The term ṭilṣam (talisman) is so named (in terms of its root letters) because it is something that is reversed or inverted. That is, the ṭilṣam dominates or is imposed upon anyone who appoints it as a representative.
It is said: "It becomes dominant over (is imposed upon) whomever makes it dominant." Anything that is made dominant continues to be called 'talismanic' as long as it remains so. For this reason, in the case of the ṭilṣam, there is no aspect of dominating intellects.
The strongest form of this is as follows: The ṭilṣam does not leave those intellects that accept dense divine reports and prophetic sciences until those intellects submit to the taʾwīl (interpretive explanation) and mīzān (criterion) of these reports and sciences. Unless the ṭilṣam reaches this level, intellects do not accept it. This is the most difficult form of imposing dominion over the world. The possessor (ṣāḥib) of this ṭilṣam is under protection. Allah has granted him much knowledge concerning Himself. Thought has been made dominant over him. Allah has made thought dominant over him so that, by reflecting on Himself, he may know any matter only through Allah. Otherwise, this thing that has been made dominant over him says to the intellect: 'O intellect, without me you cannot know Allah!'
Another ṭilṣam is ḥayāl (imagination). Allah has imposed it over meanings (has made it dominant over meanings). Imagination adorns meanings with substances that can manifest a meaning which has not yet fully settled in them, but for which there is also no obstacle to its manifestation.
A third ṭilṣam is the ṭilṣam of customs. Allah has imposed it over rational souls (nātiq nafs). When something is lost from among these, a sovereignty and an effective power, which it seeks and possesses, manifests over it. People can only distinguish themselves through the elevation of these three ṭilṣams. (al-Futūḥāt, III, 227)
It itself is the center of the enmūzaj (enmüzec) sphere and the pole (quṭb) of the mines of governance.