III. Asceticism Rabi’a’s Asceticism and Her Prayer-Life

Just as to the Christian saint, the life of Purgation was the first stage towards the attainment of the mystic’s goal, and asceticism was enjoined on all who entered the novitiate. Only when the novice had purged himself of the carnal Self and its desires, could he hope to enter on the way which would lead to Union with the Divine. Ascetic (zahid) was the most common appellation of the Sufi, and even those who had attained to sainthood, with few exceptions, practised asceticism to the end of their lives. As a Sufi writer expresses it: “If you ask, Who is the traveller on the road (the mystic Way)? It is one who is aware of his own origin… He is the traveller who passes on speedily; he has become pure from Self as flame from smoke”. Rabi’a al-‘Adawiyya was an ascetic who followed the path of poverty and self-denial with unwavering steps to the end. Again and again her friends would have given her of their substance to alleviate her poverty and discomfort, but she would have none of their proffered gifts and looked only to the Lord she served, to provide for the needs of His servant. For some time after her release from slavery, according to ‘Attār, she retired to the desert and there lived the life of a recluse in a cell, and even after her return to Başra she lived apart from the world, so far as the constant visits of her disciples and other visitors made it possible. Al-Jahiz, our oldest authority, says that some of her friends said to Rabi’a al-Qaysiyya, “ If we were to speak¹ to the men of your kinsfolk, they would purchase a servant for you, who would look after the needs of your house “, but she said,” Verily, I should be ashamed to ask for worldly things from Him to Whom the world belongs, and how should I ask for them from those to whom it does not belong? “A similar story is told of a man who brought her forty dīnārs and said to her,” Spend them on something that you need “, and she wept and lifted up her head and said,” God knows that I am ashamed to ask Him for this world, though He rules it, and how shall I take it from one who does not rule it? “’ ‘Attār relates that some people came to see her and she was tearing a piece of meat with her teeth, and they said to her,” Have you no knife with which to cut it? “She said,” From fear of cutting off (separation from God) I have never had a knife in my house, so I have none “. He also tells a story of how Rabi’a learnt the lesson of giving up all worldly desires in order that she might serve God without distraction. Once for seven days and nights she had been fasting and had eaten nothing, and during the night she had not slept at all, but had spent every night in prayer. When she was in extremity from hunger, someone came into the house and brought her a cup of food. Rabi’a took it and went to fetch a lamp. When she returned, a cat had upset the cup. She said,” I will go and fetch a jug and break my fast (on water) “. When she brought the jug, the lamp had gone out. She intended to drink the water in the darkness, but the jug fell from her hands and was smashed to pieces. Rabi’a broke into lamentations and heaved such a sigh that it almost seemed as if the house would catch fire.^2,3,4

She said, “O my Lord, what is this which Thou art doing to wretched me?” She heard a voice saying, Have a care, if you desire it, I will endow you with all the pleasures of this world, but I shall take concern for Me out of your heart, for such concern and the pleasures of this world cannot dwell together in one heart. O Rabi’a, you have a desire and I have a desire, I cannot combine my desire and your desire in one heart. She said, When I heard this warning, then I separated my heart from worldly things and so cut off my worldly hopes that for thirty years every prayer which I have performed, I have prayed as if it were my last, and I have cut myself off from the creatures so that when day broke, from fear lest anyone should distract me from Him, I have said, “O Lord, make me occupied with myself, lest they should distract me from Thee”. The austerity of her views is shewn by a little anecdote which tells how Rabi’a went out on a feast-day, and when she returned she was asked, “What did you think of the feast?” She said, “I saw how you went out (nominally) to make the Sunna a living force and to put a stop to heresy, but you displayed a love of luxury and soft living and thereby you brought humiliation upon the Muslims”. Illness and suffering Rabi’a accepted as her Lord’s will for her, enduring them with fortitude, and she even shewed herself oblivious to pain; more