Baqāʾ al-baqāʾ is more perfect than baqāʾ (baqāʾ: subsistence in God). The possessor of this baqāʾ is in hudā (guidance) and has attained the perfection of taqwa (God-consciousness).
Principle: Whenever baqāʾ is present, ṣaḥw (sobriety) is also present. When it departs, the state of sukr (spiritual intoxication) comes to the one who possesses maḥw (effacement).
Benefit: That which is enduring (bāqī) is at the same time perishing (fānī). However, not every perishing thing is enduring.
Principle: The maqām (spiritual station) of baqāʾ encompasses the maqām of jamʿ (union), while baqāʾ al-baqāʾ encompasses the maqām of jamʿ al-jamʿ (union of unions).
Benefit: Jamʿ is different from jamʿiyya (collectivity). Jamʿ is to witness the oneness of the light. Jamʿiyya is absence in presence. Jamʿiyya is to be with the Real (al-Ḥaqq) while being absent from creation. Jamʿ is to witness the Real without creation. In the ḥāl (spiritual state), the maqām of jamʿiyya is more perfect than the maqām of jamʿ.
Principle: To be in the maqām of jamʿ without sharia (the sacred law) is heresy; to be in the maqām of farq (differentiation) without jamʿ is division.
Benefit: Ḥaqīqa (inner reality) has concealed the inward, while sharia has revealed the outward. Therefore, in terminology, bāṭin (inward) is used in the sense of ḥaqīqa, and ẓāhir (outward) in the sense of sharia.
Principle: The maqām of baqāʾ is only valid after the maqām of fanāʾ (annihilation in God).
Benefit: The walī (friend of God) is given tamkīn (firmness) in the maqām of baqāʾ. In the maqām of baqāʾ al-baqāʾ, he acts with tamkīn in talwīn (changeability).
Principle: The attribution of baqāʾ to the enduring one (bāqī) varies according to what existed before fanāʾ. This is the reason for the diversity of maqāms and the differences of ḥāls.
Benefit: Some people only find baqāʾ after fanāʾ; this is the case for most. However, some, those who have access to the realities of the Prophets, find the baqāʾ that is accessible to the elect at the very beginning. These are the perfect inheritors.
Principle: Baqāʾ requires the existence of fanāʾ. This occurs through the annihilation of human attributes that must be purified and removed.
Benefit: Baqāʾ is the mirror of the manifestation (tajallī). Fanāʾ is the expansion of transformation (taḥallī). The enduring one (bāqī) is upon the throne of manifestation. Principle: Even if the path of the sālik (spiritual traveler) is opened, the baqāʾ of the Eternal (Qadīm) is not the same as the baqāʾ of the contingent (ḥādith). The baqāʾ of the contingent is, in reality, metaphorical.
Benefit: The loftiness of baqāʾ is only realized through the lowness of fanāʾ. Stand at the door like a trustee; do not calculate, and you will attain your desired goal.
Principle: The attribute of baqāʾ in the Prophets is ʿiṣma (infallibility) and hudā; in the walīs it is preservation (ḥifẓ) and care (riʿāya). Whoever attains baqāʾ is safe from shaqāʾ (wretchedness in the sight of Allah).
Benefit: The one who advances in the degree of fanāʾ witnesses the beginning of the maqām of baqāʾ. At the beginning, he is given glad tidings of what will be at the end. For it is the beginning of deliverance from acceptance in the maqām of arrival (wuṣūl). (Qawānīn, 47)
balāʾ / balwā (balīyya) Both the little and the much, the sweet and the bitter, the beginning and the end, in short, everything belonging to the dunya (this world), is Allah's testing of His servant and his imtiḥān (trial). However numerous, varied, and diverse the tribulations of the dunya may be, they are all encompassed in these two qualities: shukr (gratitude) and sabr (patient endurance). The servant is either in a position to show gratitude for a blessing or to show patience in the face of a tribulation. (Ādābī, 82)
Balāʾ is Allah's testing of His servant by exposing the reality of his state through afflictions. (Lumaʿ, 429)
The Sufis, by the word balāʾ, mean Allah's testing of His friends with various hardships, illnesses, and pains. For the stronger the balāʾ, the closer the servant becomes to Allah. For balāʾ is the garment of the walīs, the cradle of the pure (aṣfiyāʾ), and the nourishment of the Prophets. (Hujwīrī, 471)
Prophethood (nubuwwa), messengership (risāla), walāya (sainthood), maʿrifa (gnosis), and maḥabba (love) are all founded upon balāʾ. If one is able to bear balāʾ...