LETTER 53: SPIRITUAL RESOLVE

In the name of God, the Merciful, the Compassionate!

Dear Brother Shamsuddin, may God grant you greatness of soul! Any disciple lacking in spiritual resolve will get nowhere! Until a disciple mounts the steed of resolution concerning Him, and arrives before the portals of heaven, he cannot be considered as a man of this field! It is a saying of the Sufis-that wanting to have everything in accordance with your own fancy is a task fit only for women, not for men! The intention of this saying has been explained by Imam Shible: The person who is preoccupied with this world and the next has not been sufficiently purified to be able to enter Our assembly! As the poet has attested

O son, justice would mean that you bear yourself Beyond the boundaries of whatever is created. Then it might be that, aided by your Lord, You would be borne to the Seat of Righteousness itself!

Everyone is concealed beneath his own spiritual resolve, and the measure of each person can be gauged from the aspirations of his soul, since the true worth of a man can be estimated by seeing what he prizes. Even today everyone is able to approximate his own worth. The person whose aspirations are linked to what he puts into his stomach can have his value gauged by what comes out of it. You and I are in that category! How can it be said that either of us is of any value?

O brother, if tomorrow we were to enjoy the fullness of peace so that nothing has a claim on us, nor do we have a claim on anything. then you might say that we were departing from the field of frivolity and play! A Sufi was asked, as he lay dying: Is there anything you would like us to bring you? Yes, he replied, there is! What is it? they enquired. Nothingness, for it has no existence They were astonished! It has been said: You know my condition to be that of a broken-hearted one; You can read, on any page of my life, what is my desire! I am astonished at my good fortune! Take me by the hand, O You who grasp the hand of all astonished by You!

In a word, the very first step that a resolute disciple takes is to trample underfoot his own soul, and the first sword that he wields in anger is upon himself, not an infidel. Any wound that is inflicted on an infidel is only a bodily one and is made only for the sake of looting a person's goods, but the wound inflicted on the ego goes to the very foundation of faith, and its only intention is to plunder the faith! Hence, any blow you strike should be directed toward your ego. If you connive at its activities, do not be lulled into thinking it will be have kindly toward you. Those well acquainted with this saying heap piles of thorns upon themselves for this purpose. They rain all sorts of anger upon themselves for the purpose of containing this unfortunate dog. In this way they aspire to great wealth. Khwaja Sanai has said:

You are the hidden treasure of the nine heavens; Come out of the four walls of time!

Break even the binding spell of salvation!

Tear down the door and vestibule of created beings!

You, the treasure contained in an enchanted palace, You are Life, though imprisoned in a body! If You show Your face from behind the curtain, You will consume the seven ancient heavens! One who, for God's sake, does not leave this prison, Why should he be astonished that he does not find Him. These people are men noted for their spiritual resolve. Whatever falls under the sway of Be! and comes into existence, they do not look at it, even out of the corner of their eye, nor do they submit to either paradise or hell at the threshold of their resolution! One of noble ambition has said:

O son, separate yourself from yourself Put on the garb of patience! Once and for all, make the capital of both worlds A present to the very World of Love! Resolve to ascend to the heights of heaven, And praise Him without hope of gain and without tongue!

Do you know what the secret of this is? It is this. Out of 18,000, worlds God Almighty has not created any other group endowed with nobler ambitions than those of mankind The reason is that to no other group has it been said: I breathed into him of my Spirit (Q38:72) Only man heard this! Neither has He sent prophets and books to any other group except mankind. Nor has He greeted, from the very beginning, any other group except mankind. Nor did He give the sight of Himself to any other group except mankind. Also, it was only human beings who, out of the force of their love and their lofty aspirations, did not have the strength to bear separation from God. The curtain of this world has been removed from their hearts, and the curtain of the world to come will also be removed from their inner eyes, for they seek none but Him in this world, and in the next they will gaze upon nothing other than Him. The eye neither blinked nor exceeded the limit (Q53:17) is a lesson learnt in primary school!

Take care, O wise bird, to read the signs of the times! For do you imagine you can find a better nest than This? Open up your wings for a flight into Meaning Open the Inn containing seven doors! When you alight upon the celestial Lote-tree, You will become All, but you will lose sight of yourself.

