“Seeing God.” It’s one of the most human desires we carry: to see, to know, to be certain. We long to look beyond the veil of this world and glimpse the One who created it. The question quietly rises within us: Can I see You? This longing isn’t rebellion but it’s relationship. It’s the heart reaching toward the Infinite, seeing God.
Blog Summary:
Part 1: Why Is God Not Visible?
- A strange and wanton joke of nature – Seeing God
- The Story of Hazrat Musa when he wanted to see God – Decoding the Holy Quran
- The Closest People to see God failed to see Him physically
- Direct Observation and Inferential Observation
- Observable and Non Observable
- If God exists, why can’t we see Him?
- What Is Epistemic Limitation?
- Gorakh Ganga: When Poetry Explains Philosophy
- Divine Hiddenness is important for our Free Will
- Atheism vs Theism: God’s presence surrounds all things, but not physically
- Allegory of the Cave by Plato
- The Illusion of Complete Knowledge
Part 2: If God Is Invisible, How Can We See Him?
- O Hidden Truth, Reveal Yourself – Seeing God
- The Human Demand to See God — Decoding the Holy Quran
- Having the Right Eyes
- Majnun and the Art of Seeing God
- Mansur saw God in himself
- A dirty mirror that needs to be cleaned
- Seeing God Through a Pure Heart – Decoding the Verses of the Holy Quran
- What is God then?
- Standing Before Allah: The Meaning of Lowering the Gaze and seeing God
Part # 1 Why Is God Not Visible? – Seeing God
Abstract: Seeing God and Human Understanding
The inability to see God does not mean that God does not exist. In reality, non-visibility is not non-existence; it only reflects the limits of human perception. Human beings are not capable of directly observing everything that is real, just as many invisible realities are accepted through their effects and signs.
God is not physically visible, even to those at the highest levels of spirituality and righteousness. This indicates that His reality is beyond physical perception, not absent from existence. Instead, He is known through His signs, through consciousness, order in the universe, moral awareness, and the deeper structure of reality.
Inferential understanding allows humans to know the unseen through the seen. Just as we cannot directly observe atoms but accept them through their effects, similarly, the existence of God is understood through His manifestations in creation.
At the same time, divine hiddenness is essential for human free will. If God were physically visible, human actions would become influenced by fear or compulsion, and moral choice would lose its sincerity. Hiddenness preserves genuine freedom and meaningful ethical responsibility.
Thus, human beings are not meant to “see” God with physical eyes, but to recognize Him through signs, reason, and inner awareness. The search for God is not a flaw in human nature, it is part of its design.
A strange and wanton joke of nature – Seeing God
Here is a beautiful ghassal of Allama Muhammad Iqbal:
قدرت کا عجیب یہ ستم ہے
انسان کو راز جو بنایا
راز اُس کی نگاہ سے چھپایا
بے تاب ہے ذوقِ آگہی کا
کھلتا نہیں بھید زندگی کا
حیرت آغاز و انتہا ہے
آئینے کے گھر میں اور کیا ہے
ہے گرمِ خرام موجِ دریا
دریا سوئے بحر جادہ پیما
بادل کو ہوا اُڑا رہی ہے
شانوں پہ اُٹھائے لا رہی ہے
تارے مستِ شرابِ تقدیر
زندانِ فلک میں پابہ زنجیر
خورشید، وہ عابدِ سحر خیز
لانے والا پیامِ “برخیز”
مغرب کی پہاڑیوں میں چھپ کر
پیتا ہے مئے شفق کا ساغر
لذت گیرِ وجود ہر شے
سرمستِ مئے نمود ہر شے
کوئی نہیں غم گسارِ انساں
کیا تلخ ہے روزگارِ انساں!
Translation:
Nature has played a strange and wanton joke
Making man a seeker of secrets,
But hiding the secrets from his view!
The urge for knowledge gives him no rest,
But the secret of life remains undiscovered.
Wonder is at the beginning and the end
What else is there in this house of mirrors?
The wave of the river glides along,
The river follows its course to the ocean.
The wind sweeps the clouds along,
Bearing them on its shoulders.
The stars are drunk with the wine of fate,
And lie chained in the sky’s prison.
