No Opposite, Without its Own Opposite
The Forgiving God desired and decided in
eternity to reveal and manifest Himself.
eternity to reveal and manifest Himself.
But no opposite can be displayed without its
own opposite, and that peerless King had no opposite.
So He made a vicegerent, a Possessor of the
Heart, to be the mirror of His Kingship.
Then He gave him limitless purity, and
produced his opposite from darkness.
He made two banners, white and black:
The one was Adam, the other the satan of His way.
Then the strife and war that came to pass
between these two great camps came to pass.
between these two great camps came to pass.
In a similar manner, Abel came in the second period:
Opposed to his pure light was Cain. . . .
Period after period, generation after generation,
the two parties have continued to war.
Mathnawi VI: 2151-57, 62
Translation by William C. Chittick
"The Sufi Path of Love"
SUNY Press, Albany, 1983
Mathnawi VI: 2151-57, 62
Translation by William C. Chittick
"The Sufi Path of Love"
SUNY Press, Albany, 1983