Be careful not to amble into foolishness, for fortune does not favor the foolish! It has been said: When anyone wishes to pass through the lane of manliness the leader of the reprobate, Satan, grabs the skirt of his garment and says: The reason why I have wrapped the accursed thread around my waist is to ensure that no unworthy person turns aside into this lane of manly endeavor. If anyone tries to enter without the crown of Unity and Sincerity, I will cut off his feet! The poet was hinting at this possibility when he said:

The Beloved instructed me: Sit at My-door!

Do not let anyone in till he has grasped My secret!

And that accursed one does not budge from his position for any mean-spirited fellow, for he is arrogant and terrifying, his head full of self-conceit. Do you not see that he had to give way to Adam, but when that righteous one made his appearance in the kingdom, and the rays of his righteousness shone on the supports of the divine throne, Satan protested aloud, The time for action has arrived! What trick should I employ in order to cut off his feet? Even if he could have done so, he would only have succeeded in binding himself to his saddle straps and muttering: O unfortunate one, make do with me! Otherwise, Satan will appear as a slave and say: O righteous one! May you enjoy success every moment along the road of religion! Be careful! I do not say Pray for me! or, Intercede for me! for my work has gone beyond all this! What I need is to have you apply a soothing dressing to the jealousy inflicted on me by the curse, so that this cursed robe might become fresh in the time of the divine covenant, just as prophets rejoice when they receive the robe of prophecy.

That chief of all wretches boasts that the collar of imprecation has been placed around his neck without any intermediary. There is a tradition that, on the Day of Resurrection, a command will reach the angels: Take the leader of the wretches to hell! Ten thousand angels will set upon him. They will not be able to contain him. Another ten thousand will come to their assistance. They, too, will fail to subdue him. A second command will reach the angels: The neck that bears the collar of My curse cannot be broken by any intermediary except My own wrath! When the Eternal Strength loosens that collar of reprobation from around his neck, that accursed one will be worse off. A dog from hell will attack him and seize him with its fangs and bear him off in rage to the depths of hell. All this indicates the extent of the curse that, without intermediary, was placed around the neck of Satan. If mystical union and consolation without intermediary should appear to God's dear ones, then similarly the heavens will not be able to bear that weight nor the earth, nor will paradise have the strength for that, nor hell-only the world of the essence of the Venerable King can bear the righteousness of men!

It is related about Sheikh Luqman Sarkhasi that once, while listening to music, one of the dervishes began to fly like a bird and alighted on a tree. He said: O Luqman, come here so that we may fly off together! O man of peace, replied Luqman, How can our hearts be contained by any world, for when we take to flight, we head beyond both worlds! Any mean denier will not be able to hear this tradition. Or if he does hear it, he will not believe it. O helpless one, listen with faith so that foolishness may not gain ascendancy over you. One day He may take your hand. If no one comes to your help in the world, then perhaps someone will do so in the grave. If none comes even there, then at least on the Day of Resurrection a helper will come. Be on the alert, helpless one, lest you try to act with authority like those self-righteous ones with their paltry intellects, for these sayings cannot be grasped by a small-minded person. The speech of the just can be understood only with the aid of faith. Listen, then, with faith, so that some help might appear and the speech of these dear ones do not go to waste.

If you wish to see a Bayazid on the morn, You need the service of a hundred Bayazids today!

Look at the King of the Prophets. He is the choicest of both worlds. Every time that a certain slave of Mughira appeared on the scene, the Prophet would approach him and bow to him and ask for his prayers. Muhammad's eyes used to fill with tears at his prayers. He would say: If you belong to His community, may His community be such as you have heard but if-God forbid you do not belong to His community, then remove the cap of claim from your head, and give back the key of the promise! Now know in truth that the field of the seeking of the disciples is not the divine footstool or throne, nor heaven or earth. If you say, Where is it?-it is where He said it was: I am in the heart of my servant, the pious believer.

What is this divine throne? Compared to the lofty resolve of these men, it is no higher than the earth itself! Do you not see that concerning Sa'id ibn Mu'az it was said: The divine throne was shaken by the death of Sa'id ibn Mu'az! He had been given some influence over it, with the result that when he left the world, a trembling seized it.

O brother, the stock of Adam, in the world of Truth, lives on in such people. The highway of righteousness is filled with the constancy of their blessed steps and, in the world of Truth, they are called the outsiders of their respective tribes, just as Bilal came from Abyssinia, Shuaib from Byzantium, Salman from Persia, and Khwaja Uways from Qaran. If the purity of their faith were to fall on brambles that are trampled underfoot they would turn into lilies. The sun of their high resolve makes acceptable every obedient one it shines upon. If it shines upon some sinner, he becomes an intimate friend. [A long poem from Sanai follows.