The sun, a worshipper who rises at dawn,
Brings the message: “Arise!”
Then hiding behind the western hills,
It drinks the crimson wine of twilight.
Everything delights in its own existence,
Everything is intoxicated with the wine of appearance.
But there is no one to soothe the sorrow of man
How bitter is the destiny of humanity!
The Human Longing to See Beyond
Allama Muhammad Iqbal is saying that human beings are created with a strange spiritual restlessness. Just as a person standing before a mirror sees what is present in front of it, the human soul too feels that behind this visible existence there is an Ultimate Reality. That is why humans constantly question, search, and long to see beyond the visible world. Deep within us lives a natural desire for seeing God, for witnessing the Creator behind the universe itself. According to Allama Muhammad Iqbal, this restlessness is not a flaw of human nature, it is part of being human.
“A House of Mirrors” — What Does Iqbal Mean?
When Iqbal says:
حیرت آغاز و انتہا ہے
آئینے کے گھر میں اور کیا ہے
He means that this universe is like a house of mirrors, everything we see is only a reflection, a sign, an image, but not the Absolute Truth itself. And just like in a mirror we only see what appears before it, human beings see reflections of God’s attributes in creation, beauty, order, love, power, infinity, yet the Essence itself remains beyond complete human sight.
The Connection with Plato (Aflatoon)
This idea closely resembles the philosophy of Plato (Aflatoon). Plato believed that the physical world is only a shadow or reflection of a higher and more perfect reality. Iqbal similarly suggests that the material universe is not the final truth; it points toward something beyond itself. The stars, rivers, clouds, and even human consciousness are reflections of a deeper reality hidden behind the visible world.
Why Humans Cannot Stop Searching
Human beings are different from the rest of nature. Rivers flow without questioning. Stars move without anxiety. But man thinks, wonders, and searches endlessly. The longing to see God, to understand existence, and to look beyond infinity is not a flaw in human nature, it is part of its design.
Before diving deep into this topic, I think it is important to understand that the arising of such questions is itself a sign of being human. It is almost like a CAPTCHA test proving that you are not a robot, humans naturally question, wonder, and search for answers. So, asking questions like these is not a big deal. It does not mean that the moment you begin questioning, you somehow go out of Islam.
When Musa Asked to See God – Decoding the Holy Quran
Imagine the scene.
Moses is on the mountain. It is quiet and powerful.It is a moment of closeness between a servant and his Lord. Musa speaks. He asks Allah if he can see Him.
Now think about this. Musa is not a random person. He is a prophet. He speaks to God. There is love and friendship. There is closeness. So you can almost imagine the conversation.
Musa asks with longing. Allah responds with wisdom.
Allah tells him that he cannot see Him directly. Then Allah says, look at the mountain. If the mountain stays in its place, then you will see Me.
“And when Musa came at the appointed time and his Lord spoke to him, he said: ‘My Lord, show Yourself to me that I may look at You.’
[Allah] said: ‘You will not see Me, but look at the mountain; if it remains in place, then you will see Me.’
But when his Lord manifested Himself to the mountain, He made it crumble to dust, and Musa fell unconscious…”1
The mountain shatters. And Musa falls unconscious.The message is simple. If a mountain cannot handle even a glimpse, how can human eyes handle the full reality? If a prophet like Musa could not see God with his naked eyes, then what about us? Let’s decipher it today.
The Closest People to see God
In every religion, there are people at the top.
In Islam, prophets, Christianity, people speak of the Father and divine revelation, Judaism, great prophets., Buddhism, masters.
These are the highest of the high. The closest to the Divine. The most pure. The most prepared. And even they were not seeing God like we see a tree or a chair. So when someone says, If I cannot see God, I will not believe, that is a weak argument. It is like saying, I cannot see my thoughts, so I must not have any. Try telling that to your exam results.
Direct Observation and Inferential Observation
Now let us make something clear. There are two ways of knowing things.
The first is direct observation. You see it, touch it. You hear it. That is simple. The second is inferential observation. You do not see the thing itself. You see its effects. Then you use your mind.
This is how most of science works. You do not see gravity but see an apple fall. We do not see air but see trees moving. You do not see electricity but see the light turn on. You do not see your WiFi signal. But when the internet stops working, suddenly you believe in it very strongly.
