Section: On fanāʾ and its categories

• Linguistically, fanāʾ means “passing away.” The Almighty says, “Everyone upon it is perishing, and there will remain the Face of your Lord, Possessor of Majesty and Bounty.” (55:26–27)

• In technical usage fanāʾ is divided into three kinds.

1. Religious, in full accord with the Sacred Law.
   It is the extinction of wanting anything other than Allah—that is, of desiring whatever lies beyond Him. In this state a person is annihilated, through pure sincerity to Allah, from shirk (polytheism); through adherence to His law, from bidʿah (innovation); through obedience, from disobedience; through tawakkul (trust) in Him, from attachment to others; through seeking his Lord’s pleasure, from seeking his own—and so forth, with every engagement that diverts him from the good pleasure of Allah eliminated.

   Its reality is that the servant occupies himself with whatever draws him nearer to Allah and turns away from whatever does not, even though in their terminology this absorption is called fanāʾ.

   This is the lawful fanāʾ for whose sake the messengers were sent, the scriptures revealed; by it religion and worldly order stand, and through it both this life and the next are set aright.

   Allah the Exalted says, “Whoever desires the Hereafter and strives for it as he ought while he is a believer—it is they whose striving is appreciated.” (17:19)

   And He says, “Whoever does righteousness, whether male or …”