-From the Persian Kashf al-mahjub-
by Data Ganj Bakhsh, al-Hujwiri, from Ghazna in Afghanistan (d. in Lahore between 465 and 469 AH/ 1072 and 1077 CE)
The Apostle said: "If ye knew God as He ought to be known, ye would walk on the seas, and the mountains would move at your call."
Gnosis of God is of two kinds: cognitional ('ilmi) and emotional (há1i). Cognitional gnosis is the foundation of all blessings in this world and in the next, for the most important thing for a man at all times and in all circumstances is knowledge of God, as God hath said: '' I only created the jinn and mankind that they might serve Me (Koran, 51:56), i.e. that they might know Me. But the greater part of men neglect this duty, except those whom God hath chosen and whose hearts He hath vivified with Himself.
Gnosis is the life of the heart through God, and the turning away of one's inmost thoughts from all that is not God. The worth of everyone is in proportion to gnosis, and he who is without gnosis is worth nothing.
Theologians, lawyers, and other classes of men give the name of gnosis (ma'rifat) to right cognition ('ilm) of God, but the Súfi Shaykhs call right feeling (hál) towards God by that name. Hence they have said that gnosis (ma'rifat) is more excellent than cognition ('ilm), for right feeling (hál) is the result of right cognition, but right cognition is not the same thing as right feeling, i.e. one who has not cognition of God is not a gnostic ('arif) but one may have cognition of God without being a gnostic. Those of either class who were ignorant of this distinction engaged in useless controversy, and the one party disbelieved in the other party. Now I will explain the matter in order that both may be instructed.
[p. 268] SECTION. You must know that there is a great difference of opinion touching the gnosis and right cognition of God. The Mu'tazilites assert that gnosis is intellectual and that only a reasonable person ('áqil) can possibly have it. This doctrine is disproved by the fact that madmen, within Islam, are deemed to have gnosis, and that children, who are not reasonable, are deemed to have faith. Were the criterion of gnosis an intellectual one, such persons must be without gnosis, while unbelievers could not be charged with infidelity, provided only that they were reasonable beings. If reason were the cause of gnosis, it would follow that every reasonable person must know God, and that all who lack reason must be ignorant of Him; which is manifestly absurd.