Thus, the sālik must first strengthen, with judicial proof,...

Thus, the sālik must first strengthen, with judicial proof, the fact that “There is no effecter [ mu'aththir ] in the (world of) existence except Allah.” He must not evade the divine knowledge, which is the objective of sending prophets, and not turn away from remembering Allah and from the affairs of the Essence and Attributes, for the source of all (kinds of) happiness is the remembrance of Allah: “ And whoever turns away from remembering me, his shall surely be a straitened life.” [^1] After attaining the truth of this divine delicacy, which is the source of the divine knowledge and the door of the doors of the hidden facts, by way of thinking and reasoning, he is to make his heart, through remembrance and austerity, familiar with them until it believes in them.

This would be the first stage of the truthfulness of his words, and it is marked by complete dependence on Allah, and by taking the eye of greed and hope away from all beings, a fact which results in believing in Allah's Unity of Action, being one of the great states of the people of knowledge.

Having ascribed all effects to Allah, and closed the eye of greed against all beings, save His Sacred Essence, the sālik becomes worthy attending the Sacred Presence, or rather his heart becomes, by nature, attentive to that Presence. Repeating the testimony may be for confirming it, and by the testimony we mean one of the two testimonies, or it may not be a repetition, but one may refer to the Divinity of Essence and the other to the Divinity of Action.

📌In this instance, its repetition at the end may be to confirm them, and that is why it is not mentioned there with the very words: “I testify.” A Gnostic Note Know that testimony is of many stages, of which we shall be satisfied with referring to a few, as suits these pages. The first is the verbal testimony [ shahādat-i qawliyyah ], which is already known.

If the verbal testimony is not accompanied by cordial testimony, even in a lower stage, it will not be a testimony, but a deception and hypocrisy, as it was mentioned in the hadīth concerning takbīr , quoted from Imām as-Sādiq (' a ).[^2] The second is the Practical Testimony [ shahādat-i fi'liyyah ], which means that man testifies through the practices of his organs.

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