ISLAMIC MYSTICAL LITERATURE 671
"These seven lights made a circle around
the faces of the believers and imams.^28
The seven and twelve virtues hide in them.
If one is missing, then the body's clothing
and form are incomplete. The right ear hears
three words of knowledge. The right eye sees
three tools, white, black, and yellow. The right nostril
smells three aromas, good, bad, and mixed.
The left ear and nostril are similarly set,
and the tongue speaks the three words of knowledge.
They are nineteen. As it is written, 'It burns the skin.
Nineteen over them.'^29 The twenty-eight Najib angels
are ten fingers and two hands confirming
the twelve and twenty-eight of the white sea.
"Here you have the meaning of Bismillah
al-rahman al-rahim. Jabir, here is
the knowledge that heaven and earth cannot know
and in the book there is no explanation."WHAT IS THE CREATOR OF THIS WORLD LIKE?
Jabir rose to his feet, wiped his face with his hand,
and asked, "My lord, is the creator in heaven
or on earth? What is he and where is he from?
What does he look like? What virtues has he?
Where is he from and what has he created?"^30
The revealer of knowledge—may our salvation
come from him—said, "Jabir, these are hard questions.
Forget them. It's wrong to open the curtain
before the high king. It is a grave sin.
No prophet or spirit has ever drawn open
the curtain, even a slit, to reveal the king.
No book has ever recorded his face.
Keep this book for yourself and the believers."- Leaders of the Islamic community.
- Qur'an sura 74.
- Such a list of questions to be answered by the revealer is attested in other gnostic texts.