Inferential observation means you look at the signs and you conclude there is a cause behind them.
Observable and Non Observable in seeing God
Some things are observable.
Some things are non observable.
Non observable does not mean non existent.
We cannot see atoms with our eyes.
Scientists cannot see viruses without special tools.
An astronomer cannot see black holes directly.
Yet we accept them. Why?
Because we see their effects.
Scientists did not see viruses at first. They saw disease spreading. They used logic. Something smaller than bacteria must exist. Later, tools improved and they confirmed it.
Seeing God is not difficult
The point I want to make here is that just because you cannot see something does not mean it does not exist. It simply means that your knowledge, perception, or capability is not sufficient to observe it.
There are many things whose effects we can observe even though we cannot directly see them. For example, we cannot see an atom with our naked eyes, yet we believe in its existence because we witness its effects and influence on the world around us. In the same way, if we cannot see God, it does not mean that He is not there. It simply means that we, as human beings, are not capable of perceiving Him directly. Now we return to the main question.
If we cannot see God with our five senses, then how do we see Him?
We see Him through signs.
Through order in the universe.
The fine balance of nature.
Through the design in life.
Through the laws that hold everything together.
This is not direct observation. This is inferential observation.
You look at the effect. You think about the cause.
When you see a building, you do not see the builder standing there. But you know someone built it.
When you see a painting, you do not say the colors threw themselves on the canvas out of boredom.
When you see a universe full of laws, balance, math, and beauty, it is not strange to ask if there is a Designer.
So how do you see the Lord? You see God through His signs. When you witness consciousness, for example, does it not make you question how something so aware, so meaningful, and so profound could arise merely from lifeless atoms on their own? Consciousness itself becomes a sign pointing toward the existence of God.
If God exists, why can’t we see Him?
At some point, almost everyone asks: “If God exists… why can’t we see Him?”
It’s a fair question. We see mountains, see oceans. We see each other. So why not God?
Sometimes people ask this aggressively. Sometimes quietly. But deep down, it’s a human question, not just an atheist question.And to answer it properly, we need to understand something called epistemic limitation.
What Is Epistemic Limitation in seeing God?
“Epistemic” simply relates to knowledge. So epistemic limitation means: There are limits to what human beings can know or perceive. That’s it. You already accept this in daily life. You can’t see:
- Wi-Fi signals
- Gravity
- Dark matter
- Your own thoughts
But you don’t say they don’t exist. You accept that your senses are limited. If we can’t see Wi-Fi but still believe in it (because your YouTube works), then maybe visibility is not the ultimate test of existence.
Maybe We’re Asking the Wrong Kind of Question
When someone says, “Why can’t we see God?” they assume something important:
That God would be a physical object inside the universe. But classical theism says God is:
Not material or made of atoms nor inside space and time
So asking to see God might be like asking: “What does justice taste like?” It’s the wrong category.
If God is the creator of space, He wouldn’t be a visible object inside space.That would be like a video game character trying to find the programmer inside the screen.
Divine Hiddenness: A Serious Objection in seeing God
Now let’s be fair. Philosophers talk about something called the “problem of divine hiddenness.”
It goes like this:“If God wants a relationship with us, why isn’t His existence obvious?”
That’s not a stupid question. But here’s where epistemic limitation becomes important. Just because we don’t see a reason for hiddenness doesn’t mean there isn’t one.
A child might not understand why a parent allows struggle. That doesn’t mean the parent has no reason. It means the child’s understanding is limited.
Gorakh Ganga: When Poetry Explains Philosophy
There’s a famous Qawwali, Gorakh Ganga, performed beautifully by Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan.
The word “Gorakh” refers to something mysterious, puzzling, beyond easy understanding.
“Ganga” refers to a river, deep, flowing, vast.
Together, it points toward something like: A mysterious, unfathomable depth. That’s not a dictionary definition of epistemic limitation.
Tum Ek Gorakh Dhanda Ho
But spiritually? It captures it perfectly. Reality may be like a vast river. We are standing on the shore.
We see part of it but we don’t see its source or where it ends.
That doesn’t mean the river isn’t real. It means we are limited. And sometimes music expresses this better than philosophy ever could.
