I think this article is one that could change anyone’s perception about life, love and God.
It is about a true historical character and events I have compiled from various sources I would like you to know about one sufi saint. I love the saint very much, because his character can influence anyone’s life very deeply.
There have been many mystics, and there will be many mystics, but I don't think anybody will have the same taste as Al-Hillaj Mansoor. He was rare in every sense.
Mansoor (858-922 A.D. - 64 years)
Full name: Abu-al-Mughith al-Husayn ibn Mansur al-Hallaj
"Mansur" is his father's surname, his name is "ibn Mansur", meaning "son of Mansur", his personal name is "Husayn". "Al-Hallaj" means "wool carder", a reference to his families profession (though some, like Idries Shah, disagree, and say this is a Sufi name).
Al-Hillaj Mansoor. A sufi mystic. Disciple and an early student of another great sufi saint Al-Junnaid!
Mansoor was born in Iran in 858 AD.
People say that when he was in his youth, he memorized the whole Quran.
He has not written any books, just a few of his declarations have been collected by his family and friends and preserved in a work called Kitab al Tawasin (Ta Sin al Azal). Mansoor never had any followers, because he was a man who would never accept followers, imitators – he only accepted lovers and friends.
But Mansoor became the most precious name in the whole Sufi tradition; and the tradition is rich: Bahauddin, Jalaluddin, Hassan, Rabiya, Mansoor's own master, Junnaid, and thousands of others who have become enlightened.
Mansoor has a beauty as far as his words are concerned, a tremendous poetry, far superior to the KORAN.
When someone asked Mansoor: What is God?
Al-Hillaj Mansoor says:
It is the gathering together then the silence
then the loss of words and the awareness
then the discovering and the nakedness.
and it is the fire clay then the fire
then the clarity and the cold
then the darkness then the sun.
and it is the orgy then the casting away of cares
then the wish and the approach
then the conjunction then the joy.
and it is the strain then the relaxation
then the disappearance and the separation
then the union...
then the fusion.
People could not understand him. This happens always. You cannot understand any point other than your own. It becomes a danger to you because accepting something requires you to change from your position; and you fear to change your present state. If you accept it, then you accept that there is some possibility that is different from what you know or perceive. That hurts the ego, which humiliates. You would like to destroy a Mansoor or a Christ or a Socrates just for a single reason: that you cannot conceive, you cannot concede, that there is a possibility of some other standpoint than yours. You seem to believe that you are the last thing in existence; that you are right, you know it all, you are in control of your life, you are the paradigm, that you are the climax, that there is no beyond. The religious mind is always open. The religious mind is never confined by its own limitations. It keeps remembering that there is no end to growth; one can go on growing.
This man, Mansoor, became a man of unique individuality. Wherever he went he was immediately recognized; it was impossible to miss him. He came to India too. In fact, because his Master, al-Junaid, told him, 'It is better if you start travelling into other countries, otherwise you will be caught,' he travelled to faraway countries. Everywhere he was recognized immediately. No one could not miss him. If he was standing in a crowd of ten thousand people, you would be able to see him. His presence was immense, huge, enormous. Once you had seen him, all other persons would look pale, faint, flat. So sooner or later he would be recognized and he would have to leave the country because trouble would arise.
He went to many countries in the Middle East – but wherever he went it was okay for a few days -- he could live without being recognised -- but not for long.
Mansoor pilgrimaged to Mecca and later moved to Iraq and shared sufi teachings to masses. So finally, he went back to Baghdad and said to Junaid, his Master, 'It is futile. I get caught everywhere. So why not here?'
It happened that for nine years before al-Hillaj Mansoor was crucified he was confined in a jail.
And he was tremendously happy because he used those nine years for constant meditation. Outside there were always disturbances, distractions -- friends, followers, the society, the world, the worries. He was very happy. The day he was put into jail he thanked God from his very heart. He said, 'You love me so much. Now you have given me complete protection from the world and there is nothing left except you and me.' THEN THE UNION... THEN THE FUSION.
Those nine years were of tremendous absorption. He had gone farther in the same direction. His direction was that he started declaring, 'AN-EL-HAQ! I am the truth, I am the reality.'
