ON THE NAME ALLĀH
Leo Schaya
The Name “Allāh”—which is written as A-L-L-H or, with all its vowels, A-L-L-ā-H-u1—results etymologically from a combination of the Arabic definite article al-(“the”) with the noun ilāhun (“divinity”), which then becomes al-ilāhu through its linkage with the article. One translates this name as “the Divinity” which, in the meaning intended by the language of the Koran, excludes any other “god” (ilāhun) . In Sufism, the Name Allāh is synonymous with “the Pure Reality”: this can exclude or include, according to the point of view one takes on the relativeness of reality.
We are going to consider the Name Allāh in the light of Sufi doctrine. According to this doctrine, the Name indicates both the pure and supreme “Essence” (adh-dhāt) and Its “Quality of Divinity” (al- ulūhiya) or Its Universality. In the Book of the Name of Majesty—Allāh by Muḥyi ʾd-Dīn ibn ʿArabī, we read that this Name, although it designates the supreme Essence alone, also appears within the various degrees of All-Reality. The Essence contains, indeed, all realities, and Its Name contains all the truths of the Divine Names; this is why Its Name is often used when a more particular name of God might be used to designate one of His specific aspects. In such cases, the name Allāh, which is beyond any limiting definition, “replaces” any such particular designation of the divine Reality.
Ibn ʿArabī also says: “The Name Allāh is, in relation to the other Divine Names, as the supreme Essence is in relation to the Qualities that are included in It. All the Divine Names are contained in this Name. They issue forth from it, and toward it they re-ascend.” Finally, ʿAbd al-Karīm al-Jīlī says in The Universal Man:
Know that the Divine Nature which encompasses all the Realities of Being and maintains them in their respective degrees is called the “Quality of Divinity” (al-ulūhiya). And I mean by Realities of Being (ḥaqāʾiq al-wujūd) both the principles (aḥkam) which condition the different states of manifestation, and that which is manifested therein, that is to say God (al-Ḥaqq) and the creature (al-khalq) at the same time. The “Quality of Divinity” signifies, then, that which totalizes the Divine Dignities (i.e. Divine Aspects), at the same time as all the degrees of existence, and which assigns to every thing that which returns to it from Being. The name Allāh designates the Master of this supreme dignity which can only belong to the Absolute Essence. The supreme affirmation of the Essence is, then, that of the “Quality of Divinity” which “Itself” encompasses and synthesizes all the affirmations and governs every Quality and every Name.2
He also says:
[Since] there is access to the knowledge of God . . . only through the intermediary of His Names (which reveal the “Being of His Aspects”) and His Qualities (which reveal the “mode of Being” or the “mode of manifestation” of His Aspects), and each Name and each (Divine) Quality being contained in the Name Allāh, it follows that there is no access to the knowledge of God except by way of this Name. In truth, it is this Name which in reality communicates (supreme and universal) Being and which leads toward Him.3
Thus, the Name Allāh is not merely the verbal expression that indicates the Divine Essence and Its All-Reality or Universality, but it actually “gives” what it designates. It thereby becomes in Sufism the means of spiritual assimilation of the one Real and of complete identification with It. This is also true for the other Divine Names, inasmuch as they represent aspects of the “Supreme Name” (al-ism al-aʿẓam) and represent access to It. This is true whether they are “Names of the Essence,” “Names of the Qualities,” or “Names of the Activities” of God.4 But when one considers each of these Names within its own function, it conveys “only that which corresponds to its condition,” while from the name Allāh “one can reap all the fruits (of spiritual realization, namely All-Reality),” because it is “without any conditioning particularity.”*
The mystery common to all the Divine Names is therefore that they “are” and that they actually “transmit” what they designate; thus, they allow the one who pronounces them to identify spiritually with the Named. This is not in any way the same with names of created beings, which are only analogical terms intended for the symbolic and mnemonic assimilation into thought of that which is named. This “non-total” assimilation or identification also occurs in the pronunciation of the Divine Names when a person stops at their verbal forms and doesn’t fulfill the traditional conditions of “invocation” (adh- dhikr). These conditions vary according to the religion in question and to the levels of application, and they alone can elevate that person beyond himself.
From the sensorial or formal point of view, the Divine Name is only a simple word and a vestige of mental activity, like the designation of any thing, but from the spiritual point of view it is a sacred word, a revealed ideogram that not only symbolizes but also contains, like a chalice ready to be emptied, the “real Presence” (al-ḥuḍūr) of the Named. The infinite Content of the “chalice” flows into the “heart” (al-qalb), the spiritual organ of “the invoker” (adh-dhākir), to the extent that he thirsts for It. When this “influx” occurs, the container, the Name, reveals Its identity with the Content or the Named; then the dhākir knows, according to the expression of Ibn ʿArabī, that “the Name is He”; and reaching the ultimate expression of the invocation, he realizes that the invoker, the Name, and the Invoked are but one.