Finally, you must have heard of the proof of a righteous man. It was discovered in a urinal flask placed before a stranger. The latter was urged to have a look at its contents. I was not at all aware, he observed, among Muslims there were such men whose livers have turned to blood on account of their longing on the road to God. It is not fitting to expound on what happened except to say that he immediately snapped his thread and began to tread the path of Islam.

What can you say, O miserable denier? Is his urine better than your speech and mine? If you have anything Islamic about you, then judge for yourself and say, Better than a thousand pretenders to knowledge is the one who, at the hour for prayer, can bring over one person from a shop to the mosque. This is the sort of knowledge of which we are speaking! But the scholars of today are not like those of yesteryear. Then they used to be constantly busy, they were not gossipers. Nowadays they are only good for talking and making claims, but there is no steady dedication to work. Speaking about such righteous ones of those bygone days, and raising objections and difficulties concerning them, stems from blindness and ignorance. Someone has said:

Nothing comes from the light of the eyes of the head: It is the light of the eye of the heart that is needed! Both Jesus and the donkey had eyes in their head, But Oh, the difference in the eye of the heart of Jesus!

O brother, former ages were such that the odor of a heart emanated even from a stone. Nowadays, in these bad times, the odor of a stone emanates from our hearts! The heavens have been consumed is one saying, and the earth has dried up is another. In the temple of fire worshipers while in a state of ecstasy, you may hear a voice from the fire telling you: Even though we ourselves are being consumed, still we have the quality that we care not for this handful of graceless people! And if you go to a temple where idols are worshiped, you will hear the same news. When the Prophet arrived in the world, the first to do him reverence were the idols in the Kaaba-all 360 of them! They fell down in worship

I went to the churches of the Christians and the Jews And found every Christian and Jew facing toward You In the hope of being united to You, I went to an idol temple, And there the idols, too, were murmuring their love for You! A poem from Attar follows.)

Heaven and earth, footstool and throne, angels and firmament, from the very heights above to the depths below, anything at all that can be named, falls on its face while searching and running hither and thither! Man is cruel, for he has fallen in with the enemy, having strayed far from the Friend. If anyone asks you, Who are you? be careful not to say, I am a Muslim Three times on Friday once in the morning, then between the sermon and the prayer, and again between the afternoon and evening prayer-a disciple should be present to God and remember himself and the writer of this letter in his prayers. After every obligatory prayer the one hundred and twelfth chapter of the Quran on Purity should be recited ten times and he should say ten times: If they do not take heed, say, God suffices for me! There is no God but Him. In Him have I put my trust! He is them Lord of the glorious throne! (Q09:129), Let him persevere in reciting this prayer and know for sure that one accepted by Him does not be come rejected, while one rejected by Him never becomes acceptable For the one who has been received with honor, he is the man of good fortune who has arrived at that stage after which there is no ill fortune, while everyone who has to taste ill fortune becomes the hapless one who has arrived at that stage where no good fortune can be found.

The seeker of favors is happier to experience His wrath than to bask in the shadow of His mercy, for the shadow may pass away and lose its value, as has been said In separation there is the hope of union, while in union there is a fear of separation along with the plea sure experienced.

There is pleasure in separation from You, and tyranny in Your presence:

That pleasure is better, for we have no strength to bear Your tyranny!

A spiritual guide used to say: For lovers, it is more enjoyable to be in the company of separated ones than in the company of the joyful. O brother, for one seeking Him, what place is there for rejection or acceptance? To want the honor of being accepted is to consider yourself worthy of it, and in the religion of love this is a fault, as an inflamed one has said:

If you welcome me, then I am Your accepted one:

If You do not, I am still Your rejected servant! I should not be worried whether You accept or reject me: My task, in either state, is to remain preoccupied with You!

O brother, if a seeker is accepted, then his blessing and reward is ordinary. And if he is not accepted-well, a king is free to act as he chooses! That is the fruit of our misfortune, just as a hapless one has said:

Since the Beloved is a king, whatever He says, goes! Concerning His actions, who will be so bold as to ask why? If He accepts, it is because of His mercy: If He spurns us, that is our misfortune!

