Knowledge and Love: The Two Elements

This brings us back to the opinion that only those Sufis who manifest an attitude of love truly represent the mystical aspect of Islam. In support of this opinion criteria are wrongfully applied which are valid only in relation to Christianity, the basic theme of which is Divine Love so that those who are the mouthpieces of gnosis in Christianity express themselves - though there are some rare exceptions - through the symbolism of Love. This is not the case in Islam where at every level knowledge or gnosis in no way implies an emphasis on the mind at the expense of the emotional faculties: its organ is the heart, the secret and ungraspable center of man's being, and the radiation of knowledge penetrate into the whole sphere of the soul. A Sufi who has realized utterly "impersonal" knowledge may nonetheless make use of the language of love and reject all doctrinal dialectic; in such a case the intoxication of love will correspond to the states of knowledge, which are beyond forms and outstrip all thoughts.

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