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Mashrabaمشربة

ʿAbd al-Salām ibn Mashīsh · d. 622/1225

الصلاة المشيشية

The Prayer of Ibn Mashīsh

The Arabic is read from the page images of the Ibn Kīrān edition and collated with other printings, commentaries and recordings.

Thirty-nine clauses in seven movements, each set Arabic against English with the notes folded under it: where the witnesses differ, what the commentators say, and the places where the meaning is disputed. Qurʾān is marked with its reference.

The English is an AI translation from the Arabic; no person has reviewed it yet. The notes are AI summaries of the sources they name, with page references.

About the prayer and its author · Textual notes: witnesses and readings.

1. Opening blessing

1اللهم صل على من منه انشقت الأسرار

1O God, bless him from whom the secrets burst open,

Notes (2): Variant, Reception
  • VariantEvery witness that covers the line reads it as printed. One recording (Temsamani) opens with the taʿawwudh, the basmala and the blessing verse (33:56) before the prayer: a framing, not part of the text. In a Turkish recording the machine transcript begins only at line 5, so lines 1 to 4 are not attested there.
  • ReceptionIbn ʿĀbidīn's thabat, as quoted in the editor's introduction (printed p. 6), gives this line as the prayer's opening and notes that the name is spelt with bā' or mīm (Bashīsh, Mashīsh). Ibn Kīrān, Sharḥ al-Ṣalāt al-Mashīshiyya, ed. Bārūd (Abu Dhabi 1999), on archive.org

2وانفلقت الأنوار

2and the lights broke forth,

Notes (1): Commentary
  • Commentaryal-Timsamānī takes «انشقت» (line 1) and «انفلقت» (here) as a variation of wording to avoid heaviness («تفنن؛ دفعاً للثقل»). Machine text of a scan (OCR), read only that way. al-Timsamānī, Riyāḍ al-raqāʾiq, on archive.org

3وفيه ارتقت الحقائق

3in whom the realities ascended,

Notes (1): Commentary
  • CommentaryIbn Kīrān devotes a heading to the verb («المراد بالارتقاء في قوله ارتقت», about p. 83 by his table of contents); we have not read that page.

4وتنزلت علوم آدم فأعجز الخلائق

4and the knowledge of Adam came down, leaving all creatures unable to match it,

Notes (1): Term
  • TermThe subject of «فأعجز» can be taken as the knowledge that came down, or as the Prophet in whom it came down. The English leaves the subject open with "it".

5وله تضاءلت الفهوم فلم يدركه منا سابق ولا لاحق

5before whom understandings shrank, so that no one of us, early or late, has grasped him.

2. Light and secrets

6فرياض الملكوت بزهر جماله مونقة

6So the meadows of the Malakūt are lush with the flowers of his beauty,

Notes (1): Term
  • TermMalakūt and jabarūt name two of the realms of the Sufi cosmos (the realm of dominion and the realm of power); the prayer uses them as given names and does not define them. Read the two lines as a pair: gardens and basins, flowers and floods.

7وحياض الجبروت بفيض أنواره متدفقة

7and the basins of the Jabarūt overflow with the flood of his lights.

Notes (1): Variant
  • VariantIbn Kīrān's introduction prints «أنواره» unvowelled; al-Timsamānī and the NU Online copy vowel «أنوارِه».

3. The intermediary

8ولا شيء إلا وهو به منوط

8And there is nothing that does not hang upon him.

Notes (1): Commentary

9إذ لولا الواسطة لذهب كما قيل الموسوط

9For if it were not for the intermediary (wāsiṭa), then, as is said, that which is mediated (mawsūṭ) would be gone.

Meaning disputed: see the notes.

Notes (4): Term, Variant, Commentary
  • TermWāsiṭa is the one in the middle, the go-between; mawsūṭ is the one reached through the middle. The English keeps both words visible. Which "intermediary" the prayer means is the commentators' reading: both Ibn Kīrān and al-Timsamānī take it as the Prophet.
  • VariantEvery witness read, print, commentary, recording and web copy alike, has «كما قيل» ("as is said"). We found none with «لذهب الموسوط» alone, although an earlier note of ours said some web copies drop it: none of the web copies read for this page does. Where the shorter form comes from is not found.
  • CommentaryIbn Kīrān, in a passage we have only as machine text, says «كما قيل» does not weaken the claim: it points to a saying well known among the intelligent, which he holds is also established in the hadith. He argues that a cause depends on a cause, and the mediated on the intermediary («السبب يتوقف على السبب، والموسوط يتوقف على الواسطة»), and that every good, religious or worldly, reached us at the Prophet's hand. Ibn Kīrān, Sharḥ al-Ṣalāt al-Mashīshiyya, ed. Bārūd (Abu Dhabi 1999), on archive.org
  • Commentaryal-Timsamānī glosses «لذهب» as «لفقد ولم يوجد» (it would be lost and not exist) and «الموسوط» as «كل موجود» (every existent), then supports it with the report «لولاه ما خلقت السماوات ولا الأرض». We have not checked the standing of that report. Machine text of a scan. al-Timsamānī, Riyāḍ al-raqāʾiq, on archive.org

10صلاة تليق بك منك إليه كما هو أهله

10A blessing worthy of you, from you to him, as he deserves it.

