Imām 'Alī ibn Abū Tālib (' a ) is quoted to have said...

Imām 'Alī ibn Abū Tālib (' a ) is quoted to have said: “The best of the people is the one who adores worship, embraces it, whole-heartedly loves it, touches it with his body and disengages himself for it.

He would not care whether he gains his share of this world with difficulty or with ease.”[^1] And the fearing hearts will be overpowered by the manifestation of the Greatness, and overwhelmed by the attraction of the Omnipotence, so that they (the sālik s) will be led to ecstasy, their hearts will melt with fear and awe, and their personal shortcomings and their feeling of humility and inability will hold them back from everything.

In a hadīth Mūsā ibn Ja'far (' a ) is quoted to have said: “Amīr al-Mu'minīn ('Alī) (' a ) said: “Allah has servants whose hearts are broken by fearing Him, causing them to keep silent.”[^2] Sometimes Allah, the Exalted, manifests Himself to His perfect friends in a kind manifestation, and the attraction of love becomes their guide, as the hadīth says that the Messenger of Allah ( s ) used to be waiting for the time of the Salat , his longing ever increasing, until at last he would say to Bilāl (the Messenger's mu'adhdhin ): “Relieve us, O Bilāl.”[^3] Sometimes He would manifest Himself through greatness and sovereignty, such that they feel they are filled with fear and awe.

Such states are related from the Messenger of Allah ( s ) and the Imāms of guidance (' a ). Sometimes He manifests Himself in “the Collective Oneness” [ jam'ī-i ahadī ] according to the endurance of the hearts and the capacities of their vessels.

We, the veiled, the busy with the world, the imprisoned in the prison of nature and in the chains of desires and hopes, and the deprived of the divine intellectual happiness, who, because of being drunken with nature, will not come back to sobriety nor get up from the deep sleep till the dawn of eternity, are out of the calculations of these divisions, and excluded from this declaration.

Thus, the disciplines of the Presence, which suit us are different, and the performance of the cordial duties has a different form. But what should be the first and foremost, before all else, is to drive out of the heart the despair of Allah's mercy, and prevent it from losing hope for His generosity, for these are of Iblīs' dangerous soldiers and of the inspirations of the human and jinn Satans.