Kitab-i-Sultan/GPT4 27
O King, I saw for the sake of God what the eye did not see and the ear did not hear. Acquaintances have disapproved of me and the ways have become narrow for me. The stream of safety has dried up and the stream of comfort has become yellow.
How many calamities have descended and how many are yet to come? I walk forward towards the One who is Almighty and the Giver, and behind me flows a stream of loving care. My tears have started flowing until my resting place has become soaked. By God, my sorrow is not for myself, but for my head that longs for arrows in the love of its Master. I have not passed by a tree without my heart addressing it, wishing that my name would be cut and my body crucified on you in the way of my Lord. But what I see people doing in their intoxication, they blindly follow and do not realize that they have raised their desires and cast aside their God as if they have taken the matter of God as a joke, play, and entertainment while thinking that they are doing good and in the fortress of safety they believe themselves to be protected.
The matter is not as they think; tomorrow they will see what they deny today. The people of authority and wealth will drive us out of this land, which has been named Edirne, to the city of Akká. Among the things they say about it, it is the most desolate and hideous of all the cities of the world, with the worst climate and the foulest water. It is as if it is the abode of the government of the one who governs by false pretense, from which nothing is heard but the sound of his regurgitation.
They want to imprison the youth there, close the doors of ease upon our faces, and prevent us from having a worldly life with the remainder of our days. By God, even if they subject me to hardship and destroy me with adversity, and make my bed from the deaf rock and my companion the beasts of the wilderness, I will not grieve and will be patient, like the people of determination and resolve, with the power of God, the One who is Eternal and the Creator of nations.
I will give thanks to God for all circumstances and we hope that with this imprisonment, He will free us from the chains and the shackles, and make the faces purely devoted to His Blessed Face. He is the one who responds to those who call upon Him and is near to those who address Him. We ask Him to make this great affliction an armor for the pillar of His command, shielding it from sharp swords and penetrating spears.
The trials have not ceased to be for the sake of God, for the sake of His servant, and for the sake of the remembrance of Him. This has been the case in the past centuries and previous ages. People will soon know what they do not understand today when their steeds stumble, their resting places are overturned, their swords are blunted, and their feet slip.
I do not know how long they will continue to ride the mounts of desire and wander in the wilderness of negligence and deviation. Will any glory remain in glory or any disgrace in disgrace, or will any who rely on the supreme cushion remain, and reach the utmost limit of glory? By the Lord of Mercy, all that is in it shall perish, and the Face of your Lord, the Almighty, the Munificent, shall remain. What sort of armor is it that has not been struck by the arrow of destiny, and what kind of land has not been exposed to the hand of fate, and what fortress has kept the Angel of Death from reaching it when it comes, and what bed has not been broken, and what well has not dried up?
If people knew what was behind the seal of the sweet mercy of their Lord, the All-Knowing, they would throw away their blame and be content with the youth. But now they have veiled me with a veil of darkness that they have woven with the hands of suspicions and illusions. Soon the white hand will tear apart the pocket of this dark night and God will open a shining door for His City where people will enter in droves and say what those before them have said, so that the final ends will appear as they had started.