Peace

In the name of God, the Merciful, the Compassionate!

Dear Brother Shamsuddin, may God grant you greatness of soul! Any disciple lacking in spiritual resolve will get nowhere! Until a disciple mounts the steed of resolution concerning Him, and arrives before the portals of heaven, he cannot be considered as a man of this field! It is a saying of the Sufis-that wanting to have everything in accordance with your own fancy is a task fit only for women, not for men! The intention of this saying has been explained by Imam Shible: The person who is preoccupied with this world and the next has not been sufficiently purified to be able to enter Our assembly! As the poet has attested

O son, justice would mean that you bear yourself Beyond the boundaries of whatever is created. Then it might be that, aided by your Lord, You would be borne to the Seat of Righteousness itself!

Everyone is concealed beneath his own spiritual resolve, and the measure of each person can be gauged from the aspirations of his soul, since the true worth of a man can be estimated by seeing what he prizes. Even today everyone is able to approximate his own worth. The person whose aspirations are linked to what he puts into his stomach can have his value gauged by what comes out of it. You and I are in that category! How can it be said that either of us is of any value?

O brother, if tomorrow we were to enjoy the fullness of peace so that nothing has a claim on us, nor do we have a claim on anything. then you might say that we were departing from the field of frivolity and play! A Sufi was asked, as he lay dying: Is there anything you would like us to bring you? Yes, he replied, there is! What is it? they enquired. Nothingness, for it has no existence They were astonished! It has been said: You know my condition to be that of a broken-hearted one; You can read, on any page of my life, what is my desire! I am astonished at my good fortune! Take me by the hand, O You who grasp the hand of all astonished by You!

In a word, the very first step that a resolute disciple takes is to trample underfoot his own soul, and the first sword that he wields in anger is upon himself, not an infidel. Any wound that is inflicted on an infidel is only a bodily one and is made only for the sake of looting a person's goods, but the wound inflicted on the ego goes to the very foundation of faith, and its only intention is to plunder the faith! Hence, any blow you strike should be directed toward your ego. If you connive at its activities, do not be lulled into thinking it will be have kindly toward you. Those well acquainted with this saying heap piles of thorns upon themselves for this purpose. They rain all sorts of anger upon themselves for the purpose of containing this unfortunate dog. In this way they aspire to great wealth. Khwaja Sanai has said:

You are the hidden treasure of the nine heavens; Come out of the four walls of time!

Break even the binding spell of salvation!

Tear down the door and vestibule of created beings!

You, the treasure contained in an enchanted palace, You are Life, though imprisoned in a body! If You show Your face from behind the curtain, You will consume the seven ancient heavens! One who, for God's sake, does not leave this prison, Why should he be astonished that he does not find Him. These people are men noted for their spiritual resolve. Whatever falls under the sway of Be! and comes into existence, they do not look at it, even out of the corner of their eye, nor do they submit to either paradise or hell at the threshold of their resolution! One of noble ambition has said:

O son, separate yourself from yourself Put on the garb of patience! Once and for all, make the capital of both worlds A present to the very World of Love! Resolve to ascend to the heights of heaven, And praise Him without hope of gain and without tongue!

Do you know what the secret of this is? It is this. Out of 18,000, worlds God Almighty has not created any other group endowed with nobler ambitions than those of mankind The reason is that to no other group has it been said: I breathed into him of my Spirit (Q38:72) Only man heard this! Neither has He sent prophets and books to any other group except mankind. Nor has He greeted, from the very beginning, any other group except mankind. Nor did He give the sight of Himself to any other group except mankind. Also, it was only human beings who, out of the force of their love and their lofty aspirations, did not have the strength to bear separation from God. The curtain of this world has been removed from their hearts, and the curtain of the world to come will also be removed from their inner eyes, for they seek none but Him in this world, and in the next they will gaze upon nothing other than Him. The eye neither blinked nor exceeded the limit (Q53:17) is a lesson learnt in primary school!

Take care, O wise bird, to read the signs of the times! For do you imagine you can find a better nest than This? Open up your wings for a flight into Meaning Open the Inn containing seven doors! When you alight upon the celestial Lote-tree, You will become All, but you will lose sight of yourself.