His Master, Al-Junaid, tried to persuade him in many ways -- 'Don't say these things! Keep them inside you, because the people won't understand it, they will think you are dis-respecting them and you will be getting into trouble unnecessarily!'
However, it was beyond Mansoor. Whenever he was in that state - what Sufis call HAL -, he would start singing and dancing. In addition, those utterances would simply overflow from him; it was not possible for him to control them. There was nobody to control; all control was lost. Junaid understood his state, but he knew the state of the people too - that sooner or later Mansoor would be thought to be anti-religious, against existing traditions and culture.
His declaration, 'I am Reality,' was a fact, his experience was there behind it, but people did not understand it. They would take it as arrogance, dis-respectful, as ego, and there would be trouble. And the trouble came.
After nine years, they decided that he had not changed a bit; in fact he had grown deeper into it. Now he was continuously declaring, 'AN-EL-HAQ!!' So finally, they decided that he had to be crucified.
When this man was being carried from the cell, they tried to pull him out but they could not. Then there was only one way: his Master Al-Junaid was asked to come and help because the time was passing and Mansoor had to be crucified and they could not get him out.
If you start living in God you become intolerable to the so-called society. The society lives in hypocrisy. It cannot tolerate truth. Truth has to be crucified. When Mansoor is gone you can go on talking about him. But when he is there he is a fire. Only those who are ready to be consumed by the fire will be ready to fall in love with Mansoor
Somebody asked Mansoor, (the greatest mystic ever), 'What is the ultimate in Sufi experience?' Mansoor said, 'Tomorrow, tomorrow you will see what the ultimate in Sufi experience is.' Nobody knew what was going to happen the next day. The man asked, 'Why not today?' Al-Hillaj said, 'You just wait. It is going to happen tomorrow -- the ultimate.' And the next day he was to be crucified.
Al-Junaid came and he said, 'Mansoor, now listen. A thousand and one times I have told you to surrender to God. If he wants you to be crucified, then be ordinary and be crucified. Let him do his work. Enough is enough?'
When he was taken out of the gallows in front of the crowds, it was very difficult to kill him.
And when he was being crucified he shouted loudly for his friend who had asked the question. He said, 'Where are you hiding in the crowd? Now come on and see the ultimate in Sufism. This is what it is.'
Thousands of people had gathered to watch. Al-Junnaid, was also present. Of course he was absolutely against what was happening, but the weakness of the good. Seeing the majority he remained silent.
Junaid knew that Mansoor was born after thousands of years; he was one of the rarest flowers. Junnaid had been a teacher of thousands, but none of his students, none of his disciples had reached to the same heights as Mansoor -- all this he understood.
People were throwing stones before the assassination began. He did not want people to know that he was not throwing stones, so instead of throwing a stone he threw a roseflower, just to show that he had thrown. Now in thousands of stones, who can find out what he had thrown? People saw that he had thrown something.
But Mansoor could see. When thousands of stones were falling on him, hitting him, and blood was flowing all over his body, he could see that a roseflower also fell on his face. And he knew that this roseflower could only be thrown by his master Junnaid. He shouted from his cross, "Junnaid, these thousands of stones are not hurting me so much as your roseflower; it has created a wound in my very soul."
This statement is tremendous: "Thousands of stones have not hurt me. These are people who don't know me -- but you know me; I had grown under your love. Still, instead of protesting, you are so cowardly that you are afraid that if you don't throw something people may start suspecting that you may be a friend..."
And tears came to his eyes. And Mansoor said, "These tears are not for these stones; these stones are not worth my tears. These tears are for the man who has thrown the roseflower to me." And still Junnaid remained silent.
The good person is responsible. The silent person, the person who has understood is responsible for all that has happened in the history of human kind against the people who were just pure love, pure silence, pure godliness and pure compassion.
But perhaps nothing can be said to those good people either, because if they had come out there would have been another assassination and nothing else. That's what Junnaid said afterwards, and he was right.
Other disciples asked him, "It was very shameful when he called out your name. You behaved as if you were not Junnaid. It is shameful that you did not protest when your greatest disciple was being tortured -- tortured brutally."