The Joke We Need
If everything that exists must be visible, then:
- Air doesn’t exist.
- Wi-Fi doesn’t exist.
- Your intelligence (depending on the day) might not exist either.
Clearly, visibility is not the standard of reality.
Divine Hiddenness is important for our Free Will
Think about this carefully.
If God were overwhelmingly visible, undeniable, constantly obvious, would belief be free? Or would it be forced?
If every time you lied, the sky lit up with divine lightning and a loud voice said, “I SAW THAT,” moral choice would be… easier.
But would it be meaningful? Some philosophers argue that a certain “epistemic distance” allows: freedom, sincerity and Genuine seeking
So, another important point is that divine hiddenness is necessary for genuine free will. If a person knew with absolute visible certainty that God was standing directly before them at every moment, many of their choices would no longer come from sincere morality, but from fear, pressure, or shame. We often avoid certain actions when we know someone is watching us. In the same way, if God were visibly present before us, our moral decisions could become biased, and true free will would lose much of its meaning. Then we would have argued, “Why is God always watching us?”
Atheism vs Theism: God’s presence surrounds all things, but not physically – Seeing God
Think about a ball. It has a size, shape, and weight. You can hold it, measure it, or even change it. That’s what we mean when we say everything in the world has limits, it can be described, shaped, or altered. Even stars, time, and space are like that. They exist, they change, and they have boundaries.
Now think about God. In discussions about Atheism vs Theism, understanding God’s infinite nature is essential. God has no limits, He doesn’t grow or shrink, change or evolve, and He has no parts or pieces. He doesn’t depend on anything because He simply exists infinitely. Imagine presence like light filling a room. The light touches everything, but it isn’t a physical object you can hold. Similarly, God’s presence surrounds all things, but not physically. It is complete, infinite, and perfect, beyond any human measure.
Seeing God Through Plato’s Allegory of the Cave
Imagine you were born in a small room.
No windows. No doors.
Just one wall in front of you, covered with moving shadows. That’s all you have ever known.
You grow up there, laugh there, argue there, build your beliefs there.
And if someone whispers, “There’s a whole world outside,” you smile and say,“This is the world.”
That’s the heart of the Allegory of the Cave by Plato. In Plato’s Allegory of the Cave, people are chained inside a dark cave, only able to see shadows projected on a wall. Because they have never seen the outside world, they mistake those shadows for reality itself. But when one person finally leaves the cave and sees the light of the sun, he realizes that what he once believed to be real was only an illusion. The allegory suggests that humans often remain trapped within limited perception, while the ultimate truth lies beyond what the eyes can immediately see.
Not to mock us. But to humble us. Because we are like that. We see a little, and conclude a lot. One bad person, and we say humanity is bad. One heartbreak, and we say love is fake. One tragedy, and we say there is no higher wisdom.
But what if we are only seeing shadows? What if reality is wider than our angle? We live inside time. Inside space. Inside fragile bodies. And then we say, “If I can’t see God, how can He exist?”
But a fish doesn’t see the sky, and the sky still exists. A child in the womb doesn’t see the world, and the world still exists. Maybe the problem is not absence. Maybe it is limitation.
The light that makes seeing possible.
We are small, not in worth, but in perception. The cave is not calling us foolish. It is reminding us we are finite. And maybe God is not another object inside our frame. Maybe He is the reason there is a frame at all. Not a shadow on the wall, but the light that makes seeing possible.
So be gentle with your conclusions. Maybe what you call “everything” is only your wall. And maybe faith is not blindness, it is the courage to say, “I might not be seeing the whole picture.” That’s human.
The Illusion of Complete Knowledge and Seeing God
Now imagine the same person who has lived his entire life inside that room of shadows. For him, shadows are not symbols, they are reality. He can describe them, classify them, even build theories about them. He might say, “Living beings look flat and dark. This is how life appears.”
From his perspective, he possesses knowledge. He can explain what he sees. He feels informed and certain. But the question is: informed about what? About reality, or about reflections of reality?
Inside the cave, his knowledge works. It helps him survive. It helps him interpret movement and sound. In that limited environment, it is functional. But the moment he steps outside, everything changes. He realizes that what he called “complete knowledge” was only a narrow slice of truth shaped by his limited view.