than one story tells how she was unaware of injury until others reminded her of it. It is related that one day her head was struck by some boughs and began to bleed, but she paid no attention to it, and when someone said to her, “Do you not feel the pain?” she said, “My concern is to accommodate myself to His will; He has⁵ made me occupied with something other than the tangible things which you see ”. Another story to the same effect tells how one night she was making supplication and the result was that she fell asleep from the extremity of her absorption and a blood-vessel in her eye broke, but when she awoke, she was quite unaware of it. The capacity of these ascetics for enduring physical pain and rising above it is exemplified by the story of another woman, of Rabi’a’s time, named Batja, who followed the sect of Qadiriyya al-Hururiyya. Zayd, Amir of Başra, when he heard of this, took her and cut off her hands and feet. The people came to visit her in her illness and they said to her, “How do you feel, O Batja? ” she answered,” Awe of the future has distracted me from the cold of your iron “. On one occasion Rabi’a fell ill, and her sickness was serious. Her friends came and asked her what was the cause of her illness, and she said,” I looked towards Paradise and my Lord has chastened me. At daybreak my heart looked in the direction of Paradise (i.e. I longed for its joys) and my Friend has reproached me. This illness is a reproach from Him “. Her unwillingness to depend on any save God is shewn in another account by the same writer, who tells how Hasan of Başra once came to visit her when she was ill and said that on his way he saw one of the merchants of Başra at the door of Rabi’a’s cell, with a purse of gold, weeping. Said Hasan,” O merchant, why are you weeping? “He said,” On account of this ascetic of our time [ Rabi’a ], for if her blessings upon^6,7,8,9 M mankind were to cease, mankind would perish “, and he added,” I have brought somewhat as a recommendation to her, but I fear that she may refuse it. Do thou intercede for me, that she may accept it “. Hasan went in and spoke about it to Rabi’a, who looked at him out of the corner of her eye and said: Shall not He who provides for those who revile Him, provide for those who love Him? He does not refuse sustenance to one who speaks unworthily of Him, how then should He refuse sustenance to one whose soul is overflowing with love to Him? Ever since I have known Him, I have turned my back upon mankind. How should I take the wealth of someone of whom I do not know whether he acquired it lawfully or not?… Make my excuses to that merchant, that my heart may not be in bondage (to a creature). Rabi’a made clear her attitude on the subject of resignation and the renunciation of desire to certain visitors who came to see her during one of her illnesses. These were ‘Abd al-Wahid ‘Amr, and her constant visitor Sufyan. The former relates: I and Sufyan Thawri visited Rabi’a when she was sick, and from awe I was not able to begin to speak, and I said to Sufyan,” Say something “. He said (to Rabi’a),” If you would utter a prayer, (God) would relieve your suffering “. She turned her face to him and said,” O Sufyan, do you not know Who it is that wills this suffering for me, is it not God Who wills it? “He said,” Yes “. She said,” When you know this, why do you bid me ask for what is contrary to His will? It is not well to oppose one’s Beloved “. Sufyan said then,” O Rabi’a, what is your desire? “She replied,” O Sufyan, you are a learned man, how can you ask me such a question as ‘What do I desire ’? I swear by the glory of God that for twelve years I have desired fresh dates, and you know that in Başra dates are plentiful, and I have not yet tasted them. I am a servant and what has a servant to do with desire? If I will (a thing) and my Lord does not will it, this would be^10,11 unbelief. That should be willed which He wills, that you may be His true servant. If He Himself gives anything, that would be a different matter “. Sufyan was silenced and offered no more on the subject. One of her acquaintances, Muhammad b. ‘Amr, says: I went in to Rabi’a, and she was a very old woman of eighty years, as if she were a worn-out skin almost falling down, and I saw in her house a reed-mat and a clothes-stand of Persian reed, of the height of two cubits from the ground and upon it were her shrouds and the curtain of the house was made of palmleaves, and perhaps there was a mat and an earthen jug and a bed of felt, which was also her prayer-carpet. Another friend of hers, Malik Dīnār, once found her lying on an old rush