About this text: The Prayer of Effusion

Ṣadr al-Dīn al-Qūnawī and Dāwūd al-Qayṣarī: the scheme of the five divine PresencesAkbarian tradition (after Ibn Arabi) · probable

The prayer says the Prophet comprehends the worlds of the five divine Presences. That fivefold scheme was set out and systematised in the school of Ibn ʿArabī by al-Qūnawī and later al-Qayṣarī, which bears on the prayer's attribution and places its vocabulary within that school's reading of Ibn ʿArabī.

Carried byالحضرات الخمسal-ḥaḍarāt al-khamsroot حضر“the five divine Presences”

In the library:Faṣṣ Ādam ¶1Awrād: Sunday ¶18

• William C. Chittick, The Five Divine Presences: From al-Qūnawī to al-Qayṣarī (1982): Traces how the doctrine of the five divine Presences was formulated and developed by Ibn ʿArabī's followers.

Ibn ʿArabī, al-Futūḥāt al-makkiyya and Fuṣūṣ al-ḥikam: the Muhammadan reality and the sealAkbarian tradition (after Ibn Arabi) · probable

The prayer gathers into one address the doctrine, worked out in the Futūḥāt and the Fuṣūṣ, that the reality of Muḥammad is the first thing determined, the source from which every prophet and saint draws, and the Reality of realities that is neither existent nor nonexistent.

Carried byالحقيقة المحمديةal-ḥaqīqa al-muḥammadiyyaroot حقق“the Muhammadan reality”

In the library:al-Futūḥāt al-makkiyya ¶18al-Futūḥāt al-makkiyya ¶20Faṣṣ Shīth ¶18Inshāʾ al-dawāʾir ¶39

• Michel Chodkiewicz, Le Sceau des saints: prophétie et sainteté dans la doctrine d'Ibn Arabî (1986): Sets out Ibn ʿArabī's doctrine of the Muhammadan reality as the source of prophecy and sainthood, and of the seals.

Ibn ʿArabī, Fuṣūṣ al-ḥikam, chapter of Adam: the comprehensive configuration and the mirrorAkbarian tradition (after Ibn Arabi) · probable

What the Fuṣūṣ says of Adam, the comprehensive configuration in which the Real sees Itself and the receptacle fixed by the most holy effusion, the prayer says of Muḥammad, 'through whom You beheld the beauty of Your Essence'.

Carried byالنشأة الجامعةal-nashʾa al-jāmiʿaroot جمع“the most comprehensive configuration”

In the library:Faṣṣ Ādam ¶3Faṣṣ Ādam ¶6Faṣṣ Shīth ¶13Path: The mirror

• William C. Chittick, The Sufi Path of Knowledge: Ibn al-ʿArabi's Metaphysics of Imagination (1989): Documents Ibn ʿArabī's teaching on the perfect human as the comprehensive locus of the divine names, and the terms most holy and holy effusion.

Sahl al-Tustarī: the primordial light of Muḥammad (nūr Muḥammad)Sufism · probable

The idea that Muḥammad is a light brought forth before creation, from which the cosmos proceeds, was developed in early Sufism by al-Tustarī and became part of the long tradition of blessings on the Prophet in which this prayer stands.

Carried byنور محمدnūr Muḥammadroot نور“the light of Muḥammad”

In the library:al-Futūḥāt al-makkiyya ¶26

• Gerhard Böwering, The Mystical Vision of Existence in Classical Islam: The Qurʾānic Hermeneutics of the Ṣūfī Sahl At-Tustarī (d. 283/896) (1980): Documents al-Tustarī's doctrine of the pre-eternal light of Muḥammad.
• Annemarie Schimmel, And Muhammad Is His Messenger: The Veneration of the Prophet in Islamic Piety (1985): Traces the growth of the Muhammadan light doctrine and of prayers of blessing on the Prophet.

The Arabic Plotinus (the 'Theology of Aristotle') and the falsafa vocabulary of emanation (fayḍ)Neoplatonism · suggestive

The Arabic word fayḍ for the overflowing of being from a first principle entered Islamic thought through the Arabic adaptation of Plotinus and the philosophers who used it. The prayer inherits that word, while making the first effusion a person and grounding it in mercy.

Carried byفيضfayḍroot فيض“effusion, emanation”

In the library:Ennead VI.9, ch. 1Hayākil al-nūr ¶16

• Peter Adamson, The Arabic Plotinus: A Philosophical Study of the 'Theology of Aristotle' (2002): Documents how the Arabic adaptation of the Enneads carried Plotinus's account of procession from the One into Arabic.