The Divine Name is the mediator between the one who invokes and the One who is invoked. It is the non-human “Messenger” of God, just as the human “Messenger,” because of his total and permanent realization of the Name, is called the “invocation of God” (dhikru ʾLlāh). In truth, there is but one “Messenger,” who is manifested within the formal world in one connection in human form and in another connection as an expression of language. These two forms unite spiritually in that invocation which actualizes their shared and supra-formal content: Allāh. Anyone who invokes the Name of God, conforming to His Will, is integrated by the same into His “Messenger,” who alone is suited to lead the way to the Supreme. In the same way that the Prophet is both man and God, the Name is simultaneously speech and God. That which the Prophet accomplished in his time, namely the “direct mediation” between humanity and the Divinity, the Name achieves from generation to generation: It is the “Messenger” that is present in every era; It is the synthesis of all divine and created Names, of the entire Koranic revelation (which itself sums up all previous revelations), of all prayer and all ritual gesture, as well as of all deiform aspirations, virtuous acts, and wise thoughts; It is God Himself dwelling within and supporting the whole of creation and fully gratifying with His revelatory and saving Presence those who call to Him with sincerity. This is in accordance with God’s word transmitted by the Prophet: “I keep company with the one who invokes Me.”
The Name Allāh is the Divine Essence that knows Itself in Itself. This occurs even through the illusory appearances of Its manifestation of created beings. This illusion perpetually fades away into the Non Manifestation that is real only to the Name. Muḥyi ʾd-Dīn declares in his Book of the Name of Majesty—Allāh: “The Name Allāh is entirely non-manifestation. From within the domain of manifestation it offers, at the most, but an exhalation”;∗ and: “Allāh is a negative term (denying everything that is not He, the only Real) that secludes Itself within the (infinite and absolute) higher-order World, and he who would interpret It vanishes along with It”; or, as has already been said: “The proper signification of this Name is that It designates the supreme Essence and nothing else.” And here, in substance, is how Muḥyi ʾd-Dīn explains the symbolism of the constituent letters of the name Allāhu:*
– The first A(lif) signifies: the one Real;
– the first L(ām): His pure Knowledge of Himself;
– the second L(ām): His Knowledge of Himself through His “All-encompassing Possession,” which penetrates the illusory aspects of all that is “other than Him”;
– the L(ām) -A(lif), that is, the passing from the second L(ām) to the second A(lif) , which together form the word lā (“no”): these signify the automatic negation of any form of negation (such as ignorance or otherness) within His Essence, which is symbolized by the second A(lif);
– the H(ā) , the ideogram of Huwa (“He”): the Essence that rests in His absolutely non-manifested Selfhood;
– finally, the “u”— W(āw) that appears as the diacritical mark ḍamma above the Hā (and is pronounced only if the Name Allāh is followed in a sentence and in the nominative case by another word): this signifies the world eternally non-manifested in the absolute non-Manifestation of the one Real.5
Thus, as Muḥyi ʾd-Dīn says, “It is He alone, Huwa, that remains, and it is He that is sought” in His Name. He Himself seeks Himself through the “other,” to whom He makes known that this other is not other than He; and the “other,” which is dualistic ignorance, evaporates within His Knowledge of Himself, and “it is He only that remains.” All this is achieved in the eternal “instant” within the uncreated Name, so that, actually, ignorance is perpetually erased in the one Real that knows Itself. Yet, from the illusory point of view of this “other,” there seems to be progressive extinction of “otherness” within “Selfhood” (al-huwiyya): the “other” invokes the Name Allāh while searching for Him through the meditation of His Aspects and the concentration of the mind on His Unity, until “He alone remains.” This reintegration and dissolution of “otherness” into “Selfhood” is traced out in the Name by a secret language spoken by Sufis: in invoking the Name Allāh:
– one passes from the A(lif) to the L(ām), so that the Name is reduced to L-L-a-H, which one will read as liLlāh (“to Allāh”), which signifies that the illusory appearances of “otherness” form an integrative part of the divine All-Reality;
– in continuing the invocation, the Name is reduced to L-a-H, which must be read as la-Hu, (“to Him”), which means that man and all things essentially identify with the divine “Self,” called “Him”;
– the invocation [ultimately] reaches the H(ā), which indicates Huwa (“Him”): “it is He alone that remains.”
The Name is Essence and Knowledge of Essence; man is Essence and ignorance of Essence. After having been the representative of God or of His plan for a perfect reflection of Himself, man has become like His broken and inoperative mirror, while God’s Name is, to every degree and in all cycles of universal existence, His incorruptible and revealing Form. Earthly man is no longer attended by the real Presence of God except in Its latent and virtual state, while the Name contains this Presence in Its permanent Actualization: the Name communicates this Presence to man to the extent that the latter calls to God with a true “thirst.” Allāh made His Name known to man so that the latter would recover his lost Unity in the invocation, for He, His Name, and man are of a single Essence. In other words, Allāh is the Essence of the Name and of man; He is truly present in man, as in His Name; but after Adam’s fall, He is hidden in man and is only revealed to him by His Name.
