The intoxication of one who drinks wine cannot be compared. For sometimes, those who drink wine experience sorrow, anxiety, or even weeping. This depends on the temperament of the one who drinks. Such a person is also called sekrān (intoxicated). However, such states do not occur in sekr (spiritual intoxication) on the path to Allah.
Very few people can distinguish between liveliness and intoxication. According to us, in natural science, if sorrow, weeping, anxiety, and sadness appear in one who drinks wine, this is due to the requirements of his nature and temperament. Such a person is not sekrān in the sense we intend, nor is he the sâhib (possessor) of the state of sekr.
Certain temperaments do not accept sekr. In those temperaments, not even a trace of sekr is found. The absence (ghayba) of sekr does not arise from the senses. Its absence is due to nothing other than joy and delight. Similarly, there are those who do not experience joy, who are people of contemplation, absence, and fanāʾ (annihilation in God), and who can distinguish between the types of absence and sekr. (Futūḥāt, II, 534-535)
According to the Sufis, sahw (sobriety) is the return to a state of consciousness through a powerful influx (wārid) after the state of absence (ḥāl) has passed. In the definitions of both sekr and sahw, they use the expression of a powerful influx. They state that sahw is realized through a stronger influx and that it is not a locus described by sekr. Sahw, being equal in strength, is realized by both of these influxes. These two states are mutually exclusive.
The influx of sekr is more worthy of acceptance. This influx is the possessor of the locus and has the power to prevent (other influxes). However, without a nisba (spiritual connection) and aptitude, it does not become established in that locus. Even if all influxes are equal, this locus, due to the aforementioned nisba and aptitude, seeks the influx appropriate to itself. If another influx dominates in that locus and a different influx arrives, immediately the existing nisba and aptitude demand the ruling of that influx in the state in which it is found, and thereby remove the dominance of the influx other than sekr or sahw. However, this situation arises not from the strength of that influx or the weakness of the other, but due to the strength of the nisba and aptitude.
Know that, on this path, sahw occurs only after sekr. There is no true state of sahw before sekr, nor is such a person a possessor of sahw. Nevertheless, such a person is not called a possessor of sekr, but rather a possessor of presence (ḥuḍūr), or baqāʾ (subsistence in God), or something else. (Futūḥāt, II, 536)
According to them, sekr is the loss of what one possesses while in a state of joy. This is among the maqāms (spiritual stations) of the lovers. In this station, everyone except those who possess firmness (tamkīn) has stumbled. (Rawḍa, 666)
It should be known: Everything from the rulings of sekriyyet (the state of sekr) belongs to the maqām of walāya (friendship with God). Everything from the rulings of sahw belongs to the maqām of nubuwwa (prophethood). The most perfect of the awliyāʾ (friends of God) in following the prophets (upon them be blessings and peace) have a share in this station through following and by means of sahw.
The Bistāmīs consider sekr superior to sahw. For this reason, in one of his ecstatic utterances (shaṭaḥāt), Abū Yazīd al-Bistāmī said: "My banner is higher than the banner of Muḥammad." (In this statement,) he meant by his own banner the banner of walāya, and by the banner of Muḥammad, the banner of nubuwwa, preferring the banner of walāya oriented toward sekr over the banner of nubuwwa oriented toward sahw. The view of some Sufis that walāya is superior to nubuwwa is of this kind. This is because they see walāya as directed toward the Real (al-Ḥaqq), and nubuwwa as directed toward creation. There is no doubt that something directed toward the Real is superior to something directed toward creation.
Some Sufis, regarding the orientation in this statement, have said: The walāya of the Prophet is superior to his nubuwwa. In my view, such statements are far from being correct. For the orientation in nubuwwa is not only toward creation. Rather, together with this orientation, it is also toward the Real. For their inward is with the Real, and their outward is with creation. That which is oriented solely toward creation...