In every era, there are twenty-four individuals known as the rijāl al-fath (men of spiritual opening). Their number neither increases nor decreases. Allah has opened the hearts (qulūb) of these friends of God (awliyāʾ) to maʿrifa (experiential knowledge of God) and to secrets. Allah has made these men as many as the hours for every hour. Among them, there are those to whom knowledge and maʿrifa are unveiled at any hour of the night or day. This state pertains to the person of that particular hour. They are in different places and never come together. Each has a place where he will remain eternally. Of these, two are in Yemen, four in the eastern lands, and six in the Maghrib. The rest are in other regions. The verse (āya) concerning them in Allah’s Book is as follows: “Whatever mercy Allah opens for the people, none can withhold it; and whatever He withholds, none can release it thereafter.” (al-Fāṭir 35:2) (Futūḥāt, II, 15)
Fath (spiritual opening) and the state of fath (ḥāl al-fath) is the condition in which creation (takwīn) pertains to things. Or, if you wish, it is the state in which power (qudra) pertains to that which is decreed (maqdūr). In this matter—that is, the connection of power to the decreed—no one besides Allah has any taste (dhawq) of it (there is no one besides Him who possesses this power, and no one besides Him can experience this taste). There, in the domain of power, by way of taste, neither a manifestation (tajallī) nor an unveiling (kashf) occurs. For in none besides Allah is there power or act, for that which cannot be delimited...