ESTUDIO DE COMPETITIVIDAD DEL SECTOR EXPORTADOR DE BANANO

The significance of the concept of the Celestial Axis to Ismail Hakki’s self- representation and notions of Sufi authority is evident in his multiple claims to have reached the status of Axishood (quṭbiyyet). In April 1718 CE (Jumada I, 1130 AH), while residing in Damascus, Hakki reports hearing a voice informing him, “You protect the

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realm of bodies (Alem-i ecsām seninle korunur).”321 The statement indicates Hakki’s status at that point as the First Imam to the right side of the Axis (imām-ı eyser, rukn-i yemānī), who oversees the material world and will succeed the Axis. In December of the same year (1718), Hakki receives another divine message, instructing him to remain in Damascus for 115 more days.322 In the poem he composed upon the completion of these 115 days, he indicates his elevation to the status of the Axis in somewhat cryptic terms:

When I became a king of Anatolia (Rūm), I was made a sultan The sixth clime is in me, see how famous I’ve become! In the sixth clime are included other climes

Manifest in Anatolia (Rūm), I hid in the struggle for fame In Damascus, the land of the Arabs became part of my land And I became equal to all the substitutes (abdāl)

Because 100 [days] and 15 more have passed I’ve become the moon of the heavens

All know the folk of the throne and its footstool, what is my rank? According to which face of the earth (ferş-i basīt) I became Süleyman I took tribute from the east and the west

My wealth is enough, I have become a full treasure-chest.323 Hakki speaks of his status as the Axis in another poem:

I am the loftiest imam (imam-i a‘zam), people endow me with power Every preacher says a prayer for me

In me is the secret of Muhammad, God bless him The sinners ask me for forgiveness

The man near the sultan is the sultan to this world

Whatever my lesson may be, the people of the world seek refuge in me It is to be the heir to the prophet, the glory of your community

With every breath the Breath of Holiness I receive divine inspiration (vahy-i Hudā)

I am a poor wretch, at the gate of God, no one is below me,

321 _{Namlı, İsmail Hakkı, 100.}

322 _{Ismail Hakki Bursevi, Düreru’l-‘irfāniye. Istanbul University Rare Book Library, Manuscript 4019, fol.}

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All good is the Real (Ḥaqq), and they call me Ḥaqqi.324

After returning from Damascus to Üskudar, Hakki also reports being told by a mysterious voice that, “All of creation – big and small – comes from you, yet nobody knows that.”325 These statements strongly suggest Hakki’s self-portrayal as a superior, albeit unrecognized, source of religious authority.

In Sufi metaphysics, the Celestial Axis stands for the Perfect Human Being, (al- insān al- kāmil), who is believed to be the manifestation of the totality of God’s names and the one entrusted by God with safeguarding the world.326 _{In his glossary of Sufi}

terms, ʿAbd al-Razzāq al-Kāshāni (1256-1353) defines the Axis as “the place of God’s ever present appearance in the world”.327 Hujwīrī (ca. 990-1072) describes the Axis as the pivot of the universe, and head of the saintly hierarchy (consisting of more than 350 other saints).328

The most comprehensive treatment of the Cosmic Axis is provided by Ibn ʿArabi (1165-1240) who distinguishes between two types of “Axes”: 1) Sufis around whom the realities of the universe revolve, and 2) the Absolute Axis, around whom the entire

324 _Ibid.

325 _{Ibid., 102.}

326 _{See R. Arnaldez, “al-Insān al-Kāmil,” in EI}2_.

327 _{William Chittick, Self-disclosure of God. Principles of Ibn ‘Arabi’s Cosmology (SUNY Series in Islam}

State University of New York Press, 1997).

328 _{‘Ali ibn ‘Uthman al-Hujwiri. The Kashf al-maḥjūb: the oldest Persian treatise on Sufism. Translated}

from the text of the Lahore edition, compared with mss. in the Indian Office and British Museum. By Reynold A. Nicholson (London: Luzac, 1936), 147, 214.