Be careful not to amble into foolishness, for fortune does not favor the foolish! It has been said: When anyone wishes to pass through the lane of manliness the leader of the reprobate, Satan, grabs the skirt of his garment and says: The reason why I have wrapped the accursed thread around my waist is to ensure that no unworthy person turns aside into this lane of manly endeavor. If anyone tries to enter without the crown of Unity and Sincerity, I will cut off his feet! The poet was hinting at this possibility when he said:

The Beloved instructed me: Sit at My-door!

Do not let anyone in till he has grasped My secret!

And that accursed one does not budge from his position for any mean-spirited fellow, for he is arrogant and terrifying, his head full of self-conceit. Do you not see that he had to give way to Adam, but when that righteous one made his appearance in the kingdom, and the rays of his righteousness shone on the supports of the divine throne, Satan protested aloud, The time for action has arrived! What trick should I employ in order to cut off his feet? Even if he could have done so, he would only have succeeded in binding himself to his saddle straps and muttering: O unfortunate one, make do with me! Otherwise, Satan will appear as a slave and say: O righteous one! May you enjoy success every moment along the road of religion! Be careful! I do not say Pray for me! or, Intercede for me! for my work has gone beyond all this! What I need is to have you apply a soothing dressing to the jealousy inflicted on me by the curse, so that this cursed robe might become fresh in the time of the divine covenant, just as prophets rejoice when they receive the robe of prophecy.

That chief of all wretches boasts that the collar of imprecation has been placed around his neck without any intermediary. There is a tradition that, on the Day of Resurrection, a command will reach the angels: Take the leader of the wretches to hell! Ten thousand angels will set upon him. They will not be able to contain him. Another ten thousand will come to their assistance. They, too, will fail to subdue him. A second command will reach the angels: The neck that bears the collar of My curse cannot be broken by any intermediary except My own wrath! When the Eternal Strength loosens that collar of reprobation from around his neck, that accursed one will be worse off. A dog from hell will attack him and seize him with its fangs and bear him off in rage to the depths of hell. All this indicates the extent of the curse that, without intermediary, was placed around the neck of Satan. If mystical union and consolation without intermediary should appear to God's dear ones, then similarly the heavens will not be able to bear that weight nor the earth, nor will paradise have the strength for that, nor hell-only the world of the essence of the Venerable King can bear the righteousness of men!

It is related about Sheikh Luqman Sarkhasi that once, while listening to music, one of the dervishes began to fly like a bird and alighted on a tree. He said: O Luqman, come here so that we may fly off together! O man of peace, replied Luqman, How can our hearts be contained by any world, for when we take to flight, we head beyond both worlds! Any mean denier will not be able to hear this tradition. Or if he does hear it, he will not believe it. O helpless one, listen with faith so that foolishness may not gain ascendancy over you. One day He may take your hand. If no one comes to your help in the world, then perhaps someone will do so in the grave. If none comes even there, then at least on the Day of Resurrection a helper will come. Be on the alert, helpless one, lest you try to act with authority like those self-righteous ones with their paltry intellects, for these sayings cannot be grasped by a small-minded person. The speech of the just can be understood only with the aid of faith. Listen, then, with faith, so that some help might appear and the speech of these dear ones do not go to waste.

If you wish to see a Bayazid on the morn, You need the service of a hundred Bayazids today!

Look at the King of the Prophets. He is the choicest of both worlds. Every time that a certain slave of Mughira appeared on the scene, the Prophet would approach him and bow to him and ask for his prayers. Muhammad's eyes used to fill with tears at his prayers. He would say: If you belong to His community, may His community be such as you have heard but if-God forbid you do not belong to His community, then remove the cap of claim from your head, and give back the key of the promise! Now know in truth that the field of the seeking of the disciples is not the divine footstool or throne, nor heaven or earth. If you say, Where is it?-it is where He said it was: I am in the heart of my servant, the pious believer.

What is this divine throne? Compared to the lofty resolve of these men, it is no higher than the earth itself! Do you not see that concerning Sa'id ibn Mu'az it was said: The divine throne was shaken by the death of Sa'id ibn Mu'az! He had been given some influence over it, with the result that when he left the world, a trembling seized it.

O brother, the stock of Adam, in the world of Truth, lives on in such people. The highway of righteousness is filled with the constancy of their blessed steps and, in the world of Truth, they are called the outsiders of their respective tribes, just as Bilal came from Abyssinia, Shuaib from Byzantium, Salman from Persia, and Khwaja Uways from Qaran. If the purity of their faith were to fall on brambles that are trampled underfoot they would turn into lilies. The sun of their high resolve makes acceptable every obedient one it shines upon. If it shines upon some sinner, he becomes an intimate friend. [A long poem from Sanai follows.

