The Essence of Islam – Volume III — Page 97
Faith, Certainty and Insight 97 from and enmity with his personal emotions as well as with everyone who is subject to such emotions. . The difference between this stage and the second stage is that though in the second stage also complete accord is established between the will of the seeker and the will of. God and the pain that proceeds from God is felt as a bounty, yet his relationship with God is not such as to charge him with personal enmity towards everything beside God, so that the love of God should not merely be the goal of the heart but should become its characteristic. . In short, in the second stage accord with God and opposition to all beside Him is the goal of the seeker and he finds pleasure in the achievement of that goal, but in the third stage of progress these two become an integral part of his being from which he cannot depart under any circumstances, because it is not possible for something to be separated from itself. On the contrary such departure is possible in the second stage. So long as the sainthood of a seeker does not arrive at the third stage it is not permanent and is not secure against peril, the reason being that so long as the love of God and opposition to all beside Him does not become characteristic of a person, some traces of wrong linger in him because he has still not fully discharged his obligations to Providence and falls short of perfect liqā'. But when the love of God and accord with His will saturate his being, so much so that. God becomes his ears with which he hears, and becomes his eyes with which he sees, and becomes his hands with which he grips, and becomes his feet with which he walks, then there is left in him not a trace of wrong and he becomes secure against every hazard. This stage is indicated in the verse: الَّذِينَ آمَنُوا وَلَمْ يَلْبِسُوا إِيمَانَهُمْ بِظُلْمٍ