Page:A Moslem seeker after God - showing Islam at its best in the life and teaching of al-Ghazali, mystic and theologian of the eleventh century (IA moslemseekeraft00zwem).pdf/201

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ritual of Islam from the standpoint of the mystic. Our illustration shows in facsimile the first page of this celebrated work from a recent Cairo edition. On the margin of the text we have the Beginner’s Guide, already spoken of. These two works of Al-Ghazali are very popular and have recently had an increasing circulation.

The Minhaj shows that Al-Ghazali at the close of his life had adopted the vocabulary of the mys tics even for popular teaching. The various chap ters are called " stages " in the progress of the soul towards salvation and peace. The first stage is that of knowledge, then follows repentance, a list of the hindrances on the road to God, things that delay the soul in its onward progress, such as the world and its allurements, the flesh, the devil, the senses. Other hindrances are the cares of gaining a living, the perplexities and troubles of life, while the last stages in the road of the mystic are those of praise to God under all circumstances, and ear nest endeavour to attain to the reality of the ex perience of His presence.

So difficult is the road which Al-Ghazali de scribes that he says: " Some seekers can only finish these stages in seventy years, some in twenty, some in ten. Others there are, however, whose souls are so enlightened, so free from the care and perplexity of the world, that they finish the journey and arrive at the goal in a year, a month, what do I say, in an hour; so that they awaken like the Companions of