mat, with a brick under her head to serve as a pillow and drinking and making her ablutions from a cracked jar and his heart was pained at the sight and he said,” I have rich friends and if you wish, I will take something from them for you “. She said, “ O Mālik, you have made a great mistake. Is it not the same One Who gives daily bread to me and to them?” Mālik said, “It is”. She said, “Will He forget the poor because of their poverty or remember the rich because of their riches?” He said, “No”. Then she said, “Since He knows my state, what have I to remind Him of? What He wills, we should also will”. Rabi’a’s devotion to the life of prayer is evident in^12,13,14,15 all the accounts given of her life, and her biographers speak frequently of her custom of spending her nights in prayer. As a modern authority on Sufism has written, “In Mohammedan mysticism it is Prayer that supplies the best evidence of personality-not the ritual prayer (salat) but the free prayer (du’a ’) and in particular the loving converse with God (munājāt) when the mystic speaks out of the depths of his heart”, and Rabi’a’s prayers reveal her personality more clearly perhaps than anything else. It is told of her that at one time she was laid aside by sickness and, in the weakness which followed it, she gave up her night-prayers and slept instead and for some days she recited her portion when the day had risen, although it was the portion appointed for the night-prayer. Then God restored her to health, but for a time, through the languor produced by sickness, she went on reciting the portion by day and neglected rising at night. Then she says: One night, while I was sleeping, it seemed to me in my sleep as if I were lifted up to a green park containing palaces and beautiful plants. While I was wandering about in it, astonished at its beauty, I saw a green bird and a maiden pursuing it as if she wished to take it, and her beauty distracted me from its beauty, and I said, “What do you want with it? Leave it alone, for truly I have never seen a bird more beautiful than that”. Then she said, “Shall I show you something more beautiful than that?” I said, “Yes, surely”. Then she took my hand and led me round that garden until she brought me to the gate of a palace and she sought to open it and it opened to her and from the door were cast rays from a candlestick the light of which shone before me and behind me, and she said to me, “Enter”, and I entered the house, in which the sight was dazzled by the beauty of it, I know nothing in the world like it and while we were going round it, there appeared to us a door opening from it on to a garden and she hastened towards it and I with her and¹⁶ there met us a band of servants, with faces like pearls, and in their hands aloeswood, and she said to them, “What do you seek?” and they said, “We seek such a one, who was drowned in the sea, as a martyr”. She said, “Will you not perfume this woman?” They said, “She had her portion in that, and she left it”. Then (Rabi’a said) she withdrew her hand from mine, and approached me and said: “Your prayers were light and your worship rest, Your sleep was ever a foe to prayer, Your life was an opportunity which you neglected, and a preparation It passes on and vanishes slowly and perishes”. Then she vanished from before my eyes and I awoke as the dawn appeared and verily I remembered it, and thought of it only as confusion of my mind and a phantom of my soul. When Rabi’a had related her dream she fell unconscious and her servant said that after this vision she never slept at night, until her death. It is related of her that at night she used to go up on to her roof and pray thus: O my Lord, the stars are shining and the eyes of men are closed, and kings have shut their doors and every lover is alone with his beloved, and here am I alone with Thee, and then she began her prayers. When she saw the dawn appearing, she would pray: O God, the night has passed and the day has dawned. How I long to know if Thou hast accepted (my prayers) or if Thou hast rejected them. Therefore console me for it is Thine to console this state of mine. Thou hast given me life and cared for me and Thine is the glory. If Thou wert to drive me from Thy door, yet would I not forsake it, for the love that I bear in my heart towards Thee.^17,18