Notes (2): Variant, Commentary
  • VariantPresent in the print, the commentary, three recordings and the web copies. In one Moroccan recording (al-ʿImrānī) the machine transcript runs from «الموسوط» straight to «اللهم إنه سرك»; that may be a real omission in that setting or a transcription drop, and has not been checked by ear.
  • CommentaryIbn Kīrān lists this clause as a lemma of its own (about p. 169, from his table of contents).

4. Secret and veil

11اللهم إنه سرك الجامع الدال عليك

11O God, he is your all-gathering secret, which points to you,

Meaning disputed: see the notes.

Notes (2): Term, Commentary
  • TermSirr (secret) is what lies hidden within. «الجامع» means the one who gathers or comprises everything; «الدال عليك» is the one who points to you. The English keeps the two as a pair of descriptions of one person.
  • CommentaryIbn Kīrān's table of contents splits this lemma into «اللهم إنه سرك», «الجامع» and «الدال» and treats them word by word (pp. 174 to 176). We have not read those pages, so no gloss is given here. Ibn Kīrān, Sharḥ al-Ṣalāt al-Mashīshiyya, ed. Bārūd (Abu Dhabi 1999), on archive.org

12وحجابك الأعظم القائم لك بين يديك

12and your greatest veil, standing for you before you.

Meaning disputed: see the notes.

Notes (2): Term, Commentary
  • TermḤijāb is ordinarily what hides or screens. Here it is something that stands before God and is called the greatest of veils, and line 24 asks that it become the life of the reciter's spirit. The prayer does not say in the line what is veiled. «القائم لك» can be read "stands for you" (acts for you, represents you) or "stands up for you". The English keeps "stands for you".
  • CommentaryIbn Kīrān's table of contents splits the lemma into five parts («وحجابك», «الأعظم», «القائم», «لك», «بين يديك», pp. 176 to 180). Those pages are not yet read here. Ibn Kīrān, Sharḥ al-Ṣalāt al-Mashīshiyya, ed. Bārūd (Abu Dhabi 1999), on archive.org

5. Plea

13اللهم ألحقني بنسبه

13O God, join me to his lineage (nasab),

Meaning disputed: see the notes.

Notes (1): Term
  • TermNasab is descent or lineage; ḥasab (line 14) is the standing or worth one has by one's own deeds. The two are a standard Arabic pair. Here both are "his": the Prophet's. How a reciter can be joined to a lineage in the spiritual sense is left to the commentators.

14وحققني بحسبه

14and make me real in his noble worth (ḥasab),

Meaning disputed: see the notes.

Notes (1): Term
  • Term«حققني» comes from the root of ḥaqq (the real, the true): to verify, to make real, to realise. "Make me real in his standing" is one reading; "make me true to his standing" is another. See also line 26.

15وعرِّفني إياه معرفة أسلم بها من موارد الجهل

15and let me know him, with a knowledge by which I am safe from the watering-places of ignorance,

Notes (2): Variant, Term
  • VariantIbn Kīrān's introduction and al-Timsamānī print «وعرِّفني» with a shadda. A web copy (NU Online) vowels «أسلَمُ»; the print leaves it unvowelled.
  • TermMawārid are the places one comes to for water. Lines 15 and 16 set two sets of such places against each other: ignorance and bounty.

16وأكرع بها من موارد الفضل

16and drink deep by it from the watering-places of bounty,

17واحملني على سبيله إلى حضرتك

17and carry me on his road to your Presence,

18حملاً محفوفاً بنصرتك

18a carrying surrounded by your help.

19واقذف بي على الباطل فأدمغه

19And hurl me against falsehood, that I may crush it,

Notes (2): Variant, Qurʾān
  • VariantThree recordings are garbled here in the machine transcript («وقف بي», «وقذف بي»); these are transcription errors, not readings.
  • QurʾānThe wording echoes Qurʾān 21:18, where God hurls the truth against falsehood and it crushes it («بل نقذف بالحق على الباطل فيدمغه»). The prayer turns the verse into a request in the first person.