Finally, you must have heard of the proof of a righteous man. It was discovered in a urinal flask placed before a stranger. The latter was urged to have a look at its contents. I was not at all aware, he observed, among Muslims there were such men whose livers have turned to blood on account of their longing on the road to God. It is not fitting to expound on what happened except to say that he immediately snapped his thread and began to tread the path of Islam.

What can you say, O miserable denier? Is his urine better than your speech and mine? If you have anything Islamic about you, then judge for yourself and say, Better than a thousand pretenders to knowledge is the one who, at the hour for prayer, can bring over one person from a shop to the mosque. This is the sort of knowledge of which we are speaking! But the scholars of today are not like those of yesteryear. Then they used to be constantly busy, they were not gossipers. Nowadays they are only good for talking and making claims, but there is no steady dedication to work. Speaking about such righteous ones of those bygone days, and raising objections and difficulties concerning them, stems from blindness and ignorance. Someone has said:

Nothing comes from the light of the eyes of the head: It is the light of the eye of the heart that is needed! Both Jesus and the donkey had eyes in their head, But Oh, the difference in the eye of the heart of Jesus!

O brother, former ages were such that the odor of a heart emanated even from a stone. Nowadays, in these bad times, the odor of a stone emanates from our hearts! The heavens have been consumed is one saying, and the earth has dried up is another. In the temple of fire worshipers while in a state of ecstasy, you may hear a voice from the fire telling you: Even though we ourselves are being consumed, still we have the quality that we care not for this handful of graceless people! And if you go to a temple where idols are worshiped, you will hear the same news. When the Prophet arrived in the world, the first to do him reverence were the idols in the Kaaba-all 360 of them! They fell down in worship

I went to the churches of the Christians and the Jews And found every Christian and Jew facing toward You In the hope of being united to You, I went to an idol temple, And there the idols, too, were murmuring their love for You! A poem from Attar follows.)

Heaven and earth, footstool and throne, angels and firmament, from the very heights above to the depths below, anything at all that can be named, falls on its face while searching and running hither and thither! Man is cruel, for he has fallen in with the enemy, having strayed far from the Friend. If anyone asks you, Who are you? be careful not to say, I am a Muslim Three times on Friday once in the morning, then between the sermon and the prayer, and again between the afternoon and evening prayer-a disciple should be present to God and remember himself and the writer of this letter in his prayers. After every obligatory prayer the one hundred and twelfth chapter of the Quran on Purity should be recited ten times and he should say ten times: If they do not take heed, say, God suffices for me! There is no God but Him. In Him have I put my trust! He is them Lord of the glorious throne! (Q09:129), Let him persevere in reciting this prayer and know for sure that one accepted by Him does not be come rejected, while one rejected by Him never becomes acceptable For the one who has been received with honor, he is the man of good fortune who has arrived at that stage after which there is no ill fortune, while everyone who has to taste ill fortune becomes the hapless one who has arrived at that stage where no good fortune can be found.

The seeker of favors is happier to experience His wrath than to bask in the shadow of His mercy, for the shadow may pass away and lose its value, as has been said In separation there is the hope of union, while in union there is a fear of separation along with the plea sure experienced.

There is pleasure in separation from You, and tyranny in Your presence:

That pleasure is better, for we have no strength to bear Your tyranny!

A spiritual guide used to say: For lovers, it is more enjoyable to be in the company of separated ones than in the company of the joyful. O brother, for one seeking Him, what place is there for rejection or acceptance? To want the honor of being accepted is to consider yourself worthy of it, and in the religion of love this is a fault, as an inflamed one has said:

If you welcome me, then I am Your accepted one:

If You do not, I am still Your rejected servant! I should not be worried whether You accept or reject me: My task, in either state, is to remain preoccupied with You!

O brother, if a seeker is accepted, then his blessing and reward is ordinary. And if he is not accepted-well, a king is free to act as he chooses! That is the fruit of our misfortune, just as a hapless one has said:

Since the Beloved is a king, whatever He says, goes! Concerning His actions, who will be so bold as to ask why? If He accepts, it is because of His mercy: If He spurns us, that is our misfortune!

Peace