No, even animals don't torture in that way. If you want to kill someone, kill. But to cut him piece by piece is so condemnable. The other disciples said, "You should have protested."
Junnaid said, "Do you think it would have saved him? I have also thought about it. It is not that I have not felt the tragedy, I have felt as much hurt as Mansoor. I loved him, but I knew that if I had come out and protested, then instead of one man, two men would have been assassinated. Nothing would have been achieved by it."
But still it would have been better that two men were assassinated instead of one, because there may have been a third man who would have come out, and three men may have provoked courage in many more. It is not that in that vast crowd there was only Junnaid who saw that it was absolutely inhuman and ugly -- and there was no crime.
The crime was simply that Al- Mansoor had said, "I am Truth," ana'l haq”, and simultaneously he said, "It is not that only I am God -- you are also. I know it; you still have to know it. That's the only difference."
One thousand wounds were made on his body -- still he was alive. Then they started cutting off his limbs, but still he was alive. Mansoor was killed part by part.
Mansoor has become an eternal light, for the simple reason that he was killed, brutally killed and primitively assassinated - yes, chopped into parts. Jesus' death compared to Mansoor's looks very human, compassionate. Jesus' crucifixion is far more sophisticated; Socrates' poisoning is even more sophisticated, but nobody has suffered as much as Al-Hillaj Mansoor.
First they cut his legs -- they killed him piece by piece, just to torture him as much as possible, to the optimum -- then they cut his hands. then his eyes were taken out and they inserted his eyes with hot iron rods, then his tongue was cut out -- they went on piece by piece - then his head was cut off -- in parts, in pieces.
People like al-Hillaj only declare, not out of any egoism -- they don't have any ego, that's why they declare, "ana'l haq!"
There are two traditions in the world who have created the most enlightened people: one is Zen, born out of Buddha's insight, and another is Sufism, born out of Mohammed's insight. These two traditions have created the greatest light in the world. But you cannot find a single name in Zen compared to Mansoor, for the simple reason that no Zen master was chopped up, killed, crucified
God is energy for a man of the state of Mansoor – present also in everyone of us.
It is about a true historical character and events I have compiled from various sources I would like you to know about one sufi saint. I love the saint very much, because his character can influence anyone’s life very deeply.
There have been many mystics, and there will be many mystics, but I don't think anybody will have the same taste as Al-Hillaj Mansoor. He was rare in every sense.
Mansoor (858-922 A.D. - 64 years)
Full name: Abu-al-Mughith al-Husayn ibn Mansur al-Hallaj
"Mansur" is his father's surname, his name is "ibn Mansur", meaning "son of Mansur", his personal name is "Husayn". "Al-Hallaj" means "wool carder", a reference to his families profession (though some, like Idries Shah, disagree, and say this is a Sufi name).
Al-Hillaj Mansoor. A sufi mystic. Disciple and an early student of another great sufi saint Al-Junnaid!
Mansoor was born in Iran in 858 AD.
People say that when he was in his youth, he memorized the whole Quran.
He has not written any books, just a few of his declarations have been collected by his family and friends and preserved in a work called Kitab al Tawasin (Ta Sin al Azal). Mansoor never had any followers, because he was a man who would never accept followers, imitators – he only accepted lovers and friends.
But Mansoor became the most precious name in the whole Sufi tradition; and the tradition is rich: Bahauddin, Jalaluddin, Hassan, Rabiya, Mansoor's own master, Junnaid, and thousands of others who have become enlightened.
Mansoor has a beauty as far as his words are concerned, a tremendous poetry, far superior to the KORAN.
When someone asked Mansoor: What is God?
Al-Hillaj Mansoor says:
It is the gathering together then the silence
then the loss of words and the awareness
then the discovering and the nakedness.
and it is the fire clay then the fire
then the clarity and the cold
then the darkness then the sun.
and it is the orgy then the casting away of cares
then the wish and the approach
then the conjunction then the joy.
and it is the strain then the relaxation
then the disappearance and the separation
then the union...
then the fusion.