20وزُجَّ بي في بحار الأحدية

20and plunge me into the seas of Oneness (aḥadiyya),

Notes (2): Term, Variant
  • TermThree words are kept visible in lines 20 to 22. Aḥadiyya is oneness in the sense of God being the one without a second; tawḥīd is the declaring of God as one, which, on Ibn Kīrān's third reading (line 21), can be the reciter's own act; waḥda is unity. The prayer asks to be plunged into the first, taken out of the second and drowned in the third. How they differ is a matter for the commentators.
  • Variant«وزُجَّ» is vowelled in Ibn Kīrān's introduction.

21وانشلني من أوحال التوحيد

21and pull me out of the mud of tawḥīd (declaring God one),

Meaning disputed: see the notes.

Notes (4): Commentary, Term

22وأغرقني في عين بحر الوحدة

22and drown me in the very source of the sea of Unity (waḥda),

Meaning disputed: see the notes.

Notes (2): Term, Variant
  • Term«عين بحر الوحدة»: ʿayn means eye, spring, source, and also the thing itself, the essence. "The very source of the sea" is one reading; "the sea itself" is another. The English uses "source".
  • VariantTwo recordings are garbled here in the machine transcript («بحار الوحدات»); not counted as a reading.

23حتى لا أرى ولا أسمع ولا أجد ولا أحس إلا بها

23until I see nothing, hear nothing, find nothing and sense nothing except through it.

Meaning disputed: see the notes.

Notes (3): Variant, Commentary, Term
  • Variant«ولا أجد» ("find nothing") is in Ibn Kīrān's own lemma (p. 202, vowelled), in al-Timsamānī and in every recording. It is missing only from the quotation in Ibn Kīrān's introduction (p. 5), which looks like a slip inside the same book. Our text follows the lemma.
  • CommentaryIbn Kīrān (p. 202) calls this the limit of the immersion just named, «الغيبة عن الأكوان بشهود المكون فيها»: absence from created things through witnessing the One who makes them. Ibn Kīrān, Sharḥ al-Ṣalāt al-Mashīshiyya, ed. Bārūd (Abu Dhabi 1999), on archive.org
  • Term«بها» is feminine, so it most naturally takes «الوحدة» (line 22, waḥda) as its referent. The English gives "through it".

24واجعل [اللهم] الحجاب الأعظم حياة روحي

24And make the greatest veil [O God] the life of my spirit,

Notes (1): Variant
  • VariantOur text brackets «اللهم» after «واجعل». It is in Ibn Kīrān's introduction and in the NU Online copy only; Ibn Kīrān's table of contents (p. 204), al-Timsamānī and every recording omit it.

25وروحه سر حقيقتي

25and his spirit the secret of my reality,

26وحقيقته جامع عوالمي بتحقيق الحق الأول

26and his reality the gatherer of my worlds, through the realising of the First Real (al-Ḥaqq al-awwal).

Meaning disputed: see the notes.

Notes (3): Variant, Commentary, Term
  • VariantIbn Kīrān's table of contents (p. 209) lists «وحقيقته جامع عوالمي» and «بتحقيق الحق الأول» as two lemmas; al-Timsamānī writes them as one line. The phrase is here attached to line 26.
  • Commentaryal-Timsamānī gives the bā' of «بتحقيق» two readings: instrumental ("through"), or an oath ("I ask you by the realising of the First Real"). Machine text of a scan. al-Timsamānī, Riyāḍ al-raqāʾiq, on archive.org
  • TermTaḥqīq is the verbal noun of the same verb as line 14: making real, verifying. al-Ḥaqq al-awwal is the First Real, a name for God.

6. Closing invocations

27يا أول يا آخر يا ظاهر يا باطن

27O First, O Last, O Manifest, O Hidden,

Notes (1): Qurʾān
  • QurʾānThe four names are those of Qurʾān 57:3, here as four calls.

28اسمع ندائي بما سمعت به نداء عبدك زكريا [عليه السلام]

28hear my call as you heard the call of your servant Zakariyyā [peace be upon him],

Meaning disputed: see the notes.

Notes (3): Term, Variant, Commentary
  • Term«بما سمعت به» is literally "with that by which you heard". The clause asks for the same hearing, not only a similar one. Qurʾān 19:3 to 6 and 21:89 tell how Zakariyyā called on his Lord and was answered with a son.
  • Variant«عليه السلام» after «زكريا» is in Ibn Kīrān's introduction and in two Moroccan-register recordings; Ibn Kīrān's table of contents (p. 214), al-Timsamānī and the other witnesses end at «زكريا». The NU Online copy lacks «به».
  • Commentaryal-Ḥarrāq, in a recorded talk (machine transcript only, not yet checked by ear), reads this as the plea for a spiritual heir, answered in al-Shādhilī. This is his reading, not a finding.

29وانصرني بك لك

29and help me by you, for you,

Meaning disputed: see the notes.

