Shah Abdul Latif Bhittai's house in Bhit Shah (via Wikimedia Commons)
Why I am sometimes happiest and
other times gloomiest in love? The mind is entangled in the puzzles of emotions.
In psychology, and
other sciences studying the human behavior, the emotion of being in love is
described in different angles. But, in Sufism, the love is seen in different
terms.
Since Sufism is meant for
channelizing our attentions towards God, therefore, the love for our humanly
beloved is also seen an essential ladder to the God’s love. In order to distill
this idea further, we will have to zoom in the concept of love and its connected
ideas.
Sufism is the esoteric
understanding of religion. It is more concerned with love, connection and
subservience of the Divine, than the outward formal religious practices. Therefore,
it elucidates the beautifully delicate but difficult aspects of religion which
are often ignored by hardliners, like the good conduct as per the way of
Prophet Muhammad PBUH (Urdu/Persian: Uswa-e-Hasna), beauty of behavior
(Urdu/Persian: Husn-e-Ikhlaq), perfect belief (Urdu/Persian: Yaqeen-e-Kamil),
the way or conduct (Urdu/Persian: Rah-e-Sulook) of grand master or Shuyukh.
The poetry of Sufi Shuyukh, like Bulleh Shah (link),
Abu Said Ibn e Abil Khair, Ibn Al-Fariz (link),
Waris Shah is abundant with such ideas, especially that of love.
In Islamic ideology, Allah cannot
be depicted in any idol or picture form. Despite being Omnipresent &
Omniscience (Urdu/Persian: Hazir-o-Nazir) and omnipotent (Urdu/Persian: Qadir-e-Mutlak),
he cannot be seen directly with our material eyes, therefore, the inner essence
(Arabic: Batin) of religion is faith (Arabic: Iman) on the Divine
truth, with verbal profession (Arabic: Iqrar bil-lisan), and heart-felt
conviction (Arabic: tasdeeq bil-qalb). This recognition of Divine
differentiates the faith from Kufr and Shirk. However, there come a question: how
to love the One we have never seen or met?
As an oriental proverb goes,
“Woman is the teacher of love”. People fall in love with people in this world
and learn the emotions and etiquette of love. The experience of love and
heart-break softens the human heart enabling to feel delicate aspects of
conduct and life. This shift from love for one to love for all and then love
for God is an important phase. The poetry recognizes it, by acknowledging the
idea that the love for worldly beloved is in fact a form of love for God. In
the poetry of Shah Abdul Latif Bhitai (link) and Waris Shah (link), the love tragedies in
fact decode the states of our souls desperate to meet the Divine Lord. (Qawwali link, poetry link)