of God and emerges in a new garment of ho- liness, God, Who is Unchangeable and Ever-Living and Self-Subsisting, too appears to him in a new guise. This does not mean that any change takes place in the eternal attributes of the Divine. He is eternally unchangeable, but there is a new Divine manifestation for the perfect believer. When the believer brings about a change in himself, a change manifests itself in the Divine, the nature of which we cannot fathom. This happens in such a manner that God's unchangeable Being is not affected by the dust of events. He remains unchangeable as ever. It is a change of the type as has been mentioned, that when a believer moves towards God Almighty, the Almighty moves much more swiftly towards him, though it is obvious that as the Divine is not subject to change, He is also not subject to movement. All these expressions are metaphorical and the need for their use arises because experience testifies that as a believer assumes a new