101:0 In the name of God, the All-Merciful, the Ever-Merciful.

In the name of God is a word that makes him who has faith in it secure from the disappearance of blessings. He who mentions it wins the bliss of this world and the afterworld. He who recognizes it and believes in it will be felicitous with a felicity that is never wretched, he will find a kingdom that never decays, and he will subsist in exaltedness and elevation.

This is the name of the Renowned, whose name is the reminder of spirits, the everlasting happiness of hearts, the repose of the spirits of the friends, and the ease of the sorrowful. It is the title-page of a book which is a mark of the Friend and whose purport is the eternal love. This book is the remedy for unsettledness and the security against severance. It is both polo-ball and bat, its steed yearning and its field His love. Burning for Him is the rose, and recognizing Him the garden. It is the book from which the tree of tawḥīd drinks water and whose fruit and produce is friendship with the Real. God says, “The servant does not cease remembering Me nor I remembering him until he loves Me and I love him.”

One of the great ones said, “When I remember who I am, I feel lowly, but when I recall to whom I belong, I boast. When I look at myself and see my own doing, I ask who is more miserable than I. When I look at You and see myself as Your servant, I ask who is greater than I.”

When my gaze falls on my own clay,

I see nothing worse in the world.

When I pass beyond my attributes,

I look at myself from the Throne.

The Pir of the Tariqah said, “When I look at myself, I become all burning and need. When I look at Him, I become all caresses and mysteries. When I look at myself I say,

“My two eyes full of water, my liver full of fire,

my hands full of wind, my head full of dust!

“When I look at Him I say,

“What does the Throne do that it does not carry my saddlecloth?

In my heart I carry the saddlecloth of Your ruling and decree.

The scent of the spirit comes to my lips when I speak of You,

the branch of exaltedness grows from my heart when I suffer Your trial.” [DS 933]