cannot make his fellow beings share his vision. He cannot impart his
knowledge thus gained to others. The mystic may have a feeling of
contact with what he considers to be the Real, but his experience, of
whatever order, remains personal and subjective. The experience of
revelation is different. It is the experience of dawning of Reality as it
is on the individual mind. The Nabi feels himself not merely in
contact with the Divine but in communication with it. And no
doubts assail him. He is quite sure that he is receiving knowledge
which he must impart to all men. Wahi or Revelation is meant to be
communicated. The purpose of Wahi is not to gratify the urges or
aspirations of a single individual, the Nabi, or to guide only him, but
to place guidance, through him, at the disposal of all who wish to
profit by it. The message conveyed through Wahi is to be broadcast
all over the world as its content is of objective value. This radical
difference puts Wahi exclusively in a class by itself and sets it far
apart from all types of mystical experience. Mystical experience may
enrich the mind of the mystic; revelation, on the other hand, acts as
a powerful leaven in the life of the people. It is a living and dynamic
force which turns the stream of history into a new channel. The rise
of Islam offers a striking example of the power of revelation.
There is another significant difference between Wahi and
mystical experience. The mystic feels his personality melting and
dissolving as a grain of salt in water. The finite self is supposed to
have merged in the Infinite. The liberation from the narrow
confines of personality gives the mystic a sense of exhilaration and
exaltation. He soars high above the world of fact into a region where
there is neither "must" nor "ought". If he returns to the world of
fact, he is afflicted with nostalgia and groans under the burden of
life. Revelation, on the contrary, both enriches and invigorates the
human self. Thriving on the nourishment provided by Wahi, it deals
effectively with the problems of actual life and strives to establish
the "Kingdom of Heaven" on earth. The Nabi’s revelation infuses a
new life into the people, so that with renewed faith and revitalised
energy they march forward to battle with the forces of destruction
and disintegration. In short, while the mystic aims at self-
effacement, the Nabi, armed with his revelation, summons the
people to march towards the goal of self-realisation, and self-
development and self-assertion. Iqbal, in his masterly discussion of
Islam: A Challenge to Religion 101