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cosmos turns. 329 According to Ibn ‘Arabi, the many Axes inherit the knowledge and spiritual states of Muhammad (and other prophets). They are also closely tied to Qur’anic form and content: each Axis is assigned a Qur’anic verse or an entire sura which reveals his spiritual state and knowledge; his waystations furthermore are in accord with the number of verses in that sura.330

We name them “Axes” because of their fixity and because this station – I mean the station of servanthood – revolves around them. I do not mean by their Axishood that they have a group who are under their command, of whom they would be the chiefs and for whom they would be Axiss. They are more majestic and higher than that.331

Like Ibn ‘Arabi, Hakki distinguishes between two types of axes – a single Supreme Axis, which he refers to as the Axis of Being (kutb-i vücūd), and multiple Axes of Guidance (kutb-i irşād), referring to Sufis that have reached the highest level of knowledge through observation (referred to as “the eye of certainty”, ‘ayne’l-yakin).332 Echoing Ibn ‘Arabi, Hakki defines the Axis of Being as the vicegerent of God (khalifatullah) and the amalgam of all divine names (cemī‘-i esmānın mecmūası).333 _The

Axis’s role as an intermediary between God and the world is central: it is through the eyes of the Axis that God looks over His creation.334 In Hakki’s spiritual hierarchy, the Axiss – be they the single Axis of Being or the multiple Axiss of Guidance – occupy a middle position between prophets and the majority of worshippers:

329 _{Chittick, Sufi path, 371.}

330 _{Chittick, Self-disclosure, 33.} 331 _{Ibid., 142.}

332_{Kitābü’n-netice I, 299. Also see Kitābü’n-netice, II, 21.} 333 _{Ibid., I, 299.}

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Every axis is the station (maqām) of a prophet and is the heir of a prophet.335 The other heirs of the righteous community (umma) shine in the niche of his sainthood and emanate from his knowledge.336

The Axiss take part in Hakki’s well-defined spiritual hierarchy. Below the Axis of Axiss (another term Hakki uses for the Axis of Being), he situates two imams, four pegs (awtād), and seven substitutes (abdāl) who follow the guidance of the Supreme Axis. An additional category of spiritual masters, the solitaries (afrād), exist independently of the Axis and pledge allegiance directly to God.337 This spiritual hierarchy is visually represented in a collected volume of Hakki’s writings, Mecmua-i Hakki, in a diagram at the center of which is the Supreme Axis (quṭbu’l-aqtāb). To his sides can be seen the two imams, the first of whom (to the Axis’s right) is the guardian of the corporeal realm (mulk), and the second of whom (to the Axis’s left) is the shepherd of the spiritual realm (malakūt). The four pegs (awtād) preserve the four directions of the world, and among them are also scattered the seven substitutes (abdāl) who govern the seven climes.

335 _{Ibid., I, 327.}

336 _{Ibid., I, 376.} 337 _{Ibid., II, 95.}

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Figure 9. The hierarchy of saints headed by the Supreme Pole (quṭbu’l-aqṭāb).

153 v Supreme Pole (Pole of the Poles) * Axis of the world First of the Four Pegs … (East) Fourth of the Four Pegs … (North) Third of the Four Pegs … (South) Second of the Four Pegs … (West) First of the Seven Substitutes (First Clime) Second of the Seven Substitutes (Second Clime) Second Vizier And Second Imam * Level of the Lord of the People First Vizier And First Imam * Level of the King of the People Third of the Seven Substitutes (Third Clime) Fourth of the Seven Substitutes (Fourth Clime) Fifth of the Seven Substitutes (Fifth Clime) Sixth of the Seven Substitutes (Sixth Clime) Seventh of the Seven Substitutes (Seventh Clime)

Figure 10. The hierarchy of saints headed by the Supreme Axis (quṭbu’l-aqṭāb). Mecmua-i Hakki, Istanbul University Rare Book Manuscript 482, fol. 41b. (English rendering)

As I will demonstrate below, it is in this function of the Cosmic Axis, as the transformative meeting point of material and immaterial realities that Hakki conceives of the Sufi shaykh, in general, and of his role as a renewer of the divinely established order, in particular.

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