Then she is said to have recited these verses: O my Joy and my Desire and my Refuge, My Friend and my Sustainer and my Goal, Thou art my Intimate, and longing for Thee sustains me, Were it not for Thee, O my Life and my Friend, How I should have been distraught over the spaces of the earth, How many favours have been bestowed, and how much hast Thou given me. Of gifts and grace and assistance, Thy love is now my desire and my bliss, And has been revealed to the eye of my heart that was athirst, I have none beside Thee, Who dost make the desert blossom, Thou art my joy, firmly established within me, If Thou art satisfied with me, then I O Desire of my heart, my happiness has appeared. ‘Abda bint Shūwāl, already mentioned in the last chapter, says of her: Rabi’a used to pray all night, and when the day dawned she allowed herself a light sleep in her place of prayer, until the dawn tinged the sky with gold, and I used to hear her say, when she sprang up in fear from that sleep, “O soul how long wilt thou sleep and how often wilt thou wake? Soon wilt thou sleep a sleep from which thou shalt not wake again until the trumpet call of the Day of Resurrection”. A story is related of how Rabi’a visited Hayyūna, an ascetic who practised the greatest austerity and who used to pray, “O God, I would that the day were night that I might enjoy Thy proximity”. In the middle of the night sleep overcame Rabi’a, and Hayyūna rose and came to her and kicked her with her foot, and said, “Rise up, the Bridegroom of the truly guided ones has come. The adornments of the brides of night are revealed by the light of the night-prayers”. This anecdote^19,20,21 is remarkable in that it is the only passage I have met with which makes a reference to the Spiritual Marriage of lover and Beloved, in these terms, applied to Sufis, and it appears also as if there might be a reference to the parable of the Ten Virgins. One of the biographers tells how she used to pray a thousand raka’s in the day and night, and someone said to her, “What are you seeking (to gain) by this?” and she replied, “I do not desire God’s forgiveness (by this), I do it only that the Apostle of God on the Day of Resurrection may be able to say to the rest of the Prophets, ‘Behold this woman of my community, this is her work ’”. Her friend, Sufyan al-Thawrī, relates: I approached Rabi’a, and she was in the mihrab, where she was praying till day, while I, in another corner, was praying until the time of dawn and I said, “How shall we give thanks for His grace given to us, whereby we spent the whole night in prayer?” She said, “By fasting to-morrow”. Rabi’a for the most part was filled with a radiant faith and joy in the service of God, which left little room for the gloomy fears by which Hasan of Başra was so constantly obsessed, but an old writer tells us how once, overcome by a dread of judgment, she prayed, “O my God, wilt Thou burn in Hell a heart that loves Thee?” and she heard an unseen voice speaking to her inner consciousness, “O Rabi’a, We shall not do this. Do not think of Us an Evil thought”. Among the prayers recorded by her biographer ‘Attār are several beautiful examples, shewing how prayer to her in truth was “loving converse” with her Lord, not supplication on her own behalf or on behalf of others but simply communion with the Divine^22,23,24 Friend, and perfect satisfaction in His presence. Among those quoted are the following: O my Lord, whatever share of this world Thou dost bestow on me, bestow it on Thine enemies, and whatever share of the next world Thou dost give me, give it to Thy friends. Thou art enough for me. One night Rabi’a said, “My God, when I make my prayer, take from my heart all Satanic suggestions, or through Thy generosity, accept my prayer with these suggestions”. Again she used to pray, O my Lord, if I worship Thee from fear of Hell, burn me in Hell, and if I worship Thee from hope of Paradise, exclude me thence, but if I worship Thee for Thine own sake then withhold not from me Thine Eternal Beauty. Yet another prayer was this: O my God, my concern and my desire in this world, is that I should remember Thee above all the things of this world, and in the next, that out of all who are in that world, I should meet with Thee alone. This is what I would say, “Thy will be done”. In the last sentence is fittingly summed up Rabi’a’s attitude to this life and to the Lord of life. We are given yet another prayer with which this chapter may close: O my God, the best of Thy gifts within my heart is the hope of Thee and the sweetest word upon my tongue is Thy praise, and the hours which I love best are those in which I meet with Thee. O my God, I cannot endure without the remembrance of Thee in this world and how shall I be able to endure without the vision of Thee in the next world? O my Lord, my plaint to Thee is that I am but a stranger in Thy country, and lonely among Thy worshippers.^{25,26,27,28,29}