People could not understand him. This happens always. You cannot understand any point other than your own. It becomes a danger to you because accepting something requires you to change from your position; and you fear to change your present state. If you accept it, then you accept that there is some possibility that is different from what you know or perceive. That hurts the ego, which humiliates. You would like to destroy a Mansoor or a Christ or a Socrates just for a single reason: that you cannot conceive, you cannot concede, that there is a possibility of some other standpoint than yours. You seem to believe that you are the last thing in existence; that you are right, you know it all, you are in control of your life, you are the paradigm, that you are the climax, that there is no beyond. The religious mind is always open. The religious mind is never confined by its own limitations. It keeps remembering that there is no end to growth; one can go on growing.
This man, Mansoor, became a man of unique individuality. Wherever he went he was immediately recognized; it was impossible to miss him. He came to India too. In fact, because his Master, al-Junaid, told him, 'It is better if you start travelling into other countries, otherwise you will be caught,' he travelled to faraway countries. Everywhere he was recognized immediately. No one could not miss him. If he was standing in a crowd of ten thousand people, you would be able to see him. His presence was immense, huge, enormous. Once you had seen him, all other persons would look pale, faint, flat. So sooner or later he would be recognized and he would have to leave the country because trouble would arise.
He went to many countries in the Middle East – but wherever he went it was okay for a few days -- he could live without being recognised -- but not for long.
Mansoor pilgrimaged to Mecca and later moved to Iraq and shared sufi teachings to masses. So finally, he went back to Baghdad and said to Junaid, his Master, 'It is futile. I get caught everywhere. So why not here?'
It happened that for nine years before al-Hillaj Mansoor was crucified he was confined in a jail.
And he was tremendously happy because he used those nine years for constant meditation. Outside there were always disturbances, distractions -- friends, followers, the society, the world, the worries. He was very happy. The day he was put into jail he thanked God from his very heart. He said, 'You love me so much. Now you have given me complete protection from the world and there is nothing left except you and me.' THEN THE UNION... THEN THE FUSION.
Those nine years were of tremendous absorption. He had gone farther in the same direction. His direction was that he started declaring, 'AN-EL-HAQ! I am the truth, I am the reality.'
His Master, Al-Junaid, tried to persuade him in many ways -- 'Don't say these things! Keep them inside you, because the people won't understand it, they will think you are dis-respecting them and you will be getting into trouble unnecessarily!'
However, it was beyond Mansoor. Whenever he was in that state - what Sufis call HAL -, he would start singing and dancing. In addition, those utterances would simply overflow from him; it was not possible for him to control them. There was nobody to control; all control was lost. Junaid understood his state, but he knew the state of the people too - that sooner or later Mansoor would be thought to be anti-religious, against existing traditions and culture.
His declaration, 'I am Reality,' was a fact, his experience was there behind it, but people did not understand it. They would take it as arrogance, dis-respectful, as ego, and there would be trouble. And the trouble came.
After nine years, they decided that he had not changed a bit; in fact he had grown deeper into it. Now he was continuously declaring, 'AN-EL-HAQ!!' So finally, they decided that he had to be crucified.
When this man was being carried from the cell, they tried to pull him out but they could not. Then there was only one way: his Master Al-Junaid was asked to come and help because the time was passing and Mansoor had to be crucified and they could not get him out.
If you start living in God you become intolerable to the so-called society. The society lives in hypocrisy. It cannot tolerate truth. Truth has to be crucified. When Mansoor is gone you can go on talking about him. But when he is there he is a fire. Only those who are ready to be consumed by the fire will be ready to fall in love with Mansoor
Somebody asked Mansoor, (the greatest mystic ever), 'What is the ultimate in Sufi experience?' Mansoor said, 'Tomorrow, tomorrow you will see what the ultimate in Sufi experience is.' Nobody knew what was going to happen the next day. The man asked, 'Why not today?' Al-Hillaj said, 'You just wait. It is going to happen tomorrow -- the ultimate.' And the next day he was to be crucified.
Al-Junaid came and he said, 'Mansoor, now listen. A thousand and one times I have told you to surrender to God. If he wants you to be crucified, then be ordinary and be crucified. Let him do his work. Enough is enough?'
When he was taken out of the gallows in front of the crowds, it was very difficult to kill him.
