At that time I observed that like qibla-directing compasses showing the course to be  followed  in ships,  each of  the  matters  of the  practices,  even small  points  of conduct,  were  like  electric  switches  among  innumerable  hazardous,  dark  ways. Whenever in the  course of that spiritual journeying I saw myself under awesome pressure  overwhelmed  by  truly burdensome  loads,  I followed  the  matters  of  the practices touching on the situation, I experienced a lightness as though all my burdens were being lifted from me. By submitting  to  them, I was saved from doubts and scruples,  that  is,  from  such  anxieties  as:  “Is  this   course  of  action  right,  is  it beneficial?” But if I gave them up, I looked and saw that the  pressure was intense; there were numerous ways and it could not be known where they led. The load was heavy, and  I was utterly powerless. My view  was  short, and the way, dark.  But whenever I adhered to the Prophet’s (UWBP) practices, the way was lit up and seen to be safe. I felt as though the load was being lightened and the pressure lifted. At those times I confirmed through my own observations what Imam-i Rabbani had said.

FOURTH POINT

At one time, I saw myself in a strange world that arose from a state of mind produced by contemplating death and affirming the proposition “Death is a reality,”7 and from the transience and passing of the world. I saw myself as a corpse standing at the head of three huge corpses.

One: I was like a tombstone at the head of the immaterial corpse of all living creatures,  with which I was connected through my life and which had entered the grave of the past.

The Second: In the graveyard of the globe on the face this century, which was the tombstone at the head of the vast corpse buried in the grave of the past of all the species of living creatures, with which mankind is connected through its life, I was a mere point that would be swiftly erased, an ant that would quickly die.

The Third: Since the universe is certain to die on Doomsday, that is how I saw it. In  addition to seeing myself in terror at the death agonies of that vast corpse, in wonder and astonishment at its death, my own death too, which is certain to occur in the future, appeared to be happening at that time. In accordance with “And if they turn away (to the end of the  verse),”(9:129) on my death all beings, all my beloveds, turned their backs on me, abandoning me and leaving me alone. My spirit was being driven towards the future on the side of post-eternity, which resembles a boundless ocean. Whether it wanted or not, it would be cast into the ocean.

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7   See, Ahmad ibn Muhammad, Kitab Usul al-Din, i, 213; al-Qinnawji, Qatf al-Thamar fi Bayan

‘Aqida Ahl al-Athar, i, 121.