When Limited Knowledge Becomes Dangerous
Knowledge is not just about having explanations. It is about whether those explanations connect to the whole of reality. The man in the cave is not foolish, he is limited. His certainty is sincere, but it is confined.
The real danger begins when limited knowledge is treated as absolute knowledge. Imagine if everyone in that society is taught that shadows are the highest form of reality. Children grow up believing humans are flat shapes. Anyone who questions this idea is mocked or rejected. Over time, the society becomes intellectually trapped, not because it lacks intelligence, but because it lacks perspective.
Partial truth, when declared final truth, can misguide an entire culture.
The Humble Conclusion
The man in the cave does have knowledge, but it is contextual knowledge. It serves him within his boundaries. The problem arises when he assumes there is nothing beyond those boundaries.
The deeper lesson is not that humans are ignorant. It is that humans are limited. And wisdom begins the moment we admit that what we call “everything” might simply be the wall in front of us.
Part # 2 If God Is Invisible, How Can We See Him?
Abstruct: How Can we see the invisible?
Seeing God is not a matter of physical sight but of inner perception. Through the insights of Iqbal, Majnun, Mansur, and the teachings of the Qur’an, this article explores how divine reality is recognized through signs, reflection, and a purified heart. It argues that God’s hiddenness does not imply absence; rather, it invites human beings to develop the right kind of vision—one that sees beyond appearances and discovers the Divine within creation, consciousness, and the depths of the human soul.
O Hidden Truth, Reveal Yourself – Seeing God
Iqbal has beautifully put it as:
کبھی اے حقیقت منتظر نظر آ لباس مجاز میں
کہ ہزاروں سجدے تڑپ رہے ہیں مری جبین نیاز میں
طرب آشنائے خروش ہو تو نوا ہے محرم گوش ہو
وہ سرود کیا کہ چھپا ہوا ہو سکوت پردۂ ساز میں
تو بچا بچا کے نہ رکھ اسے ترا آئنہ ہے وہ آئنہ
کہ شکستہ ہو تو عزیز تر ہے نگاہ آئنہ ساز میں
دم طوف کرمک شمع نے یہ کہا کہ وہ اثر کہن
نہ تری حکایت سوز میں نہ مری حدیث گداز میں
نہ کہیں جہاں میں اماں ملی جو اماں ملی تو کہاں ملی
مرے جرم خانہ خراب کو ترے عفو بندہ نواز میں
نہ وہ عشق میں رہیں گرمیاں نہ وہ حسن میں رہیں شوخیاں
نہ وہ غزنوی میں تڑپ رہی نہ وہ خم ہے زلف ایاز میں
جو میں سر بہ سجدہ ہوا کبھی تو زمیں سے آنے لگی صدا
ترا دل تو ہے صنم آشنا تجھے کیا ملے گا نماز میں
Translation:
O awaited Truth, come and reveal Yourself in the world of appearance,
for thousands of prostrations are trembling within my forehead of devotion.
If you truly understand the joy of expression, then let your melody be heard;
what kind of music is it that remains hidden in the silence behind the instrument?
Do not preserve it carefully, for it is your mirror
because if it breaks, it becomes even more precious in the eyes of its maker.
At the moment of circling, the moth said to the flame:
that ancient effect no longer remains in your burning story, nor in my tale of melting passion.
Nowhere in the world did I find peace, and if I did, where was it?
My ruined existence finds no refuge even in Your mercy, O Lord of forgiveness.
Neither is there warmth left in love, nor charm left in beauty;
neither does Ghazni’s hero still tremble, nor does Ayaz remain in his master’s curl.
And when I once fell into prostration, the earth began to speak:
“Your heart is still attached to idols, what will you find in prayer?”
Human Longing for Seeing God
The poem by Allama Muhammad Iqbal begins with a deep cry of the human soul asking the hidden Truth to appear in a visible form. It shows the intense inner restlessness of man who is constantly searching for Seeing God and wants the ultimate reality to become directly known.
The World as Hidden Meaning
Iqbal suggests that everything in the universe is pointing toward a deeper truth. Sound, silence, love, and beauty are not meaningless, they are signs. But the reality behind them remains veiled, which is why human beings continue to search and wonder.