Plotinus, Ennead VI.9.8: the centre and the circleNeoplatonism · probable

Plotinus pictures souls gathered round the One as radii touch a centre. The prayer makes the Prophet the point that runs through the circles of engendered beings and the centre of the encompassment of Inward and Outward. The images match in shape; no influence on the prayer is claimed.

Carried byنقطةnuqṭaroot نقطκέντρονkentron“the point, the centre”

In the library:Ennead VI.9, ch. 8Inshāʾ al-dawāʾir ¶56Path: Contemplation: the signs

al-Ghazālī, Mishkāt al-anwār: God hidden by the intensity of His lightSufism · firm

Al-Ghazālī argues that the divine light is hidden because it is too manifest, and he reads 'wherever you turn, there is the Face of God' as the gnostic's vision. The prayer says God's hiddenness is the intensity of His manifestation and asks to see His face wherever one turns. Both work from the same Quranic verses; direct borrowing is not claimed here.

Carried byظهورẓuhūrroot ظهر“manifestation”

In the library:Mishkāt al-anwār ¶45Mishkāt al-anwār ¶60Mishkāt al-anwār ¶70Path: Light and its veils

Plato, Symposium 202e–203a: Love as the daimōn in between (metaxy)Platonism · probable

Diotima's Love stands between mortal and immortal, carrying messages across so that the whole is bound together. The prayer's Prophet is the isthmus between existence and nonexistence and the bond tying originated to eternal. The two share the figure of a binding middle term with no line of influence.

Carried byبرزخbarzakhμεταξύmetaxy“the between”

In the library:Symposium 202eSymposium 203a

Ibn al-Fāriḍ, al-Khamriyya: 'wine and no vine, while Adam was a father to me'Arabic poetry · probable

Ibn al-Fāriḍ's speaker claims a being prior to Adam, as the prayer places Muḥammad before all creation as the first determination and the jewel from which things come. The two contemporaries voice a primordial reality in different genres, ode and litany.

Carried by“priority over Adam”

In the library:al-Khamriyya ¶23al-Khamriyya ¶26

Gospel of John 1:1–3: the Word through whom all things were madeEarly Christianity and the Fathers · probable

John's Logos is the Word through whom all things come to be. The prayer calls the Prophet the matter of the divine address that passes from the hidden 'Be!' into the visible 'and it is'. The difference is sharp: the Logos is confessed as God, while the prayer's Prophet unites servanthood and lordship and remains a servant.

Carried byكلمةkalimaroot كلمλόγοςlogos“the Word”

In the library:al-Futūḥāt al-makkiyya ¶17

Mahāyāna Buddhism: the three bodies of the Buddha (trikāya)Buddhism · suggestive

The trikāya teaching lets one teacher be at once a historical man and a cosmic body of reality. The prayer likewise speaks of a man who fasted, prayed and journeyed by night, and of the same figure as the first determination and the prime matter of all forms. The likeness is structural only.

Carried by“historical person and cosmic body”

Suhrawardī, al-Ghurba al-gharbiyya: out of the dark well toward the lightIshraqi philosophy · probable

The prayer asks to be brought out of the darkness of 'I-ness' into light and from the grave of the bodily frame to the Resurrection. Suhrawardī's exile climbs out of the well of Qayrawān toward Sinai. Both describe a release from bodily confinement toward a light, in different genres and schools.

Carried byظلمةẓulmaroot ظلم“darkness”

In the library:al-Ghurba al-gharbiyya ¶7al-Ghurba al-gharbiyya ¶42Path: The fall and the return of the soul

Plotinus, Ennead VI.9: the One that is loved and does not loveNeoplatonism · firm

The prayer calls the first effusion God's beloved, through whom God beholds His own beauty, and asks God to open the door of His love for the one who prays. In Plotinus the soul longs for the One while the One, needing nothing, turns toward nothing.

Carried byحبيبḥabībroot حبب“the beloved”

In the library:Ennead VI.9, ch. 9Path: Love: the soul's longing back

Ashʿarī kalām: the renewal of accidents in each instantKalam · probable

Ashʿarī theologians held that accidents are recreated at each instant while the atoms bearing them persist. The prayer says the forms never disclose themselves twice in the same way, which carries renewal through the whole of what appears, a point on which the Akbarian school held that the theologians stopped halfway.

Carried byتجديد الخلقtajdīd al-khalqroot جدد“renewal of creation”