Life After Death_ A History of the Afterlife in Western Religion - Alan Segal [402]
Upon hearing that, it was as if I were melting like melting lead. Then he gave me a drink from the spring of graciousness (luf) with the cup of intimacy. Then, he brought me to a state that I am unable to describe. Then, he brought me closer and closer to him until I was nearer to him than the spirit is to the body.
Then, the spirit of each prophet received me, saluted me, and glorified my situation. They spoke to me and I spoke to them. Then the spirit of Muḥammad, the blessings and peace of God be upon him, received me, saluted me, and said: O, Abu Yazid: Welcome! Welcome! Allah has preferred you over many of his creatures. When you return to earth, bear to my community my salutation and give them sincere advice as much as you can and call them to Allah, Most High and Glorious. I kept on in this way until I was like he was before creation and only the real remained (baqiya) without being or relation or place or position or quality. May his glory be glorified and his names held transcendent!27
This is as complete a retelling of the ecstatic journey to heaven of Mesopotamian, Jewish, Christian, and Hellenistic cults as we are likely to find. And it seems to function in the same ways as its predecessors. The adept enters an ecstatic state, journeys to heaven, and is greeted in each heaven, verifying that each has all the things that the faithful are led to expect. Then, the adept is led into the presence of the saints and prophets and God himself, just as is narrated of Muḥammad himself. Ecstasy accompanies these miraculous events. The adept comes into the presence of God and is transformed into one of the immortal company, essentially becoming a saint or angel.28 The metaphor for the transformation is of smelting metals together. As we have seen, there are physiological concomitants to these ascension traditions. The content is a mixture of physiological experience and cultural expectations.
The Martyr (Shahid)
IN QURAN Sura 29, “The Spider,” Ayyas 57-58, we find the following stirring picture:
Every soul must taste of death, then to Us you shall be brought back. And (as for) for those who believe and do good, We will certainly give them abode in the high places in gardens beneath which rivers flow, abiding therein; how good the reward of the workers.
This passage discusses the felicities awaiting all the faithful. But there are those who associate the verse with the word shahid of ayya 52. In any event, unlike the mass of humanity, “martyrs” (sing. shahid; pl. shahada) do not have to wait in their graves for the final consummation.
The word shahid is related to the Muslim affirmation of faith, the shahada. It means “witness” and appears to be a direct appropriation of the Syrian Christian term for “martyr,” which, in turn, comes from the Greek Christian martyr. The watchword of Muslim faith can also be called “witnessing” because it is a kind of creed spoken publicly like an oath. It is always difficult to use the vocabulary of one religion to describe characteristics of another. But there is an added difficulty with the extension of the term to martyrdom. Because the Christian tradition of legal witnessing (sacramentum) is not present in Islam, there is a difficulty in the early Muslim tradition concerning exactly what “witness” means: for example, is the martyr the witness or does God witness the sacrifice?29 This parallels the use of the term martyr in early Christianity, like the protomartyrium of Stephen.30 It is quite probable that the vocabulary was borrowed from Christianity first, with its specific meaning in Islam developing subsequently.
From all that we know about martyrdom, we should expect a special reward between martyrdom