The Problem of Inner Purity
In the final message, Iqbal warns that even worship is incomplete if the heart is not pure. Outward prayer alone is not enough if the soul remains attached to worldly “idols.” True connection with God requires inner transformation, not just physical action.
The Human Demand to See God — Decoding the Holy Quran
In the Qur’an, a powerful theme appears in both Surah Al-Baqarah (2:55–56) and Surah Al-A‘raf (7:143): the demand of the Children of Israel to see Allah directly with their physical eyes. This moment becomes a deep lesson about human perception, faith, and the limits of seeing God.
And (remember) when you said, “O Musa, we will never believe you until we see Allah clearly,” so a thunderbolt seized you while you were looking on. Then We raised you up after your death so that you might be grateful.2
In Surah Al-Baqarah, the Qur’an describes how the people demanded a direct vision of Allah even after witnessing many signs through Prophet Musa (Moses). As a consequence of this extreme demand, a thunderbolt struck them, and they fell into a state of shock. Then Allah revived them again. The event shows that their request was not based on true spiritual readiness but on insisting that the Divine must be seen like a physical object.
This connects deeply with your theme of Seeing God. The Qur’an does not deny God’s existence; instead, it redirects human understanding from physical sight to signs, awareness, and inner realization. God is known through His آثار (signs), His creation, and the consciousness He has placed within human beings, not through direct sensory perception.
Having the Right Eyes
When people say they want to see God, they usually mean seeing Him with their physical eyes. But perhaps that is the wrong way to approach the question. We do not use our ears to see colors, nor do we use our noses to solve mathematical equations. Every reality requires the proper instrument to be understood. Why should the Creator of space, time, and matter be any different?
Consider a flower. A child sees beauty. A poet sees symbolism. A scientist sees millions of cells, intricate biochemical reactions, genetic instructions, and astonishing molecular machinery working together in perfect harmony. The flower itself has not changed; only the eyes through which it is being observed have changed. The depth of what we see depends on the depth of our perception.
In this sense, seeing God is not primarily about eyesight; it is about insight. We may not see God physically, but we can perceive His signs in consciousness, in the laws of nature, in beauty, in morality, and in the remarkable order of existence. The question, then, is not merely, “Why can I not see God?” The deeper question is, “Have I developed the right eyes to recognize Him?”
Perhaps the greatest realities are not the ones we look at directly. They are the ones we come to understand. And when the eyes of reflection, reason, and the heart are opened, the entire universe begins to point toward something beyond itself. That is when seeing God becomes not a matter of sight, but a matter of perception.
Majnun and the Art of Seeing God
When we understand this, our love becomes pure and unconditional because we begin to see the real person behind the skin. This is what Majnun expressed when people mocked his love for Laila, calling her dark and unworthy. They could not understand how he could love her so deeply because they were judging with their eyes, while Majnun was seeing with his heart. In essence, he replied: “Go away; your eyes are not capable of seeing. What argument can I possibly give you?”
وے جا تیری اکھ نئیں ویکھن والی
اب دلیل کیا دیتا ہےقرآن کریم دے ورق نے چٹے
اُتے لکھی اے سیاہی کالیوے بلّیہ جتھے دل اڑ جاوے
پھر کی گوری، کی کالی وےGo away, your eyes are not capable of seeing,
what argument can you even give?The pages of the Holy Qur’an are pure white,
yet the words written upon them are black.O Bulleh, wherever the heart finds its place,
what does it matter, fair or dark?
This is exactly what I want to emphasize here: your eyes are not capable of seeing everything. Just as a normal person cannot see the cells of a flower or the biochemical processes taking place inside it, we may not be able to perceive realities that lie beyond our senses. In the same way, Mansur saw God within himself, not with his physical eyes, but with a deeper vision and understanding.
Mansur saw God in himself
While most people searched for God in the heavens, Mansur searched for Him within. He believed that when the ego, pride, and illusion of separation disappear, the Divine becomes visible in every part of existence. This is why he famously declared, “Ana al-Haqq” (I am the Truth). He was not claiming to be God; rather, he was expressing that his individual self had become so insignificant that all he could perceive was the presence of God.
