The Mirror of the Excellences of Islam — Page 270
MISCONCEPTION IN NUR AFSHAN 269 deemed it enough to reveal an abbreviated version of the words وَمَا أَرْسَلْنَا مِنْ رَسُوْلٍ وَلَا نَبِيٌّ وَلَا مُحَدَّثٍ into the second reading: وَمَا أَرْسَلْنَا مِنْ قَبْلِكَ مِنْ رَّسُولٍ وَلَا نَبِي 2 And the answer to the question as to when and under what circum- stances someone gifted with Divine discourse deserves to be blessed with a greater experience of the converse from Allah is that very often it is at a time of great affliction and calamity that the word of God descends upon Allah's saints to be a source of support and strength for them. When they are crushed under the pain and distress of calamities and unbearable events, and pain and grief reach their extreme, it is then that God Almighty directs His speech upon their hearts, and they are granted comfort and satisfaction with the sacred word of Allah. The fact is that the humility of a recipient of revelation has a very close relationship with the fire of Divine revelation bursting into a flame. When someone who is honoured with the gift of Divine discourse is in extreme pain and distress, and his attention reaches the point of being like a wick dipped in feelings of pain and affliction, and with qualities of loyalty, humility, and sincerity, comes under the rays of Rabūbiyyat [Providence], then a ray with its light of Rabūbiyyat, falls on him and illumines him. The light of such illumination sometimes manifests itself in the form of Divine speech and sometimes in the form of visions. It illuminates the seeker's heart with a Divine light like a wick which creeps close to a fire. Do we not see that a wick saturated with clean combustible oil, when taken close to a fire, changes its character and, as it recedes from the fire, brings back a bright flame with it? In the same way, the enlightened and perfect man is most eminently fit to receive 1. The words مِنْ قَبْلِكَ have been inadvertently omitted. See the Tafsir Qurtabi and Rūhul-Ma'ānī with reference to Sūrah al-Hajj, 22:53. [Publisher] 2. Never sent We a Messenger or a Prophet before thee. . . (Sūrah al-Hajj, 22:53) [Publisher]