The Seventeenth Word

 

A fruit of the pine, cedar, juniper, and wild poplar trees in the uplands of Barla

 

During my exile, while watching from a mountain top the awe-inspiring forms of the pine, cedar, and juniper trees and the tremendous spectacle they made, a gentle breeze blew. The scene was transformed into a magnificent, delightful, and noisy display of dancing, a rapturous performance of praising and glorifying God. My enjoyment changed into watching for instruction and listening for wisdom. I recalled these Kurdish lines of Ahmed-i Jizri:

 

Everyone has hastened to gaze at Your Beauty;

they are putting on airs due to Your Beauty.

 

To express the meanings of the instruction it derived from the scene, my heart wept as follows:

 

O Lord, all living creatures hasten from everywhere to gaze on

You, on Your Beauty.

 

From every corner they emerge and look on the face of the earth, which is a work of Your Art.

Emerging from above and below, they cry out like heralds.

 

Those herald-like trees dance in pleasure at the beauty of Your inscriptions.

 

Filled with delight at Your Art’s perfection, they are joyful and sing sweet melodies.

It is as if the sweetness of their melodies fills them with renewed joy and makes them sway coyly.

At last they have started dancing and are seeking ecstasy.

 

It is through the work of Divine Mercy that all living creatures receive instruction in the glorification and Prayer particular to each.

 

 

 

After receiving instruction, each tree stands on a high rock and raises its head toward the Divine Throne.

 

Each, like Shahbaz-i Kalender,76 stretches out hundreds of hands to the

Divine Court and assumes an imposing position of worship.

 

They make their twigs curl like dancing love-locks, and arouse fine ardor and exalted pleasures in those who are watching.

 

As if the most sensitive strings were touched, they sing love songs at a high pitch, and make even the dead hear their eternal tunes arising from the sweet sorrow caused by touching.

 

A meaning comes to mind: They recall the weeping caused by the painful fading of metaphorical love and deeply touching sighs.

 

They make audible the melancholy songs that lovers sing at their beloveds’ grave.

 

They seem to make the eternal tunes and sorrowful voices heard by the dead, who no longer hear worldly voices and words.

 

The spirit understands from this that things respond with glorification to the manifestation of the Majestic Maker’s Names; they perform a graceful chant.

 

The heart reads the meaning of Divine Unity in this exalted, miraculous spectacle from these trees, each of which is like an embodied Qur’anic verse .

 

In other words, there is so wonderful an order, art, and wisdom in their creation that if all “natural causes” were conscious agents able to do whatever they wished, they could not imitate them even if they joined all their forces.

 

On seeing this, the soul thinks that the earth is revolving in a clamorous tumult of separation and seeks an enduring pleasure. It has received the meaning: “You will find it by abandoning your adoration of the world.”

 

From such chanting of animals, plants, trees and air, the mind discerns a most meaningful order of creation, inscriptions of wisdom, and treasury of secret truths. It concludes that everything glorifies the All-Majestic Maker.

 

The desirous soul receives such pleasure from the murmuring air and whispering leaves that it forgets mundane pleasures, the basis of its life, and seeks to realize self-annihilation in this pleasure of truth.

 

The imagination beholds the scene as if angels appointed for trees were embodied in each tree, from whose branches hang many flutes.

 

It is as though the Eternal Monarch clothed these angels in trees for a magnificent parade accompanied with the sounds of countless flutes. So the trees show themselves to be conscious and meaningful.

 

The flutes’ tunes are pure and touching, as if issuing from an elevated heavenly orchestra.

 

The mind does not hear the sorrowful wails of separation that all lovers, including primarily Mawlana Jalalud-Din ar-Rumi, hear;

 

Rather, it hears the grateful thanks offered to the All-Living, Self Subsistent One for His Mercy, and praises for His sustaining.

 

Since the trees are bodies and their leaves are tongues, a breeze makes each tree to recite with its thousands of tongues: “He, He (meaning God).” As the glorification and praise of their lives, they proclaim their Maker to be the All-Living and Self-Subsistent.

 

All things form a universal circle to proclaim God’s Unity: “There is no deity but God,” and perform their duties.

 

In the tongue of disposition, they often declare “O Ultimate Truth,” and ask for their vital needs from His treasury of Mercy. Through the tongue of being favored with life, they continuously recite His Name: “O All-Living One.”

 

O All-Living, O Self-Subsistent! For the sake of Your Names, the All-Living and Self-Subsistent, endow this wretched heart with life, and show this confused mind the right direction. Amin.

 

Bediuzzaman Said Nursi

 

 

76 Shahbaz-i Kalender: A famous hero who, through the guidance of ‘Abdul-Qadir al-Jilani, took refuge at the Divine Court and achieved the rank of sainthood.