And when he was being crucified he shouted loudly for his friend who had asked the question. He said, 'Where are you hiding in the crowd? Now come on and see the ultimate in Sufism. This is what it is.'
Thousands of people had gathered to watch. Al-Junnaid, was also present. Of course he was absolutely against what was happening, but the weakness of the good. Seeing the majority he remained silent.
Junaid knew that Mansoor was born after thousands of years; he was one of the rarest flowers. Junnaid had been a teacher of thousands, but none of his students, none of his disciples had reached to the same heights as Mansoor -- all this he understood.
People were throwing stones before the assassination began. He did not want people to know that he was not throwing stones, so instead of throwing a stone he threw a roseflower, just to show that he had thrown. Now in thousands of stones, who can find out what he had thrown? People saw that he had thrown something.
But Mansoor could see. When thousands of stones were falling on him, hitting him, and blood was flowing all over his body, he could see that a roseflower also fell on his face. And he knew that this roseflower could only be thrown by his master Junnaid. He shouted from his cross, "Junnaid, these thousands of stones are not hurting me so much as your roseflower; it has created a wound in my very soul."
This statement is tremendous: "Thousands of stones have not hurt me. These are people who don't know me -- but you know me; I had grown under your love. Still, instead of protesting, you are so cowardly that you are afraid that if you don't throw something people may start suspecting that you may be a friend..."
And tears came to his eyes. And Mansoor said, "These tears are not for these stones; these stones are not worth my tears. These tears are for the man who has thrown the roseflower to me." And still Junnaid remained silent.
The good person is responsible. The silent person, the person who has understood is responsible for all that has happened in the history of human kind against the people who were just pure love, pure silence, pure godliness and pure compassion.
But perhaps nothing can be said to those good people either, because if they had come out there would have been another assassination and nothing else. That's what Junnaid said afterwards, and he was right.
Other disciples asked him, "It was very shameful when he called out your name. You behaved as if you were not Junnaid. It is shameful that you did not protest when your greatest disciple was being tortured -- tortured brutally."
No, even animals don't torture in that way. If you want to kill someone, kill. But to cut him piece by piece is so condemnable. The other disciples said, "You should have protested."
Junnaid said, "Do you think it would have saved him? I have also thought about it. It is not that I have not felt the tragedy, I have felt as much hurt as Mansoor. I loved him, but I knew that if I had come out and protested, then instead of one man, two men would have been assassinated. Nothing would have been achieved by it."
But still it would have been better that two men were assassinated instead of one, because there may have been a third man who would have come out, and three men may have provoked courage in many more. It is not that in that vast crowd there was only Junnaid who saw that it was absolutely inhuman and ugly -- and there was no crime.
The crime was simply that Al- Mansoor had said, "I am Truth," ana'l haq”, and simultaneously he said, "It is not that only I am God -- you are also. I know it; you still have to know it. That's the only difference."
One thousand wounds were made on his body -- still he was alive. Then they started cutting off his limbs, but still he was alive. Mansoor was killed part by part.
Mansoor has become an eternal light, for the simple reason that he was killed, brutally killed and primitively assassinated - yes, chopped into parts. Jesus' death compared to Mansoor's looks very human, compassionate. Jesus' crucifixion is far more sophisticated; Socrates' poisoning is even more sophisticated, but nobody has suffered as much as Al-Hillaj Mansoor.
First they cut his legs -- they killed him piece by piece, just to torture him as much as possible, to the optimum -- then they cut his hands. then his eyes were taken out and they inserted his eyes with hot iron rods, then his tongue was cut out -- they went on piece by piece - then his head was cut off -- in parts, in pieces.
People like al-Hillaj only declare, not out of any egoism -- they don't have any ego, that's why they declare, "ana'l haq!"
There are two traditions in the world who have created the most enlightened people: one is Zen, born out of Buddha's insight, and another is Sufism, born out of Mohammed's insight. These two traditions have created the greatest light in the world. But you cannot find a single name in Zen compared to Mansoor, for the simple reason that no Zen master was chopped up, killed, crucified
God is energy for a man of the state of Mansoor – present also in everyone of us.
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