When the Koran (29:45) says that “the invocation of Allāh is the greatest (thing of all)” it is not only affirming the superiority of the Name Allāh over all other Divine Names revealed in Arabic, but also that the most perfect invocation is the one in which God is seen as being the Invoker.∗ In truth, He who invokes, the Name, and Named are but one. This is, as we have said, the mystery of the invocation, and it is this very thing that man must achieve while invoking God. That which in itself is one, appears first of all through the “prism” of cosmic distinctivity as being separated, but God reveals the “link”—which leads to “unity”—between Himself and the one who invokes Him, in this appeal: “Remember Me [or: ‘invoke Me’] and I will remember you . . .” (Koran 2:152). God thus establishes, says Ibn ʿArabī,
the existence of His remembrance of His subjects in relation to our remembrance of Him. . . . He won’t remember you before you have remembered Him. But you will not be able to remember Him until He has granted you adequate assistance and inspired in [or: ‘breathed into’] you His invocation. [Ibn ʿArabī also says:] The invocation carried out by the servant is accomplished through the actualizing power (of the real Presence of the Lord), whereas the one performed by the Lord is accomplished by (His) real Presence (al-ḥuḍūr) .
The “effort of actualization” or the “exercise of the real Presence” (al-istiḥdār) comes about first in spiritual “retreat” (al-khalwa) ordained and supervised by a spiritual Master. Al-Ghazzālī, in his Revivification of the Sciences of Religion, says on this topic:
When the intense desire to follow this way [i.e. Sufism] seized me, I consulted one of the main Sufis, a very famous man, on the ardent recitation of the Koran. He gave different advice, saying: “The best method consists of completely cutting ties with the world, in such a way that your heart does not occupy itself with family, nor with children, nor with money, nor with homeland, nor with science, nor with government—the existence or the non-existence of these things being for you of equal value. In addition, for you to be alone in a retreat, it is necessary to accomplish among your duties of worship only the prescribed prayers, those that precede them and those that follow them, and being seated, to concentrate your thought on Allāh, without other interior occupation. You will first accomplish this by pronouncing the Name of Allāh with your tongue, repeating without ceasing: Allāh, Allāh, without losing your concentration.6 The result will be a state in which you will feel this Name in the spontaneous movement of your tongue without any effort on your part.”
Al-Ghazzālī specifies that the one who has reached the “state in which one stops the movement of the tongue and sees the word (Allāh) as flowing over it . . . moves from there to the point where he erases all traces of the word on the tongue and finds his heart continually engaged in the dhikr; he perseveres in this assiduously until it comes about that he erases the image—the letters and the form—of the word from his heart, and the sense (that is, the supra-formal and infinite Reality) of the word alone abides in his heart, present in him, as if conjoined to him, never departing from him.”
The spiritual “retreat”—which must be carried out only under the direction of an authentic Master—thus requires in the beginning “completely cutting ties with the world,” not only in the way that it surrounds us, but also, and especially, in the way that it lives within us under the form of cosmic illusion, which separates us from the one Real. This requires the continual pronunciation of the Divine Name. “Say Allāh and put aside existence and that which surrounds it, if you want to accomplish my perfection. If you accomplish this well, everything, except God, is nothingness, both individually and all together,” said Abū Madyan, the great saint of Algeria. The Sufi ʿAbd al-Qādir al-Jīlānī stated: “When you say Allāh, He answers you; none other than He enters your heart.”
To the extent that a man joins himself to the world, he distances himself from God. In attaching himself to the multiplicity of created things, he exteriorizes through his thoughts and actions the spirit that resides within him as a direct manifestation of the Divine Immanence. Though lost within the multiplicity that surrounds him and fills his soul, man does enjoy glimmers of the Divine Immanence by which all things maintain their very life and shape. Yet, he forgets that the Divine Immanence gives Itself to him and to the world in order that created beings may affirm the one Real within It, and in order that human beings, who are endowed with intelligence and free will, may contemplate Him within the Divine Immanence until there is full identification with Him. This is why man must strip his thoughts of the multiplicity of created things, detach his bodily and psychic vigor from the world, focus on God, and invoke Him with his whole heart. Then his mind, free of the fetters of illusory existence, itself goes into retreat and his whole being enters with him into his divine Essence.
According to Ibn ʿArabī,
The messenger of Allāh (may Allāh bless and give him peace!) said: “The final Hour will only come when there is no longer on the face of the earth anyone who says Allāh, Allāh!” He did not stipulate (the invocation of God) by anything other than this word Allāh, because this word is the one of the invocation practiced by elite beings, those through whom Allāh preserves this lower world, as well as every house in which they are found. When there are no longer any of them in this world, there will no longer be a protective force for the world, and then the world will come to an end and destroy itself.
And the Prophet transmitted these words from God:
Allāh the Most High has said: “O son of Adam, so long as you call upon Me, and hope in Me, I shall forgive you for what you have done, and I shall not concern (Myself with it). O son of Adam, if your sins were to reach to the clouds of the sky and were you then to ask forgiveness of Me, I would forgive you. O son of Adam, if you come to Me with so many sins that they fill the earth, and you meet Me without having ascribed partners to Me, I will forgive you with the same great amount of forgiveness.”