Mansur’s way of seeing God was not through physical sight but through inner realization. Just as a scientist sees far more in a flower than an ordinary observer, Mansur saw far more in existence than what appeared on the surface. Where others saw a human being, he saw the reflection of the Divine. For him, God was not absent from the world; God was hidden behind the veil of the self. Remove the veil, and the Divine is seen everywhere.
A dirty mirror that needs to be cleaned
A simple example is a dirty mirror. The mirror itself is capable of reflecting light, but if it is covered with dust, the reflection becomes distorted. In this analogy, the heart is the mirror and the ego is the dust. “Removing the self” means cleaning the mirror so that it can reflect truth more clearly.
For Mansur, when the ego disappeared, he no longer saw himself as the center of existence. Instead, he saw everything as dependent upon God. That is why his focus shifted from “I” to God. In Sufi language, this state is often called fana (annihilation of the ego), not annihilation of the person.
Seeing God Through a Pure Heart: Decoding the Verses of the Holy Quran
This is exactly what Allah says in the Holy Quran:
إِلَّا مَنْ أَتَى اللَّهَ بِقَلْبٍ سَلِيمٍ
“Except the one who comes to Allah with a sound (pure) heart.”3
The Qur’an is suggesting that true perception is not merely a function of the physical eyes. What ultimately matters is the condition of the heart. A qalb saleem (sound heart) is a heart free from arrogance, hypocrisy, hatred, and ego, a heart capable of recognizing truth when it sees it.
Perhaps this is what Mansur was trying to express. The ability to perceive God is not a matter of eyesight but of insight. When the heart is purified, the eyes see the hidden, then we are able to see realities that physical eyes alone cannot perceive. The eyes may look at the world, but it is the heart that understands it.
What is God then?
What is God? God is not a thing that exists within the universe. He is the reason anything exists at all. He is the source of existence, consciousness, beauty, truth, and order. Everything changes, ages, and depends on something else, but God is the one reality that depends on nothing and sustains everything.
God = The Absolute NECESSARY BEING – اللَّهُ الصَّمَدُ
اللَّهُ الصَّمَدُ
“Allah, the Eternal Refuge (The Self-Sufficient One upon whom all depend).”4
For example, let’s take the analogy is the Sun and its rays.
- The Sun represents God.
- The rays represent consciousness, life, and existence.
A ray is not the Sun itself, yet it is inseparable from the Sun. Similarly, we are not God, but our existence, consciousness, and life are connected to Him and dependent upon Him. God is not merely one being among many beings. Rather, He is the source of all being. Everything exists because He gives it existence. So, we are connected to Him, we are, we just need to see through right eyes.
Standing Before Allah: The Meaning of Lowering the Gaze during Salah and seeing God
In Ṣalāh (prayer), lowering the gaze is not just a physical act, it reflects a deep state of adab (respect), humility, and inner awareness before Allah.
When a believer stands in prayer, he is not merely performing movements; he is entering a moment of direct spiritual presence with his Lord. The heart is meant to feel that it is standing before Allah, in a state of complete submission and attentiveness. In such a moment, the lowering of the gaze becomes a natural expression of reverence, because the servant recognizes his own smallness before the Majesty of the Creator.
It is not that Allah is physically in front of us in a material sense, but the worshipper is spiritually conscious that he is being observed, heard, and addressed by the One who is beyond all sight. Out of love and awe, the eyes turn downward, not out of fear alone, but out of honour and deep respect, as if the heart says: “I am not worthy to look directly; I stand in humility before You.”
In Ṣalāh, you are standing before Allah, not in a physical sense, but in a deeply spiritual one. You are directly connected to Him through your heart, awareness, and devotion, as if you are in His presence while remaining fully conscious of His nearness and majesty.
Do you want to know what true beauty is? Click here: The Illusion of Physical Beauty in Love and Marriage
- Chapter 7 (Surah Al-A‘raf), Verse 143 ↩︎
- Chapter 2 (Surah Al-Baqarah), Verses 55–56 ↩︎
- Chapter 26 (Surah Ash-Shu’ara) Verse 89
↩︎ - Chapter 112 (Surah Al-Ikhlas) Verse 2 ↩︎
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