Mistyka Al-Halladża (858-922 r.) w perspektywie dialogu Kościoła z islamem

Abstract

There may be distinguished three principal approaches of man to the Absolute: theism, pantheism and non-theism, and accordingly we may speak about three types of mysticism: the mysticism of unification, that of identity and that of the simple liberation. The latter occurs when the reaching of the Absolute is convergent with a negative moment of the mysticism i. e. the liberation from the relative (the case of the primitive Buddhism). The mysticism of identity is linked with a panthestic approach to the Absolute. In Brahmanism, it occurs, in the form of panentheism. The theistic approach underlies the mysticism of unification, God being transcendent and personal, distinct from the world and experiencing man (Christianity, Islam). Al-Hallaj (858-922) is the principal representative of the mysticism of unification in Islam. The atmosphere in which he lived and preached his message of love to God was extremely unfavorable, since Islam tended to consider God as being, not only inaccessible, but also beyond any human participation, as having revealed his Word without revealing himself. Al-Hallaj carried the doctrine of unification with Allah to the point where his mystical exclamations and „theopatic locutions” caused scandal and were regarded as blasphemous. On account of the vehemence with which he kept insisting on the doctrine of the mutual love between God and the creature, he encountered increasing opposition and persecution until in the end he was put to death. He was flogged, mutilated, exposed on a gibbet, and finally decapitated and burned. He died calling God’s mercy on the executioners who were cutting off his hands and feet. In his mystical doctrine, al-Hallaj proclaimed the primacy of love. He called isolation or aloneness (lairid in Arabic) the culmination of enstasy in the experience of „fulfilled possession”, which was a product of total absorption or „extinction” in the divine Absolute (fana in Arabic). The next step, however, toward unification in God was the complete suppression of isolation followed by outward movement toward the depths of the „totally Other” (ecstasy). Al-H allaj discovered certain specific Christian tenets such as the crucifying aspect of unitive love, together with the intercessory value of the suffering implied by this love. Louis Massignon (1863-1962), a prominent French scholar and humanist, exemplifies in an outstanding way the effects of the mutual deep acquaintance in the way of the religious dialogue, the good influence an alien religion may have. He was powerfully attracted – during his archaeological work – by the personality of al-Hallaj and certain curious parallelisms between the Baghdad mystic and Jesus, and was brought back to his Christian faith lost during the adolescence crisis. A mysticism modelled on that of al-Hallaj and yet also deeply Christian came to occupy the Centre of his life, and as a married man he was ordained priest of the Greek Catholic rite. The presentation of the personality and the mystic way of al-Hallaj – in the Islamo-Christian dialogue – may make Christians more sensitive to the spiritual possibilities of other religions and to the elements of Truth and Grace that exist in them.