Notes (3): Variant, Commentary, Term
  • VariantAbsent from the quotation in Ibn Kīrān's introduction; present in his own lemma (p. 216), in al-Timsamānī and in every recording. Our text includes it.
  • CommentaryIbn Kīrān (p. 216) glosses it at length: asking help from God himself and not through intermediaries, «غير الواسطة العظمى». Compare line 9. Ibn Kīrān, Sharḥ al-Ṣalāt al-Mashīshiyya, ed. Bārūd (Abu Dhabi 1999), on archive.org
  • Term«بك لك» is "by you, for you": you as the means and you as the purpose.

30وأيدني بك لك

30and strengthen me by you, for you,

31واجمع بيني وبينك

31and join me with you,

32وحل بيني وبين غيرك

32and come between me and all that is other than you,

33الله الله الله

33Allāh, Allāh, Allāh,

Notes (1): Variant
  • VariantThree times in the print and most witnesses. Two recordings sing four, and one Indonesian recording runs the name some nineteen times. Ibn Kīrān has headings on the ranks of passing away in God (p. 234) and on the name alone (p. 238); al-Timsamānī, in machine text, says three because the ranks are three.

34﴿إن الذي فرض عليك القرآن لرادك إلى معاد﴾

34Indeed He who made the Qurʾān binding on you will bring you back to a place of return.

Qurʾān 28:85

Notes (1): Qurʾān
  • QurʾānQurʾān 28:85. Ibn Kīrān's table of contents has the verse as a lemma (p. 241).

35﴿ربنا آتنا من لدنك رحمة وهيئ لنا من أمرنا رشدا﴾

35Our Lord, give us mercy from Yourself, and make ready for us right guidance in our affair.

Qurʾān 18:10

Notes (1): Qurʾān
  • QurʾānQurʾān 18:10, the prayer of the young men who took refuge in the cave. Written once; the recordings repeat it, three times in two of them. Ibn Kīrān has a heading at p. 250 on it.

7. Doxology

36﴿إن الله وملائكته يصلون على النبي يا أيها الذين آمنوا صلوا عليه وسلموا تسليما﴾

36Indeed God and His angels bless the Prophet. O you who believe, ask blessings on him and greet him with a full greeting of peace.

Qurʾān 33:56

Notes (2): Qurʾān, Variant
  • QurʾānQurʾān 33:56. Ibn Kīrān's commentary ends on this verse (the last page is printed p. 259), so he gives no lemma for the three clauses that follow. al-Timsamānī's printed text omits the verse but his commentary glosses it.
  • VariantAbsent from al-Timsamānī's printed text. One recording (Temsamani) sings the verse first, before the prayer, and does not end on it.

37صلوات الله وسلامه وتحياته ورحمته وبركاته على سيدنا محمد عبدك ونبيك ورسولك النبي الأمي

37Blessings of God, His peace, His greetings, His mercy and His blessings upon our master Muḥammad, your servant, your prophet and your messenger, the unlettered prophet,

Notes (2): Reception, Variant
  • ReceptionLines 37 to 39 are in Ibn Kīrān's introduction and in al-Timsamānī's commentary, but are not lemmas of Ibn Kīrān's commentary. They look like a recited conclusion that travels with the prayer. The editor (p. 7) says some great Shādhilī shaykhs added «زيادات» and made it a daily litany; al-Nakhlī, quoted in the introduction, says to read it once after Fajr and once after Maghrib. Ibn Kīrān, Sharḥ al-Ṣalāt al-Mashīshiyya, ed. Bārūd (Abu Dhabi 1999), on archive.org
  • Variantal-Timsamānī's commentary reads «ورحماته»; Ibn Kīrān's introduction reads «ورحمته».

38وعلى آله وصحبه عدد الشفع والوتر وعدد كلمات الله التامات المباركات

38and upon his family and companions, as many as the even and the odd, and as many as the perfect, blessed words of God.

Notes (2): Variant, Qurʾān
  • Variant«كلمات الله» is Ibn Kīrān's introduction alone; «كلمات ربنا» ("the words of our Lord") is in al-Timsamānī's commentary and in the two Malay recordings. A real variant, not yet checked against more prints.
  • Qurʾān«الشفع والوتر» is the pair of Qurʾān 89:3.

39﴿سبحان ربك رب العزة عما يصفون وسلام على المرسلين والحمد لله رب العالمين﴾

39Glory to your Lord, the Lord of Might, above what they describe. And peace upon the messengers. And praise belongs to God, Lord of the worlds.

Qurʾān 37:180-182

Notes (2): Qurʾān, Variant
  • QurʾānQurʾān 37:180 to 182, the close of sūrat al-Ṣāffāt. al-Timsamānī's commentary, in machine text, calls it the closing of al-Ṣāffāt and cites ʿAlī: whoever wants the fullest measure of reward should make it his last words.
  • VariantAbsent where the performance ends at the blessing verse (al-ʿImrānī, and the Turkish recording).

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